Stolen comp, £3k to spend

Tarty · 16 Feb 2006 at 08:17

Recently we had a break in at home, and my comp /laptop (among other things were stolen). Luckily we have insurance, but I now have £3k to spend on a new desktop, as I already have another laptop for work....

So basically I need a desktop not including the pherials but I need: A new monitor, atleast 500gb HD space, reasonable sound card and enough cooling to overclock, which is quiet enough so that it doesn't sound like a helicopter is flying next to me...

Edit: Forgot to say it'll be used a lot for Gaming, and possibly some video/sound editing

pre thanks to any responce

Monstermunch · 16 Feb 2006 at 09:04

You could try something like this:

MO-045-VS Viewsonic VP930 19" LCD Monitor - Black/Silver (MO-045-VS)
£299.95 £299.95
CA-006-SV Silverstone Temjin TJ05 - Silver (No PSU) (CA-006-SV)
£69.50 £69.50
CA-002-SS Seasonic S12 600W Silent ATX2.0 Power Supply (CA-002-SS)
£79.95 £79.95
CP-148-AM AMD Opteron UP 170 Dual Core San Diego 2.0GHz 2MB Cache (Socket 939) - Retail (CP-148-AM)
£299.95 £299.95
HS-008-VP VapoChill Micro Ultra Low Noise (Socket 754/939/940) (06-L-0018) (HS-008-VP)
£29.95 £29.95
MB-018-DF DFI LanParty NF4 SLI-DR EXPERT (Socket 939) PCI-Express Motherboard (MB-018-DF)
£129.95 £129.95
MY-008-GS G.Skill 2GB DDR HZ PC4000 (2x1GB) CAS3 Dual Channel Kit (F1-4000USU2-2GBHZ) (MY-008-GS)
£129.95 £129.95
GX-064-XF XFX GeForce 7800GTX 512MB GDDR3 VIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (PVT70FYDL7) (GX-064-XF)
£549.95 £1,099.90
BU-000-WD Western Digital Raptor 74GB 10,000RPM SATA 8MB Cache RAID Bundle (BU-000-WD)
HD-015-WD Western Digital Raptor 74GB WD740GD 10,000RPM SATA 8MB Cache - OEM (HD-015-WD) 2
£197.90 £197.90
HD-046-WD Western Digital Caviar SE16 250GB 2500KS SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (HD-046-WD)
£64.25 £128.50
CD-025-NE NEC ND4550 16x16 DVD±RW Dual Layer ReWriter (Silver) - OEM (CD-025-NE)
£25.50 £25.50
KB-069-LG Logitech G5 Gaming-Grade Laser Mouse (KB-069-LG)
£37.95 £37.95
KB-000-SL SpeedLink Ultra SL-6465 Flat Metal Keyboard (KB-000-SL)
£19.95 £19.95
Subtotal £2,548.90
VAT £446.06
Total £2,994.96

Or alternatively wait for OCuk to get the crossfire DFI's back in stock and go for 2 x x1900xt's and will probably save you £250+ over the 7800gtx's.

Amps · 16 Feb 2006 at 09:42

1,099.90 on graphics card i like it

fenderbass86 · 16 Feb 2006 at 10:13

Amps said:
1,099.90 on graphics card i like it

I don't, waste of money. Just get one X1900XT-X cause it's miles better and cheaper than SLI 7800GTX's. Not to mention overkill on a 19" monitor.

Borden · 16 Feb 2006 at 10:38

fenderbass86 said:
I don't, waste of money. Just get one X1900XT-X cause it's miles better and cheaper than SLI 7800GTX's. Not to mention overkill on a 19" monitor.

I have to agree, spending that much on a computer and not getting a much larger monitor will be a waste. Maybe only have one graphics card and add in a Belinea 102035W 20" or Philips 200W6CS 20". Both of them are very good and you will end up saving some money out of the £500 odd for the 7800GTX 512.

Eliminos · 16 Feb 2006 at 10:39

Without the keyboard/mouse it will come to under £3k, but they are good so I put them in. The 20" monitor will make 1600x1200 gaming possible, which is where the crossfired x1900s come in. The processor will be good for 3GHz and the RAM should do about 280. I wasn't sure whether to put in Raptors or 1 big Hitachi but I opted for the big Hitachi because I couldnt justify the small performance gain for the big amount of cash. Sound cards aren't my thing but I think the one I chose is fairly decent. With the 2 fans at 7V they should be whisper quiet. The x1900s while gaming aren't though

Tarty · 16 Feb 2006 at 11:09

Eliminos that looks almost identical to the spec i made up, but is there any advantage in using 2x 250 spinpoints in raid 0 than using 1x 500?

Eliminos · 16 Feb 2006 at 11:28

Correct me if I'm wrong but I think you'd get a slight [read: slight] performance increase using just the one drive. I don't think it makes a whole world of difference but I'd rather have one big drive.

this_is_gav · 16 Feb 2006 at 11:35

It's a bit silly using RAID 0 for data (assuming that's what you had in mind) without any redundancy.

I'm also amazed that for £3,000 there's not a Dell 2405FPW been mentioned yet

PinkPig · 16 Feb 2006 at 11:39

this_is_gav said:
I'm also amazed that for £3,000 there's not a Dell 2405FPW been mentioned yet

Very good point! If you're going to have such a good processor and video card, you must have a decent monitor to go with it. I wouldn't bother with the FX60 - an Opteron 170 or A64 4400+ is just as good really, and save some money for a 2405fpw.

