Please check this build over/critique

Sifal

Sifal

Sifal

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31 May 2012
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16
I'm fairly new to PC building, have only ever done upgrades etc.
Here is a build I have come up with, I may game a little but it is mainly for Photoshop and similar. I run two monitors and at any given point I may be batch processing large PS files and raw files, playing media, several Chrome tabs open, email open etc etc all at the same time and I need this computer to do it all without blinking and whilst also being nearly silent.
The only thing missing off the list are some aftermarket fans but thats just because Overclockers are currently out of Noctua stock. Suggest an alternative fan? (silence important)
Couple of particular questions:
1) do I need such a large and expensive aftermarket cooler over something like a £50 BeQuiet.
2) Is the power supply more than sufficient? I may add watercooling in the future.
3) was thinking about a scratch disc for photoshop but not sure if it'll ever get used by Photoshop if I've got 32GB RAM!?


YOUR BASKET
1 x Asus HD 7950 TOP 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card - AMD 3 for FREE Promotion £323.99
1 x Kingston HyperX 3K SSD 240GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Drive (SH103S3/240G) £199.99
1 x AMD Bulldozer FX-8 Eight Core 8150 Black Edition 3.60Ghz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail with FREE Deus Ex & Dirt Showdown PC Games £184.99
1 x Asus Sabertooth 990FX AMD 990FX (Socket AM3+) DDR3 Motherboard £126.00
2 x Corsair Vengeance Low Profile 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C10 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CML16GX3M2A1600C10) £109.99 (£219.98)
1 x Akasa Venom 750w Modular '80 Plus' Power Supply £79.99
1 x Fractal Design Define R3 Midi Tower Case - Arctic White £79.99
1 x Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 64-Bit - OEM (GFC-02050) £79.98
1 x Noctua NH-D14 Dual Radiator CPU Cooler (Socket LGA1366/LGA1156/LGA1155/LGA775/AM2/AM2) £72.98
1 x Sony Optiarc AD-7280S 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £19.99
Total : £1,404.40 (includes shipping : £13.75).



Thank you very much for the help.
 
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wow what a build, that should definately be able to cope with anything you throw at it a bit of browsing and photoshop now problem and batch processing yes it will be able to cope but just one suggestion have you considered going for intel? like an i7 3770k it's a lot better than the bulldoser and would be faster especially if your doing batch processing? as for fans i'll take a look
 
Thanks for the reply.
I have an OCD like draw towards AMD because I've always had their chips but I could "live" with an I7 so long as it didn't increase the overall price and/or was cooler and thus quieter.
Perhaps I could save money on the graphics card (the 7950 is prob overkill for Photoshop CS6)?
 
Also, I'm unlikely to ever overclock so would a i7 3770 be better value? Does the "k" just mean unlocked. I do like that the Ivybridge chip is only 77W!
 
Sifal said:
Thanks for the reply.
I have an OCD like draw towards AMD because I've always had their chips but I could "live" with an I7 so long as it didn't increase the overall price and/or was cooler and thus quieter.
Perhaps I could save money on the graphics card (the 7950 is prob overkill for Photoshop CS6)?
Click to expand...

Sifal said:
Also, I'm unlikely to ever overclock so would a i7 3770 be better value? Does the "k" just mean unlocked. I do like that the Ivybridge chip is only 77W!
Click to expand...

yes the 7970 is a bit overkill give me a sec and i will get you links but yes the i7 3770k is faster i dont know about quieter it might be if you buy the right fan and the k just means it has built in graphics the 3770s doesnt but it has a slower clock speed so the 3770 k is better it comes stock at 3.5ghz but with intel turbo technology it can be 3.9ghz give me a sec and i will give you links
 
Graphics card http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-123-MS&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=1752 this will do rightly and you will still be able to game if you wish
CPU: http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-403-IN&groupid=701&catid=6&subcat=567
motherboard: http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-390-GI&groupid=701&catid=5&subcat=2261

that comes to a total of 584.98 whereas the cpu, motherboard and graphics card you chose came to 649.28 saving you £64.30 so it is cheaper and the i7 is definately much better than the bulldoser
 
Thanks for the replies and links, you're an absolute gent.

I've heard that 69xx series cards are very loud?
What's The difference between the mobo chipsets seeing as they can be the same socket type?

Sorry for all the questions, just want to make sure I'm spending 1.5k correctly
 
Sifal said:
Thanks for the replies and links, you're an absolute gent.

I've heard that 69xx series cards are very loud?
What's The difference between the mobo chipsets seeing as they can be the same socket type?

