Self Build Concerns

Insanity said:
EDIT: I noticed your cooling concern, i dunno about anybody else, but if you're going for a socket 939 setup, i found the stock coolers on these to be an absolute pig to attach to the motherboard. Mine took a lot of force, anger won over in the end and everything clicked into place finally.

Hopefully you wont have that issue, but if you do, just know that the board/heatsink assembly can take more abuse than you'd think... well in my case anyway. :D
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your not joking, i was purple with steam coming out of my ears and the stupid thing still wouldn't lock into place.... took me ages to attach it, was worth it in the end. Did my first build in april and I would never ever buy off the shelf again. I priced the system i have against what i could get in the shops and self building saved anywhere from 3 to six hundred quid :eek:

Apart from the sense of achievment, the best thing has to be having the confidence to solve/diagnose problems, not that there has been anything major.

Build your own now and you'll never look back
 
I love self builds, been doing it for years, my first self build was a 16mhz 80286 computer :).

If this is your first self build, resist all temptations to start overclocking it. Run everything at stock speeds (although sometimes you have to set bios to avoid underclocking... but thats less common now than in the past some P4 Northwood 2.4's would detect as 1.8's)

£1500 will get you a kick ass computer, to avoid buying incompatible parts make the choice of stuff you like, and then post here and if there are any problems someone will sort you out.

Once you have made your decision for parts, stick with your choices, if you 'want' an Intel Core 2 processor, and some people say why not get an AMD you can build a cheaper system, maybe they would be right (maybe not), but it wont be the spec you wanted to build.

Of course if you see a really compelling argument and you agree with an alternate choice of products nothing wrong with that either.

Look forward to reading your wish list :) Have fun building.

Dont forget to get a proper cooling system sorted. Seen some people building self builds, with not a single case fan, and an Prescott CPU. Bad bad combination :)

Regarding Anti Static protection, some people have dry skin, others have oily skin... Some people seem to generate a ton of static, others seem to discharge easily to earth. So some people can slap a computer together on their beds and never had a single problem.

Personally I would recommend caution, build the computer on a clean and tidy work area, fit the PSU to the computers case, and then (after checking PSU is set to 230V if it has a selection switch on it), plug it into the mains, with the switch on the wall turned OFF.

Every time you want to pick up a componant, (cpu/ram/mobo/graphics anything really) touch the case for a moment which will discharge your body of any potential static.

This costs you just a few seconds of time, and decreases any risk. Sure the risk of damage may be 'low' but why put any risk at all on your new investment of hardware.

If your the kinda guy who walks around shops unable to touch metal doors/stairs/lifts without getting a zap, or get a zap every time you get out of a car etc etc, then buy a cheap antistatic mat. Dunno if OcUK stock those, but if you feel more comfortable using one, then dont let people tell you its a waste of time.

The guy who builds his computers on the bed, he's probably one of the lucky ones who naturally discharges, or his house is naturally low on static etc.
 
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Well atm I want a Conroe CPU and probably a 7950 but I belive ive read that there arent currently any mother boards which support the two together?
 
Proper SLI (IE 2x7900GTX) will be harder than a single 7950 single slot SLI solution. Im sure your in a hurry, but if you can wait a few days until after a few of the more experienced self builders have got their systems together you'll probably have a better idea of which board to get to support a 7950.

Intel D975XBX Intel 975X (bios 1073 or newer) for instance supports conroe and Geforce 7950, although the intel boards dont have so many overclocking options, they are nice stable boards. (this is according to Nvidia's own website) This is intel's idea of an 'Enthusiasts' board. And its sold by OcUK :)
 
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Given this is my first build nice and stable sounds good to me, and im not gonna rush this cos the last thingI want to do is screw up. :)
 
There will also be a 'new' Nvidia SLI motherboard chipset coming out soon after Core 2's launch, dont know when they will be in stock, but they will naturally support both Conroe, and SLI with 7950's, or dual 7900's. So plenty to look at.

Expensive chips like Core 2 X6800 sure are sweet, and very fast, but work out for yourself if you feel its worth twice the price for just a very small increase in clock speed 2.9 V 2.67 of the next model down.
 
Is that all you get for the extra £340ish ? :o Ill admit im normaly one for spending for the sake of it but even I find it hard to spend that much for such a small gain.

Anyway lots of ideas swirling around my head now, as soon as I decide if I want to go for a 7950 or 2x x1900s ill post some sort of a wish list. :) Seriosly thanks for all this help guys.
 
shimy182 said:
dont know if anyone has said but...

getting a propper kit will help a lot with these sort of things.
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Propper kit? :) do you mean the right tools? if so ive access to a lot of tools but if there are any which are almost if not totaly PC specific could anyone point them out to me?
 
yeah. i mean right tools.

right size screw drivers to start off with. might be a good idea to consider anti static electricity equipments.

skin tight gloves, tweezers for emergency use, champaign might be another good thing.
 
Ok this is my first attempt at a spec andi m sure theres a lot wrong with it but here we go.

