Self build - help please

Jody

Jody

Jody

Associate
Joined
27 Dec 2007
Posts
223
Location
Lincs
Firstly id like to say hello to everyone here, Im Jody, I live in lincolnshire UK and im looking forward to learning from people here.

Im currently thinking about upgrading to a nice new RAPID pc and could do with a little advise please.

I currently have a dell 8400 3.6ghz 3ghz ram, i do quite a lot of encoding and this pc is useless for anything else whilst doing that as you are no doubt aware given the spec. I want a fast and flexible (clockable) system which is great at encoding, will let me play some games if required (but not essential), at least 5.1 sound, ddr3 capability, and just generaly very fast. I want to learn how to overclock.

Im sick of having a computer that i cant tweak with and get more speed so im gonna treat myself to one i can hopefully get to around 3.0-3.6 ghz stable, this is what ive been thinking about getting so far:

Antec p182
psu - not really sure about this
Intel core 2 quad go slacr 2.4 oem
Turniq tower 120 cooler
Mobo - (x38-maximus extreme/IP35)-unsure really
4ghz DDR2 to begin with but DDR3 capability needed
HDD- SATA2 250gb x2 (raptor maybe)
Graphics - havent a clue about this one
20x20 dvdrw lightscribe

I would like to spend around £600-700 if possible but not rigid about this, I have a monitor, mouse, keyboard, speakers etc. Do you think its wise to buy now or wait a little while?

Any suggestions greatly appreciated

Kind Regards

Jody
 
Last edited:
if you brought now
Your basket
Product Name Qty Price Line Total
Corsair HX 520W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU (CMPSU-520HXUK) £57.99
(£68.14) £57.99
(£68.14)
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 250GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (ST3250410AS) £38.99
(£45.81) £77.98
(£91.62)
Tuniq Tower 120 CPU Cooler (Socket 478/754/939/940/AM2/LGA775) £27.99
(£32.89) £27.99
(£32.89)
Intel Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient SLACR 95W Edition" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - Retail £129.99
(£152.74) £129.99
(£152.74)
HIS ATI Radeon HD 3850 Pro 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - Retail £89.99
(£105.74) £89.99
(£105.74)
OCZ 4GB (2x2GB) PC2-6400C5 Dual Channel Vista Gold Series DDR2 (OCZ2G8004GK) £64.99
(£76.36) £64.99
(£76.36)
Antec P182 Super Midi Tower Case - No PSU (Gun Metal Black) £74.99
(£88.11) £74.99
(£88.11)
Asus DRW-2014L1T 20x DVD±RW SATA Dual Layer Lightscribe ReWriter (Black/Silver) - Retail £17.99
(£21.14) £17.99
(£21.14)
Gigabyte GA-P35C-DS3R (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 & DDR3 Motherboard £61.99
(£72.84) £61.99
(£72.84)
Sub Total : £603.90
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : FREE
VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £105.68
Total : £709.58
it seems to fit your needs,
i picked 2x2GB rather then 4x1GB of ram as it will allow for better OCs and the possibilities of getting 8GB if ram if you need it.
the corsair HX520 is the most highest recommened PSU on the fourm due to its excellent performance.
i picked a p35 chipset MB as the x38 ones put you way over yoru budget.
you will have to live with onboard sound for the time being, unless you are alright with this
2x250GB drives are present as requested
i picked a 3850 as the GPU as it would allow you to game at a reasonable level of detail if you so wish.

around the corner are the penryn CPU by intel and the 9800 series graphics cards by nvidia, both are hopefully expected in q1 or q2 of next year
 
Last edited:
Hi Jodie,

I have specced the following, though i am out of touch with the latest motherboards :o

