Help spec me an upgrade

will1b

will1b

will1b

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Joined
25 Dec 2010
Posts
114
Location
England
I have a sum of money, around £400-£500, which I am able to spend on upgrading my PC. I have ideas of what I want from the upgrade, and I've also drafted up a few parts. Verification and recommendation would be very much appreciated! (My current spec can be found here).

I'd like a new CPU, because my current overclock was a little shaky a while ago. It's fine now (and it had been for a year or two beforehand), but the incident still makes me suspicious of the stability. I don't mind if it's an i5 or an i7, but I don't really want to sacrifice much speed. Of course, this'd mean a new motherboard too. My RAM should still be okay.

I also *need* a new storage hard drive. Preferably 2TB, as my 1TB one which I have pretty much filled has had a few CHKDSKs going on lately so I feel it may need replacing.

Lastly, I'm considering getting a mechanical keyboard to replace my increasingly ageing Logitech Internet Pro, although I'm not sure whether it's worth it. I've used one of my friends' MX Black Qpad MK-50, but from what I've read I might be better off with MX Browns (as I do quite a lot of typing as well as my gaming). I'd need noise dampeners though, as (at least with my current keyboard) typing at all creates rather a lot of noise.

All of this said, this is what I'm currently considering buying:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i7-4770K 3.50GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £239.99
1 x Gigabyte Z87X-D3H Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ATX Motherboard £119.99
1 x Qpad MK-50 Mechanical Gaming Keyboard - UK Layout - Brown Switches £69.95
1 x Toshiba 2TB 7200RPM SATA 6GB/s 32MB Cache - OEM (DT01ACA200) HDD £68.99
1 x OcUK Tech Labs Noise Dampening O-Rings for Cherry MX Keyboards - 125 pieces £6.95
Total : £515.46 (includes shipping : £8.00).



Of course, if you think I'd be better off getting something completely different, please say!
 
Last edited:
An i5 760 @ 4Ghz is still a pretty strong CPU, so you may benefit more from getting a better GPU. Would you mind telling us what your PSU is as well, as I don't see that listed :)
 
altrewin said:
An i5 760 @ 4Ghz is still a pretty strong CPU, so you may benefit more from getting a better GPU. Would you mind telling us what your PSU is as well, as I don't see that listed :)
Click to expand...

I've already said about my slightly dodgy overclock. Hm.

I forgot that my PSU isn't on that page! It's a 700W OCZ StealthXStream 2. Overkill for my current build but I was going for forwards compatibility.
 
PSU seems to be OK, here's what I would personally go for:
YOUR BASKET
1 x Gainward GeForce GTX 780 Phantom 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £359.99
1 x Qpad MK-50 Mechanical Gaming Keyboard - UK Layout - Brown Switches £69.95
1 x Seagate Barracuda 2TB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST2000DM001) HDD £59.99
1 x OcUK Tech Labs Noise Dampening O-Rings for Cherry MX Keyboards - 125 pieces £6.95
Total : £506.47 (includes shipping : £8.00).



As for the OC being a little shaky, it might be worth asking in the OC/Cooling section for advice on getting the most stable OC on your CPU. :)
 
It had been stable for a long time beforehand, at least a year if not two. After that period of time stable, I don't think it's an issue with the overclock rather than with the chip. Hm.
 
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