A cheaper spec thread... Just in case

Vidar · 1 Apr 2012 at 20:52

Okay, I'm reasonably sure I'm irritating people with my endless supply of questions but here it goes again, the below spec is currently what is in my basket ready to order tomorrow or Tuesday, subject to swapping a few bits out for lack of availability etc

It's not often I have such a large amount to spend and I am wanting/ needing a powerful computer for Gaming, web design, photo editing, some video editing and some CAD as and when, it main purpose is to get me through College (Studying Level 3 BTEC IT) and university (Hopefully studying comp science) but am just worried that this may be a little overkill for my uses.... Mostly Gaming, web design, photo editing and course work predominantly for at least the next year....

So with this system coming to around £2,600.00 (My maximum budget) I am wondering if anyone can spec me a system with comparable performance but ultimately saving me some cash?

So what can you guys come up with?

jamesfreddie · 1 Apr 2012 at 20:59

YOUR BASKET
1 x Gainward GeForce GTX 580 "Phantom" 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £339.98
1 x Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - Retail £169.99
1 x Corsair Obsidian 650D Gaming Midi Tower - Black £145.99
1 x Gigabyte Z68XP-UD3P Intel Z68 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £129.98
1 x Crucial RealSSD M4 128GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive (CT128M4SSD2) £119.99
1 x Microsoft Windows 7 Professional SP1 32-Bit - OEM (FQC-04617) £109.99
1 x XFX 850W XXX Edition Modular '80 Plus Silver' Power Supply £99.98
1 x LG BH10LS38 10x BluRay-RW / 16 x DVD±RW Lightscribe Drive - Black (OEM) £69.98
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB SATA 6Gb/s 16MB Cache - OEM (ST500DM002) £57.98
2 x Crucial Ballistix Sport 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (BLS2CP4G3D1609DS1S00CEU) £33.59 (£67.18)
1 x Corsair A50 High-Performance CPU Cooler (Socket AM2/AM3/LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366) £21.98
Total : £1,349.54 (includes shipping : £13.75).

The Halk · 1 Apr 2012 at 21:00

NW_SKINHEAD said:
irritating people with my endless supply of questions

I would imagine not. I only get irritated when people ask a question, ignore the question and ask again!

That is a very good system indeed, and the only way I could save money on it would be cutting corners, however I'm not a fan of the all in one watercooling units, and I'd say it would be better to go for decent air rather than that.

Edit : Erm, cutting corners like having no monitor...

Or dropping down to a different platform when I assume you've carefully selected the top Intel platform?

Vidar · 1 Apr 2012 at 21:02

The Halk said:
I would imagine not. I only get irritated when people ask a question, ignore the question and ask again!

That is a very good system indeed, and the only way I could save money on it would be cutting corners, however I'm not a fan of the all in one watercooling units, and I'd say it would be better to go for decent air rather than that.

Edit : Erm, cutting corners like having no monitor...

Or dropping down to a different platform when I assume you've carefully selected the top Intel platform?

Can I ask why in regards to the coolers?

Also I chose that platform for its performance with much deliberation but as stated am wondering now if it is a tad overkill

The Halk · 1 Apr 2012 at 21:07

Only you can decide which platform is right for you.

I've tried this explanation a few times, and nobody has really said if I get the point across correctly or not, I'll try it here, let me know if it makes sense.

The idea behind watercooling is to take a large amount of water and use it as a heat reservoir, adding the heat from several components into the water, and constantly reducing the temperature of the water towards ambient. By doing that the total mass of water shouldn't be greatly above ambient, and when you have a good loop that is what happens. The faster you have the water going around the lower the difference in temperature between the waterblocks and the water. The faster you have the fans running/bigger the radiator the lower the difference between air and the water.

The closed loop coolers are perhaps a nice convenient way of watercooling, but all they really do is move the fan from inside the case to out. Sure it does have an impact on temperatures but it's not fundamentally different to air cooling.

Vidar · 1 Apr 2012 at 21:17

The Halk said:
Only you can decide which platform is right for you.

I've tried this explanation a few times, and nobody has really said if I get the point across correctly or not, I'll try it here, let me know if it makes sense.

The idea behind watercooling is to take a large amount of water and use it as a heat reservoir, adding the heat from several components into the water, and constantly reducing the temperature of the water towards ambient. By doing that the total mass of water shouldn't be greatly above ambient, and when you have a good loop that is what happens. The faster you have the water going around the lower the difference in temperature between the waterblocks and the water. The faster you have the fans running/bigger the radiator the lower the difference between air and the water.

The closed loop coolers are perhaps a nice convenient way of watercooling, but all they really do is move the fan from inside the case to out. Sure it does have an impact on temperatures but it's not fundamentally different to air cooling.

Personally that makes perfect sense, I would like to try my hand at Water cooling in the future but not now, I was after one of those units for the increased performance in terms of temperature when I come to start overclocking

[WU-TANG]GZA · 1 Apr 2012 at 22:17

I would personally sacrifice SB-E for SB and increase the GPU. I also made some other changes - better speaker system, I'm typing on the keyboard but you can change that and the case too and has a 2TB storage drive included too.

This would rip through games a lot better but wouldn't be quite as good as the 3930K for your editing work but it isn't exactly going to be a slouch. whereas the 570 at that resolution will be a bit of a slouch and imo is out of balance with a £2.6k system.

here is what I would currently do:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Dell UltraSharp U2711 27" Widescreen LCD Monitor - Midnight Grey £539.99
1 x OcUK GeForce GTX 680 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £429.95
1 x Crucial RealSSD M4 256GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive (CT256M4SSD2) £249.98
1 x Intel Core i7-2700K 3.50GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - OEM £239.99
1 x Gigabyte Z68X-UD5 Intel Z68 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £134.99
1 x Razer BlackWidow Ultimate Elite Mechanical Gaming Keyboard £119.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 2TB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST2000DM001) £113.99
1 x Antec P280 Super Midi Tower Case - Gun Metal Black £109.99
1 x XFX 850W XXX Edition Modular '80 Plus Silver' Power Supply £99.98
1 x Antec Kúhler H2O 920 High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler (LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366/AM2/AM2+/AM2+/AM3+) £84.98
1 x Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 64-Bit - OEM (GFC-02050) £79.98
1 x Logitech Z506 5.1 Surround Sound Speakers - 75W RMS (980-000432) £74.99
1 x Samsung SH-B123L/RSBP 12x BluRay ROM / DVDRW DL & RAM Lightscribe SATA-II Optical Drive - Black (Retail) £60.98
1 x Logitech G500 Gaming Mouse and FREE Boogie Bug AimB.Pad XL Gaming Mouse Surface £42.98
2 x Kingston HyperX Genesis Grey 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX1600C9D3X2K2/8GX) £39.95 (£79.90)
1 x Akasa FLEXA P8 40cm CPU power extension £5.99
Total : £2,501.71 (includes shipping : £27.55).