£900 small gaming rig

jp7152 · 12 Mar 2014 at 00:09

Please would anyone be so kind as to check out / critique my new build. It's for a front room media center / gaming rig (1080p.) I know the PSU is a little OTT but I wanted a modular one and couldn't find another.

Thanks in advance.

Asus Z87 MAXIMUS VI IMPACT Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ITX Motherboard £173.99
(£144.99) £173.99
(£144.99)
Intel Core i5-4670K 3.40GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - OEM £169.99
(£141.66)
MSI Radeon R9 270 Gaming Edition OC 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics £137.99
(£114.99)
Corsair Hydro H100i High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler (CW-9060009-WW) £99.95
(£83.29)
Crucial M500 240GB SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive - (CT240M500SSD1) £95.99
(£79.99)
SuperFlower Leadex GOLD 650W Fully Modular "80 Plus Gold" Power Supply - £79.99
(£66.66)
Corsair Obsidian Series 250D Mini ITX Compact Gaming Case - Black (CC-9011047-WW) £71.99
(£59.99)
TeamGroup Xtreem LV 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-21300C11 2666MHz Dual Channel Kit (TXD38G2666HC11CDC01) £67.99
(£56.66)
OcUK Value 2m Male - Male Gold Plated Swivel Head HDMI Cable (CDLHD-902) £4.79
(£3.99)
Submit Sub Total : £752.22
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
UPS Access Point
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £8.00
VAT is being charged at 20.00% VAT : £152.04
Total : £912.26

stulid · 12 Mar 2014 at 00:16

Board is a bit expensive maybe, there are cheaper alternatives, although they probably dont clock as well.

YOUR BASKET
1 x MSI Z87I Gaming AC Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ITX Motherboard £129.95
1 x Gigabyte Z87N-WIFI Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Mini ITX Motherboard £112.99
Total : £252.54 (includes shipping : £8.00).

Danny75 · 12 Mar 2014 at 02:50

I'd get the MSI board that Stu listed. Every review seems to rave about it. So you can squeeze a better GPU into your build for gaming, and a better SSD.

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-4670K 3.40GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - OEM £169.99
1 x MSI Radeon R9 270X Gaming Edition OC 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £157.99
1 x Samsung 250GB SSD 840 EVO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7TE250BW) £129.95
1 x MSI Z87I Gaming AC Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ITX Motherboard £129.95
1 x Corsair Hydro H100i High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler (CW-9060009-WW) £99.95
1 x SuperFlower Leadex GOLD 650W Fully Modular "80 Plus Gold" Power Supply - Black £79.99
1 x Corsair Obsidian Series 250D Mini ITX Compact Gaming Case - Black (CC-9011047-WW) £71.99
1 x TeamGroup Xtreem LV 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-19200C10 2400MHz Dual Channel Memory Kit (TXD38G2400HC10QDC01) £59.99
1 x OcUK Value 2m Male - Male Gold Plated Swivel Head HDMI Cable (CDLHD-902) £4.79
Total : £914.18 (includes shipping : £8.00).

There are some cheaper modular PSU's that can do the job but can't really see how the savings could be spent on anything that would improve performance, and the SuperFlower Leadex is excellent so might as well stick with it.

No need for 2666Mhz RAM, imo. The higher the frequency the more stress will be placed on the CPU memory controller. And the only real difference will be that the CPU temp becomes hotter. 2133/2400 is the sweet spot. And even then, tests have shown there's not much difference between 1600 and those.

jp7152 · 12 Mar 2014 at 03:55

Thanks very much for the advice. I really like the look of the more expensive board. I know it's silly but it just looks so good! Also I think it has a slightly better onboard sound than the others.

I looked at the 270 and 270 x and the reviews seem to suggest they MSI ones both end up with a similar overclock.

I have just placed the order! Just got to wait now.