New Build Advice

IanB001

IanB001

IanB001

Associate
Joined
21 Dec 2004
Posts
141
Location
Bristol, UK
Hello

I've just saved up sufficient funds to build a decent computer and I'm seeking some expert guidance.

The computer will be mainly used for gaming, video edting and video production.

I plan to retain my current monitor, a Dell Widescreen Ultrasharp 2407WFP 24" ( it would be cool if I could play everything at 1920 x 1200), my mouse, a Logitech MX510, my cheap but functional Keysonic USB keyboard and my set of Creative 2.1 speakers.

I have up to £3,000.00 to spend, but the missus insists I don't have to spend it all.

I consider myself a complete novice having built only two systems in the past. A P4 system in 2002 and an AMD FX55 system in 2004. It's unlikely that I will be carrying out any overclocking shinanigins as it still seems like a dark art to me and I am fearful of damaging valuable components.

I've been pouring over components for the past few weeks and come up with the following specification:

Basket.jpg


I like the flexability the the motherboard offers, but I'm not sure about everything else especially the memory and PSU. I'm also concerned about my back catalogue of games running on a new rig with the 64bit version of Windows 7.

Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.
Ian.
 
Right where to start. The mobo is excellent but the ROG (republic of gamer) mobos are geared towards serious overclockers which you are hesitant to do. Never the less a good mobo is the foundation of an excellent system.

Interesting you opted for Intel as the sandybridge (or whatever they call it once released) should be out soon. Maybe you want to wait a while or switch to AMD for future proofing. Of course remember VAT goes up come January!

You could save some £s with a lower capacity SSD since you are fitting a 1TB drive aswell. The SSD will give excellent performance for the OS and games but 256GB is a bit OTT.

Windows ultimate (i use too) probably isn't worth it, although my misses likes the internet tv which ultimate's media centre includes over the home premium edition. Don't panic about 32 bit apps it's drivers that are more of an issue with 64bit OS's

Check if the Bluray is supplied with software. A retail version should ship with powerdvd in the box so you can play bluray movies, you have opted with the oem.

I'm sure this thread will attract a lot of attention and advice. I only suggest saving a few pounds as you may like to pick up two extra screens for eyefinity with the 5970

Good luck with the build, keep us posted
 
Thanks honosuseri

I selected the motherboard for exact reason you state. It's an excellent place to start and offers possibilities.

I was going to add the Intel Core i7 980X 3.33GHz (Gulftown) Extreme Edition , and at only an extra £100.00 I think I should have. I've just Googled Sandy Bridge and it appears that it will require a different CPU socket (what a surprise :rolleyes:). I suppose I could delay but there's always something new just around the corner and as you've mentioned VAT goes up to 20% in January.

I was thinking of using the SSD for the operating system & games, and the Samsung for my media. I was even considering two Samsungs. I already have 500GB of media to transfer.

Ok, I won't worry too much about 32bit and 64bit, although I must check driver compatibility with some of my peripherals.

Good point about the Bluray drive. The retail would be better.

I wish I could accommodate extra screens but space is at a premium.

Thanks again.
Ian.
 
You will need 64 bit as 32 bit versions of windows only support 4GB ram. What i meant was 32 bit programs should run fine, you just need to check that the hardware you chose has 64bit drivers.

How much you spend is entirely your decision. I just felt 256GB of SSD was a bit much. A 2TB drive or two 1TB drives would be more cost effective and keep the Mrs sweet ;p
 
I see what you mean about the memory, I forgot about that, 64 bit it is, although I think the retail version of Ultimate comes with both anyway, so I've no need to fret.

I'm not too worried about the mrs, she'd only spend what was left on clothes anyway ;), however, I do see your point.

There are just too many choices. I feel like a kid in a sweet shop.
 
can I suggest a modular psu, a psu of that wattage will have a lot of cables, getting a modular one will be make it easier to do a tidy build.
 
Going to query some points of your build.
Have you any particluar reason why you actually want windows 7 ultimate?
You're going for an overclockers motherboard, and then not overclocking, just spending a great deal of money on a processor that won't provide much more performance, perhaps considerably less performance than a processor costing one third the amount and OCed a small amount. You could buy a preoverclocked bundle, the OC would be done for you, and it would cost less than the processor alone, saving the entire cost of motherboard.

I see a very impressive pricetag, that doesn't include peripherals (your existing ones will do nicely) and I don't see lot of grunt from the machine.
Nice GFX, should run everything very happily at full res for a couple of years. I game at 1920*1200 and my old 4890 doesn't find much it can't cope with. The 5970 should blister aa and af as much as is possible.

SSDs are a matter of choice. At £500 for a 256GB drive, I personally still think price is an incredible sticking pont, but you've money to spend, and you will see the performance. For £500, I'd buy myself 4 1TB Samsung F3's and RAID them and still have £300 left over, could buy 3*2TB F3's for storage to match. 10TB of storage instead of 256GB. Anywhoo....

Modular PSU will be a very good idea, airflow, ease of cabling, and easier to get back at things afterwards.

Go 64bit, if you don't you will regret it in the years to come.
 
Some very good points Hikari.

One reason for identifying Ulitmate was that it came with both 64 bit and 32 bit versions as I was unsure about software compatibility. It also has BitLocker which I found of interest as I could make a valid use of such a feature. If all my software will run on 64 bit then Home Premium will be fine and I can look at alternative security applications.

I've even been considering dual boot with Win XP Pro, but I only have the 32 bit version.

