~£1000 Gaming PC Spec Check!

Uncle-Argon

Uncle-Argon

Uncle-Argon

Associate
Joined
31 Aug 2007
Posts
19
Location
Manchester or Cleveland
Hi,

I've never built my own PC before and, after what seems like an insufferable amount of time with my current Dell machine, I'm finally in a position to piece together something good. I'll be using this machine for playing games, listening to music, watching movies, a little bit of image editing, and general browsing and word processing. I've never tried overclocking before but I'm interested in learning about it and I intend to give it go with this machine.

I've been browsing these forums for a few weeks trying to figure out what I want and I've come up with the following spec:

newpcspec.jpg


Obviously I'm new to this, so I'd be really keen to hear if any of you would change anything. I'm spending a little more than I wanted to, but I don't mind that so long as it isnt money wasted. It feels horrible spending money on an OS, but I suppose I'll have to get over that. Oh, and I know the SE version of the p182 is a slight extravagance, but I like the look of it :)

Couple of basic questions:

1. Do I need the 620 psu or could I go for the 520 and save a few quid with no worries? The only things I'm going to add to the machine are a soundcard and perhaps a second hdd sometime in the next few months.

2. Is it worth getting an extra fan for the p182 to put in the space left by one of the hard drive bays (which I have to remove to accommodate the gtx)?

Oh, and I'll probably be running thing this on a 22" monitor which I intend to buy either at the same time or relatively soon afterwards. I was thinking about the Samsung 2232BW but the price of the 223BW is pretty inviting; I suppose I should go and pick the brains of the monitor forum on this one.

I'm expecting to order this from Overclockers tomorrow, so I'd be extremely grateful to anybody who could offer some advice on any of this before then. :cool:
 
well i think it's just me, but I'm having problems with my hardware atm, see rig, and I think it's down to my gtx, and my hdd, both of which u have in ** spec.
 
@yantorsen: Your signature is too big, 4 lines max.

@Uncle-Argon:

Welcome to the forum :-)

Uncle-Argon said:
1. Do I need the 620 psu or could I go for the 520 and save a few quid with no worries? The only things I'm going to add to the machine are a soundcard and perhaps a second hdd sometime in the next few months.
Click to expand...
Go for the HX520 and save yourself the £30, as the 620W is an overkill for your machine and only worth getting if you were planning on SLI or Crossfire, which you haven't got so get the 520W version which'll power your system fine.

Uncle-Argon said:
2. Is it worth getting an extra fan for the p182 to put in the space left by one of the hard drive bays (which I have to remove to accommodate the gtx)?
Click to expand...
Yes definetly. I got an extra TriCool in there and it's really helped as otherwise you don't have an intake into the case (3 fans in total - 2 at top, 1 in bottom next to PSU). Just get something like an Akasa Amber 120mm and maybe a Zalman Fan Mate with it so you can regulate the speed / noise of it.

Uncle-Argon said:
Oh, and I'll probably be running thing this on a 22" monitor which I intend to buy either at the same time or relatively soon afterwards. I was thinking about the Samsung 2232BW but the price of the 223BW is pretty inviting; I suppose I should go and pick the brains of the monitor forum on this one.
Click to expand...
Yeah I'd check with the people that scout that forum often - probably get a much better response there than you would in other parts of the forum :-)
 
Ok first of all 520 PSU is fine, even with the expansion that your thinking about doing later on... but if your planning on playing games I would get Vista at the moment, as there are not that many games that will run on Vista and the ones that do run worse on it then on XP. The GTZ if I remember right fixs fine in the case... but I'm not 100% sure.

I recently bought the Dell E228WFP 22" Widescreen LCD Monitor, which is superb, with a 4 year on site warrenty as well :)

Stelly
 
Great, my thanks to you all for the quick replies.

From what I've gathered, both my proposed card and hdd are pretty popular choices here so I'd imagine a lot of people have both. Fortunately, it doesn't look like many people are having problems related to the combination. I'll probably live to regret saying this, but I think I'll still stick with what I've got. You can tell me that you told me so when i come here crying about it in a few days :p

I figured I'd be fine with the 520, but I just wanted to double check. I suppose I can spend the savings on the 120mm fan and something like the Fan Mate to control it. Does it make a great deal of difference which fan I go for? My main priority is to end up with something quiet that fits the case. I seem to remember people recommending the scythe fans, but I'm not at all sure I remember why. The Asaka Amber you mentioned seems a good option, so long as I don't stick my fingers into it...

I'm feeling increasingly unsure about Vista. I fancied the change, but the more I think about it the more it seems to throw up unnecessary complications. I suppose I could swap it for xp, and then move down to 2gb of ram for the time being and then upgrade both when things are more settled. Is 2gb going to be enough to complement my other hardware? It seems to be the minimum people are buying these days. It actually brings me much closer to what I initially intended to spend though, which is nice.

Any further thoughts? I notice the Ballistix 8500 RAM is on special this week, do you think its at all worth paying double for this over the OCZ 6400 that I'm currently looking at?
 
Uncle-Argon said:
I seem to remember people recommending the scythe fans, but I'm not at all sure I remember why. The Asaka Amber you mentioned seems a good option, so long as I don't stick my fingers into it...
Click to expand...
Scythe S-Flex fans are brilliant fans, but they do come with a hefty price tag. Akasa Amber fans are also great fans, arguably not as good but still great and half the cost.

Uncle-Argon said:
I'm feeling increasingly unsure about Vista. I fancied the change, but the more I think about it the more it seems to throw up unnecessary complications. I suppose I could swap it for xp, and then move down to 2gb of ram for the time being and then upgrade both when things are more settled. Is 2gb going to be enough to complement my other hardware? It seems to be the minimum people are buying these days. It actually brings me much closer to what I initially intended to spend though, which is nice.
Click to expand...
2GB will be fine for your system. I went 4GB myself and to Vista 64bit, but found it a bit of an overkill for my system (in spec) and eventually sold 2GB so I had 2GB left and due to issues with my tv card in Vista, moved back to XP Professional. Think it's probably worth waiting until Vista SP1 gets released and see if the operating system becomes more stable and less problematic, and lazy manufacturers get better drivers out.

Uncle-Argon said:
Any further thoughts? I notice the Ballistix 8500 RAM is on special this week, do you think its at all worth paying double for this over the OCZ 6400 that I'm currently looking at?
Click to expand...
Nah, I wouldn't bother. There is some Black Dragon GeIL RAM if you wanted something a bit more flash / slightly better but the OCZ stuff is great RAM and really worth it for the price.
 
Cheers, I think I'll probably go for XP. Im thinking of getting wireless internet soon, and a friend of mine is having a lot of problems with Vista 64bit on his own wireless network, so thats another compelling reason to stick with XP.

Perhaps I'm missing something blindingly obvious here, but the 120mm Akasa Amber (£11.74) and the 120mm Scythe fans (£12.91) are around about the same price here. I notice the smaller Ambers are cheaper, but I understand that it's a 120mm that I need. When it comes to a £1000 spec, I don't really mind spending a couple of quid extra on a fan if its going to be blowing lots of lovely cold air over the gtx without making as much noise as a cheaper model.
 
Uncle-Argon said:
Cheers, I think I'll probably go for XP. Im thinking of getting wireless internet soon, and a friend of mine is having a lot of problems with Vista 64bit on his own wireless network, so thats another compelling reason to stick with XP.
Click to expand...


yeah, i agree, I've been looking for weeks to find a 64-bit wireless adapter card, and i've finally found one, it's an abit pci-e card one.

generally though if DX10 isn't of intrest then I'd definatly stick with xp, or atleast vista 32-bit. I learnt the hard way :mad:
 
120mm Asaka Amber are amazing I use the to cool my RAD on my watercooling... they are really quiet as well :)

Stelly
 
Uncle-Argon said:
Perhaps I'm missing something blindingly obvious here, but the 120mm Akasa Amber (£11.74) and the 120mm Scythe fans (£12.91) are around about the same price here.
Click to expand...
Ah that's right. I was looking at the Akasa Amber 92mm vs. the S-FLEX. In that case I'd rather have the S-FLEX as they are only £1 difference in price. Heard they perform a little better than the Ambers.

Uncle-Argon said:
When it comes to a £1000 spec, I don't really mind spending a couple of quid extra on a fan if its going to be blowing lots of lovely cold air over the gtx without making as much noise as a cheaper model.
Click to expand...
This is true :-) The position of the card in relation to the intake however is kinda weird. The fan will blow onto the side of the PCB a little but about 60% of the intake air will blow under the card, which is good as it'll suck the colder air through the GTX. I never noticed any difference at all when having a fan blowing at 2500 RPM to a fan blowing at 1200 RPM in terms of cooling performance for my 2900 XT, without any fan however did show a 5c roughly increase in temps so one is definetly needed there.

If you're really after quiet and good cooling though, you could maybe look at and HR-03 and an Akasa Amber 92mm, which comes in aroud £37 for both, compared to 1x 120mm fan which is near £13. So £24 difference but you get a brilliant aftermarket cooler for your GTX and it'll run quieter overall, and cooler.
 
I hadn't considered adding a VGA cooler. Its very tempting I must admit, but I might look at adding this at a later date once I get the hang of overclocking. That way it might at least give me the satisfaction of being able to step things up a little later on in order to squeeze a little more performance and a little less sound out of my shiny new box. I'll sleep on it I guess. Excellent advice though, thanks.

I was just looking at fan controllers and came across the Scythe Kama Panel. ( http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=BB-001-SY&groupid=701&catid=57&subcat=189 ). I could do with a built in card reader and this thing seems to have everything but the kitchen sink. I expect its going to have millions of wires that I'd have to find a way to hide, but it could prove to be pretty useful. Has anybody used one before?
 
your spec is close to what i built last month psu,cpu,mobo,dvdrw (sata cable looks a lot more tidy) and ram, and can say its the quietest system ive built so far, very powerfull also. good choices !!
 
Last edited:
OK, I'm off out to see if some money I've been waiting for has finaly found its way into my account. Provided my univeristy have got around to paying me, I'll be ordering all of this lost this afternoon. Here's the revised spec:

specrevised.jpg


Any final thoughts before I nervously click on the order button?

Cheers
 
Looks great

Might want to have a look at this monitor, it's a 22" Samsung on This Week Only offer and it's a great price. Just thought I'd mention that in case you were interested, would save you £40 too.
 
Yeah, I think I'm probably going to go for XP for now. I'll make the switch over to Vista when things are more stable and when there are more games out there making the most of dx10. I've never built a pc before, and XP feels like a safer and more familiar option for now.

I was looking at that Samsung 223bw earlier and its certainly set at a tempting price. However, it looks like the pebble and the 226BW have a better response time and, from what I've seen, they tend to get slightly better write ups. I do like the way the pebble looks as well; a slightly shallow standpoint, I know, but I'm going to have to spend a lot of time looking at it when I'm not staring dazedly into the mirror finish of that damned case....
 
Paulus said:
did you read the thread?
everyone was saying not to get vista.
Click to expand...


i did!, but got to say that other than 1 minor issue ive had no problems with vista, so in my opinion its the better os to go for, also having a dx10 card and winxp32 means upgrading again in the near future otherwise may as well get a cheaper dx9
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom