Please check this before I buy

Petestorm

Petestorm

Petestorm

Associate
Joined
16 Jan 2009
Posts
7
I am about to build my 2nd Gaming pc and would appreciate any advice and opinions from you experts before I spend the money.

My budget is £1000, it will be primarily for games and I have a 22" monitor.

This is what I have chosen

Sapphire ATI Radeon HD 4850 X2 2048MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - Retail (11139-00-40) £259

Intel Core 2 Duo E8500 LGA775 'Wolfdale' 3.16GHz (1333FSB) - Retail £139

Asus P5Q Pro Intel P45 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £96.99

Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium SP1 64-Bit - OEM (66I-01939) £76.99

OCZ GameXStream 700w Silent SLI Ready ATX2 Power Supply £69.99

Coolermaster CM-690 Dominator Case - Black (No PSU) £55.99

OCZ 4GB (2x2GB) PC2-8500C5 1066MHz Dual Channel Platinum Series DDR2 (OCZ2P10664GK) X2 £99.98 (8GB)

Scythe Kaze-Master 5.25" Fan Controller - Black £29.99

Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775) £17.99

Samsung SH-S222A/BEBE 22x DVD±RW IDE Dual Layer Rewriter (Black) £13.99

I am most interested to hear what you think of the case and the power supply and if I am likely to need extension cables for it.

Thanks in advance for helping me out.
 
The graphics card is overkill for a 22" monitor. A 4870 would easily be enough.

Ditch the terrible OCZ psu. Poor build quality and high ripple makes it a bad choice. Try one of these instead:-

Zalman ZM600-HP

PC Power and Cooling Silencer 610. Not modular though.

600w is more than enough for that rig even with the X2.

I found that Samsung DVDRW to be very noisey. The LG is much quieter.

I would go for a better cooler if you are going to clock it. Something like the TRUE or Tuniq Tower. If you want to stick with something like the Freezer 7 Pro then go for the much cheaper but equally as good Akasa AK-965.

Personally i hate that style of case. The Coolermaster/Antec 300/900/1200 style just looks cheap and tacky to me. If it was me i would be looking at a Silverstone or Lian li. Cases are personal though and it's really only the buyer who can decide.

What about hard drives? The Samsung Spinpoint F1 320/640/1TB and Western Digital AAKS 320/640/1TB drives are the ones to go for at the moment.
 
Thanks for the advice I'll change to a Zalman PSU as recommended

Will a single HD4870 be enough to run games maxed out for the next year or so?

Thanks
 
pastymuncher said:
Personally i hate that style of case. The Coolermaster/Antec 300/900/1200 style just looks cheap and tacky to me. If it was me i would be looking at a Silverstone or Lian li. Cases are personal though and it's really only the buyer who can decide.
Click to expand...

yep, cases are personal, I quite like the coolermaster range especially considering their price. Granted, the 590 (for example) might not have the polish that a Lian Li might have but then again it is much cheaper. Depends on your budget (or maybe Im saying this because I just bought a 590!) :p
 
Any more advice please before I take the plunge.
I've noticed that I could build a i7 system for not much more money, would you recommend that instead for gaming?
 
No i wouldnt say the i7 is worth it really, not for gaming
Re: PSU, theres a few people on this forum knocking OCZ at moment, and I dont understand why, according to this review by techreport (who are very well respected btw) its just as good as the Zalman and came joint 2nd in their roundup, only behind the PC P&C
 
Last edited:
Thanks for the advice I'm amazed at how much time I,ve spent looking at reviews etc and trying to decide what to buy. I,ve forgotten what its like to actually play a damn game.
I can see why people end up going for an Alienware set up where the works done for you.
 
lol, yeah but you pay through the nose for alienware and its still not as good as doing it yourself, if youre serious about not having the time/effort to do a selfbuild i'd recomend one of OcUK's systems as theyre very good, customisable and tend to use high quality branded components, though imo you should still do it yourself ;)
 
Ok once and for all please put me out of my misery is my spec good for playing far cry 2 or crysis etc on high settings or if you have a better spec for £1000 max please let me know so I can quit looking and build the thing.
 
If you shop around, trading that CPU, mobo and RAM for i7 will set you back as little as on extra £200. I'd go i7, but obviously up to you.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom