New PC build

Bezzaboy1234

Bezzaboy1234

Bezzaboy1234

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29 Aug 2010
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654
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United Kingdom
Hi guys,

So a friend is looking for a new PC build as his old PC is getting old,

He's looking for pretty much a gaming rig, so I pulled together a few parts that suit his needs and he really likes the Aerocool case so he's sticking by that.

What do you guys think? any possible suggestions? I was debating whether the 7850 was better than two 6850's or possibly a 6950. trying to keep costs down to around £700 but it is possible to go over that if need be.


YOUR BASKET
1 x Sapphire HD 7850 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £189.95
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - OEM £161.99
1 x Asus P8Z77-V PRO Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £152.4
1 x Cooler Master Silent Pro Modular 700W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £89.99
1 x Aerocool Strike-X Advance Midi Tower Case - Red/Black £54.98
1 x BeQuiet Shadow Rock Pro CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366/AM2/AM2+/AM3) £36.98
1 x Crucial Ballistix Tactical Tracer 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C8 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (BLTCP2G3D1608DT2TXRGCEU) (Red & Green Activity LEDs) **WORLD FIRST** £26.99
Total : £725.28 (includes shipping : £10.00).



We already have Monitor/keyboard/mouse etc. and HDD's/DVD drive and he already has 4GB of ram but he wants to add another 4.

Suggestions and amendments to the basket would be greatly appreciated :D

Thanks guys
 
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Yeah looks good. Sure the ram fits under heatsink?

I'd also thinnk of adding a SSD. These are always nice to have but it depends on budget. And if he has budget for SSD, he would probably have budget for a GTX670 anyway.
 
Hey,

Looks pretty good, couple of changes:


YOUR BASKET
1 x Sapphire HD 7850 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £189.95
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £173.99
1 x Gigabyte Z77X-UD3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard with FREE BOOGIE BUG XXL GAMING MOUSE MAT £139.99
1 x OCZ ZT 550W '80 Plus Bronze' Modular Power Supply £63.98
1 x Aerocool Strike-X Advance Midi Tower Case - Red/Black £54.98
1 x BeQuiet Dark Rock Advanced CPU Cooler (Socket LGA 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366, AM2 / AM2+ / AM3 / 754 / 939 / 940) £41.99
1 x Corsair XMS3 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CMX8GX3M2A1600C9) £41.99
Total : £718.87 (includes shipping : £10.00).



Cheaper motherboard with free mouse mat, still got SLI/CF support
8GB matched RAM, sell the 4GB? 2x4GB sticks then allows you to add more later
Better cooler
You don't need that much power, this PSU is plenty and a fair bit cheaper.
Retail CPU has 3 yrs warranty, stock cooler (spare) and a nice box :D

I'd certainly recommend a 7850 over two 6850s, not least because of VRAM and overclocking ability.
How to overclock a 7850 past 1050MHz?
 
beejjacobs said:
Hey,

Looks pretty good, couple of changes:


YOUR BASKET
1 x Sapphire HD 7850 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £189.95
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £173.99
1 x Gigabyte Z77X-UD3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard with FREE BOOGIE BUG XXL GAMING MOUSE MAT £139.99
1 x OCZ ZT 550W '80 Plus Bronze' Modular Power Supply £63.98
1 x Aerocool Strike-X Advance Midi Tower Case - Red/Black £54.98
1 x BeQuiet Dark Rock Advanced CPU Cooler (Socket LGA 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366, AM2 / AM2+ / AM3 / 754 / 939 / 940) £41.99
1 x Corsair XMS3 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CMX8GX3M2A1600C9) £41.99
Total : £718.87 (includes shipping : £10.00).



Cheaper motherboard with free mouse mat, still got SLI/CF support
8GB matched RAM, sell the 4GB? 2x4GB sticks then allows you to add more later
Better cooler
You don't need that much power, this PSU is plenty and a fair bit cheaper.
Retail CPU has 3 yrs warranty, stock cooler (spare) and a nice box :D

I'd certainly recommend a 7850 over two 6850s, not least because of VRAM and overclocking ability.
How to overclock a 7850 past 1050MHz?
Click to expand...

Nice spec. Completely agree but I would spend a bit more on a better 650-700W modular power supply seeing as he's getting a Crossfire ready motherboard. Save the hassle in the future if he ever wants to throw in another 7850.
 
shadow_boxer said:
Nice spec. Completely agree but I would spend a bit more on a better 650-700W modular power supply seeing as he's getting a Crossfire ready motherboard. Save the hassle in the future if he ever wants to throw in another 7850.
Click to expand...

