New build help needed

[LittleChimp]

Hi guys sorry to make another of these threads but I really needed some expert help.

I am building a pc for the first time and I want it to last a good while. I have spent a good few weeks trawling the internet and these boards and have come up with a spec. It will be used primarily for gaming WOW, WAR and Fallout 3 maybe fps like Crysis, listening to music, watching films.

Until now my pc hasnt been up to it (celeron processor fx5200 card) so ive probally been missing out.

My only concern though is would it be better to buy something cheaper like an e5200 and a 8800gt for now and enjoy these games at lower settings. I could then perhaps buy a quad which would be more optimised for games and a newer graphics card DX 11 later on in the year, Id rather use a dualcore if its more energy efficient though.

Ill probally get a monitor for christmas 20-24 so 1920x1200 wouldnt be out of the question but I dont mind a lower resolution I have a 15 inch atm so im used to 1024x768.

Here is my basket for now

Powercolor ATI Radeon HD 4870 1024MB GDDR5 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - Retail £199.99 (£234.99)

Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 LGA775 'Wolfdale' 3.00GHz (1333FSB) - Retail £119.99 (£140.99)

Asus P5Q Pro Intel P45 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £94.99 (£111.61)

Corsair HX 620W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU (CMPSU-620HXUK) £79.99 (£93.99)

Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 500GB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (ST3500320AS) £39.99 (£46.99)

Corsair 4GB DDR2 XMS2 PC2-6400C5 TwinX (2x2GB) £39.99 (£46.99)

Antec Three Hundred Ultimate Gaming Case £33.99 (£39.94)

Pioneer DVR-216DBK 20x DVD±RW SATA Dual Layer ReWriter (Black) OEM £15.99 (£18.79)

Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775) £15.99 (£18.79)

Akasa AK-191-SM Smoke Ultra Quiet 120mm Fan - 3 pin £4.99 (£5.86) x2

Sub Total : £650.89
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £9.95
VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £115.65
Total : £776.49


Basically my question is should I buy this system knowing it should last me awhile or would I be better off buying a cheaper mobo cpu gfx and psu cutting about 300 quid off the price and using the money saved to upgrade later on summer time or next year.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. I should be able to get the vat off also.

Thanks

 

[divuk83]

Similar spec to what I'm running at the mo, and a pretty good one for the money I reckon. I would deffo buy that if I was building a new PC.

I wouldn't worry to much about DX11 as there is naff all that even needs DX10 at the moment. Those games that do use it such as Warhead often suffer from low fps when using DX10 so its often better to run them in DX9 anyway.

Dave

 

[GSDog]

My only concern though is would it be better to buy something cheaper like an e5200 and a 8800gt for now and enjoy these games at lower settings. I could then perhaps buy a quad which would be more optimised for games and a newer graphics card DX 11 later on in the year, Id rather use a dualcore if its more energy efficient though.

In my opinion, no. Most of the games available now do not use quad cores and I could be wrong, but I very much doubt dual-core CPU's will be the bottlenecks in game releases in the near future. A CPU such as the E8400 will be a good idea. It's cheaper than quad cores, it can overclock very nicely (most people are hitting 4Ghz) and it is more enery efficent.
If you will be doing lots of video encoding, or generally using programs that you think would benefit greatly from a quad core CPU, then go consider buying a quad core. Otherwise, stick with a dual core.

Ill probally get a monitor for christmas 20-24 so 1920x1200 wouldnt be out of the question but I dont mind a lower resolution I have a 15 inch atm so im used to 1024x768.

Depending on your budget, I can highly recommend the Dell S2409W monitor. I just got mine a few days ago for just £200 and it's an excellent monitor with low input lag - great for gaming.

Here is my basket for now

Powercolor ATI Radeon HD 4870 1024MB GDDR5 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - Retail £199.99 (£234.99)

Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 LGA775 'Wolfdale' 3.00GHz (1333FSB) - Retail £119.99 (£140.99)

Asus P5Q Pro Intel P45 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £94.99 (£111.61)

Corsair HX 620W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU (CMPSU-620HXUK) £79.99 (£93.99)

Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 500GB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (ST3500320AS) £39.99 (£46.99)

Corsair 4GB DDR2 XMS2 PC2-6400C5 TwinX (2x2GB) £39.99 (£46.99)

Antec Three Hundred Ultimate Gaming Case £33.99 (£39.94)

Pioneer DVR-216DBK 20x DVD±RW SATA Dual Layer ReWriter (Black) OEM £15.99 (£18.79)

Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775) £15.99 (£18.79)

Akasa AK-191-SM Smoke Ultra Quiet 120mm Fan - 3 pin £4.99 (£5.86) x2

Sub Total : £650.89
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £9.95
VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £115.65
Total : £776.49

Looks like a great spec to me.
Do you plan to overclock? If you think you might overclock later on and you want to get the most out of your CPU, you might want to consider getting some PC8500 ram.
I would also personally change the HDD to a Western Digital Caviar Blue 640GB SATA-II 16MB. It's only a few quid more and you get another 140GB. It is an excellent drive.

Basically my question is should I buy this system knowing it should last me awhile or would I be better off buying a cheaper mobo cpu gfx and psu cutting about 300 quid off the price and using the money saved to upgrade later on summer time or next year.

From what I have seen the new i7 cores about to come out are going to cost a lot of money. You'll also need to buy a new motherboard as it uses a different socket and the motherboards are going to cost >£200.
You then need to buy DDR3 RAM which is a lot more expensive than current DDR2 RAM.
It'll probably end up costing you £600+ to upgrade to the new i7 cores which would be out of your budget.
I also don't think you would notice a significant increase in gaming performance with the i7 and if you are not using programs that will make use of the quad cores then it's not worth it (IMO).
I am in the same situation as you. I am going to buy a very similar rig because I know A) I won't be able to afford the new i7 cores anytime soon and B) 95% of the programs/games, etc that I use will not make use of quad cores. For those reasons I am going to buy a similar setup to your spec above.

Thanks

You're welcome.

 

[LittleChimp]

Thanks for the quick replies. I was going to use it at stock for the time being and then overclock if nessacery later on. From what I understand the e8400 is pretty fast already.

That hardrive looks a better choice thanks, Ill also keep that monitor in mind very nice price.

Should I change the psu to the 650w version and get some some PC8500 sticks instead. That would save afew quid

 

[GSDog]

I'd personally stick with the 620W modular PSU. It'll keep your case tidy and help with the airflow.
You could try and find some PC8000 RAM. It's between the price of the PC6400 and PC8500 RAM. OcUK did have some G-Skill PC8000 RAM but it's out of stock now with no ETA.