Help to select a CPU/MB/Ram bundle for £200

Sixshot84

Sixshot84

Sixshot84

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28 Jul 2014
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9
Hi all,

New member looking for some advice – I’ve been trawling the net for the best forum to ask this in and OCUK seems to be by far the best :)

I think my Q6600 is dying as it’s started getting really high temps even under simple tasks so I think it’s time for an upgrade. I want a new mATX MB/CPU/Ram for under £200 ideally.

The only real power I need is for photo editing in Adobe Lightroom. Other than that I only use my desktop for media management really. So my requirements are good photo editing performance and a cool and quiet system.

I was thinking of building a system around an i5 4440 which seems to sell for around £120-130. That doesn’t leave a lot for a MB and Ram (I’d like 8gb ideally). Would I be better off going for a used IveBridge or similar? I’m not interested in overclocking really so will a budget board be ok?

Also, I only use Lightroom occasionally, it’s not part of my job or anything so I don’t need cutting edge performance, just decent performance. Would I be able to get away with a less powerful processor?

Any thoughts or specific part recommendations welcome. I’ve been out of the loop since I bought my Q6600 so I’m a bit lost!

Many thanks in advance
 
For £200 I'd be looking at AMD. However, there's no AMD mATX boards with the AM3+ chipset, so the only option is a budget Intel. Probably better for lightroom anyway with Intel.
YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-4460 3.20GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £134.99
1 x Gigabyte H97M-HD3 Intel H97 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £67.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan RED 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLD38G1600HC9DC01) £61.99
Total : £274.57 (includes shipping : £8.00).



£270 though :( And only 1600Mhz RAM useable in the H97 board. Used would be a good bet, ~£120 for a 3570k + £50 + ~£45 for a solid set of 8GB RAM
 
You can get AM3+ mATX boards, just not from OcUK.

Like the Asus M5A78L.

You could get one of those, an 8320 and RAM for within your £200.00 budget.
 
Thanks for the advice. I've read Intel are better for photo editing so would prefer an intel if possible. I'll have a look into it more though.

My case does accept full size atx too so could go that route. I was just hoping to get an mATX in case I wanted to down-size the case in the future
 
PapaLazaru said:
You can get AM3+ mATX boards, just not from OcUK.

Like the Asus M5A78L.

You could get one of those, an 8320 and RAM for within your £200.00 budget.
Click to expand...

That board has poor VRM and VRM cooling from a quick glance, good VRM with these high power FX CPU's is essential unless you want an unstable experience :)
For photo editing, you definitely want Intel for the strong single core performance
 
If I'm not overclocking what the disadvantages of a budget MB? I know you only get 2 ram slots which would make adding more ram more expensive but anything else? Do more expensive boards offer better fan speed management? In my current set-up I can only get the case fans to slow down with Speedfan which is annoying...

I should have also mentioned that all I'll be connecting to it is an SSD, and HDD and a DVD drive. I've got a basic passive gfx card but would get rid of that if my CPU had intergrated graphics
 
SpeedFan is great if you set it up right - I wrote a guide and my setup is so good, don't even need to touch it.
Budget mobo's have no speed control whatsoever, I got a H81M-HD3 recently for some office builds and you cannot control speeds whatsoever.

I suppose you could go with something like this

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-4440 3.10GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £131.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan RED 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLD38G1600HC9DC01) £61.99
1 x Gigabyte H81M-HD3 Intel H81 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £41.99
Total : £245.57 (includes shipping : £8.00).



But you get a really small list of features etc, no fan control
 
ShakeNBake said:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=bu-240-ok&groupid=2833&catid=2512&subcat=2686

£198 with an i3-4330 (3.5ghz dual core with hyperthreading), 8gb ram, h81 motherboard.


won't be as powerful as ur q6600 tho.

you'll need an i5 or i7 ideally, which will cost over your £200 budget (but totally worth).
Click to expand...

it is much faster than the q6600, even the i3. about 40-50%!

http://www.cpu-world.com/compare/612/intel_core_2_quad_q6600_vs_intel_core_i3_i3-4330.html
 
ShakeNBake said:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=bu-240-ok&groupid=2833&catid=2512&subcat=2686

£198 with an i3-4330 (3.5ghz dual core with hyperthreading), 8gb ram, h81 motherboard.


won't be as powerful as ur q6600 tho.

you'll need an i5 or i7 ideally, which will cost over your £200 budget (but totally worth).
Click to expand...

thanks for the i3 recommendation. according to this the i5 is around 40% better at multi-threaded tasks but similar opn everything else:
http://www.cpu-world.com/compare/415/intel_core_i3_i3-4330_vs_intel_core_i5_i5-4440.html

I may get something along the i3 lines for now and then if I'm not happy with it I could look out for a used deal on an i5/i7 in a year or so
 
Honestly I'd just find the extra money, spend it now and get an i5 + mobo to suit something along the lines of what I specced, possibly the Z97P-D3 motherboard to open up upgrade options in the future

snips86x said:
B-grade?

