Fun Spec Time - Got £2k to spend, go crazy :)

MrYiff

MrYiff

MrYiff

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Joined
28 Jun 2007
Posts
47
Location
Portsmouth
Im used to building my own boxes but ive got to admit that ive not been keeping track of the latest and greatest kit lately and while ive got some idea of what i want, picking stuff like the best ram for the job etc.. is a little beyond me at the minute (damn real life and having to work 50+ hr weeks!) So im hoping everyone can give me a little help and advice.
Ive got around £2k to spend (£2.5k max). Already got a good enough keyboard, mouse and speakers, but i am after a shiny new monitor. From reading around a little im very tempted by the BenQ FP241WZ 24" beast.
Other than that so far im looking at:
Core 2 Quad CPU
4GB DDR2 Ram
SLi Capable mother board
WD 10k RPM HDD for OS + Games
500 or 750GB HDD for general storage
GF8800 GTX or Ultra?
Antec P190 case

Im attempting to try and make this build as quiet as possible so by all means offer ideas, so far ive only had chance to do basic research so im not committed to anything, although i would like to have a SLI capable motherboard to leave the option open for a later upgrade.
Please, go forth and help me spend my money :D
 
well, getting a loan to pay of various student related debts so figured i might aswell go the whole hog and get a new pc, id rather pay for it now with my loan than in a few months on various credit cards :p
 
This is what I come up with.

2000spec.PNG


Over all it's a really nice spec, I have put the dell in as it is a very good and very popular on this forum. Unless you need the HDMI port on the BENQ. Also I put in a 1TB hard drive as they are the same speed as the 150GB raptors and having one drive will be quieter than having a raptor and a storage drive. You can easily overclock the CPU as you have a very good motherboard, ram and cooler combo plus the QQ6600's are good overclockers. The EVGA 8800 Ultra should be quieter than most the other 8800's plus it will run all the new games fine on a 24" monitor. If your not fussed about sound then ditch the XFI but they are a lot, lot better than on board sound cards.
 
is there still such a difference between onboard and dedicated sound cards? Its been a while since i had one. Last time it was going from a SB16 to a SB Live and the difference was noticable even with fairly rubbish speakers. Is there still that much difference?
Forgot to add that id more than likely put vista x64 on the new build, are the creative vista drivers up to scratch now? Last i heard, saying they were a farce would be generous.

Looking around a bit, how does the asus striker extreme stack up to the evga board? Is there any difference? Id be tempted to go with the asus if those heatpipes help much.

Thanks for the help so far, its kinda the way i was going, but its definately nice to have others confirming my thinking :)
 
My XFI work's fine in 32Bit Vista, the drivers are not a good as XP but everything work's and they are stable. And yes I noticed a difference going from the onboard sound off my Gigabyte DQ6 motherboard to my XFI music.

I am not sure about the Asus motherboard, but if I was looking for a SLI board I would get the Evga my self due to the good support and warranty same with the graphics card.
 
Your best off searching google for some reviews on both the Evga and Asus and then you can decide what motherboard you want as they will both do the job.
 
Case + PSU is a waste,

I'd suggest something like Lian Li v2000 + corsair 620W for that rig.

sid
 
Welcome to the Forums MrYiff.

BenQ FP241WZ 24" Widescreen HDMI/HDCP LCD HD Monitor - Silver/Black
Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium 64-Bit Edition DVD - OEM - 1Pk
Intel Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "LGA775 Kentsfield" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - Retail
Thermalright Ultra-120 Extreme (Socket AM2/LGA775) Heatsink
Abit IP35 Pro (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
Crucial Ballistix 2GB (2x1GB) DDR2 PC2-5300C3 667MHz Dual Channel Kit X2
EVGA GeForce 8800 GTX 768MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express)
Western Digital Caviar SE16 400GB 4000AAKS SATA-II 16MB Cache X2
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Music 7.1 Soundcard - OEM
Samsung SH-183LBEBN 18x18 DVD±RW Dual Layer Serial ATA Lightscribe ReWriter (Black) - OEM
Corsair HX 620W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU
Akasa Eclipse 62 Aluminium Case - No PSU

Total : £1,832.78

Hows that.