Sorry for all the questions, just want to make sure I'm spending 1.5k correctly
Click to expand...

no problem i am very happy to help, gives me something to do.

the msi card is 37db which is quite wuiet considering when you in bed at night with everything off the room is at 30dbs (googled it) you shouldnt hear a lot of noise just the general noise of a pc

and the the different chipsets just have different features for example the z68 series is or was for sandybridge cpus (there is a bios update that allows you to use them with ivybridge cpus but you require a sandybridge cpu to install it in the first place) and then the Z77 was made for the new ivybridge cpus

and as for the questions thank you for them it gets me more posts and as i said i a very happy to help
 
Hope this helps, my £0.02!

- i7-3770K has much more processing power for things like rendering, Photoshop, etc. (see review here)
- SSD is cheaper and is near enough on par in terms of performance to the Kingston, this part is debatable tbh.. (see review here)
- The GTX 670 for a little bit more money, this card performs a lot better than a 7950 and also has a quiet after-market cooler. (see review here)
- 16GB of this well reviewed Samsung Green RAM is good stuff, I don't think Photoshop/rendering would notice 32GB (but I'm not a Photoshopper) - if you know it will benefit then double up on this and get 32GB of it instead! :)
- The PSU is more than powerful enough for this whole rig and will happily take water-cooling if you opt for this at a later date.
- The Antec 920 water cooler is geared towards the silence you are after and cools very well.

YOUR BASKET
1 x Palit GeForce GTX 670 Jetstream 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £349.99
1 x Intel Core i7-3770K 3.50GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £274.99
1 x Samsung 256GB SSD 830 Notebook/Apple Series SATA 6Gb/s KIT with Norton Ghost - (MZ-7PC256N/EU) £153.95
1 x Samsung Green 16GB (4x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz 30nm Dual/Quad Channel Kit (MV-3V4G3D/US) £113.98
1 x Gigabyte Z77X-D3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £109.99
1 x OCZ ZT 650W '80 Plus Bronze' Modular Power Supply £79.99
1 x Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 64-Bit - OEM (GFC-02050) £79.98
1 x Antec Kúhler H2O 920 High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler (LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366/AM2/AM2+/AM2+/AM3+) £74.99
1 x Corsair Carbide 300R Mid Tower Case - Black £53.99
1 x Samsung SH-S222BB/BEBE 22x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £18.98
Total : £1,310.83 (includes shipping : FREE).

 
You are limited to 16GB (including Vram) with home premium.

But yeah, Intel makes more sense, as does the 670.

Noctua is a good cooler. I prefer it to the H2O 920.

Sparx's build is what I'd go for (something similar anyway).

If you thinking of full water cooling, the 300R isn't really suitable. Personally, I'd stick with air. Perfectly fine to get decent overclocks. Fractal R3 is a good quiet case and will take the Noctua and 670.
 
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olivier renault said:
You are limited to 16GB (including Vram) with home premium.

But yeah, Intel makes more sense, as does the 670.

Noctua is a good cooler. I prefer it to the H2O 920.

Sparx's build is what I'd go for (something similar anyway).
Click to expand...

good point forgot about the 16gb limit although does he really need a 670? if it just for photoshop and maybe a bit of gaming a 6970 should suffice?
 
I know about the 16gb roof on windows 7 sorry I should have said. I have a code (legal and official) for Windows 7 Ultimate but in order to install it I need to get on a browser, hence getting an oem 7 premium disc. It's annoying really cos I don't have to pay for Windows at all if their was a way to install ultimate directly. Is there such a thing as a windows 7 trial disc?
Is the big Noctua cooler 3 pin or pwm? If 3 pin then I'll also need a fan controller with auto adjustment.
 
Is the big Noctua cooler 3 pin or pwm? If 3 pin then I'll also need a fan controller with auto adjustment.
Click to expand...

The Noctua is 3-pin. There is a version with PWM for 2011 sockets (SB-E). The NH-D14 for 1155 socket comes with an adapter that lets you select 7 / 12 volts. Usually people run it on 7 volts with the adapter.

You also have the Thermalright SilverArrow, and the Phanteks with similar performance (and they are PWM). These two requires cases with a bit more space. The HAF-X should work with any, but you can look around to see what fits in what.

The K2 isn't quite as good as the Noctuas, but good enough for most. The BeQuiet DarkRock's are also good, and a bit below the K2. All of these are considered 'quiet'.