ACESHIGH · 16 Feb 2006 at 11:40

Eliminos said:
Without the keyboard/mouse it will come to under £3k, but they are good so I put them in. The 20" monitor will make 1600x1200 gaming possible, which is where the crossfired x1900s come in. The processor will be good for 3GHz and the RAM should do about 280. I wasn't sure whether to put in Raptors or 1 big Hitachi but I opted for the big Hitachi because I couldnt justify the small performance gain for the big amount of cash. Sound cards aren't my thing but I think the one I chose is fairly decent. With the 2 fans at 7V they should be whisper quiet. The x1900s while gaming aren't though

That looks like a great rig. Thats definitely what i would be recommending too.

(Nvidia cards are far too overpriced for their lower performance at the moment).

Eliminos · 16 Feb 2006 at 11:42

20" is about as big as I would go, personally.

There'd be too much to keep an eye on in games at 24"

fenderbass86 · 16 Feb 2006 at 11:42

this_is_gav said:
It's a bit silly using RAID 0 for data (assuming that's what you had in mind) without any redundancy.

I'm also amazed that for £3,000 there's not a Dell 2405FPW been mentioned yet

That's cause he specced an FX60, I really think you should consider an X2 4400+ or a 170 San Diego Opteron and OC them. You may have £3K to spend, but there's no point throwing money at a cpu that's not gonna be much better than something half the price.

amx · 16 Feb 2006 at 11:47

Won't the XT-X step down to the speed of the XT mastercard? Seem's a waste of money to me...?

this_is_gav · 16 Feb 2006 at 12:10

Eliminos said:
20" is about as big as I would go, personally.

There'd be too much to keep an eye on in games at 24"

It depends on your genre of game really. I'm a dedicated simulation racer, doing endurance events of upwards of 7 hours, with 24hr races each year. A high-quality monitor is a god-send, and with a big widescreen monitor it lets me concetrate my focus on the centre of the screen where the action generally is.

If you play a lot of FPS games though, then a smaller monitor would probably suit you more, as 24" is a lot of screen to look around for surprises lurking in dark corners.

The Dell does have the advantage of being able to box smaller resolutions into a, for instance, 1600x1200 'letterbox', so you can still have the monitor, while for certain games, only run at a specific resolution, without having to stretch or distort the image.

It just depends on what you do most, really.

I do think an SLi/Crossfire setup is wasted on a 20" monitor though.

Eliminos · 16 Feb 2006 at 12:13

this_is_gav said:
I do think an SLi/Crossfire setup is wasted on a 20" monitor though.

I have an x1900xtx and it can only just run fear at max settings at 1280x1024. So I wouldn't say crossfired x1900s are wasted on a 20" (native 1600x1200) at all.

Messiah Khan · 16 Feb 2006 at 13:02

Eliminos said:
I have an x1900xtx and it can only just run fear at max settings at 1280x1024. So I wouldn't say crossfired x1900s are wasted on a 20" (native 1600x1200) at all.

I'd get the Dell 2405, as this is great for video editing/less demanding games, then on games such as fear, simply run at a lower resolution, but still at 1:1 pixel ratio.

Tarty · 16 Feb 2006 at 14:48

The games i'll be playing mainly are F.E.A.R, BF2, CoD2 and possibly bw2 if they release mp

Tarty · 16 Feb 2006 at 14:55

So from looking at what you all have suggested, the spec is looking along the lines of:

Shopping Cart (Prices in British Pounds)
REFERENCE DESCRIPTION QUANTITY PRICE COST REMOVE
GX-045-CO ATI Radeon X1900 ***Crossfire Edition*** 512MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-045-CO)
£379.95 £379.95
GX-047-HT HIS Excalibur ATI Radeon X1900 XT-X 512MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-047-HT)
£349.95 £349.95
CP-129-AM AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4800+ (Socket 939) - Retail (ADA4800CDBOX) (CP-129-AM)
£399.95 £399.95
MY-002-MK Mushkin 2GB DDR XP4000 Redline Extreme Performance Dual Channel Kit (2x1GB) (991493) (MY-002-MK)
£214.95 £214.95
CA-007-TT Thermaltake VA8000BWS Armour Super Tower - Black (CA-007-TT)
£76.95 £76.95
MB-001-SP Sapphire PURE Innovation Gruper Radeon Xpress 200P (Socket 939) PCI-Express Motherboard (MB-001-SP)
£114.95 £114.95
CA-001-SK FSP Sparkle FX700-GLN Epsilon 700W ATX2.0 PSU (CA-001-SK)
£96.95 £96.95
SC-034-CL Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Music - Retail (SC-034-CL)
£77.50 £77.50
HD-018-SA Samsung SpinPoint P SP2504C 250GB SATA-II 8MB Cache - OEM (HD-018-SA)
£61.95 £123.90
CD-025-NE NEC ND4550 16x16 DVD±RW Dual Layer ReWriter (black) - OEM (CD-025-NE)
£25.50 £25.50
MO-002-DE Dell Ultrasharp 2001FP 20.1" Performance LCD Monitor - Midnight Grey (359) (MO-002-DE)
£374.95 £374.95
Subtotal £2,210.00
VAT £386.75
Total £2,596.75

With possibility of changing to the 24" dell monitor and then rest going to cooling / keeping her quiet?

Eliminos · 16 Feb 2006 at 14:59

All sounds good to me. A few little things to split hairs with.

The 700W PSU is overkill, I'm really vouching for the 580W Tagan Easycon because of the amount of useless cables you can just remove and put in the box.
The Hitachis are slightly better drives
The Sapphire XTX would be the better card to get - again its only a small difference
The ND-4551 (in the LightScribe Writers Section) is a marginally better drive