Fair point, e.g.
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-002-XF&groupid=701&catid=123&subcat=

Though that OCZ has 45A on the 12V, so would probably run two 7850s
http://www.ocztechnology.com/res/manuals/OCZ_ZT_PSU_Product_Sheet.pdf
 
YOUR BASKET
1 x Sapphire HD 7850 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £189.95
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £173.99
1 x Asrock Z77 Extreme4 Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £124.99
1 x BeQuiet Pure Power L8 730W '80 Plus Bronze' Modular Power Supply - With 120mm Silent Wing Fan Built in £89.99
1 x Zalman Z9 Plus Tower Case with Fan Controller - Black £52.99
1 x GeIL Dragon 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (GD38GB1600C11DC) £39.95
1 x Titan Fenrir Evo CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775/LGA1156//LGA1366/AMD K8/AM2/AM2+/AM3) £37.99
Total : £709.85 (includes shipping : FREE).



You could probably get away with the CM silent pro 600 or the bequiet L8 630W (i have the later). I actually prefer the Bequiet PSU having used both. My mate Beej does recommend that OCZ PSU a lot, the reviews i read said it gets quite noisey under load, so might not be the best choice for xfire.

http://www.kitguru.net/components/p...iet-pure-power-l8-630w-power-supply-review/7/

I changed the case but hey its about the same price, my mobo choice isn't going to colour clash with the red on his case choice either :) RAM and heatsink are colour coded to the mobo too, the titan fenrir is a good heatsink in it's own right.
 
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YOUR BASKET
1 x Sapphire HD 7850 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £189.95
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - OEM £161.99
1 x Asus P8Z77-V PRO Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £152.4
1 x Cooler Master Silent Pro Modular 600W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £65.99
1 x Aerocool Strike-X Advance Midi Tower Case - Red/Black £54.98
1 x BeQuiet Dark Rock Advanced CPU Cooler (Socket LGA 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366, AM2 / AM2+ / AM3 / 754 / 939 / 940) £41.99
1 x Crucial Ballistix Tactical Tracer 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C8 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (BLTCP2G3D1608DT2TXRGCEU) (Red & Green Activity LEDs) **WORLD FIRST** £26.99
Total : £706.28 (includes shipping : £10.00).




Again as stated he is sticking with this case honosuseri, He likes the look, also the Asus has the WiFi built in which he likes and so do I, the gigabyte board is nice but doesn't really offer anything majorly better than the Asus board, As unreliable as the P67 socket was they should redeem themselves on the Z77 (asus that is) I have dealt with Asus for the return and replacement of my P67 deluxe and they were great about it, so thumbs up to them. Any other suggestions on the build guys? Touch outdated on the graphics area, is there a card in the Nvidia range better than the 7850 for around the same price? Been stuck with AMD for a while so haven't noticed them much :p
 
Bezzaboy1234 said:
YOUR BASKET
1 x Sapphire HD 7850 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £189.95
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - OEM £161.99
1 x Asus P8Z77-V PRO Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £152.4
1 x Cooler Master Silent Pro Modular 600W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £65.99
1 x Aerocool Strike-X Advance Midi Tower Case - Red/Black £54.98
1 x BeQuiet Dark Rock Advanced CPU Cooler (Socket LGA 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366, AM2 / AM2+ / AM3 / 754 / 939 / 940) £41.99
1 x Crucial Ballistix Tactical Tracer 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C8 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (BLTCP2G3D1608DT2TXRGCEU) (Red & Green Activity LEDs) **WORLD FIRST** £26.99
Total : £706.28 (includes shipping : £10.00).

Click to expand...

Looks solid.

Any other suggestions on the build guys?
Click to expand...

Marginal bits. I like the Thermalright True Spirit 120, but it's not available yet. It's punching above its weight, it's nice quality (Thermalright always is), and it's quiet.

Touch outdated on the graphics area, is there a card in the Nvidia range better than the 7850 for around the same price? Been stuck with AMD for a while so haven't noticed them much :p
Click to expand...

Not in that price range. Although you could go with a GTX570 (had a special offer on 580's a few days ago), I would still take the 7850, due to its efficiency (low power low noise), overclocking headroom, and 2GB ram. I would spend an extra £10 for the Twin Frozr, maybe save on the CPU cooler (A50, Hyper 212 Evo, True Spirit).

