Newb after some advice

MalakiUK · 30 Dec 2011 at 19:32

Hi all,

Ive been wanting to build my own system for a few years and have finally given myself a kick up the bum to get it done, ive specced the following parts and was wondering if id missed anything, anything was under or over specced. Im a complete newb when it comes to all the technical stuff so would appreciate any help that can be offered. My apologies if this is in the wrong section.

It will be used mostly for playing games, im not after a rig that can run Battlefield 3 on ultra, itll will primarily be used to play Star Wars: The Old Republic on medium-high specs.

Anyway, without further a-do:

Case: Cooler Master Elite 330 Midi Tower Case - Black[url]

Motherboard: [url=http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-054-AK]Asrock Z68 Extreme4 Gen3 Intel Z68

Processer: Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz

Memory: Corsair Vengeance Blue 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3

Graphics Card: GeForce GTX 460 Superclocked 1024MB GDDR5

Sound Card (this will be used with some turtle beeches): Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Audio 7.1

Harddrive: Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB SATA 6Gb/s

CD Drive: LG BH10LS38 10x BluRay-RW

PSU: Corsair Enthusiast Series TX850M High Performance 850W

Network Card: Intel Gigabit PRO/ 1000 CT PCI

Thanks Guys (that took a really long time to copy and paste on my naff laptop lol)

The below was offered up by DoomedSpeed:

1 x Asus GeForce GTX 560Ti DirectCU II 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £169.99
1 x Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - OEM £161.99
1 x MSI Z68A-GD65-G3 Intel Z68 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £149.98
1 x Crucial RealSSD M4 64GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive (CT064M4SSD2) £87.98
1 x BeQuiet Pure Power L8 730W '80 Plus Bronze' Modular Power Supply - With 120mm Silent Wing Fan Built in £79.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB SATA 6Gb/s 16MB Cache - OEM (ST500DM002) £71.99
1 x Samsung SH-B123L/RSBP 12x BluRay ROM / DVDRW DL & RAM Lightscribe SATA-II Optical Drive - Black (Retail) £54.98
1 x BitFenix Shinobi Gaming Case - Black £48.98
1 x Crucial Ballistix Sport 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C10 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (BL2KIT51264BA160A) £34.99
1 x Corsair A50 High-Performance CPU Cooler (Socket AM2/AM3/LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366) £29.99
Total : £905.87 (includes shipping : £12.50).

95thrifles · 30 Dec 2011 at 19:50

Hi and welcome
You don't need a network card so can save yourself some money there, the mobo has everything you need
Also you don't need as powerful a PSU, 750 would allow for SLi, 600 for single card
I'd use some of that money saved to up the gfx card a little, a 560Ti would be good
Also you've gone for quite a high end mobo but don't have an aftermarket CPU cooler and the case isn't the best, if you're after budget drop the mobo back a bit, if you want high end then up the case and add a cooler
Also you can get cheaper HDD, or maybe even add a SSD
What's your total budget?

Doomedspeed · 30 Dec 2011 at 19:53

Welcome,

Looks over-specced to me. Can you answer some questions to help us help you?

Are you looking to Overclock?
Are you looking to be doing any upgrades in the near future?
Any idea's about Xfire/SLI?

From what i can see, you may have overspecced it.

CPU and GPU are fine. RAM is good as long as you don't want to use an aftermarket CPU cooler.

No need for a PSU that big, unless youre planning on Xfire/SLI.
Do you really need a blu-ray drive?
The motherboard have GREAT sound and an ethernet port too.
Case is decent.

We will be more than willing to help.

FiXiT · 30 Dec 2011 at 19:57

I would change the memory for http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-094-KS . it was on offer at £29.99 but sold out at this price now, but I would say it will be back down in price sometime soon. The reason I would change is; that sometimes the heat spreaders on the Corsair ram get in the way of larger cpu heat sinks. Have a read of the post to see the problems this member had.
http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18356121

MalakiUK · 30 Dec 2011 at 20:39

Thanks for the input all.

I dont really have a budget per-se as ill be buying most the bits on a monthly basis.

