Upgrade Advice ~£600 budget

Tiny Clanger

Tiny Clanger

Tiny Clanger

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Joined
19 Oct 2002
Posts
783
Looking for some help/advice/criticism* (*delete as applicable) with an upgrade to my existing PC. It was originally built 8 years ago and has had one or two minor changes over the years - however, I think it's now time for a more major upgrade.

Q6600 CPU
Gigabyte DS3 motherboard
Asus 5700 Graphics Card
LG2442 monitor
OCZ Modsteam PSU (I think it's the 450W one)
4Gb RAM
LG 2442 24" monitor

Happy with sound card, speakers, mouse, keyboard, case, OS (Win7) and hard drives but do quite fancy a SSD for the OS.


So - with a birthday and Black Friday on the horizon I thought I'd look into an upgrade - however, it's so long since I built a PC that I've no idea what would work together well. What I want is something that’s a significant & noticeable improvement from my current system, and something that will allow for incremental upgrades in the future. I also want to change out the monitor (but that's for another day - I'm waiting until next year to see what the new LG ultra wide Freesync monitors are like) - so any upgrade would need to be able to support > 1920x1080...

What I've come up with so far is:
Intel Core i5-4690K 3.50GHz (Devil's Canyon) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail
Gigabyte Z97P-D3 Intel Z97 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ATX Motherboard
Avexir Gold Series 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-17200C11 2133MHz Dual Channel Memory Kit (AVD3U21331104G-2CEY) - Yellow/Gold Light
XFX Radeon R9 290 DD 4096MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (R9-290A-EDFD)
Raijintek Themis Black Heatpipe CPU Cooler PWM - 120mm
Crucial MX100 128GB SATA 2.5” 7mm SSD + 9.5mm Adapter (CT128MX100SSD1)

All of which comes to under £600... But...as I say, no idea if this is compatable and if it will work with my existing PSU. Any help gratefully received - thanks in advance :)

(oh - and finally - do any of my exisiting components have any value - can I factor in any resale value and increase my budget?)
 
Look at the bundles which Shivy011 has mentioned and I agree, a 550w psu would be better.
 
Hi mate.

I cant give you prices for your old parts (price checks are only allowed in the members market), but they do have value.

Are your HDD of the SATA type?

What case do you have?

If everything is good with the case and HDDs then you can get,


YOUR BASKET
1 x gigabyte z97x-sli - devils canyon core i5 4690k bundle **£14 saving** £264.58
1 x xfx radeon r9 290 dd 4096mb gddr5 pci-express graphics card (r9-290a-edfd) £191.99
1 x kingston hyperx savage red 8gb (2x4gb) ddr3 pc3-19200c11 2400mhz dual channel kit (hx324c11srk2/8) £62.99
1 x superflower golden green hx 550w "80 plus gold" power supply - black £59.99
1 x sk hynix 128gb ssd sh910a sata 6gb/s solid state drive (hfs128g32mnb-2201a) £49.99
total : £639.13 (includes shipping : £8.00).




get £22.50 cashback via this deal - http://www.gigabytenordic.com/uk/intel_z97-x99_promotion/index.html

You will need a better PSU for this power hungry card.

Then add a heatsink later or now.
 
Hi - thanks all for the (very) quick replies... :)

So - took the case to bits and the label says it's a Lian Li PC-7 Plus (which is what it looks like when I've googled the name). Power supply is labelled as 'OCZ-520 12U EU' - so looks like I have a better PSU than I thought. HD's are SATA (there's a 1Gb Samsung and a 240Gb Maxtor).

So...some questions back (apols for all the questions - it's an age thing - I shall be even closer to 50 by the end of this week and not as up to date as I once was :()

- Will the 520W PSU be sufficient or do I still need to consider an upgrade?
- Does the CPU come with a 'stock' heatsink (i.e. I don't need to worry about adding in the cost for one?
- The motherboard in the bundle mentions SLI - would I not need crossfire for an AMD GPU?
- I'm assuming that I should keep my eye on the store page over the next few days just in case any of the items get additional 'Black Friday' discounts?

Again - sorry if the questions are numpty ones ;)
 
The case looks fine and looks like it certainly can take long gfx cards.

I think the maximum CPU cooler height is 170mm, so a Rajintek like you listed will fit.

----------------------------------------------------------

1) That PSU is around 10 years old, they degrade over time so I would get a new one.

2) The retail CPU does come with a stock heatsink.

3) It does Crossfire also, it does it at the better 8X/8X (8X being the minimum needed for SLI certification)

4) Yes - http://www.overclockers.co.uk/productlist.php?groupid=2913
 
So....parts delivered this afternoon and laid out on my desk ready for assembly tomorrow :). However, I think I may have a bit of an issue.

The R9 290 is mahoosive and, when I look at how the internal space in the case is I'm wondering if it's going to fit. If you look at the picture here:

http://www.lian-li.com/en/dt_portfolio/pc-7-plus/

I think that the HDD bay frame at the bottom right will be, at best, very close to the card when installed and, at worst, may prevent it being fitted in the first place. I haven't tried it yet as this is the only PC in the house and so if I do start to build it and hit problems I've nothing to post questions with :D.

Now, I need to have my two existing HDD's and my new SSD installed (need to go and pick up a 2.5" to 3.5" converter for the SSD tomorrow by the way - didn't think that one through too well really!) - but, if the R9 290 doesn't fit I suppose the only thing to do would be to take out the HDD bay at the bottom right. Oddly enough this is held in place with two screws and two rivets (so some brute force required methinks). Then I could put one HDD and the SSD in the 3.5" external bays - but that leaves me one short. Any ideas or suggestions on what else to do?
 
It will - but not easily. As I said - it's odd in that it's held in place by 2 screws and 2 rivets - so I'd have to shear the rivets to get it out.

But...I'm then left with only 2 bays and 3 drives...
 
Ah - would that work? I ended up buying the Crucial MX100 256Gb SSD and, looking at it, there look like threaded holes in the top - could I perhaps mount it vertically somewhere in the 5.25" bay?
 
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