New build spec. check/ improve please

ozzie858

ozzie858

ozzie858

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23 Jan 2013
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6
Inspired by this board and other places over the last few months I have decided to have a crack at building a new system for myself. Have built a couple in the past but nothing for last approx. 8 years so I had a little bit of catching up to do.

Hopefully I am along the right lines but if I am not I would really appreciate an comments and recommendations.

The system will mostly be used for gaming with browsing and media viewing thrown in. I am interested in overclocking CPU straight away (never done this before so a motherboard that makes this as simple as possible would be an advantage) and later probably running crossfire cards.

YOUR BASKET
1 x Gigabyte ATi Radeon HD 7950 Windforce 3X 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £259.99
1 x OCZ Vertex 4 256GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive (VTX4-25SAT3-256G) £199.99
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £167.99
1 x CM Storm Stryker Full Tower Gaming Case - White £139.99
1 x Gigabyte Z77X-D3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £112.99
1 x XFX Pro Series 850W XXX Edition Modular '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £89.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 2TB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST2000DM001) HDD £73.99
1 x Corsair Vengeance Low Profile 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CML8GX3M2A1600C9) £59.99
1 x Cooler Master Hyper 412S CPU Cooler (Socket 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366 / 2011 / AM2 / AM2+ / AM3 / FM1 / FM2) £28.99
1 x Asus Xonar DG 5.1 PCI Sound Card with built in Headphone Amp £25.99
Total : £1,176.41 (includes shipping : £13.75).



Hopefully I am fairly close to being on the right track. I have spent quite a bit of time chopping and changing some of the parts however so would appreciate thoughts on them.

PSU: I may be overshooting on the size required here but given upgrades I hope to do later it seemed safer to aim well over. Would a 750w suffice?

Case: Was originally going for NXZT Phantom in gunmetal but a friend is able to get hold of some types of case for me so had the option of the Stryker or the HAF-X and decided on the styker but this is by no means set in stone if there is a better argument to be mad for the HAF-X.

CPU cooler: Again from a friend, seems to be well reviewed and able to handle a decent overclock.

Memory: Chose low profile even though I think normal would be ok with this cooler just incase I later need/ want to change to a larger cooler.

Motherboard: Was offered either ASrock extreme 4 or 6 from my friend but these boards seem to have mixed reviews/ opinions about them so decided to play safe with my original choice of Gigabyte but also looked at the mPower.

Drives: Happy with the HDD as I have one already and it has never steered me wrong. SSDs I do not know much about, originally was set on Samsung but heard the Vertex 4s talked up a lot recently so changed to one of those instead.

GPU: Toss up between Gigabyte or IceQ. Both seem to have strong reviews/ support. Gigabyte RMA was appealing but in the end the decision was so close TBH I made the final choice on aesthetics.

Sound card: Have no idea what I am looking at with regard to these but I do plan to invest in a decent set of speakers for gaming later so thought I would add one.

Hope I haven't made any glaring errors there. Thanks in advance for any suggestions/ improvements made.
 
Made a couple of changes.
Samsung Pro or Plextor Pro I would go for over the OCZ. OCZ seem to be having to many problems with their ssd`s.
Ram is slightly cheaper.
Left in the sound card, don`t know much about them, never use one.

YOUR BASKET
1 x Gigabyte ATi Radeon HD 7950 Windforce 3X 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £259.99
1 x Samsung 256GB SSD 840 PRO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7PD256BW) £209.99
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £167.99
1 x CM Storm Stryker Full Tower Gaming Case - White £139.99
1 x Gigabyte Z77X-D3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £112.99
1 x XFX Pro Series 750W XXX Edition Modular '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £79.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 2TB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST2000DM001) HDD £73.99
1 x GeIL EVO Leggera 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (GEL38GB1600C9DC) £49.99
1 x Cooler Master Hyper 612S CPU Cooler (Socket 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366 / 2011 / AM2 / AM2+ / AM3 / FM1 / FM2) £32.99
1 x Asus Xonar DG 5.1 PCI Sound Card with built in Headphone Amp £25.99
Total : £1,170.41 (includes shipping : £13.75).



Do you have an OS?
 
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Knew I would forget to put something in my post.

Yes I have OS. Also have monitors, keyboard and mouse etc.

Noticed you changed PSU to a 750W so looks like I overshot.