In answer to the questions, Not really looked into overclocking/xfire/sli...so not really sure. I plan to upgrade over time, maybe eventually upgrade the i5 to an i7 and as the gfx card becomes outdated, upgrade that also. The blu-Ray player isnt mandatory, just figured i may aswell get it while im building

skylineboy · 30 Dec 2011 at 20:51

are your beaches USB? if so then you can drop the soundcard. I think you will see the benefit of an overclock so add a gelid tranquilo. Grab yourself a smaller psu up to 600w.

look at the 560ti GPU which will see your TOR fix through and more

MalakiUK · 31 Dec 2011 at 08:21

Okie doke, so i wont need a sound card if using turtlebeeches via USB?

If im right in my thinking, SLI is when you use dual/triple gfx card? and i did a google on xfire and it brought up some sort of free im/voice messegner thing, is this correct, if so what difference will this make to the rig and the spec needed?

I would like in the future to run dual gfx cards (dual 560ti's?) so i think if the PSU will be sufficient i may aswell keep it in there. Being dense i know nothing of overclocking, isnt this were you "tune" your components to run faster than they usally would, but at the risk of them going boom?

Looking at the gfx cards, whats the difference between an asus 560ti and a MSI 560ti?

So the final build looks to be:

Case: Cooler Master Elite 330 Midi Tower Case - Black[url]

Motherboard: [url=http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-054-AK]Asrock Z68 Extreme4 Gen3 Intel Z68

Processer: Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz

Memory: Kingston HyperX Genesis Grey 8GB (2x4GB)

Graphics Card: Asus GeForce GTX 560Ti

Sound Card (this will be used with some turtle beeches): None due to the beeches via USB

Harddrive: Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB SATA 6Gb/s

CD Drive: LG BH10LS38 10x BluRay-RW

PSU: Corsair Enthusiast Series TX850M High Performance 850W

Network Card: None due to being onboard my mobo.

Cooler: for potential overclocking, dual cards: **B Grade** Gelid Tranquillo CPU Cooler

Will the case be big enough for all these parts, will any of them conflict?

Sorry for all the questions, im dense when it comes to this internal stuff lol

MalakiUK · 31 Dec 2011 at 09:27

Also, if i wanted to use a hdd from my old PC as a secondary storage device, is there anything i need to look for? or do hdd's all run the same connectors. Also if this had windows xp on it, what would i need to do if im installing Windows 7 on my new hdd/rig. Is it just a case of installing thenew OS on the older HDD? Im thinking this is a stupid question >.<

If someone doesnt mind me bugging them, can they add me to MSN, might be better than me spamming nonsense on the forum.

malaki _ _ at hotmail dot co dot uk

olivier renault · 31 Dec 2011 at 10:00

MalakiUK said:
Okie doke, so i wont need a sound card if using turtlebeeches via USB?

Not sure, but a on-board soundcard is just like any sound card, so I don't see why not. Your USB headphones my as well be picked up as a separate output device though, which means no moatter of soundcards will make any difference anyway (the headphone is considered as a soundcard).

If im right in my thinking, SLI is when you use dual/triple gfx card?

correct.

and i did a google on xfire and it brought up some sort of free im/voice messegner thing, is this correct, if so what difference will this make to the rig and the spec needed?

There is a IM program called xfire, but xfire (crossfire) 99.9% of the time refers to basically SLI for AMD cards. Note that putting a NVidia and a AMD graphics card won't work (at least not as intended).

I would like in the future to run dual gfx cards (dual 560ti's?) so i think if the PSU will be sufficient i may aswell keep it in there. Being dense i know nothing of overclocking, isnt this were you "tune" your components to run faster than they usally would, but at the risk of them going boom?

750W covers every dual cards, really. Except maybe the GTX580. Pick up a PSU with at least 2x8-pin PCI-E connectors, and 2x6-pin PCI-E connectors, to cover the basics.

Looking at the gfx cards, whats the difference between an asus 560ti and a MSI 560ti?

