Help on my 1st PC

<$Nick$>

<$Nick$>

<$Nick$>

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Joined
7 Feb 2008
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3
hello everyone,

Over the next month I am wanting to get a new PC. I have around £800 to spend, however I'm unsure on what components to order.

I was wondering if anyone would be able to spec me up a PC?

The main use will be for gaming, but also for some 3d modelling and some D3D programming. Looking through the components I think I'd like to have the new E8400 Wolfdale 3.00GHz, but i have no idea if a lower clock speed quad core would be more beneficial to me?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks

Nick


Edit : It's just the box I need. I already have mouse, keyboard, monitor etc
 
Last edited:
Welcome to the forums, do you need everything for a PC including monitor, OS, keyboard, mouse etc or just the system box itself? It will make quite a difference to the specifications you get.
 
Ok then, in that case I'd pick something like the system below. The cooler does have LEDs on it but it is cheaper than the ordinary model at the moment and you won't need to see them in the case anyway.

OCZ 4GB (2x2GB) PC2-6400C4 800MHz Reaper HPC Enhanced Bandwidth Edition Dual Channel DDR2 (OCZ2RPR800C44GK) (Deal Product) £59.99
(£70.49) £59.99
(£70.49)
Corsair HX 520W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU (CMPSU-520HXUK) £59.99
(£70.49) £59.99
(£70.49)
Asus P5K-E WiFi Intel P35 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £88.99
(£104.56) £88.99
(£104.56)
Antec P182 Super Midi Tower Case - No PSU (Gun Metal Black) £73.99
(£86.94) £73.99
(£86.94)
Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 LGA775 'Wolfdale' 3.00GHz (1333FSB) - Retail £149.99
(£176.24) £149.99
(£176.24)
Sony NEC Optiarc AD-7200S 20x DVD±RW SATA Dual Layer ReWriter (Black) - OEM £13.99
(£16.44) £13.99
(£16.44)
OcUK GeForce 8800 GTS 512MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £159.99
(£187.99) £159.99
(£187.99)
Tuniq Tower 120-LFB CPU Cooler (Socket 478/754/939/940/AM2/LGA775) £22.99
(£27.01) £22.99
(£27.01)
Western Digital Caviar SE16 320GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (WD3200AAKS) £44.99
(£52.86) £44.99
(£52.86)
Sub Total : £674.91
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £12.95
VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £120.38
Total : £808.24
 
Thats fantastic!

Thanks very much for the fast response and info!

You just made OCUK roughly £800, you should ask for your cut!

Once again thanks for being so helpful.

See you on the forums!
 
Sorry to gatecrash, I am in the same situation on another thread. How does this setup sound. I went with quad core, purly because i thought it was "newer" technology?!

Asus P5K Premium/WiFi-AP Intel P35 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £109.99
(£129.24) £109.99
(£129.24)
Samsung SpinPoint T 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (HD501LJ) £51.99
(£61.09) £51.99
(£61.09)
Tuniq Tower 120-LFB CPU Cooler (Socket 478/754/939/940/AM2/LGA775) £22.99
(£27.01) £22.99
(£27.01)
Arctic Silver 5 Thermal Compound (3.5g) £5.99
(£7.04) £5.99
(£7.04)
Coolermaster CM-690 Dominator / Coolermaster Real Power 520w Modular Power Supply - Bundle £93.98
(£110.43) £93.98
(£110.43)
OCZ 4GB (2x2GB) PC2-8000C5 1000MHz ReaperX HPC Enhanced Bandwidth Edition Dual Channel DDR2 (OCZ2RPX10004GK) (Deal Product) £63.99
(£75.19) £63.99
(£75.19)
Intel Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient SLACR 95W Edition" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - OEM £137.99
(£162.14) £137.99
(£162.14)
Sony NEC Optiarc AD-7200S 20x DVD±RW SATA Dual Layer ReWriter (Black) - OEM £13.99
(£16.44) £13.99
(£16.44)
EVGA GeForce 8800 GT 512MB Superclocked "Crysis Edition" GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (512-P2-E802-AE-CrysisUK) £154.99
(£182.11) £154.99
(£182.11)
Sub Total : £655.90
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £10.95
VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £116.70
Total : £783.55
 
That looks like a good system, if you don't need the dual gigabit lan then you could use the Asus P5K-E as above and save a little bit of cash.

The Wolfdale based chips (E8X00 in dual core) are newer technology since they use both 1333mhz FSB and more imporantly from an overclocking perspective a 45nm die which means they run cooler. If you want a 45nm quad then you need a Yorkfield chip and they are currently back on pre-order (I think all they had sold out in a night). However don't for a second thing that the G0 SLACR chips are bad in any way shape or form, on the contrary they are still great chips but if you don't use applications that make the most of quad core then you might be better with an E8X00 chip and overclocking as many seem to hit 4ghz+ when overclocking.
 
If it were me i would leave out the arctic silver as the Tuniq comes with some anyways, i would Go for some 6400C4 memory as if you go with the Q6600 its a bit pointless to have 8500 Ram. I would get the cheapest version of the 8800GT and save yourself a few pounds by overclocking it yourself if you really need to.

Lee
 
Semi-pro, thanks for the advice. I do not use lan, purely online gaming so have opted for the mobo that you recommended. Kearney thanks for the tip I have left the Arctic Silver out.

I do not feel comfortable overclocking the graphics card - i dont know why, would just rather get the best at the moment that i can afford.

Semi-pro you have now also got me thinking, I am new to oveclocking so with this in mind what processor would you (or anyone else) go for for maximum gaming benefits?

The next issue I have is the monitor. I have been looking at the following, connecting it via HDMI.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MO-055-LG&groupid=703&catid=511&subcat=
 
I don't know too much about monitors so I'd suggest taking a look in the monitor sub-forum.

If gaming is the primary concern then I'd probably go with an E8400 at the moment, a bit cheaper than the Q6600 but offers good potential to hit 4ghz or above. The Ram, cooler and motherboard you've selected should be fine for that. It is very quick at stock so you could use it for a while and then when/if you gain in confidence overclock then.
 
I agree the E8400 is a good one for gaming im just happy i got mine before the price went up. This is my first built and overclock and i have pretty much what you are looking at (P5K board, E8400, 8800GT) all in all im very happy even overclocked upto 3.8Ghz without really doing too much :)
 
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