EDIT : Dunno why I've got prices ex. vat. Maybe because the server thinks I'm US based?
 
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If you already have some of that crucial ballistix RAM, you should measure it. You might find the heatsink doesn't clear the RAM :(

YOUR BASKET
1 x Sapphire HD 7850 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £189.95
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £173.99
1 x Asrock Z77 Extreme4 Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £124.99
1 x Corsair Hydro H80 High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366/LGA2011/AM2/AM3) (CWCH80) £79.99
1 x Cooler Master Silent Pro Modular 600W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £65.99
1 x Aerocool Strike-X Advance Midi Tower Case - Red/Black £54.98
1 x Crucial Ballistix Tactical Tracer 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C8 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (BLTCP2G3D1608DT2TXRGCEU) (Red & Green Activity LEDs) **WORLD FIRST** £26.99
1 x OcUK Value 150Mbps Wireless-N PCI-Express Adapter £9.98
Total : £726.86 (includes shipping : FREE).



Adjusted my spec to include the wifi and a closed loop cooler, so height of RAM isn't ever an issue. Because of the choice of case I couldn't use the H100 dual 120mm Rad cooler :(
 
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Honosuseri why do you pick the Asrock board? I have heard no-end of tales of poor boards coming from them, The H80 is a good idea though, He already has the Kingston ram so it should fit fine with the H80, Might be better to match them up, But i've never found different ram brands to conflict, they all come from the same Taiwanese factory anyway.. :p
 
Bezzaboy1234 said:
Honosuseri why do you pick the Asrock board? I have heard no-end of tales of poor boards coming from them, The H80 is a good idea though, He already has the Kingston ram so it should fit fine with the H80, Might be better to match them up, But i've never found different ram brands to conflict, they all come from the same Taiwanese factory anyway.. :p
Click to expand...

Dude what are you talking about? Have you read any reviews for the kit you are buying or what has been suggested to you? The asrock extreme mobos have had excellent reviews

http://www.vortez.net/articles_pages/asrock_z77_extreme4_review,1.html

I don't like that case but I dont have to live with it. Seeing as it's red I wouldn't personally be adding a blue themed mobo inside it. The Asus maximus mobos are red but much more expensive as are the asrock fatal1ty ones, so I went with the asrock extreme as it's an excellent board with good aesthetics which will suit pretty much any case it's housed in. I see you have that asus Z77 Pro mobo but it is more expensive, you obviously like it and the brand it seems.....asrock was infact originally a subdivision of Asus FYI ;)

We don't even know what RAM he is reusing? Is it 1333mhz or 1600mhz and what CAS? I'll just assume it is DDR3 too. We like to suggest low profile RAM so you can fit heatsinks over them easily, so no need to pay extra for the closed loop coolers. I was tempted by that Bequiet heatsink you spec'd once, till i read the review and heard it was a pain to fit. I went with the titan fenrir as it tied into the mobos colour scheme but something like the gelid tranquillo R2 would be good and much cheaper too.

He obviously wants to "show off" what he has. How does this look?

YOUR BASKET
1 x Sapphire HD 7850 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £189.95
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £173.99
1 x Asrock Z77 Extreme4 Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £124.99
1 x Corsair Carbide 500R Midi Tower Case - Black/White £92.99
1 x PC Power & Cooling Silencer Mk III Series 600W High Performance Modular Power Supply - White £74.99
1 x Titan Fenrir Evo CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775/LGA1156//LGA1366/AMD K8/AM2/AM2+/AM3) £37.99
1 x Kingston HyperX Genesis Grey 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX1600C9D3X2K2/4GX) £25.99
1 x TP-Link 150Mbps Wireless PCI Express Adapter (TL-WN781ND) £9.98
Total : £730.87 (includes shipping : FREE).

 
honosuseri said:
Dude what are you talking about? Have you read any reviews for the kit you are buying or what has been suggested to you? The asrock extreme mobos have had excellent reviews

http://www.vortez.net/articles_pages/asrock_z77_extreme4_review,1.html

I don't like that case but I dont have to live with it. Seeing as it's red I wouldn't personally be adding a blue themed mobo inside it. The Asus maximus mobos are red but much more expensive as are the asrock fatal1ty ones, so I went with the asrock extreme as it's an excellent board with good aesthetics which will suit pretty much any case it's housed in. I see you have that asus Z77 Pro mobo but it is more expensive, you obviously like it and the brand it seems.....asrock was infact originally a subdivision of Asus FYI ;)