Not much, some people prefer Asus, some prefer MSI's. MSI's (Twin Frozr II, Twin Frozr III) are very popular, and often cheaper. Often those cards are factory-overclocked, meaning they come pre-overclocked, so you don't have to (although you can often push them a little bit further). My main criteria for choosing between those would be 1024MB RAM, or 2048MB RAM.

olivier renault · 31 Dec 2011 at 10:12

MalakiUK said:
Case: Cooler Master Elite 330 Midi Tower Case - Black[url]

I would pick up another case. Definitely something fitting to the hardware you will have inside. And at least a gaming case, like a CoolerMaster CM 690-II Lite. Or a Carbide 400R, BitFenix Shinobi...

Motherboard: [url=http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-054-AK]Asrock Z68 Extreme4 Gen3 Intel Z68

Click to expand...

I have one of those and it's more than fine.

Processer: Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz

The obvious choice

Memory: Kingston HyperX Genesis Grey 8GB (2x4GB)

I have that memory as well as the CPU and motherboard, and it's all working fine at 4.4 -> 4.6GHz.

Graphics Card: Asus GeForce GTX 560Ti

Good card. Some people don't like Asus (RMA mostly). Can't say personally, but I had good luck with a MSI 560ti TwinFrozr II. Again, jury is still out regarding the benefit of 2GB graphics cards. I have two 6950 2GB.

Sound Card (this will be used with some turtle beeches): None due to the beeches via USB

yup.

Harddrive: Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB SATA 6Gb/s

Expensive, but given the prices of HDD's, why not. If you can, leave the HDD and re-use one of yours, if it is SATA-compatible.

CD Drive: LG BH10LS38 10x BluRay-RW

I would suggest a retail BluRay drive, so you have some software to play Blurays (Is this still a valid point, or software now availble freely, a-la VideoLan?).

PSU: Corsair Enthusiast Series TX850M High Performance 850W

Decent PSU. These are re-badged older generation Corsairs TX, which were fine, and made modular.

Network Card: None due to being onboard my mobo.

Yes, no need for that, unless you want wireless. The Motherboard comes with XFast LAN drivers, which give you more control over the bandwidth and stuff. Never touched it, but doesn't seem to cause problems anyway.

Cooler: for potential overclocking, dual cards: **B Grade** Gelid Tranquillo CPU Cooler

This is a CPU cooler. I would not bother with B-Grade coolers, and get a full retail cooler with the warranty still intact. The Gelid is a good cooler. There are a few very good budget coolers available.

Will the case be big enough for all these parts, will any of them conflict?

As I was saying, the case is not adequate

If you want SLI / Crossfire, I would recommend a Raven RV03. Great airflow for busy rigs.

EDIT : if you use Chrome, click on the link in my sig for a cool extension.

olivier renault · 31 Dec 2011 at 10:17

MalakiUK said:
Also, if i wanted to use a hdd from my old PC as a secondary storage device, is there anything i need to look for? or do hdd's all run the same connectors.

Nope. Old HDD's can use PATA (IDE) connectors, which are deprecated and not supported by modern motherboards. You will need a SATA drive, and for the HDD power, molex or SATA power should be fine either way (I had an old drive that was SATA but still used a molex for the power). If it is an external DATA drive, you may be able to find a hard drive enclosure still supporting IDE connectors, and use your old IDE drive like that, although my guess is, they don't exist anymore, and / or are very slow.

Also if this had windows xp on it, what would i need to do if im installing Windows 7 on my new hdd/rig. Is it just a case of installing thenew OS on the older HDD? Im thinking this is a stupid question >.<

Win 7 is recommended. Although Win 8 in the horizon? And yes, it's just a matter of putting the OS CD in, and installing on the new hard drive. If you install on the old hard drive, you will most likely need a format, and that will erase all the data, so back it up (online, using a USB stick, burning DVDs...).

If someone doesnt mind me bugging them, can they add me to MSN, might be better than me spamming nonsense on the forum.

I prefer forums, and I don't have MSN (sorry!).

some walkthrough videos for building a computer. Just as an hint, best ask directly to be sure.

Doomedspeed · 31 Dec 2011 at 10:19

I put a little spec together:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Asus GeForce GTX 560Ti DirectCU II 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £169.99
1 x Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - OEM £161.99
1 x MSI Z68A-GD65-G3 Intel Z68 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £149.98
1 x Crucial RealSSD M4 64GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive (CT064M4SSD2) £87.98
1 x BeQuiet Pure Power L8 730W '80 Plus Bronze' Modular Power Supply - With 120mm Silent Wing Fan Built in £79.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB SATA 6Gb/s 16MB Cache - OEM (ST500DM002) £71.99
1 x Samsung SH-B123L/RSBP 12x BluRay ROM / DVDRW DL & RAM Lightscribe SATA-II Optical Drive - Black (Retail) £54.98
1 x BitFenix Shinobi Gaming Case - Black £48.98
1 x Crucial Ballistix Sport 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C10 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (BL2KIT51264BA160A) £34.99
1 x Corsair A50 High-Performance CPU Cooler (Socket AM2/AM3/LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366) £29.99
Total : £905.87 (includes shipping : £12.50).

Does this seem about right?

I have made sure the case can fit all of the components in. The PSU will be enough to handle GTX560ti SLI. (by the way, Xfire is using 2 AMD Graphics cards, where as SLI uses to Nvidia Graphics cards).

I would get rid of the Blu-ray drive if you don't need it. It will have you £35.

You can re-use your old HDD, aslong as it is SATA and not IDE. You can install it, even with XP on. Aslong as you use your Win7 drive as your Boot drive. This can be set-up in the BIOS.

I put you an SSD in, to use as a boot drive, will make thing SO much faster.

MalakiUK · 31 Dec 2011 at 12:11

I have no idea how the list youve put up compares the parts i listed so can only take your word for it lol

Am i right in thinking that the reason for the SSD is that booting up windows will be a lot faster and using the normal HDD as storage device for games/movies e.t.c?

How will this fare graphics-wise? what should i be expecting to run and at what level? for instance would this run the old republic on highest settings or medium e.t.c

Thanks for all the input guys, i know you must get these questions daily >.<

skylineboy · 31 Dec 2011 at 12:49

About right the spec. Although case wise is personal preference so have a look around. Do you need bluray?

The SSD will provide great performance for OS and other small programmes. I was so impressed I'm adding a bigger drive to my pc.

My runs the game at max settings no sweat so you would be looking at near max I would think.

Doomedspeed · 31 Dec 2011 at 13:09

MalakiUK said:
Thanks for all the input guys, i know you must get these questions daily >.<

Thats what we are here for.

Yes, the GTX 560ti will play most games on the highest settings. Though it does depend on what resolution you play at. It will handle near enough anything at 1680 x 1050, which is what i play at.

Is that spec within your price range?

MalakiUK · 31 Dec 2011 at 13:38

I dont really have a price range per-se, im gooing to be buying a bit a month pretty much. the smaller, less expensive stuff will bought in 1 go, but ill buy the processor 1 month and the mobo the next, if you get my meaning. Blu-ray isnt mandatory, so can be swapped for a normal cd/dvd writer. Been looking at some cases, would quite like one with an acrylic window

again, thanks for the help guys

atomic7431 · 31 Dec 2011 at 14:46

buying month by month is fine and i totally understand why but, imo you should leave the cpu and mobo until last and try and buy those together as that way your not buying them now and thinking in a few months time `oh there now only x pounds and i could have saved x, or i could have bought a better cpu for the same monies now` everyone will have there own opinions but thats just my 2 cents

good luck with it all its good fun so enjoy

Doomedspeed · 31 Dec 2011 at 15:23

Its best to buy everything in one go. By June time We will have Ivybridge (new intel CPU's) and the new AMD and Nvidia GPU's out.

Now you know your budget is about £900-£1000 it may be best to put £100-£200 a month aside. Then come here for a spec!

skylineboy · 31 Dec 2011 at 15:26

Doomedspeed said:
Its best to buy everything in one go. By June time We will have Ivybridge (new intel CPU's) and the new AMD and Nvidia GPU's out.

Now you know your budget is about £900-£1000 it may be best to put £100-£200 a month aside. Then come here for a spec!

I agree. But the RAM, case and DVD RW etc could be bought sooner as these won't really fluctuate much (based on my crystal ball) but with new tech due when you will start building, you may as well wait and save.

MalakiUK · 31 Dec 2011 at 15:43

Cool, thanks for the input folks! Ill see whats what and keep you updated