Need help spec'ing DAW build for a friend. (£540 budget)

StarblazerUK

StarblazerUK

StarblazerUK

Associate
Joined
9 Sep 2013
Posts
17
A friend of mine recently had their house broken into and the insurance is playing silly buggers. He is a musician and used to use his old laptop for recording, wasn't great, but done the job. Since they stole that he's at a bit of a loose end. He asked if I could spec him up a rig that would allow him to use programs such as Cakewalk Sonar X2, Reason 7, Ableton live 8/9 but also something he could possibly enjoy some game time on.

This is what I have come up with so far. But I am sure there are some here who could help greatly....so here we go.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-337-AM
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-300-CS
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-183-MS
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-214-MS
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-392-WD x2
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-116-CS
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-076-AE
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CD-090-LG

Total via OCUK comes to £533.36
I have listed 2 WD Caviar black drives there as he requires one for his OS and another for all his samples/audiofiles.
Obviously there is no OS here, which is something which will need to be sorted.
Sorry don't know how to pop it all in as a cart thing like most do on here so just posted the links >.<

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
 
YOUR BASKET
1 x MSI HD 7850 OC 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Cards with FREE GAMES £134.99
1 x AMD Piledriver FX-8 Eight Core 8320 Black Edition 3.50GHz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail £119.99
1 x Samsung 120GB SSD 840 EVO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7TE120BW) £86.99
1 x Seasonic S12II 520W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £59.99
1 x Gigabyte 970A-DS3P AMD 970A (Socket AM3+) DDR3 Motherboard £53.99
1 x Toshiba (7K1000.D) 1TB SATA 6GB/s 32MB Cache - OEM (DT01ACA100) HDD £49.99
1 x TeamGroup Elite Black 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TED38GM1600HC11DC01) £47.99
1 x Xigmatek Asgard III Gaming Case - Black £27.95
1 x OcUK 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £16.99
Total : £613.86 (includes shipping : £12.50).


Little bit more for a much better GPU and an SSD. Case doesn't have front USB 3, but that's a small price to pay.
 
Cheers, looks good but really need to keep this around the £550 mark as will need to factor in operating system also. I was originally thinking on SSD, but at the price it's a bit too much.


AMD Piledriver FX-... 1
MSI HD 7750 2048MB... 1
Seasonic S12II 520... 1
Western Digital Ca... 1
Gigabyte 970A-DS3P... 1
Toshiba (7K1000.D)... 1
TeamGroup Elite Bl... 1
Xigmatek Asgard II... 1
OcUK 24x DVD±RW SA... 1
Subtotal £499.86
£416.55 ex VAT
£514.86 inc vat & delivery.

How about this?

Would honestly prefer to build him an intel system but don't think I can get away with that with his budget.
 
Scratch the above spec I made.

He's said he can stump £620 max
The above spec by ExRayTed is tickling his fancy at the moment. Any advances on that whilst keeping under the £620 budget?
 
 
YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-4570 3.20GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £161.99
1 x MSI HD 7790 OC 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card with FREE GAMES £109.99
1 x Samsung 120GB SSD 840 EVO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7TE120BW) £84.95
1 x MSI B85-G43 Intel B85 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ATX Motherboard £68.99
1 x Seasonic S12II 520W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £59.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200RPM 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST1000DM003) HDD £47.99
1 x TeamGroup Elite Black 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TED38GM1600HC11DC01) £47.99
1 x BitFenix Merc Beta Gaming Case - Black £32.99
1 x OcUK 20x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £16.99
Total : £645.96 (includes shipping : £11.75).



Right, here we are so far.... Would love to try trim this back to £620ish, but don't want to cripple the system. Any idea's ppl?
Would it be worth phoning OCUK to see if they can offer some sort of bundle price/deal?
 
YOUR BASKET
1 x AMD Piledriver FX-8 Eight Core 8350 Black Edition 4.00GHz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail £149.99
1 x MSI HD 7790 OC 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card with FREE GAMES £109.99
1 x Gigabyte 970A-UD3 AMD 970A (Socket AM3+) DDR3 Motherboard £79.99
1 x Seasonic S12II 520W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £59.99
2 x Seagate Barracuda 7200RPM 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST1000DM003) HDD £53.99 (£107.98)
1 x TeamGroup Elite Black 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TED38GM1600HC11DC01) £47.99
1 x Xigmatek Asgard III Gaming Case - Black £27.95
1 x OcUK 20x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £16.99
Total : £615.86 (includes shipping : £12.50).



Substituted the ssd for another seagate, he can always upgrade later.
Spoke to his wife today, she is looking to get a PC ordered for him tomorrow. So any help or advance on this would be very welcome.
I really want to make sure this system is stable for him and although as you can see, there is no OS. I think he will go with the option of a trial version of window's 8 and then purchase, or possibly window's 7 if I can find a cheap enough oem for him.

His max outlay is £630 and as said, the system above is NOT set in stone yet so any help would be greatly appreciated.
 
Last edited:
YOUR BASKET
1 x VTX3D HD 7870 Black Boost Edition 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £164.99
1 x AMD Piledriver FX-8 Eight Core 8320 Black Edition 3.50GHz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail £119.99
1 x ASRock 990FX Extreme3 AMD 990FX (Socket AM3+) DDR3 ATX Motherboard £86.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 2TB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST2000DM001) HDD £64.99
1 x OCZ ModXStream Pro 500w Silent SLI Certified Modular Power Supply £49.99
1 x TeamGroup Elite Black 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TED38GM1600HC11DC01) £47.99
1 x NZXT Source 210 Elite Midi Tower Case - White £38.75
1 x OcUK 20x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £16.99
Total : £618.52 (includes shipping : £23.20).



This will be better overall, you can save a lot dropping the processor slightly and getting a 2TB HDD not 2 x 1TB. :p
 
As this is for a pc which will be used for recording/multitracking music the seperate drive is needed for his sample libraries/program libraries and project folders. Unfortunately putting it all on one HD won't work as it will slow down and reduce the efficiency of the Software he is using.
 
 
Torn between the spec above and this one....

YOUR BASKET
1 x AMD Piledriver FX-8 Eight Core 8350 Black Edition 4.00GHz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail £149.99
1 x MSI HD 7790 OC 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card with FREE GAMES £109.99
1 x Samsung 120GB SSD 840 EVO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7TE120BW) £84.95
1 x Gigabyte 970A-DS3P AMD 970A (Socket AM3+) DDR3 Motherboard £59.99
1 x Seasonic S12II 520W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £59.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200RPM 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST1000DM003) HDD £53.99
1 x TeamGroup Elite Black 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TED38GM1600HC11DC01) £47.99
1 x Xigmatek Asgard III Gaming Case - Black £27.95
1 x OcUK 22x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £11.99
Total : £621.82 (includes shipping : £12.50).



Any suggestions?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom