Can someone spec me? Multipurpose build.

claverty19

claverty19

claverty19

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I am looking for a desktop system to help with my education as my laptop doesn't cut it anymore. I will need it to be capable of running program's such as autocad and other design program's flawlessly. I would also like to do some gaming on this computer, play most games and fairly decent settings. However my budget is only £400 pounds. Is this possible?

I do not need a keyboard, mouse, monitor, speaker or operating system.

Any help is appreciated, thanks a bunch.
 
Depends what you think "flawlessly" and "fairly decent settings" mean really. Can you be more specific?

I'm going to go with no, it's not possible, based on my ideas of what these mean. You can have a computer that plays older games acceptably and will deal with simple CAD stuff for £400. This is roughly the right sort of thing.
 
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Thanks to you guys above. I understand where you are both coming from as CAD is a demanding program. What money would it take to be able to build a system to run CAD and play most new games at decent settings?

Could any of you recommend a build capable of both?


(When I say "run CAD" I mean smoothly and without any problems/lag as my laptop doesn't even load it properly. And when it comes to gaming I'm just looking decent settings nothing out of the ordinary, as I will be able to upgrade in the future.)
 
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YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £179.99
1 x Crucial RealSSD M4 256GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive (CT256M4SSD2) £164.99
1 x Gigabyte ATI Radeon HD 7850 OC Windforce 2X 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card w/ FARCRY3, Sleeping Dogs & Dirt Showdown PC Games £155.99
1 x Gigabyte Z77-DS3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £75.98
1 x GeIL Black Dragon 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (GD316GB1600C11DC) **OcUK Exclusive** £69.95
1 x Corsair Builder Series CX 430W V2 '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply (CP-9020046-UK) £36.98
1 x Xigmatek Asgard III Gaming Case - Black £27.98
1 x Samsung SH-224BB/BEBE 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £17.99
Total : £744.85 (includes shipping : £12.50).





Would be a lot better I think.

EDIT: TBH I think my first spec would do the job, you can upgrade to an i5 or i7 later and upgrade the GPU later too. If it doesn't even load on your laptop then either of these would be a big change I think.
 
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What do you mean by CAD? There's a world of difference between drawing a picture and coupled solid/fluid dynamics. Intel > AMD as a crude approximation, and quad core > dual. A computer that deals well with CAD, when given a gaming graphics card, will have no trouble with games.

Playing new games at decent settings just means spending money on a graphics card. Choose a specific game and a resolution and people on here will be able to tell you roughly what it'll cost. Otherwise I can tell you that the missus plays skyrim at 1280x800 using a six year old 8800GT quite happily, and that my GTX580 seems to be grossly overspecified for 1680x1050.
 
@JonJ I will be using autocad architecture, mainly for designing buildings and such. The games I will be playing would be along the lines or Arma, battlefield. I can't remember what resolution my monitor is as I'm not at home however it is certainly not 1080. I'm a newbie at this kind of thing so I apologise for being unhelpful with the detail I'm providing.
 
[WU-TANG]GZA;23516158 said:
YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £179.99
1 x Gigabyte ATI Radeon HD 7850 OC Windforce 2X 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card w/ FARCRY3, Sleeping Dogs & Dirt Showdown PC Games £155.99
1 x Samsung 128GB SSD 840 PRO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7PD128BW) £107.99
1 x GeIL Black Dragon 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (GD316GB1600C11DC) **OcUK Exclusive** £69.95
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB SATA 6Gb/s 16MB Cache - OEM (ST500DM002) £44.99
1 x Corsair Builder Series CX 430W V2 '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply (CP-9020046-UK) £36.98
1 x Xigmatek Asgard III Gaming Case - Black £27.98
1 x Samsung SH-224BB/BEBE 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £17.99
Total : £655.96 (includes shipping : £11.75).




Would be a lot better I think.


EDIT: Motherboard incoming ! :D
Click to expand...

Are you sure your going to be OK running that unlocked CPU which is begging to be overclocked and that big beefy GPU on a 430w PSU ;) I would be looking at around 500w to 550w myself just to be on the safe side.
 
Ethermaster said:
Are you sure your going to be OK running that unlocked CPU which is begging to be overclocked and that big beefy GPU on a 430w PSU ;) I would be looking at around 500w to 550w myself just to be on the safe side.
Click to expand...

I agree actually something I forgot to upgrade from my £400 spec, although it would prolly suffice, I'd still upgrade it like you say.
 
The big beefy GPU has a 130W TDP and the processor 77W... there's already a safety factor of two on the PSU without buying a more expensive one.

SSDs are lovely, but not strictly necessary given the OP. So that's £100 off the price immediately.

autocad architecture... I'm going to hazard a guess that you wont be determining stress distributions through your building as a consequence of wind loading. If I'm right in that belief, then for drawing complex pictures you'll get by on the dual core intel chip at £90. I agree completely with the above guys that the £180 quad core is a better buy though. Games are increasingly keen on quad core systems and any mathematics you end up running will scale almost perfectly with the number of processing cores. It depends how badly you want to spend the £90 on other things.

Is this for a Uni course in engineering/architecture? If so, you won't see any of the really nasty maths until a few years in, in which case it may make economic sense to buy a cheap computer now and upgrade it when finite element analysis turns up.
 
I don't know why the DS3H is reccomended, its not a good board for the money. Voltage locked, less ports and worse on-board sound.
 
JonJ678 said:
The big beefy GPU has a 130W TDP and the processor 77W... there's already a safety factor of two on the PSU without buying a more expensive one.

SSDs are lovely, but not strictly necessary given the OP. So that's £100 off the price immediately.

autocad architecture... I'm going to hazard a guess that you wont be determining stress distributions through your building as a consequence of wind loading. If I'm right in that belief, then for drawing complex pictures you'll get by on the dual core intel chip at £90. I agree completely with the above guys that the £180 quad core is a better buy though. Games are increasingly keen on quad core systems and any mathematics you end up running will scale almost perfectly with the number of processing cores. It depends how badly you want to spend the £90 on other things.

Is this for a Uni course in engineering/architecture? If so, you won't see any of the really nasty maths until a few years in, in which case it may make economic sense to buy a cheap computer now and upgrade it when finite element analysis turns up.
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I am currently studying a foundation degree at technical college which consists of a wide variety but autocad is used very frequently. I do not need to work out stress distributions as its just design as of now, I will be moving on to uni in 2 years to either do building surveying or architecture so I will have time to upgrade in future if needed. As of now it's just basic building design and gaming I am looking to do with this machine.
 
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