Intel Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient SLACR 95W Edition" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - Retail £129.99
(£152.74) £129.99
(£152.74) Western Digital Caviar SE16 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (WD5000AAKS) £55.99
(£65.79) £55.99
(£65.79) Corsair HX 620W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU (CMPSU-620HXUK) £74.99
(£88.11) £74.99
(£88.11) Western Digital Caviar Special Edition 160GB SATA-II 8MB Cache - OEM (WD1600AAJS) £28.99
(£34.06) £57.98
(£68.12) OcUK 4GB (2x2GB) PC2-6400C5 800MHz DDR2 Dual Channel Kit £53.99
(£63.44) £53.99
(£63.44) Pioneer DVR-212DBK 18x DVD±RW SATA Dual Layer ReWriter (Black) - OEM £17.99
(£21.14) £17.99
(£21.14) Lian-Li PC-7 PLUS II Aluminium Midi-Tower Case - Black £49.99
(£58.74) £49.99
(£58.74) Tuniq Tower 120 CPU Cooler (Socket 478/754/939/940/AM2/LGA775) £27.99
(£32.89) £27.99
(£32.89) OcUK GeForce 8600 GT 256MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £45.99
(£54.04) £45.99
(£54.04) Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3R (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £64.99
(£76.36) £64.99
(£76.36) Sub Total : £579.89 Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : FREE VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £101.48 Total : £681.37

CPU - Best bang for buck, and quad core for encoding.
Hard Drives - 2x 160gb single platter WD drives for RAID0 - encoding is hdd intensive, and a 500gb for storage.
PSU - Top notch PSU
Memory - Fast enough for a good overclock, cheap enough - no need for DDR3 for a few years yet - by the time its any good, the rest of the system will need upgrading anyway.
Motherboard - Not sure on this one tbh
GPU - Sufficient (IMO) if you arent a hardcore gamer, and can put up with lower settings.
Case - Personal preference, but IMO this is a FAR superior case to the antec.

Hope this is some food for thought.
 
Hi Jody and welcome to the forums:D music, media, photo storage ect. Do you require firewire? Do you require a monitor?
 
Last edited:
Hi Jody,

I'm actually a new customer to OcUK but an experienced Pc builder.

quote your spec:
"Antec p182
psu - not really sure about this
Intel core 2 quad go slacr 2.4 oem
Turniq tower 120 cooler
Mobo - (x38-maximus extreme/IP35)-unsure really
4ghz DDR2 to begin with but DDR3 capability needed
HDD- SATA2 250gb x2 (raptor maybe)
Graphics - havent a clue about this one
20x20 dvdrw lightscribe"

CASE: good choice of case, plenty of room inside, screwless, easy to navigate around. you may need extension cables for the power, but with a bit of twiddling around, its a very favourable case.

PSU: If your looking at a relatively high-end machine then i'd buy a mid-high end PSU. i'd say 500watt to 850watt perhaps.

CPU: I dont think you can go wrong with any of the Intel based quad core cpu's, their all good and Intel have come a long way with their technologies. You'll also find that most applications are primarily designed around Intel based machines.

CPU Cooler: quite adequate for the cpu you've chosen

M/Board: Great choice of board and is suitable for the CPU you've chosen. this board also supports DDR3.

Hard-Drive: with out a doubt choose Raptor if you have the need for speed. maybe look at 2 x 150gb raptors if you looking to spend a bit of money, its a great investment.

RAM: Seriously look at getting DDR3 if your budget can stretch to this, OcUK have an offer on at the moment so you might be able to pick up a bargain.

Graphics: I understand you MAY want to play games, look at the NVIDIA type 8600's or 8800's for decent speedy graphics. probably looking at prices anywhere between £90 - £300. pick one that fits into your budget between this range.

DVDRW: You cant go wrong with LightScribe technology and 20x/20x is plenty of speed if your writing your own discs.

Theres not much else that I'd recommend other than getting an Audigy 2 or X-Fi sound card for great quality sound.

oh yeah and I'd buy now, technology moves very fast from month to month and you can never keep up with it so theres no time like the present!


hope this helps, Have a happy new year :D
 
Hi, and thanks for the reply

What is the main disadvantage of this mobo compared to x38? i could go to x38 pricewise should it be worthwhile doing so.

How good would this setup be? would you make any mods to it?
 
