£800 pre-built or self build?

bgbennyboy

bgbennyboy

bgbennyboy

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11 Dec 2009
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I'm getting myself a new pc for Christmas and I've set a budget of £800 maximum. I don't need monitor/keyboard/mouse/speakers/windows - just a base unit.

My current pc is:
Athlon64 3500
2GB RAM
Geforce 6800 GS
Asus AEN-E (Nforce 4)

It works perfectly well for most things however its now right at the bottom of the spectrum for gaming (L4D2 works but isn't exactly pretty), cant possibly run games in my monitors native res (1920x1080) and is likely to have the motherboard die at some point next year (I'm on my 3rd A8N-E board in 4 years).

I'm not bothered about overclocking, I'll be using it for occasional gaming and general use so I don't need a completely top-end machine. My main requirements are that it'll run current games well, will last reasonably well for 4 years (I usually get a new pc after that) and will be quiet in normal non-gaming use (noisy pc's drive me crazy).

I've built plenty pc's in my time but haven't been keeping up with the technology for the last few years so I dont know whether to go for Athlon, i5 or i7. I'm perfectly happy to build my own but was thinking that I might just get one of the ocuk pre-built systems this time unless I'd save a decent amount by self-building.

I was looking at the Titan Goliath i7, but the fact that its overclocked made me wonder about its noise levels. Given my rather ridiculous requirements would any of you kind souls be able to suggest something suitable?
 
This would run nice and quiet, has DX11 support and if needed you can add another gfx card later for more grunt

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+1 for the suggested build. I've got a 4890 Vapor-X in an antec P183 and I've never heard it even whilst gaming. Given the 5 series cards use less power & run cooler it should be even quieter :D
 
Thanks very much for the spec :)

If you could answer another question I'd be grateful. Apart from the noise stopping that the P183 provides would this with the 5770 be any better/worse? I notice its got 6gb of ram and is only 15 quid more. Paying an extra 15 quid for another 2gb of ram and avoiding the faff of building it myself is an attractive proposition.
 
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case is no where near as good, will be louder and hotter system cos of i7 OCd vs i5 (i5 is a more efficient chip which runs cooler and therefore quieter), before you even allow for the case. For gaming 4 gig of RAM is plenty anyway tbh. Also if youre not OCing the i5 is a good choice because of its turbo boost feature, when using single threaded apps the chip disables unneeded cores and boosts the primary one for more speed
Also I find that nowadays the main source of noise in a gaming PC is the gfx card, hence why specced the Vapor X version of the card, dont think this is an option on the pre-built unless you ring them
 
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I'd go for the Titan Goliath, you can always run it at stock speeds plus you can change the components slightly by phoning o/c.
Do you need 1Tb?
Would you use all the space or is 500Gb more than enough?
 
500GB would be fine as I've got another 500GB drive that could be put in alongside it. My only concern with the Goliath is noise levels. I think I might try ringing tomorrow and see how much it would be with the 5770 vapour-x.
 
bgbennyboy said:
Thanks very much for the spec :)

If you could answer another question I'd be grateful. Apart from the noise stopping that the P183 provides would this with the 5770 be any better/worse? I notice its got 6gb of ram and is only 15 quid more. Paying an extra 15 quid for another 2gb of ram and avoiding the faff of building it myself is an attractive proposition.
Click to expand...

The case shown (antec 300) is also another £10 just incase you didn't notice. You have to change it in the drop down menu to change your case otherwise you'l get a coolermaster elite 335.
 
Jason_AJB said:
The case shown (antec 300) is also another £10 just incase you didn't notice. You have to change it in the drop down menu to change your case otherwise you'l get a coolermaster elite 335.
Click to expand...

Id say the Elite 335 was the better case anyway. Antec 300 is as noisy as they come.
 
BIGBC said:
Id say the Elite 335 was the better case anyway. Antec 300 is as noisy as they come.
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Haven't had much experience with them both personally but the 335 does have some great reviews and i've seen a lot of people also say it's a better case, I'd save the tenner and stick with the 335 as BIGBC said.
 
300 gives better cooling, 335 is an easier case to build in and is a little quieter. They're pretty comparable in build quality.

I put my kit from my 300 into the 335 I got for the family PC, and it ran about 5c hotter.
 
What fan configuration did you have in each?
I had standard in a 300 and it was pretty average, had to add 2 more fans to get decent temps.
 
Thanks again for all the help and comments, I'm going to go for a self build using the spec 95thrifles posted but without the hd as I'll use my existing ones.
One last question though:

I'm now unsure about which psu to go for, I want it to be decent, but I also want it to be quiet. Modular is nice but I'd prefer a quieter psu over a modular one. Which (if any) would you reccommend? I was looking at the Corsair TX 650w the OCZ ModXStream Pro 700w and the Antec Signature Premium 650w. Any advice, or indeed alternative suggestions would be appreciated :)
 
I've always had good luck with Antec PSUs, and they certainly don't seem loud to me - even with dust in the fan. :D
 
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