£500 SFF spec please!

Brunsathon9000

Brunsathon9000

Brunsathon9000

Associate
Joined
2 Jan 2010
Posts
48
Hello, I think I posted this in the wrong place initially, any help would be much appreciated!

I'm looking to by a SFF system to use for gaming with an nvidia gpu. I already have all the peripherals I need (monitor, mouse, keyboard etc) and an os.

I already have a Creative X-fi soundcard that I'd like to use in the system. I'm assuming because of this it'll need to be Micro-ATX due to the amount of pci-e slots I'll need?

I started looking at cases and the Lian Li PC-V351B seemed to be a good option.

Could someone spec me a £500 system?

Thanks!
 
Last edited:
wow for £500 youll need to make some serious compromises... is that your max budget? with the case along costing £90 that only leaves £410?? oh and why nvidia? just out of interest?
 
Palit GeForce GTS 250 Green 1024MB GDDR3 PCI-Express Graphics Card £92.99
(£79.14) £92.99
(£79.14)
Lian Li PC-V351B Aluminium Cube Case - Black £88.99
(£75.74) £88.99
(£75.74)
Geil Value 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C9 1333MHz Dual Channel (GV34GB1333C9DC) £88.99
(£75.74) £88.99
(£75.74)
Gigabyte GA-MA78LMT-S2 AMD 760G (Socket AM3) DDR3 Motherboard £55.99
(£47.65) £55.99
(£47.65)
AMD Athlon II X2 Dual Core 240 2.80GHz (Socket AM3) - Retail £46.99
(£39.99) £46.99
(£39.99)
Western Digital Caviar Blue 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (WD5000AAKS) £41.98
(£35.73) £41.98
(£35.73)
Corsair CX 400W ATX Power Supply (CMPSU-400CXUK) £39.99
(£34.03) £39.99
(£34.03)
Samsung TS-H353B 16x DVD-ROM SATA (Black) - OEM £12.26
(£10.43) £12.26
(£10.43)
Sub Total : £398.45
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £11.75
VAT is being charged at 17.50% VAT : £71.79
Total : £481.99

the gts 250 isnt a particualrily amazing card, and if i were you i would consider a 5770 as for the small increase in cost youre going to get better performance (around £30 more)
 
Thanks joey2cool!

I'd prefer and nvidia as I plan to get a 120hz lcd and windows 7, and as far as I'm aware theres a problem with the ati drivers with win7 where they don't support 120hz at certain resolutions.

I guess It could stretch the budget it a little, maybe to £600. What would you suggest to improve?
AMD Phenom II X2 Dual Core 550 3.10GHz Black Edition (Socket AM3) - Retail £76.99
(£65.52) £76.99
Perhaps?

Thanks again.
 
If you were going to spend a little more the first thing I would do would be to swap the cpu for an athlon II x4 630. Also swap the WD caviar blue for a caviar black. Only a bit more pricey so you might as well get the performance.

Are you overclocking? How much do you care about noise?

If you are Ocing you will need a different cooler. Ditto if you want it quiet.
 
My advice would to be save some pennies and wait a bit longer like around £1000 then you could get a nice system with a gtx 470 if your lucky :)
 
eddyc said:
If you were going to spend a little more the first thing I would do would be to swap the cpu for an athlon II x4 630. Also swap the WD caviar blue for a caviar black. Only a bit more pricey so you might as well get the performance.

Are you overclocking? How much do you care about noise?

If you are Ocing you will need a different cooler. Ditto if you want it quiet.
Click to expand...
Is Quad Core worth it yet? Especially with gaming.

I don't really care about noise and I probably won't be overclocking.

mattjd said:
My advice would to be save some pennies and wait a bit longer like around £1000 then you could get a nice system with a gtx 470 if your lucky :)
Click to expand...
I might be waiting quite a long time then :P
 
Quad cores are certainly becoming more worth it for gaming - GTA IV plays a lot smoother with a quad core, and more games are becoming optimised for more cores.

Also - the issue that ATI and the 120Hz has is likely to be fixed very quickly - also remember that the iZ3D drivers aren't the only 3D drivers out there - there's also TriDef - assuming of course you want 120Hz for 3D. If not, then ATI's driver releases are every month, and I seriously doubt they'll leave an obvious flaw in there for long.

As joey2cool said, a 5770 would be really good in a SFF system - much quieter and cooler than previous generation cards, and packs a punch too.
 
Oh, and here are my efforts on the system front:

BasketATI.png


An ATI build - pending the 120Hz issue. Which resolutions are affected?

BasketNVidia.png


And an NVidia build. Unfortunately, there just aren't any decent NVidia graphics cards for the right money here so a 250 will have to do. If you have a good look around you may be able to get a 260 - which would be pretty good.
 
Marvin said:
Also - the issue that ATI and the 120Hz has is likely to be fixed very quickly - also remember that the iZ3D drivers aren't the only 3D drivers out there - there's also TriDef - assuming of course you want 120Hz for 3D. If not, then ATI's driver releases are every month, and I seriously doubt they'll leave an obvious flaw in there for long.

As joey2cool said, a 5770 would be really good in a SFF system - much quieter and cooler than previous generation cards, and packs a punch too.
Click to expand...
It wasn't for 3d use I wanted 120hz. This is the issue that as far as I'm aware still hasn't been fixed: link.

kalvindeane said:
The 555 unlocks to quad core better, if that means anything
Click to expand...
How easy is it to unlock the other cores? Is it doable by someone with little experience?

Marvin said:
Oh, and here are my efforts on the system front:

And an NVidia build. Unfortunately, there just aren't any decent NVidia graphics cards for the right money here so a 250 will have to do. If you have a good look around you may be able to get a 260 - which would be pretty good.
Click to expand...
Thanks a lot Marvin. I'm thinking I'll probably just go with the 5770. Is the OCZ 'silent' psu worth it if I'm not bothered by noise?
 
To be honest, I didn't pick the OCZ PSU because it was silent - simply because it is a good PSU that'll handle the system fine and fits into the budget well.

If you feel that you really want 120Hz, then look around for any GTX260s still floating around - they'll be about as good as a 5770 at stock speeds (ish), and of course by-passes the 120Hz problems.

If you want 120Hz, because of one game you like to play once in a while, then I would say 5770 straight off - cooler, newer, quieter, more efficient...
 
Brunsathon9000 said:
How easy is it to unlock the other cores? Is it doable by someone with little experience?

Thanks a lot Marvin. I'm thinking I'll probably just go with the 5770.
Click to expand...

Google is your friend if you're going to unlock the cores, as long as the motherboard you have supports unlocking it, it's a piece of cake. It's not 100% wether you'll be able to unlock it or not, but with the 555 the chances of unlocking are very high. Whatever advice you follow on here, always make sure you validate it before spending any money :)

As for the 5770, they've turned me from a Nvidia fan over to Ati, great quality for the price, and possible xfire down the road, you won't go far wrong with it :)
 
Marvin said:
To be honest, I didn't pick the OCZ PSU because it was silent - simply because it is a good PSU that'll handle the system fine and fits into the budget well.
Click to expand...
Ok, thank you.

kalvindeane said:
Google is your friend if you're going to unlock the cores, as long as the motherboard you have supports unlocking it, it's a piece of cake. It's not 100% wether you'll be able to unlock it or not, but with the 555 the chances of unlocking are very high. Whatever advice you follow on here, always make sure you validate it before spending any money :)

As for the 5770, they've turned me from a Nvidia fan over to Ati, great quality for the price, and possible xfire down the road, you won't go far wrong with it :)
Click to expand...
How does this look:
newpc1.jpg


I have googled but couldn't really find anything on whether the motherboard supported unlocking or not.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom