First Build Advice

[mem101]

I'm looking to build a gaming PC for the first time. I've done some reading around and decided to go with AMD. This is what I have put together so far. My budget is £900-£1000, and this is about £1100 so any advice on where to make the savings?

AMD FX-8350 4.0GHz 8-Core
Corsair H100i 77.0 CFM Liquid
Asus Crosshair V Formula-Z ATX AM3+
Kingston 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR3-1600
A-Data Premier Pro SP920 256GB 2.5" SSD
Toshiba 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM
Zotac GeForce GTX 970 4GB
Corsair Carbide Series 300R Windowed ATX Mid Tower
Corsair 600W ATX12V
Asus BW-16D1HT Blu-Ray/DVD/CD Writer
Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 (OEM) (64-bit)

I've read about people overclocking the FX8350 to over 5GHz. If I can get it as high as 4.7 I'd consider that an achievement since I've never overclocked before. Given that, is the Corsair H100 necessary or could I go with something a bit cheaper? Also, if I'm overclocking the CPU, is it a good idea to overclock the GPU and memory? What should I be wary of when overclocking?

 

[stulid]

Hi and welcome.

Intel is a much better route to go.

Is this going to be a gaming PC?


I think this would be so much nicer and faster overall,

YOUR BASKET
1 x MSI GeForce GTX 970 Gaming Edition 4096MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £275.99
1 x Gigabyte Z97X-SLI - Devils Canyon Core i5 4690K Bundle **£14 Saving** £264.58
1 x SuperFlower Leadex GOLD 750W Fully Modular "80 Plus Gold" Power Supply - Black £99.95
1 x Crucial MX100 256GB SATA 2.5” 7mm SSD + 9.5mm Adapter (CT256MX100SSD1) £79.99
1 x Microsoft Windows 8.1 64-Bit DVD - OEM (WN7-00614) £77.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan RED 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-17100C11 2133MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLRED38G2133HC11ADC01) £65.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 2TB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST2000DM001) HDD £61.99
1 x Pioneer BDR-S09XLT 16x BluRay / 16x DVD±RW 50GB Drive - Black (Retail) £57.95
1 x In Win 703 Midi Tower - Black / Red £54.95
1 x Raijintek Themis Black Heatpipe CPU Cooler PWM - 120mm £19.99
Total : £1,077.06 (includes shipping : £14.75).



Free delivery because of the Superflower PSU+case - http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18630207

PSU+board are SLI ready.


It would actually be a shame to put an internal optical drive into the case and ruin the looks, an external via USB will solve that - http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CD-161-SA&groupid=701&catid=10&subcat=314

 

[thebennyboy]

Aren't optical drives practically redundant now? Since pretty much everything is going digital, or has already. What were you considering use the optical drive for? Is it just for installing games or installing the OS?

Most overclocking can be done using the bus multiplier, overclocking RAM doesn't really give any significant improvements. When you overclock you just need to make sure you have the right voltage for the clock you have, but that will vary per chip. You must also keep an eye on the temperatures and it probably wouldn't go amiss to do some stress tests on it to make sure it's stable and that the temps are safe too.

A good stress test is IntelBurnTest. Use software such as hwmonitor to keep an eye on your temperatures. If you notice that your PC is becoming unstable, either give it a bit more voltage or lower the multiplier a little.

 

[mtj111]

Good advice from stulid, but a 550W power supply would be more than enough.

 

[Fallen god]

Good advice from stulid, but a 550W power supply would be more than enough.

At £1000 I think you might aswell future proof for SLI, moreover with how cool and quiet these cards are.

 

[Vesper]

No point having an optical drive built into the system, I suggest a nice small external drive that will most likely be of better use in the event you need to use a disk to install something (Or, if required, reinstall your OS).

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CD-154-SA&groupid=701&catid=10

 

[mem101]

Thanks for the replies everyone. I added the optical drive as a matter of course, so I think getting a cheap external one makes sense.

Is everyone anti-AMD here then? Also, is there any reason to get Windows 8 over 7? I think I'd rather stick with 7 unless there was some compelling reason not to.

If a mobo's specs say 2033MHz(OC)/1600MHz, what does that mean exactly? Can you just go ahead and fit 2033 in that case?

 

[stulid]

Win8.1 is faster.

Longer support too.

AMD has their place but with such a huge budget you can get the i5 and not have to compromise elsewhere..

The RAM, well anything over 1600MHz is considered an "overclock" all you have to do with RAM is load the XMP profile in the bios and this will read the data on the RAM and setup the speed/timings/voltage to what they are rated to.