Spec me please

Skidder · 8 Dec 2011 at 11:39

Hello all,

I need to upgrade my work PC (which must play games well after work!)

I will be purchasing early next week. I will either get a 2500k or 2600k may be 2700k Don't think I really need HT as mostly games and office tasks but I do some home photoshop and video but not really enough to merit. As such 2500k almost a certainty

Other than that I run three monitors for work so need to be able to output to 3 screens (which I think puts me in ATI territory for a single card)

I would prefer single GPU as I have had to deal with the heat and hassle of trisli so want to go back to single card. I could use 2 of 8800gtx temporarily in an sli ready mobo and then upgrade when the new ATI cards come out - opinions?

For gaming, just single screen 1920x1200

I have optical drive and HDDs to reuse. I also have a soundcard which I could use depending on quality of onboard (old audigy ZS)

Don't need speakers, keyboard, mouse etc.

I have an enermax 1000w psu so good to go there

I am thinking either 650d or HAFx for case and want to air cool this time

I would like to get a decent overclock

Please spec me:

Processor 2500k
Air cooler
Motherboard (should be crossfire capable presuming ATI and SLI capable presuming recommendation is to stick with GTXs for a bit)
GPU - bite bullet or wait
RAM - fancy 16gb
SSD for OS and a few games
Win 7 64 home premium
Case - one of those mentioned or another suggestion at that sort of price point

Spec away and thanks very much! I spend too much time in GD so am out of loop re hardware these days

No fixed budget as I do need it for work. Don't particularly want a bells and whistles mobo unless major benefit and don't want a £300 case for no reason! GPU prepared to spend now or wait.

mickyflinn · 8 Dec 2011 at 12:40

YOUR BASKET
1 x Sapphire ATI Radeon HD 6950 "Dual Fan Edition" 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £224.99
1 x Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - Retail £179.99
1 x Asrock Z68 Extreme4 Gen3 Intel Z68 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £159.98
1 x Crucial RealSSD M4 128GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive (CT128M4SSD2) £151.99
1 x Corsair Carbide 500R Midi Tower Case - Black £92.99
1 x Kingston HyperX Genesis 16GB (4x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual/Quad Channel Kit (KHX1600C9D3K4/16GX) £89.99
1 x Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 64-Bit - OEM (GFC-02050) £79.99
1 x Gelid Tranquillo CPU Cooler (Socket 754/939/940/AM2/AM2+/AM3/LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366) £25.99
Total : £1,020.91 (includes shipping : £12.50).

The asrock board and crucial ssd are awsome , the saphire 6950 dual fan is a great card with with dual bios and may unlock 6970 spec. An alternative corsair case that will save you about £50

Skidder · 8 Dec 2011 at 13:22

Thanks very much, looks good, does that motherboard allow both cross fire and sli?

edit: also how much of a jump can I expect in performance over trisli GTX8800s? (as well as the decrease in noise and heat which will no doubt be immense!)

[WU-TANG]GZA · 8 Dec 2011 at 16:20

You will see a nice jump by not only the 6950 but the whole system.

I remember the 4890 was about the same as 8800GTX SLI and the upgrade from 4890 to 6950 is a fairly big jump too.

Seeing as you do have GFX cards though, might it be worth using them until we get price/performance charts from the new gen of AMD GPUs? Too much speculation ATM about price/performance but it is a new gen so I'm sure it will be better than 6000 series and should at least make the 6000 a little cheaper.

Wu

Skidder · 8 Dec 2011 at 16:46

[WU-TANG]GZA;20750774 said:
You will see a nice jump by not only the 6950 but the whole system.

I remember the 4890 was about the same as 8800GTX SLI and the upgrade from 4890 to 6950 is a fairly big jump too.

Seeing as you do have GFX cards though, might it be worth using them until we get price/performance charts from the new gen of AMD GPUs? Too much speculation ATM about price/performance but it is a new gen so I'm sure it will be better than 6000 series and should at least make the 6000 a little cheaper.

Wu

That was my thinking, my current PC (Q6600, 4gb and the GTXs) will be a replacement for my media PC (albeit in a cupboard away from telly where the full tower and noise won't be a big deal) so thought I would leave one GPU in that, keep 2 in the new one for a couple of months until the dust settles on the upcoming cards. Then put one in the media PC to sli it and retire the other (the PSU in that won't be up to trisli and no need)

[WU-TANG]GZA · 8 Dec 2011 at 17:37

Probably the most sensible thing to do yeah.