New build

Jonny L

Jonny L

Jonny L

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Joined
10 Nov 2006
Posts
1,859
Location
Lincoln
Hey guys I've been wanting to upgrade my old socket a system for ages now but I just havn't had the money. As its my 18th in a few days I will be getting an influx of funds so I should have enough to buy a new system. The system will be pretty basic at first, ie lacking a graphics card which I will add later. I'm thinking of something along the lines of:

Zalman CNPS8700-LED CPU Cooler (Socket 754/939/940/AM2/LGA775) £27.99
(£32.89) £27.99
(£32.89)
Intel Core 2 Duo E6550 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.33GHz (1333FSB) - Retail £91.99
(£108.09) £91.99
(£108.09)
X-Qpack II Micro ATX Gaming Case With 500W ATX2.0 PSU - (Black/Silver) £64.99
(£76.36) £64.99
(£76.36)
Gigabyte GA-G33M-S2 Micro ATX (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £51.99
(£61.09) £51.99
(£61.09)
GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C4 800MHz Ultra Low Latency DDR2 Dual Channel Kit (GX22GB6400UDC) £29.99
(£35.24) £29.99
(£35.24)
Sub Total : £266.95

Total : £324.18

I would like to stay around this price range and I will be overclocking. I would have prefered to go for an E2140 and gotten more RAM and maybe a better motherboard however I know that the 800fsb cpus dont clock well on the g33 boards.

What do you guys think of the spec? Is there anything you would change?

Thanks
 
It's well worth the extra £10 for the E6750 over the E6550, given how well they overclock and the extra multi.

You could also consider another case like the Silverstone Sugo range, in my opinion the SG01e and SG03 are both better than the X-Qpack - better airflow, better layout, better looks. But it does mean going to a competitor for those.

Apart from that I see no issues. :)
 
Thanks for the reply Tute, I do agree that the Silverstone cases would be nicer and would have better airflow, but the Q pack has recieved good reviews and it also comes with a 500W powersupply. I know that bundled psu's can sometimes be a bit carp but I've heard that this one is quite good.

Thanks for the heads up on the 6750, will look into it.

It looks like I may be keeping my current atx case until i can get a nice sff case then, which i do suppose will allow me to buy a better psu.

edit: on looking at some of the reviews it seems that most e6750 chips are happy at 3ghz on stock cooling, I think it might be a good idea if I stick with the stock cooler at first in order to get more ram, or would you get the better mobo?

Jonny
 
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Well i'd go for the CNPS8700 personally, but it depends on how much you want to overclock. The inside of a SFF case gets quite hot, and the stock cooler won't cope with the heat as well as the Zalman would.

And which better motherboard are you looking at? The only really "better" board is the DS2R, which is the same but has RAID. When overclocking the 266FSB chips, the P5K-VM and the DS2R/S2 are pretty much identical.
 
The better motherboard I'm talking about is the new p5e-vm which I believe is the G35 chipset, I just thought that this motherboard may be able to overclock the 800fsb cpus better as it has a different chipset.

Also as I'm not buying an sff case right away, I thought that maybe I should by the extra ram first as the price of this is more likely to increase than the price of the cooler.
 
Nah it's not really an improvement in terms of overclocking - the main benefit is the better onboard graphics (in that it has HDMI). Apart from that it doesn't really justify the extra.

I wouldn't touch the nVidia chipset boards for Intel until they sort out all this fuss with Penryn. You might end up with something un-upgradable, whereas the G31/G33/G35 all support Penryn now.
 
kl, thanks for all the help Tute. I think I will probably start off with:

OCZ StealthXStream 500w Silent SLI Ready ATX2 Power Supply £39.99
(£46.99) £39.99
(£46.99)
Gigabyte GA-G33M-S2 Micro ATX (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £51.99
(£61.09) £51.99
(£61.09)
GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C4 800MHz Ultra Low Latency DDR2 Dual Channel Kit (GX22GB6400UDC) £29.99
(£35.24) £59.98
(£70.48)
Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.66GHz (1333FSB) - Retail £101.99
(£119.84) £101.99
(£119.84)
Sub Total : £253.95

Total : £308.91

Then upgrade it as I go along, obviously a nice case like the sg01 will be first while I wait for the dx10.1 gfx cards.
 
Here's what i'd go for, with reasons.

Corsair HX 520W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU
£68.14
Gigabyte GA-G33M-S2 Micro ATX (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
£61.09
OCZ 4GB (2x2GB) PC2-5400C5 Dual Channel Vista Upgrade Gold Series DDR2
£76.36
Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.66GHz (1333FSB) - Retail
£119.84

I've gone for that PSU as, most importantly, it's modular - a real godsend in a SFF. You will struggle with a non-modular PSU. Secondly, it's probably the second best PSU available, the HX620 being the first. Rock solid, good wattage, high efficiency. It'll last you for ages, even if you upgrade in the future. Just bring the PSU over.

The RAM I preferred as it leaves space for upgrade, but the GeIL isn't a bad choice either.

This is a little more expensive, but well worth the extra, especially the PSU.
 
Jonny L said:
Kl thanks Tute, do you think that ram will do 800mhz or more on the s2?
Click to expand...

That i'm not sure about. From reading the Memory forum it appears that the 4GB kits are very poor overclockers beyond their rated speeds.

If you want 400MHz it might be worth going for the GeIL or stumping up the extra for the PC6400 4GB OCZ kit.
 
In the end there's not a lot of price difference, so if you're happy with 400MHz the OCZ is often the best choice.

It does leave room for another 4GB! ;)
 
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