help me spec a home pc

[Monster ninja]

Hi guys,

My parents are in need of a new home computer, looking for an ITX build in an Antec ISK 600, but because I have little knowledge of lower end/ITX machines I need a little help. the uses for the computer are web browsing and word processing plus my mother wishes to run a HDMI cable to her TV for HD netflix, my father also does some VERY light photo editing...

The computer needs an SSD as the boot drive but I already own a 1TB samsung spinpoint that will be used for mass storage.

my mother has also requested the computer be as quiet as possible and needs an optical DVD rewriter.

and for my own sake I'd love a modular power supply.

I have a flexible budget of £400. do not need an OS or any peripherals.

thanks in advance! Sorry if I've missed anything

 

[Danny75]

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i3-4160 3.60GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £95.99
1 x MSI H97I AC Intel H97 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Mini ITX Motherboard £79.99
1 x Corsair CS450M 450W Semi-Modular 80+ GOLD Certified Power Supply (CP-9020075-UK) £54.95
1 x Antec ISK 600 Small Form Factor ITX Chassis £49.99
1 x SK Hynix 128GB SSD SH910A SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Drive (HFS128G32MNB-2201A) £44.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan ORANGE 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLAED38G1600HC9DC01) £44.99
1 x Samsung SN-208DB/BEBE Slimline 8x DVD±RW SATA Drive - OEM £14.99
1 x Akasa Slimline Optical SATA Cable, 40cm (AK-CB050-40) £2.99
Total : £398.47 (includes shipping : £8.00).




Not much heat to cool with just an i3 and light demands made of it, so stock cooler should be quiet. Not worth spending extra on an aftermarket cooler till you give it a go, imo.

Motherboard's a bit of a luxury but fits budget and has onboard wireless and WiDi (which might be useful for streaming wirelessly to TV if the TV is WiDi capable). Otherwise there's dongles for that, no need to HDMI cable it (although mobo does have HDMI too). It gives you more options to play about with.

 

[Monster ninja]

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i3-4160 3.60GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £95.99
1 x MSI H97I AC Intel H97 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Mini ITX Motherboard £79.99
1 x Corsair CS450M 450W Semi-Modular 80+ GOLD Certified Power Supply (CP-9020075-UK) £54.95
1 x Antec ISK 600 Small Form Factor ITX Chassis £49.99
1 x SK Hynix 128GB SSD SH910A SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Drive (HFS128G32MNB-2201A) £44.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan ORANGE 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLAED38G1600HC9DC01) £44.99
1 x Samsung SN-208DB/BEBE Slimline 8x DVD±RW SATA Drive - OEM £14.99
1 x Akasa Slimline Optical SATA Cable, 40cm (AK-CB050-40) £2.99
Total : £398.47 (includes shipping : £8.00).




Not much heat to cool with just an i3 and light demands made of it, so stock cooler should be quiet. Not worth spending extra on an aftermarket cooler till you give it a go, imo.

Motherboard's a bit of a luxury but fits budget and has onboard wireless and WiDi (which might be useful for streaming wirelessly to TV if the TV is WiDi capable). Otherwise there's dongles for that, no need to HDMI cable it (although mobo does have HDMI too). It gives you more options to play about with.

cheers mate, that looks brilliant!

 

[Ronald]

AMD Build:

YOUR BASKET
1 x AMD Kaveri 7700K 10 Compute Core APU w/ Radeon R7 Graphics (4 CPU + 6 GPU Compute Cores) - Retail £99.95
1 x Gigabyte F2A88XN-WIFI AMD A88X (Socket FM2+) DDR3 Mini ITX Motherboard £85.99
1 x Crucial BX100 250GB SSD SATA 6Gbps 7mm Solid State Drive (CT250BX100SSD1) £72.98
1 x Antec ISK 600 Small Form Factor ITX Chassis £49.99
1 x Kingston HyperX Savage Red 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-19200C11 2400MHz Dual Channel Kit (HX324C11SRK2/8) £46.99
1 x SuperFlower Golden Green HX 350W "80 Plus Gold" Power Supply - Black £36.95
Total : £402.46 (includes shipping : £8.00).



Motherboard out of stock, and seems to be the only FM2 Mini ITX board...



Intel build:
YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i3-4160 3.60GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £95.99
1 x MSI Z97I AC Intel Z97 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Mini ITX Motherboard £94.99
1 x Crucial BX100 250GB SSD SATA 6Gbps 7mm Solid State Drive (CT250BX100SSD1) £72.98
1 x Antec ISK 600 Small Form Factor ITX Chassis £49.99
1 x Kingston HyperX Savage Red 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-19200C11 2400MHz Dual Channel Kit (HX324C11SRK2/8) £46.99
1 x SuperFlower Golden Green HX 350W "80 Plus Gold" Power Supply - Black £36.95
Total : £407.50 (includes shipping : £8.00).





- No modular PSU... Quality before convenience
- GPU is stronger on the AMD build, CPU stronger on Intel build.
- Intel build lower power.

Stock cooler on the intel build is not particularly quiet. I don't know how the AMD stock cooler fares, but I doubt it is great. For either build you probably want to use something like:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Raijintek Aidos Direct Contact CPU Cooler £14.99
Total : £20.96 (includes shipping : £4.98).




[Edit]
Sorry forgot those:
YOUR BASKET
1 x Samsung SN-208DB/BEBE Slimline 8x DVD±RW SATA Drive - OEM £14.99
1 x Akasa Slimline Optical SATA Cable, 40cm (AK-CB050-40) £2.99
Total : £20.95 (includes shipping : £2.48).

 

[Danny75]

cheers mate, that looks brilliant!

You're welcome. Was going to spec an AMD too but Ronald beat me to it. As you'll have to consider CPU processing speed v graphics speed. From what you say, I think Intel will generally be faster. If your dad used photoshop a lot then different story, but the 8GB RAM is going to help with that.

This modular PSU comes with 5-year warranty if you want to spend a few more pounds for that:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Silverstone Strider Plus 600W '80 Plus Bronze' Modular Power Supply £63.95
Total : £73.55 (includes shipping : £8.00).

 

[Monster ninja]

thanks so much for the help guys, All sorted now