Gaming Build <£1000

Tiberia

Tiberia

Tiberia

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Joined
28 Apr 2007
Posts
54
Location
Cornwall, UK
As title says, planning a gaming build for under a grand, was planning on it before last Christmas but as always other things got in the way. Already have keyboard/mouse/ 32" TV (although somewhere down the line will hopefully be able to actually get a monitor). Here is the basic outline so far;

Buildmk1.jpg


Still unsure about the MB, GPU & Case, any thoughts welcome,

Cheers

(ps. I know I did a similar thread last year, thought I would start a fresh one due to all the new hardware available now!!)
 
Two questions and a suggestion.

1. Do you need a £115 case?
2. Do you need a PSU that powerful? A 550 would do

And would recommend possibly saving money on a smaller PSU, cheaper case to get a 7850 GPU, you can overclock this and it will happily play new games on 1080P at max settings.
 
Do you need such an expensive case?? I recommend you get a SSD for your OS and most used programs. Do you use your PC for anything other than gaming (such as video editing)?

I finished my build a few days back and currently using a 32" LCD TV as a monitor.....it's rubbish!!!! I recommend you get a monitor as soon as!! Hopefully getting one next weekend!

I also suggest you spend the extra £10 on the retail version of the i5 3570k.
 
YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £189.95
1 x HIS HD 7850 IceQ X 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (H785QN2G2M) £179.99
1 x Gigabyte Z77X-D3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £109.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200RPM 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST1000DM003) £74.99
1 x Cooler Master Silent Pro Modular 500W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £54.98
1 x Corsair Vengeance Low Profile 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CML8GX3M2A1600C9) £44.99
1 x Zalman Z9 Plus Tower Case with Fan Controller - Black £40.99
1 x Akasa AK-CC7118HP01 K25 Low Profile CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156) £11.99
Total : £722.87 (includes shipping : £12.50).



Then you could add the monitor - 24"
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MO-080-IY&groupid=17&catid=510&subcat=
 
Thanks for the quick reply, other than gaming I will only be using it for browsing net etc, nothing intensive. What probs have you come across using TV for monitor? Haven't been able to use this one much for gaming atm due to the ***p spec of this computer. Suppose I dont need to spend so much on the case, mainly chose that due to the case always being visable so it would be nice if it at least looked nice.
 
Retail CPU comes with a longer warranty.

I dont know much about coolers however I suggest Alaska as they are very good for the price.
 
Ah didn't notice the OEM only have 1 year warranty opposed to 3 year retail. Not sure about that PSU, would 500w be enough?
 
I would go with Bacon? basket but also add the Crucial M4 128gb just because it's awesome!!!

I have my TV connected via HDMI and it's appalling quality!! Some things I have to zoom in before I can read the text!! I managed to get it 10 times better after finding the graphics settings but it's still rubbish!! Everything is slightly pixelated. 100% recommend you get a monitor!
 
Just realised the CPU cooler Bacon suggested, I think you would be better off with the Gelid tranquillo. It's a very good CPU cooler for the price and I suggest at least 600W PSU, always better to have too much than too little!!
 
For that system, I am almost sure, definetley not over 600 needed.

Heres a spec for the full £1000 :D
(buy two of the same 7850's!, i didnt cause it wouldnt let me)


YOUR BASKET
1 x VTX3D HD 7850 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card with FREE Dirt3 PC Game £191.99
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £189.95
1 x HIS HD 7850 IceQ X 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (H785QN2G2M) £179.99
1 x Gigabyte Z77- G1-Sniper M3 Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £139.99
1 x OCZ ZT 750W '80 Plus Bronze' Modular Power Supply £89.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200RPM 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST1000DM003) £74.99
1 x Corsair Hydro H60 High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler (Socket LGA2011/1366/1155/1156/775/AM2/AM3) (CWCH60) £59.99
1 x Corsair Vengeance Low Profile 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CML8GX3M2A1600C9) £44.99
1 x Zalman Z9 Plus Tower Case with Fan Controller - Black £40.99
Total : £1,029.36 (includes shipping : £13.75).



You might need 850W for that, let me double check.
 
no ssd?
and imo, the fractal define r3 cases are smart looking, and helluva lot cheaper too...
do u need a optical disc drive? u've not specced one in
gelid tranquilo cpu cooler have been recommended around the forums, its about 20-30 quid
 
Zalman is cheap, had 4 fans plus controller and a tempature sensor :D
I forgot about the optical disk drive, didnt see it on the OP's first post though
Like I said before i dont know much about coolers :/
 
Don't need optical drive, got 2 in this machine, one its last legs (doesn't seem to want to write to discs anymore), but I will just take the working lightscribe one and put it in the new machine as this comp will just become a media server over the network.
 
I was thinking of getting SSD for boot and game installs, just painful spending so much on so little space, although they have dropped by so much since last year. And I suppose it would be more performance gain than if I spent £100 somewhere else on the build.
Going back to **Bacon?** total £1000 build, not sure I would go for SLI build over a single card of same cost, would it not always be better to spend the £400 one powerful card rather than two middle range cards? Not that I would want to drop that much money on one aspect of the build.
 
I would say it's definetley woth spending that £100 (the M4 128gb is always coming up on offers at the mo, got mine for £90) on a SSD!!!

Can't help you much on the GPU as I don't know much about them...more of a music man!
 
I am pretty sure that SLI on the 7850's would be better than the alternative 670 or 7970. This is because you can overclock the 7850's really easy pushing them past 1000Mhz, plus you would end up with 4GB of VRAM at the end which is the same as the 670.
But get some other peoples opinions first. And an SSD would definetley be worth considering, if you can afford it a 128 GB would be good.
 
Having two cards with 2GB of VRam each does not mean you end up with 4BG of VRAM, when running SLI you only get the VRAM from one card. Think I will add SSD to the build :)
 
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