We don't even know what RAM he is reusing? Is it 1333mhz or 1600mhz and what CAS? I'll just assume it is DDR3 too. We like to suggest low profile RAM so you can fit heatsinks over them easily, so no need to pay extra for the closed loop coolers. I was tempted by that Bequiet heatsink you spec'd once, till i read the review and heard it was a pain to fit. I went with the titan fenrir as it tied into the mobos colour scheme but something like the gelid tranquillo R2 would be good and much cheaper too.

He obviously wants to "show off" what he has. How does this look?
Click to expand...

Yeah I did a good bit of research on Asrock, Mixed bag of reviews swaying towards the fact that they are a budget brand spin off of Asus so that it wouldn't tarnish the brands image, which I understand. He sent me a few articles of complaints so he's not comfortable with it, so its going to be asus or gigabyte, I like asus but the gigabytes reliability really cant be beat.

I do have the Z77 PRO and not swaying into getting it for him just because I do, However I think it performs well and the built in wireless is a nice boost, the RAM is DDR3 1600MHZ Kingston with the nice blue heat spreader. If he just wants to go with 8gb then I will probably suggest to put the old RAM to use elsewhere. Again the titan fenrir looks alright from the reviews but my friend hates it as it looks "tacky" so something black suits better I think. The Be-quiet have some good reviews around too.

Again he is not fussed about the layout or colour scheme rather odly. Which is fine, I'll do my best to nudge him towards making it all succinct. but its such a shame the red Asus boards are as expensive as they are as they would be a great mix.

Current basket;


YOUR BASKET
1 x Sapphire HD 7850 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £189.95
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - OEM £161.99
1 x Gigabyte Z77X-UD3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard with FREE BOOGIE BUG XXL GAMING MOUSE MAT £129.98
1 x Cooler Master Silent Pro Modular 600W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £65.99
1 x Aerocool Strike-X Advance Midi Tower Case - Red/Black £54.98
1 x BeQuiet Dark Rock Advanced CPU Cooler (Socket LGA 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366, AM2 / AM2+ / AM3 / 754 / 939 / 940) £41.99
1 x Crucial Ballistix Tactical Tracer 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C8 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (BLTCP2G3D1608DT2TXRGCEU) (Red & Green Activity LEDs) **WORLD FIRST** £26.99
Total : £683.87 (includes shipping : £10.00).

 
I'm not a fan of asrock boards either. People tend to buy the extreme ones just because they look good in their case window and not because they are actually any good. Whilst they have improved in recent years they are still primarily a budget brand. I stick to Asus boards myself.
 
IvanDobskey said:
I'm not a fan of asrock boards either. People tend to buy the extreme ones just because they look good in their case window and not because they are actually any good. Whilst they have improved in recent years they are still primarily a budget brand. I stick to Asus boards myself.
Click to expand...

Looking more for function rather than form anyway. He isn't bothered by fancy colours but more into the performance/reliability, as he is coming from a 5 year old setup he needs it to last and the Asrock in my opinion is not up to the job.
 
Bezzaboy1234 said:
Looking more for function rather than form anyway. He isn't bothered by fancy colours but more into the performance/reliability, as he is coming from a 5 year old setup he needs it to last and the Asrock in my opinion is not up to the job.
Click to expand...

Asus doesn't have the best customer service in the world, granted GB has UK based RMA which is nice but there have been complaints of their budget Z77 mobo hanging with ivybridge setups :( No-one is perfect but you are quite right to read reviews and check peoples experiences with the kit before you buy.

I did chuckle at the Titan Fenrir being tacky. I think you would have to agree that aerocool case is terribly tacky and the LED RAM is also a flash tacky gimmick......so it's not really a spec of the best gear at the best prices happening to clash colourwise is it? ;) Each to their own though :)

I did like what i read of the Bequiet Heatsink as I said, especially as I have a Bequiet PSU in my rig, I wanted to like it. I did love those "rubberbands" to hold the fan but the logo not being inline and the comments of it being a pain to fit put me off. There is nothing really wrong with it, just that there are cheaper alternatives.

Your friend seems pretty fixed on what he wants. Good luck with the build, if you have any questions or god forbid troubles come build day......you know where to find us :)
 
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