I specced the BenQ Screen as you wanted, lovely monitor.

Windows Vista Home Premuium in their since i have put in 4GB of Memory for you, you will have to have a 64bit O/S to fully utilize all 4 Gigs of RAM.

You shouldent have any problem hitting 3GHZ+ with the Quad especially paired with the Abit P35 Motherboard and the Crucial Ballistix Memory which will hit 1000MHZ+ with little problems. To keep that CPU nice and cool i have put in one of the best air cooler around, Thermalright Ultra-120 Extreme. ;)

The 8800 Ultras are a waste of money, they only offer a few extra FPS over the GTX, so stick with a GTX.

Two 400GB Western Digital Hard Drives, very reliable and quiet.

If you have a nice surround system, having a dedicated sound card will defiantly help. They do make quite a diffrence.

A SATA DVD Drive, you can finally get rid of them big, fat, ugly cables. :p

The CorsairHX PSU is one of the best power supply's around, very reliable and very quiet.

The Akasa Case is brilliant, fantastic build quality and great colling.


No need to go for a 680i board unless you plan on going SLI, which is poo anyway.

At this point in time SLI is a waste of money unless you game on a 30inch + screen. The performance you get out of a SLI configuration dosent justify the price you pay for that second card vs the performance you actually get out of it.
 
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Ok, well this is about as crazy a build as I can come up with :)

Case - Antec P182 Gun-Metal Black <- The P190 is overkill really, and you don't want to be saddled with the Neo Link power supply setup
Power Supply - Antec Quattro 850w <- It offers all the connectors you will need, plus it got a big thumbs up from jonnyguru
Motherboard - Abit IP35 Pro <- Probably the best P35 board out there right now
CPU - Intel c2d Q6600
CPU Cooler - Tuniq Tower 120
RAM - 4gb Geil PC2-6400C5 (2 x 2gb)
Hard-drive - 2 x Samsung Spinpoint T 500gb
Operating System - Windows Vista Home Premium x64
Optical Drive - Samsung 20x dvd burner
Graphics Card - 2 x Sapphire 2900xt 512mb <- They scale so well in crossfire
Monitor - Dell 3007wfp-hc <- You can, therefore you should (it also gives a justification for the crossfire setup) :p

That whole lot comes to £1447.40 with the 3007wfp-hc being a further £892.71 so a grand total of £2340.11

Just thinking about the gaming performance and day-to-day use of such a system gives me goosebumps :cool:

Of course you could drop down to the Benq FP241w and save about £455.
 
thanks for all the help so far, leaning towards stickroads spec but with the antec 182 case.
Down to my last question or two i think, is the raptor *that* loud that its not worth having? Even compared to its speed?
Also is there any reason for the RAM? Is there any reason for not going with the faster 800MHZ version (or even 1066)?
 
Personally i wouldn't go for the Raptor. Its very expensive for such little gain to tell you the truth.

Also about the Memory, The Crucial Ballistix will hit 1000MHZ+ so will be plenty fast enough and wont hold your overclock back. :)
 
well, i guess that just leaves me needing a newbies guide to overclocking! Bizarrely in all my years of tinkering with pc's i never bothered overclocking, i somehow expected everything would blow up the moment i tried.
 
MrYiff said:
well, i guess that just leaves me needing a newbies guide to overclocking! Bizarrely in all my years of tinkering with pc's i never bothered overclocking, i somehow expected everything would blow up the moment i tried.
Click to expand...

Thats what most people think, but the chances of actually blowing your hardware when overclocking is very very low as long as you dont go silly. :)

Theirs plenty of people here on the forums that are willing to help if you wanted to start getting into overclocking. :cool:
 
ok, idiot question again, does the thermalright heatsink need a fan as the description implies it doesnt come with one as standard?
 
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