Thanks for the reply
 
Is the vertex4 having a lot of issues then?
The Plextor is meant to be bloody good, but then so is the Vertex4 afaik.

I'd take Idleman's spec with these changes :)

YOUR BASKET
1 x Plextor M5 Pro 256GB Extreme Series Solid State Drive - (PX-256M5P) £185.99
1 x Patriot Viper "Black Mamba" Generation 3 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (PV38G160C9K) £41.99
Total : £237.58 (includes shipping : £8.00).



What is it about about Corsair vengeance that makes people automatically pick it? :)
 
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Not sure how much I can say regarding buying from competitors

I picked a lot of my components because they were available through my friend. He works with a company that sells components (hence a heavy discount) but only sells a limited product line so where there is little to no performance difference I choose the stuff he can get. If I think/ or you suggest that the price difference is not worth the performance loss I will buy for performance.

While not working with unlimited funds I had originally cost the system up a lot higher than it is currently and am prepared to spend where appropriate so there is no need to sacrifice one component to allow an upgrade another (although I appreciate the effort), just let me know where I am lacking and I will change it.

For clarity I think it is best to clear a couple of issues up.

Memory: Only memory I have heard of through my friend is Corsair and Team. Out of the two I went for Corsair, hence my current choice.

SDD: Available reputable choices from friend were Vertex 4, Samsung 830 or Samsung 840. Unfortunately no Plextor, but again if the other choices are poor I will change.

Cooler: Most limited area of choice through friend. Cooler master is the be all and end all of their range and there is really only the choice of 212 Evo or 412s. I was thinking just get it done right and go with the K2 but these coolers do seem to appear on a lot of builds I have seen on here and other sites and get good reviews so went with them as it is a relatively small expense which I am prepared to lose on to replace if it turns out to be rubbish.
 
Any of the SSD's you listed will be fine. Of the two samsung drives, I'd take the 830 if the 840 isn't the pro version. I'd take the 840 pro over the vertex4, but I wouldn't take the the 830 or standard 840 over the Vertex4. Either way, they're all solid.

K2 would obviously be a better choice, but either of the coolermasters will be fine too.

Nothing wrong with the vengeance LP stuff. It's just that at the prices listed here, it's not worth spending the extra over the other choices that have been recommended.
 
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ozzie858 said:
Not sure how much I can say regarding buying from competitors

I picked a lot of my components because they were available through my friend. He works with a company that sells components (hence a heavy discount) but only sells a limited product line so where there is little to no performance difference I choose the stuff he can get. If I think/ or you suggest that the price difference is not worth the performance loss I will buy for performance.

While not working with unlimited funds I had originally cost the system up a lot higher than it is currently and am prepared to spend where appropriate so there is no need to sacrifice one component to allow an upgrade another (although I appreciate the effort), just let me know where I am lacking and I will change it.

For clarity I think it is best to clear a couple of issues up.

Memory: Only memory I have heard of through my friend is Corsair and Team. Out of the two I went for Corsair, hence my current choice.

While Corsair is great, there are cheaper alternatives which will be just as good. The only difference being price. Compatibility is not an issue, the only difference would be timings.

SDD: Available reputable choices from friend were Vertex 4, Samsung 830 or Samsung 840. Unfortunately no Plextor, but again if the other choices are poor I will change.

OCZ Drives are great, but if you want superb build quality matched with great performance, your looking at Samsung and Plextor as a cheaper alternative, but it's just as good.

Cooler: Most limited area of choice through friend. Cooler master is the be all and end all of their range and there is really only the choice of 212 Evo or 412s. I was thinking just get it done right and go with the K2 but these coolers do seem to appear on a lot of builds I have seen on here and other sites and get good reviews so went with them as it is a relatively small expense which I am prepared to lose on to replace if it turns out to be rubbish.

There are other coolers out there which are better than the 212, but it depends on how much you want to spend. BeQuiet Dark Rock Pro 2, Alpenföhn K2 Mount Doom along with Noctua, Phateks, Prolimatech, Thermalright and a few others. ALl down to preference, budget and if your as sad as me and like to colour co-ordinate your parts.
Click to expand...
 
Thanks, last 2 posts pretty much mirrored my exact thinking on my choices. I agree if 840 pro was available to me from friend I would probably not be even debating my choice of SSD.

Think from your posts and for the small amount of extra investment I will do the job right first time and get the K2.
 
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