I was hoping that the processor would allow me to encode video, do it a lot quicker and, more importantly allow me to do other things whilst it's busy doing that. After all, it is a multi-core processor.

I assumed that with a quality processor I would need a motherboard worthy. Whilst I'm not keen on dark art of overclocking I've not completely ruled it out in the future. I just require the knowledge and to overcome my fear of frying the components, so I would like to keep that avenue open to me as an option. Although I want to do more research on water cooling first.

I'm aware that I could have invested in a pre overclocked bundle, or even a complete system off the shelf, but that's not as much fun. I don't get to do this very often so I wanna make the most of it :)

I was a little worried about opting for an ATI Radeon as I had NVidia GeForces in my previous builds and the drivers have always been stable and reliable. However, I've heard the current crop run hot and noisy.

I knew SSD was pushing the boat out a bit, but I hoped the extra speed would improve boot times, map loading times and application response times. I've had enough of clicking and waiting, what appears to be, a lifetime. Make use of at least one of those SATA 6G/s ports. If they are as fast as they are reported to be I may invest in another one in a couple of months. At present my C drive has approx 200GB of apps including games. My E drive is almost full with 468GB of media.
I'm hoping that I can add hard drives as required for extra storage. I will half fill the new drive when the data is transferred so I may invest in another one straight away or a 2TB drive.

I thought the select PSU was modular, so that was my mistake. Ops.

I hope this makes sense.

Thank you.
 
That's one hell of a neat system you got there, (wish I had the monies) if you are going to do a lot of video production shouldn't you have around 12gb ram? But then again the Dominator ram is one fast piece of kit. Go wild with this one! This is gonna be one neat build :D. Oh believe it, you will notice the difference if you decide to get a good ssd. If you are looking to add extra components sometime down the line, maybe you'd be better of with getting a higher watt psu, so you won't have to really worry whether your psu will handle it or not and if it doesn't you gotta go out and buy a better one etc. It's just all too much hassle in my opinion especially since you sound like one those guys who's going to crossfire another 5970 and add who knows what else.
 
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I could spring for more memory. It appears that the Dominator ram is currently out of stock. Any suggestions on a good quality alternative?

I was hoping that an 850w power supply would be enough for any future additions. I guess not. Any ideas on a larger, reliable as reasonably quiet modular power supply?

Thank you.
 
are you going to overclock is a question? even ram rated at 1600mhz is more than the stock frequency of a i7 chip, so will allow plenty of headroom to do this, the higher speed ram just allows more if you are an extreme overclocker?

your first post suggests not.

and that psu is great
 
Told you you'd get some interest ;p

When it comes to RAM you can never have too much (unless you have 32bit windows then anything over 4GB is wasted). Start with 6GB you can add more if you need just ensure you keep the same make preferably but speed definately! Let's be honest it's a 2 minute job to fit.

PSU is definately an area not to skimp on in any build. For the price of that corsair PSU you linked OC do the Antec TruePower Quattro 1000W for literally a couple of quid more . It has a 5 year warranty and all sorts of safety measures built in (as does the corsair) and gold plated connectors. If you talked yourself into the corsair then getting the antec makes sense giving you a bit more headroom should you xfire the 5970 later on in the builds life.
 
Cool. I've made a few updates to the contents of my basket.

That Antec power supply is a bit of a monster and it has go faster stripes, lol.

I guess I'm going to need a few SATA cables, and some method of mounting the SSD inside the case. I've seen a few mounting brackets but the reviews aren't very favourable.

With the number of fans in this system I hope it's not going to sound like an aircraft taking off. I haven't got much money left but I wonder if it would be worth investing the last of the pennies on the Corsair H50-1
, although I'm not sure this will make it any quieter.

A fan controller instead perhaps?
 
Oh I forgot about the stripes!!! That's the key selling point too lol

Check the mobo's supplied kit. Or an unboxing maybe on youtube and see howmany sata cables it ships with before you buy any.

I can't help on the mounting brackets but hopefully someone can comment on what they've used.

The H50 is a "hobbyist" watercooling system, most people that run it use 2 fans (more noise) in a push pull configuration to keep the temps in check but bear in mind they are usually overclocking the cpu.
 
How about:
Krypton Extreme Intel Core i7 930 2.80GHz @ 4.20GHz Overclocked Bundle £480.00
Options applied to the above product:
Asus Rampage III Extreme Intel X58 (Socket 1366) DDR3 Motherboard
HIS ATI Radeon HD 5970 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card + Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2
Intel X25-M Mainstream 160GB 2.5" SATA-II Solid State Hard Drive
Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate - Retail (Full Version) £167.99
Corsair HX 850W ATX Modular SLI Compliant Power Supply (CMPSU-850HXUK)
Coolermaster ATCS 840 Classic Case - Black £146.98
Samsung SpinPoint F3 1TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (HD103SJ)
Samsung SH-B083L/BSBP 8x BluRay ROM / 16x DVD±RW Drive - Black (OEM)
Sub Total : £1,820.41
Shipping : £14.75
VAT is being charged at 17.50% VAT : £321.15
Total : £2,156.31
 
I honestly could not justify paying £300 for the Rampage III when the P6X58D-E is only £150, especially if you are not intending to overclock.

With a few useful pointers and walkthroughs I have got my little i7/920 running completely stable at 4.0GHz.

You have not included a cooler in the original post - were you intending to use stock cooler? Would recommend my Noctua NH-D14 but think you will have problems fitting it with that RAM Cooler.

Still deciding when to go for an SSD

Interested to see what you go for in the end :)
 
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