1st time build, matx. need advice!

[dan1903]

Hi guys, I'm soon to be building my first system, I want it to be Micro atx so I can move it around easily (moving to uni next year). My budget is ~£600. I'll be using it mainly for gaming, heavy duty photo processing+editing and general web/office use. Just a few things to note before i post the spec, firstly I live in Jersey, in the Channel Islands, so all prices are ex VAT (yay, more bang for buck!). Secondly I don't need any HDD's or optical drives, already got some scavenged from an old dell. This is the spec I've drawn up, what are your thoughts on it, am I doing anything wrong or could it be improved? I decided whilst the performance isn't as great as i5s I would go with AMD so I could spend more on the GPU and get a SSD to boot windows rapidly. Is that the best thing to do?

Gigabyte GA-880GM-UD2H AMD 880G (Socket AM3) microATX DDR3 Motherboard (£49.57)

AMD Phenom II X4 955 3.2GHz Black Edition Socket AM3 L2/L3 6MB (£92.76)

EVGA GeForce GTX 460 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card with HAWX2 PC-Game (£117.99)

Iiyama ProLite E2208HDD 22" Widescreen LCD Monitor - Black
(£97.86)

Kingston SSDNow V-Series 30GB 2.5" SATA-II Solid State Hard Drive (SNV125-S2/30GB) (£47.99)

OCZ Gold 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C9 1333MHz Low-Voltage Dual Channel (OCZ3G1333LV4GK) (£47.99)

NZXT Vulcan Micro ATX Gaming Case - Black (£46.80)

OcUK Battle 450W Dual Rail High Efficiency Modular Power Supply (£34.88)

Akasa AK-183-L2B Amber Ultra Quiet 120mm Fan - 3 pin (£9.35)

Akasa AK-184-L2B Amber Ultra Quiet 92mm Fan - 3 pin X2 (£11.98)

Lastly, I'd like to try my hand at overclocking,has anyone got any recommendations on cooling? I think it needs to be fairly compact due to size constraints.There seem to be an endless amount of aircoolers, and I'm not convinced that stretching to a corsair h50 is worth the performance gain or hassle of modding the case to make it fit.

any help is appreciated!

Dan

 

[95thrifles]

Hi and welcome

If you want small, have you thought of ITX?

Anyhow I wouldnt bother with the SSD tbh, noy worth it at this point, I'd also recomend a proper branded PSU, re cooling, anything with low profile in it should fit, no worries

Hows this look? A little bit over I know but better case, psu, gfx, uses i5

HIS ATI Radeon HD 6870 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card with FREE CODMW2 PC-Game (£161.69)
Intel Core i5 760 2.80GHz (Lynnfield) (Socket LGA1156) - Retail (£123.39)
Iiyama ProLite E2208HDD 22" Widescreen LCD Monitor - Black (£97.86)
Gigabyte GA-H55N-USB3 Intel H55 (Socket 1156) DDR3 Mini-ITX Motherboard (£76.59)
Corsair XMS3 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CMX4GX3M2A1600C9) (£51.99)
OCZ ModXStream Pro 500w Silent SLI Certified Modular Power Supply (£46.80)
Lian Li PC-Q07B Mini-ITX Case - Black (£42.54)
Scythe Shuriken Rev.B Quiet Low Profile CPU Cooler (Socket 939/940/AM2/AM2+/AM3/LGA775/LGA1156/LGA1366) (£21.27)
Sub Total : £622.13

 

[Aretenon]

I will be pretty much reiterating what 95thrifles said.

I would definitely not recommend a Powercool PSU, as they are a bit cheap for the 'wattage' they provide, also you'll never see a review of one. They are extremely unlikely to be able provide the wattage they claim, or do it safely.
It is infact a Powercool PSU, OCUK have just rebranded it on the website - if you were to actually buy it, please don't, it would likely have Powercool written on it.

The OCZ ModXStream Pro 500W is much better than a powercool. You could also use an Antec Earthwatts Green EA-380D, or the 430W version, if you have a power cord that you can use with it (doesn't ship with one). It would be a good choice as it has higher efficiency.

According to my research the NZXT Vulcan can accomodate heatsinks (with fans) up to 165mm in height, but that is probably when there isn't a fan mounted in the side of the case. If you did mount one it would reduce the compatibility to 140mm or less, due to most 120mm fans being 25mm in height.

If you were to bypass the side fan then you would have quite a wide choice of tower heatsinks.

 

[dan1903]

Oh ok a big thank you for your help guys!

I'm not too sure on mini ITX format, not sure if i want to go that small. I like the deisgn of the NZXT and microatx seems to be a good compromise between size and practicality. Would airflow not be restricted in such a small case, reducing any potential for overclocking?

How much better is the 6870 than a GTX460? atm I play starcraft 2 mainly, and I've heard that like for like Nvidia GPUs run starcraft better ATI GPUs. And i know it doesn't reflect on the cards performance, but I like the sound of getting a free copy of HAWX than MW2, i already have MW2, so maybe Nvidia is best for me. dirty marketing tactics eh...

is it worth paying the extra £30 for an i5 760? I mean will I see a huge boost in performance, or would the AMD give reasonably similar performance in general if i overclocked it? would an Intel CPU be more reliable? I'm not fussed if all i will see is a few fps increase. I would rather not break £600 ex VAT if possible.

thanks!

 

[Superjeep4x4]

The 6870 plays SC2 really well and will beat the 460 but if you overclock the card it will bring it in line for the most part. The 460 is a pretty good value.

CPU wise from the benches I have just been looking at you can not go wrong with either so imo I would stay with the 955. You would not see a huge performance boost and chances are the MB for the same quality/features would cost more on the Intel as well which is usually the case.

As for as the SSD I do not have one so I can not say definitively either way but those that do say once you get one you will not want a mechanical for windows again.

That being said I am not sure I would purchase one that is less than 60 gigs. 60 is already tiny and 30 just leaves you really with room for nothing else but the windows install but is doable it ya keep it clean. Having the extra 30 gives ya some headroom and lets ya instal a decent amount of apps.

If it was me I would try to stretch my budget and get the OCZ Vertex 2E 60GB they have on special as its a proven and solid drive that many on the forum use.

As far as a cool goes its rerally going to come down to how much room you have in the case. For the money you really cant beat a good old Arctic cooler freezer 7 pro. I have one it it does a good job and is semi small compared to a lot of aftermarkets. Price wise the Cooler Master Hyper 101 is a good deal but its going to be pretty big.

I would almost say get everything but the cooler and just roll with the stock cooler until you get your hands on everything and see what kinda room your dealing with unless someone that has or has used the case can give ya some solid info and buy from there.

Thats all I can think of atm.