YOUR BASKET
1 x AMD Piledriver FX-8 Eight Core 8320 Black Edition 3.50GHz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail £99.95
1 x **B Grade** MSI 990FXA-GD65 AMD 990 FX (AMD AM3/AM3+) DDR3 Motherboard £70
1 x Corsair XMS3 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CMX4GX3M2A1600C9) £41.99
Total : £221.53 (includes shipping : £8.00).

Click to expand...

8320 isn't much good on photo editing :(
8GB RAM should be a minimum really
For £20 more you can get an i5 + mobo + 8GB RAM new
 
What photo editing will you be doing?
If it's nothing super demanding then no reason to not go with the AMD setup, I photoshopped regularly on a AMD Phenom, it isn't the greatest but did the job fine.
 
Shivy011 said:
It is much faster than the Q6600, even the i3. About 40-50%!

http://www.cpu-world.com/Compare/612/Intel_Core_2_Quad_Q6600_vs_Intel_Core_i3_i3-4330.html
Click to expand...

Holy crap XD

But I am assuming that is with the Q6600 at stock, WHO RUNS THOSE SUCKAS AT STOCK ANYWAY :cool:

I had one at around 3.2GHz per core, wat a bargain at the time, ate up absolutely every game I threw at it. Then I got my i5 and the rest was history.




So yea @OP +1 from me for the "save up for an i5" option if u can. i3 bundle is pretty decent though, I got one myself recently for a home computer setup (not for me, building for a friend). Up to you really. If your Q6600 was overclocked, you probably won't see an improvement, but if it was running at stock speeds, then as mentioned above you should see a significant improvement. Or yeah, try the second hand / b-grade market if you want optimal price : performance but with an extra slice of risk..

Sadly I don't know much about AMD so can't comment about that, but 3.5GHz 8 core sounds sick on paper..
 
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ThaReaperGuy said:
What photo editing will you be doing?
If it's nothing super demanding then no reason to not go with the AMD setup, I photoshopped regularly on a AMD Phenom, it isn't the greatest but did the job fine.
Click to expand...

Nothing major. Just using the develop module in Lightroom 4 really. I'll do some more research but I think I'm leaning towards either an i3 socket 1150 to allow an decent upgrade in the future, or an older used i5/possibly i7

thanks for all the advice guys :)
 
Shivy011 said:
Honestly I'd just find the extra money, spend it now and get an i5 + mobo to suit something along the lines of what I specced, possibly the Z97P-D3 motherboard to open up upgrade options in the future



8320 isn't much good on photo editing :(
8GB RAM should be a minimum really
For £20 more you can get an i5 + mobo + 8GB RAM new
Click to expand...

On that kind of budget, you cannot afford to be too fussy!

What makes you think it wont be any good? When I had my FX6100, it worked just fine!
 
Yeah I suppose, it will be good but with a comparable Intel setup which have superior single core performance (even a Pentium G3528!) which is very much the need with photo editing, I think an Intel Z97 build would be the way to go. Also opens up upgrade opportunities in the future, whereas with AM3+ the only thing that could happen is the jump to an 8320 and that's it, no more
 
Shivy011 said:
Yeah I suppose, it will be good but with a comparable Intel setup which have superior single core performance (even a Pentium G3528!) which is very much the need with photo editing, I think an Intel Z97 build would be the way to go. Also opens up upgrade opportunities in the future, whereas with AM3+ the only thing that could happen is the jump to an 8320 and that's it, no more
Click to expand...

Don't you mean 8350? There is also the 9 series but spending that money would be better on an Intel setup.

YOUR BASKET
1 x Gigabyte Z97M-D3H Intel Z97 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £79.99
1 x TeamGroup Elite Black 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TED38GM1600HC11DC01) £61.99
1 x Intel Pentium K Anniversary G3258 Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £52.99
Total : £204.58 (includes shipping : £8.00).

 
snips86x said:
Don't you mean 8350? There is also the 9 series but spending that money would be better on an Intel setup.

YOUR BASKET
1 x Gigabyte Z97M-D3H Intel Z97 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £79.99
1 x TeamGroup Elite Black 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TED38GM1600HC11DC01) £61.99
1 x Intel Pentium K Anniversary G3258 Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £52.99
Total : £204.58 (includes shipping : £8.00).

Click to expand...

Nah mate, the 8320. The 8350 is definitely not worth the extra over the 8320. All you get is a higher clock speed, which you can OC the 8320 to anyway. The 9 series are frankly just the 8 series but worse. More expensive, higher power usage. The 6300/8320 etc are great for budget builds. That build you just specced would be awesome for the photo editing etc
 
snips86x said:
Don't you mean 8350? There is also the 9 series but spending that money would be better on an Intel setup.

YOUR BASKET
1 x Gigabyte Z97M-D3H Intel Z97 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £79.99
1 x TeamGroup Elite Black 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TED38GM1600HC11DC01) £61.99
1 x Intel Pentium K Anniversary G3258 Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £52.99
Total : £204.58 (includes shipping : £8.00).

Click to expand...

Quite tempted by the G3258. I could get a decent MB with it so could add ram or a better cpu when I can afford it. To be honest, it may be fine for my needs looking at reviews.

Is it worth getting a z97 over one of the cheaper H boards that can over clock this?
 
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