New Build - Advice needed

slimUK

slimUK

slimUK

Associate
Joined
1 Jul 2014
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2
Afternoon all.

I am looking to build my first computer in about 6 years. I'm still using a pre-built system from OC from three years ago (still going strong).

My budget is around £1700/£1800, obviously less is better if performance isn't reduced that much. I'd like to overclock, use it for gaming, photoshop and some minor video editing. I would also like this to last me another few years.

This is what I have come up with so far. Could you suggest RAM for this build? Would SLI with lower performing cards be better than one powerful card? I'll possibly buy a second monitor in the near future.

Also any advice on the other components would be very helpful. I could sit and read the internet for days researching (spent a couple already) but I'd like to order something soon.

I have a 1TB HDD and a 60GB SSD to install separately.

YOUR BASKET
1 x EVGA GeForce GTX 780Ti Dual Classified ACX 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (03G-P4-2888-KR) £599.99
1 x Intel Core i7-4790K 4.00GHz (Devil's Canyon) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £259.99
1 x Asus Maximus VII Hero Intel Z97 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ATX Motherboard £164.99
1 x Asus VN247H 24"Widescreen Super Narrow Bezel LED Monitor - Black £161.99
1 x Kingston HyperX 3K SSD 240GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Drive (SH103S3/240G) £109.99
1 x SuperFlower Leadex GOLD 850W Fully Modular "80 Plus Gold" Power Supply - Black £99.95
1 x Corsair Carbide 540 High Airflow ATX Cube Case - Black (CC-9011030-WW) £98.95
1 x Corsair Hydro H105 Extreme Performance Liquid CPU Cooler (CW-9060016-WW ) £89.99
1 x Asus 24x DVD±RW DRW-24F1ST SATA ReWriter - Black (Retail) £17.99
Total : £1,633.16 (includes shipping : £24.45).

 
Hi and welcome to the forum, Slim.

Even though you mentioned possibly adding a second monitor, the 780Ti with a 24" 1080P 60Hz monitor just doesn't feel right. If you got the second monitor to run Nvidia Surround or AMD Eyefinity, you'd have the bezels of the monitors smack in the centre of your field of vision. Or, you'd keep gaming on one monitor and use the other for work, but still be having the same experience as with one.

An alternative is to purchase just one beast of a monitor, ideal for gaming, photo and video editing, and "everything". And enjoy a better experience with it, than to have very expensive components in the PC but being displayed on a lesser quality/resolution/size monitor.

Have suggested an alternative 850W PSU with a 10-year warranty, as you stated you are looking for something lasting. It is also built by SuperFlower and looks good too but of course won't be seen as it goes in the back chamber of the Carbide Air 540.

SSD-wise, specced a great value for money new Crucial SSD. The HyperX's write speeds are a little faster but it's not noticeable by and large, in real world usage. And its controller is Marvell instead of the Sandforce. No real biggie but Marvell is usually preferred. This is Plextor's take on it:


SandForce is better at handling everyday tasks using compressible data. SandForce’s strength—or limitation, depending on your needs—is the ability to compress data before it gets into the flash memory. This may achieve impressive read/write speeds, but only if the data on the drive is compressible.

Marvell achieves superior read-write performance with both compressible and incompressible data in clean or dirty state. Handling incompressible data is essential to the gamer where quick and almost instant loading of complex scenes is critical in tournament play, especially with online competition. Or consider a photographer where the ability to transfer tens of thousands of pictures a week quickly and efficiently is essential, saving time and increasing productivity.

http://shop.plextoramericas.com/blog/2012/10/marvell-sandforce-choosing-all-purpose-ssd-controller/
Click to expand...

The truth is most people including myself probably won't notice the difference regardless of the controller or write speed.

Freed up more money for a beastly monitor by going for an R9 290 GPU and a motherboard/CPU discount bundle offer, and changing the CPU cooler. That Rajintek will perform about as well as the Hydro 105, with just a few degrees difference. And note that the new "Devil's Canyon" CPUs run cooler than the Haswells anyway.

Since the optical bays are vertical on the Air 540, perhaps an external drive would be more ideal. It's just preference. If you prefer the interior device for it, there won't be a problem. The Samsung in the basket is wireless but also comes with USB for hardwiring to PC.

So, these are changes which will hardly affect PC performance (given that the 780Ti was overkill for that 1080p monitor anyway), and the lovely monitor could come in while only straying £125 over your total budget.


YOUR BASKET
1 x LG Flatron 34UM95-P 34" WideScreen Super-Wide LED Monitor £799.99
1 x Gigabyte Z97X-Gaming 7 - Devils Canyon Core i7 4790K CPU & Motherboard Bundle **£43 Saving** £351.98
1 x Gigabyte Radeon R9 290 OC WindForce 4096MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (GV-R929OC-4GD) £299.99
1 x Kingston HyperX 16GB (2x8GB) PC3-17100C11 2133MHz Dual Channel Kit - Black/Red (HX21C11BRK2/16-OC) £125.99
1 x EVGA SuperNova G2 850W '80 Plus Gold' Modular Power Supply £99.95
1 x Corsair Carbide 540 High Airflow ATX Cube Case - Black (CC-9011030-WW) £98.95
1 x Crucial MX100 256GB SATA 2.5” 7mm SSD + 9.5mm Adapter (CT256MX100SSD1) £79.99
1 x Raijintek Nemesis Dual Element Extreme CPU Cooler £49.99
1 x Samsung SE-208BW DVD Optical Wireless Smart Hub Black £18.98
Total : £1,925.82 (includes shipping : ).




Review.

Gaming (Crysis 3 with a GTX 780, similar in performance to an R9 290).


Game-wise, you'd be "future-proofed" by being able to run a second R9 290 on the 850W PSU, if games get more demanding.

There are also G-sync monitors now, with 144Hz, which might interest you. They're even more ideal for gaming, but the LG 34UM95-P is a better all-rounder, imo. Then there are the 4K monitors, but things aren't quite ready yet on that front, imo. Costs a fortune to get the GPU power to run games on them capably.
 
Last edited:
Hi slimUK,
I have just done a build with a similar spec, this is what I got:

Corsair Carbide Series Air 540 ATX – Black
Asus Z97 Pro Wifi-AC Intel Z97 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ATX Motherboard
Intel Core i7-4790 4.00GHz (Devil's Canyon) Socket LGA1150 Processor – Retail
Corsair Hydro Series H105 240mm Extreme Performance Liquid CPU Cooler
Kingston HyperX Beast 32GB(4*8) DDR3 2400MHz
Sapphire Radeon R9 290 Tri-X OC 4096MB
Crucial MX100 2.5" 256GB SATA III SSD
Western Digital Caviar Red 2TB SATA 6 Gb/s 64MB
Pioneer DVR-221LBK 24x SATA DVD/CD Burner with Label Flash
Dell 24” 1920*1200 U2412M

I have been using laptops for the last 5+ years so have not built a pc for a long time but its up and running now. The Corsair Carbide Series Air 540 ATX case is great to work with and looks very good. I am also glad I got the H105 cooler as temps are very good and the pc is quiet.

FredFlint.
 
Thanks for your advice guys.

The 34" super wide screen is definitely a beauty but may be a little too big for what I want. However I am reconsidering getting something higher than 1080p.

I looked at the g-sync monitor from Asus ROG Swift which comes out end of July. The technology sounds interesting and worth keeping an eye on. I understand I'll need a gforce card though is that correct? I was also looking at the other 1440 resolution monitors.

How is that bundle you suggested for overclocking and will the cooler you also suggested handle the same temps as the H105

Thanks again for your help.
 
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