I would also consider the Thermalright True Black / CNPS10X Flex / Prolimatech Megahalem Heatsinks, with a couple of good quiet fans. I really considered those my options when I decided to go for the MUX 120 that was on offer (around £25 iirc), which is a less performant version of the Trus Spirit / True Black, and still got my 2500K at 4.4GHZ around 65C. To give you an idea OCUK uses megahalems with sharkoon Silent Eagle fans in their bundles, which is a good combination.

Thermalrights are very quiet, very good quality coolers. Also The VenomousX, and the Thermalright True Spirit 120 which would be my choice for a cheap cooler that will let you overclock a Ivy around 4.2-4.4GHz.

I know about the 16gb roof on windows 7 sorry I should have said. I have a code (legal and official) for Windows 7 Ultimate but in order to install it I need to get on a browser, hence getting an oem 7 premium disc. It's annoying really cos I don't have to pay for Windows at all if their was a way to install ultimate directly. Is there such a thing as a windows 7 trial disc?
Click to expand...

Can you download on another machine, and burn a DVD / make a bootable USB? Or use some other OS (ubuntu)? Which you will have to download anyway :)
 
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Sifal said:
I know about the 16gb roof on windows 7 sorry I should have said. I have a code (legal and official) for Windows 7 Ultimate but in order to install it I need to get on a browser, hence getting an oem 7 premium disc. It's annoying really cos I don't have to pay for Windows at all if their was a way to install ultimate directly. Is there such a thing as a windows 7 trial disc?
Is the big Noctua cooler 3 pin or pwm? If 3 pin then I'll also need a fan controller with auto adjustment.
Click to expand...

you could download an illegal version of windows and then use the code you have because the ultimate code you have is legal just a suggestion it would save you a little bit of money
 
Hmmm, doing the maths, there isn't that much between a an 'extreme' 3820 and a 'high end' 3770K build anyway. SB-E gives you the option for IB-E later, but that will surely be quite expensive. Either will work for you.

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i7-3820 3.60GHz (Sandybridge-E) Socket LGA2011 Processor - Retail £239.99
1 x Gigabyte X79-UD5 Intel X79 (Socket 2011) DDR3 Motherboard £229.99
2 x Samsung Green 16GB (4x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz 30nm Dual/Quad Channel Kit (MV-3V4G3D/US) £113.98 (227.96)
1 x Thermalright Silver Arrow CPU Cooler (Socket LGA1366/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA775/AM2/AM3) £69.98
Total : £779.32 (includes shipping : £9.50).




YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i7-3770K 3.50GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £274.99
1 x Gigabyte Z77X-UD5H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £161.99
2 x Corsair Vengeance Low Profile 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C10 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CML16GX3M2A1600C10) £109.99 (219.98)
1 x Thermalright Silver Arrow CPU Cooler (Socket LGA1366/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA775/AM2/AM3) £69.98
Total : £738.95 (includes shipping : £10.00).



The IB-E CPU upgrade you would have to consider to make it worthwhile would cost almost the same as the whole system up there. I'm not sure it is something you are considering. If upgradability isn't an option, I would go 3770K.
 
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olivier renault said:
Hmmm, doing the maths, there isn't that much between a an 'extreme' 3820 and a 'high end' 3770K build anyway. SB-E gives you the option for IB-E later, but that will surely be quite expensive. Either will work for you.

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i7-3820 3.60GHz (Sandybridge-E) Socket LGA2011 Processor - Retail £239.99
1 x Gigabyte X79-UD5 Intel X79 (Socket 2011) DDR3 Motherboard £229.99
2 x Samsung Green 16GB (4x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz 30nm Dual/Quad Channel Kit (MV-3V4G3D/US) £113.98 (227.96)
1 x Thermalright Silver Arrow CPU Cooler (Socket LGA1366/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA775/AM2/AM3) £69.98
Total : £779.32 (includes shipping : £9.50).




YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i7-3770K 3.50GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £274.99
1 x Gigabyte Z77X-UD5H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £161.99
2 x Corsair Vengeance Low Profile 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C10 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CML16GX3M2A1600C10) £109.99 (219.98)
1 x Thermalright Silver Arrow CPU Cooler (Socket LGA1366/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA775/AM2/AM3) £69.98
Total : £738.95 (includes shipping : £10.00).



The IB-E CPU upgrade you would have to consider to make it worthwhile would cost almost the same as the whole system up there. I'm not sure it is something you are considering. If upgradability isn't an option, I would go 3770K.
Click to expand...

the 3820 is actually a worse processor it benchmarks less than the 3770k
 
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