Clearance Line Round-Up

mikester · 11 Dec 2008 at 18:06

I've been going over my Christmas budget, and it seems that along with the extra shifts I'm picking up at work and the little travel and gift expenses I will incur over the holidays I might finally be able to set myself up with a halfway decent system.

From the clearance line:

**B Grade** Asus P5N-T Deluxe nForce 780i (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 (MB-261-AS) - £59.99
OCZ 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-9200C5 1150MHz Passive/WaterCooled Dual Channel DDR2 (OCZ2FX11502GK) - £49.99
**B Grade** Antec EarthWa (CA-087-AN) - £24.99
OcUK ATI Radeon X1650 Pro 512MB DDR2 TV-Out/DVI (PCI-Express) - £19.99
**B Grade** Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 500GB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (ST3500320AS) - £28.99
Pioneer DVR-115DBK 20x DVD±RW IDE Dual Layer ReWriter (Black) - £12.99

Total including VAT: £226.48 (includes £8.99 for shipping, which I assume will be waived?)

I'll rely on the fact that I still have a Pentium 4 2.0Ghz in the old tower which I can use until I save up for, or buy from the For Sale forum, a C2D processor.

Chimerical · 11 Dec 2008 at 18:09

That 780i motherboard isn't a good idea.

A brand new Gigabyte P43 can be had for roundabout the same price new.

RAM seems a bit OTT, although good price. Unless youre overclocking though, £34 4GB 6400 stuff will do.

Total including VAT: £226.48 (includes £8.99 for shipping, which I assume will be waived?

Link your forum account with your OcUK shopping account to achieve free delivery.

mikester · 11 Dec 2008 at 19:22

Chimerical said:
That 780i motherboard isn't a good idea.

And why is that? Are there any serious problems with this model?

A brand new Gigabyte P43 can be had for roundabout the same price new.

I didn't see the P43 in the Clearance line up. It's listed as Out of Stock at the moment, and retails for £69.99 which is £10 more than the 780i. It also doesn't specify whether it can support older Pentium 4 chips, which I must have since I can't afford a new processor just yet. I do like the fact it supports 1x IDE slot, since I have an older 40GB Maxtor I'd like to use as a slave drive.

RAM seems a bit OTT, although good price. Unless you're overclocking though, £34 4GB 6400 stuff will do.

I do plan on overclocking everything eventually. I just want to build a system that I can work with slowly over time as money comes in. What brand of DDR2 would you recommend, then?

gt_junkie · 11 Dec 2008 at 19:27

mikester said:
And why is that? Are there any serious problems with this model?

Not massive ones although some NV chipsetted boards do have issues. Intel board normally run cooler and are very stable.

mikester said:
It also doesn't specify whether it can support older Pentium 4 chips, which I must have since I can't afford a new processor just yet.

I assume your P4 is skt 775 rather than the older skt 478?

gt

mikester · 11 Dec 2008 at 19:30

gt_junkie said:
I assume your P4 is skt 775 rather than the older skt 478?

I currently have an unidentified (as of yet, still need to run CPU-Z) Pentium 4 Socket 478, housed in an older Intel E210882 D865GLC/D865PESO motherboard. As far as I know, anyways. Is it worth keeping the processor as a temporary substitute, or should I splurge and get a low-end C2D? I'd have to amend the components above, since I'm observing a strict £200 limit.

gt_junkie · 11 Dec 2008 at 19:32

mikester said:
I currently have an unidentified (as of yet, still need to run CPU-Z) Pentium 4 Socket 478.

If the chip's 478 then it won't physically fit in any 775 mobo.

You'd have to track down either a dirt cheap 775 pentium 4 or get a C2D.

gt

mikester · 11 Dec 2008 at 19:37

Seems I missed the obvious point of the Asus being Socket 775.

Could you recommend a low-end C2D that won't break the bank? OCUK doesn't seem to have any on Clearance at the moment.

gt_junkie · 11 Dec 2008 at 19:44

If you're not gaming much then the e1200's are perfectly fine for fast desktop use.

That said the e2200's are excellent for the money and (if needed) clock well too!

gt

Ranger07 · 11 Dec 2008 at 19:54

I bought that motherboard, Avoid if possible, it was truely awful, spent countless hours trying to make it work.

Try this one instead-

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showp... Pro (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 (MB-135-AB)

mikester · 11 Dec 2008 at 22:40

gt_junkie said:
If you're not gaming much then the e1200's are perfectly fine for fast desktop use.

That said the e2200's are excellent for the money and (if needed) clock well too!

gt

The E2200 seems to be of great value, but I might be convinced to spend the extra £14 on an E5200, with its 2MB L2 Cache and a slightly higher clock speed. How well does it overclock?

gt_junkie · 12 Dec 2008 at 08:26

It's supposed to clock well due to it's 45nm architecture and is considered to be the best budget performance chip at the moment.

It's high multiplier also helps a great deal when clocking.

I'd be surprised if you didn't see 3.5ghz+ under a good heatsink - in fact, if you look at the reviews HERE you can see some users have it @ 3.8ghz on reasonable volts.

gt