REFERENCE DESCRIPTION QUANTITY PRICE COST
CP-129-IN Intel Core 2 DUO E6700 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.67GHz (1066FSB) - Retail (CP-129-IN) 1
£349.95 £349.95
MB-152-AS Asus P5W DH Deluxe WiFi (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard (MB-152-AS) 1
£149.95 £149.95
CA-068-LL Lian-Li PC-S80 Silver Aluminium Full Tower Case (CA-068-LL) 1
£148.95 £148.95
SC-036-CL Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Platinum - Retail (SC-036-CL) 1
£104.95 £104.95
MY-013-GS G.Skill 2GB DDR2 HZ PC2-6400 (2x1GB) CAS4 Dual Channel Kit (F2-6400PHU2-2GBHZ) (MY-013-GS) 1
£147.95 £147.95
GX-045-CO ATI Radeon X1900 ***Crossfire Edition*** 512MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-045-CO) 1
£254.95 £254.95
GX-052-HT HIS Excalibur ATI Radeon X1900 XT-X ICEQ 3 SILENT Heatpipe 512MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-052-HT) 1
£299.95 £299.95
HS-003-SY Scythe Ninja Plus Heatpipe CPU Cooler (Socket 478, 754, 939, 940, LGA755) (HS-003-SY) 1
£26.95 £26.95
HD-069-WD Western Digital Raptor 150GB WD1500ADFD 10,000RPM SATA 16MB Cache - OEM (HD-069-WD) 2
£157.50 £315.00
FG-024-AK Akasa AK-183-L2B Ultra Quiet 120mm Fan - 3 pin (FG-024-AK) 1
£9.95 £9.95
CA-001-SK FSP Sparkle FX700-GLN Epsilon 700W ATX2.0 PSU (CA-001-SK) 1
£95.50 £95.50
CD-030-NE NEC ND4570 16x16 DVD±RW Dual Layer ReWriter (Black) - OEM (CD-030-NE) 1
£21.95 £21.95
OS-002-MS Microsoft Windows XP Professional Edition inc. SP2 - OEM - 1Pk (E85-04026) (OS-002-MS) 1
£81.95 £81.95
AC-000-AC Arctic Silver 5 Thermal Compound (3.5g) (AC-000-AC) 1
£5.95 £5.95
CB-000-WD Western Digital Secure Connect Serial ATA Cable (CB-000-WD) 2
£4.95 £9.90
Subtotal £2,023.80
Shipping (City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)) £14.95
VAT £356.79
Total £2,395.5
 
The Asus boards are good, but there is a chance of getting an older incompatible bios with that board, which would prevent a Core 2 from booting up on it.

Hopefully that problem will be resolved soon, but as a first time builder, Im not sure you'll want to build up the system just to learn you need a socket 775 Pentium processor to install just to reflash the motherboard bios ;(.

Going crossfire isnt a bad idea if your after top performance, as the high end intel 975x boards are 'setup' for crossfire, whereas nvidia sli needs a hack.

Im not sure that the x1900xt-x with higher memory clocks will give much performance improvement over an x1900xt as the slave card, and thats a few pounds cheaper.

Approve of your choice of Conroe, for a first build, that will offer stellar performance without any overclocking, but without the mad price premium of the Extreme.

The E6700 will come with a retail heatsink from intel. This is the same heatsink/fan as they supply with their toasty hot Pentium-D's. However as Core 2 is much cooler, it should be able to keep the chip cool with a very low fan speed. I've read one review which showed the stock heatsink keeping the chip below 45 degrees at full load, and a almost room temperature 25 degrees when idle with speedstep activated. A bigger heatsink may well be overkill, and you probably wont hear the cpu fan over the crossfire rig anyway.
 
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Well I wasnt sure how crossfire worked as the X1900 XT-X had a warning in the details that said it needed a master card? and the only card I saw which was listed as a master card was the cheaper card.
 
Thats the only 'master' card that OcUK offer. Not even sure what other options there are. If your running a single card, then obviously getting the best single card is going to give a good boost in performance. Im just not convinced that its really worth getting a slave card thats only 'mildly' faster than the master card, with a fairly high price difference.

While crossfire doesnt much around with the clock rates of the card, I doubt you'll find much performance difference between the XT-X and the XT when running in the crossfire config. The crossfire will be very fast anyway, so the extra 70 odd pounds isnt going to give much improvement imho. Mebee someone who already has crossfire will be able to shed more light on this one, as im just guessing :)

That other card only "needs" a master card if you run it as Crossfire. You can still plug it in 'alone' for a single GPU solution, and not bother with the master at all. Its just you cant buy two slave cards and get crossfire out of it.
 
The Lian Li S80 may not be the best choice of case, very very nice case but I am spending another £80 on it to replace fans to get the noise down on it, the stock fans are dire.

Lovely case though, it is not one for super low temperatures however.
 
Which case would be better then? also how hard would it be to make a 7950 work on that mother board or on the flip side which boards currently out or out soon will support conroe and nvidia cards? I'll be honest after having crash issues with the x800 xt pe that came in this PC I was planning to move back to Nvidia.
 
Are you planning on overclocking?

The S80 is the best case ever made, in my opinion, but I find it hard to recommend people buy it as it runs a little hot, which can worry some people but its excellent if your after silence.
 
I solved all my 'ATi' crash issued by turning off VPU recovery. Works like a charm.

That aside, I would imagine that there will be bios updates, and solutions to the compatibility issues with the 7950. Already there is a bios for the 975 Bad Axe motherboard from intel, which permits both conroe and 7950's. But intel motherboards dont have so many options for overclockers.

Not enough info on the new 965 boards to know how well they will handle 7950's yet. If the asus board supports directing all 16 lans of PCIx16 to the single connector rather than 2x8 it probably already supports the 7950.

It it does, you can save some money on the PSU as well. Those ATI's use around 130watts each, the 7950 uses 150watts total, as long as you dont overclock it too far. (OC probably not the best idea on the 7950, as the first card draws its power directly from the PCI express bus, which is limited to 75 watts)
 
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