Recommendations 4u

Hi Jody,

I'm actually a new customer to OcUK but an experienced Pc builder.

quote your spec:
"Antec p182
psu - not really sure about this
Intel core 2 quad go slacr 2.4 oem
Turniq tower 120 cooler
Mobo - (x38-maximus extreme/IP35)-unsure really
4ghz DDR2 to begin with but DDR3 capability needed
HDD- SATA2 250gb x2 (raptor maybe)
Graphics - havent a clue about this one
20x20 dvdrw lightscribe"

CASE: good choice of case, plenty of room inside, screwless, easy to navigate around. you may need extension cables for the power, but with a bit of twiddling around, its a very favourable case.

PSU: If your looking at a relatively high-end machine then i'd buy a mid-high end PSU. i'd say 500watt to 850watt perhaps.

CPU: I dont think you can go wrong with any of the Intel based quad core cpu's, their all good and Intel have come a long way with their technologies. You'll also find that most applications are primarily designed around Intel based machines.

CPU Cooler: quite adequate for the cpu you've chosen

M/Board: Great choice of board and is suitable for the CPU you've chosen. this board also supports DDR3.

Hard-Drive: with out a doubt choose Raptor if you have the need for speed. maybe look at 2 x 150gb raptors if you looking to spend a bit of money, its a great investment.

RAM: Seriously look at getting DDR3 if your budget can stretch to this, OcUK have an offer on at the moment so you might be able to pick up a bargain.

Graphics: I understand you MAY want to play games, look at the NVIDIA type 8600's or 8800's for decent speedy graphics. probably looking at prices anywhere between £90 - £300. pick one that fits into your budget between this range.

DVDRW: You cant go wrong with LightScribe technology and 20x/20x is plenty of speed if your writing your own discs.

Theres not much else that I'd recommend other than getting an Audigy 2 or X-Fi sound card for great quality sound.

oh yeah and I'd buy now, technology moves very fast from month to month and you can never keep up with it so theres no time like the present!


hope this helps, Have a happy new year :D
 
i wouldnt make any mods to your setup, unless your willing to spend another 500 quid over your given budget, then i'd make some serious mods lol

my spec is on my signature. cost me just over £2000 :cool:
 
CyZMyAssBaby said:
Hi Jody and welcome to the forums:D

Apart from over clocking desires what else will you be using your pc for: music, media, photo storage ect. Do you require firewire? Do you require a monitor?.
Click to expand...

Exactly that and i dont even know what firewire is used for to be honest

Thanks for the reply
 
Firewire is a bit like USB, both used to transfer data, Firewire is generically used for Video transfer but benchmark tests prove that USB 2.0 is faster than Firewire.

For example.

If you buy a HDD Camcorder, you may well get a firewire cable with it to stream video to your PC.

USB = used for just about every peripheral i can think of lol
 
im sorry wizard2000 but i have to disagree on some of the comments you have made.

for RAM i would say stick with DDR2, as DDR3 is seriously overpriced and pc2-6400 ran will easily take a q6600 over 3ghz before it needs to be overclocked at all.

for a spec like that the corsair HX520 will be more that enough, some people sli 8800GTX on that PSU.

in most case a P35 chipset will be good enough as it has been proven to be good at OCing quads. x38 is worth getting if crossfire with high end ati graphics cards is planned

£2000 on a pc is stupid as the maximum should be £1000 and some overclocking then the other £1000 on upgrades much later down the line
 
Thanks to everyone for your replies, Glad this is a friendly forum.

Im gonna go with a x38 mobo i reckon, would anyone disagree? which x38 would you recommend?
 
 
Last edited:
wizard2000 said:
i wouldnt make any mods to your setup, unless your willing to spend another 500 quid over your given budget, then i'd make some serious mods lol

my spec is on my signature. cost me just over £2000 :cool:
Click to expand...

I was looking at the qx9650 but it just seems like too much money for me at the moment when i can get over 3ghz with the q6600, bet its well rapid though! - not jealous honest..
 
i would say stick with p35 as it does almost everything x38 does except give 2 16x pcie slots in crossfire. its also a lot cheaper too
the q6600 has a 9x multiplier, this means you need a FSB of 333mhz to get to 3GHz, which puts no stress on a p35 or x38 based MB. a Oc to 3ghz is what people expect as a minimum on these forums to be honest
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom