To Build or not to build?

simpleas123 · 16 Jun 2011 at 21:08

Hi everyone im new here so go easy on my limited knowledge of building computers, here is the situtation.

I'm willing to spend £1100 on a PC for pure performance capable of dealing with multiple applications at once such as photoshop along with games in the background. So I set my heart on the dell xps 8300 (I saw another thread on this, but didnt want to thread hijack) and the specs I got with the computer are pretty impressive.

For £1100 I could get an i7 3.4ghz 8mb 2600 processor, Windows 7 home, 8gig ram, 2TB HDD, 24inch monitor, wireless card, 1gig dedicated graphics card, mouse and keyboard.
Yes I thought this was fantastic but it was mentioned to me that building a PC may be worth it too.

So what I would like to if i built my own pc would I save any money? I wouldnt have any quarms about physically building the pc myself so dont worry about that.

Hopefully someone could help me out.
David.

Reaper 392 · 16 Jun 2011 at 21:14

it will be WAY cheaper to build it yourself. also, that XPS 8300 is delightfully vague:

- it says i7 processor, but which one? we could e talking a £75 processor, or we could be talking a £750 processor
- it says a 1GB graphics card, but again, which one, it could be an ATI 5450, or it could also be a GTX 560 Ti
- with the monitor it says 24 inch, nothing about resolution, brightness, refressh rate, etc

i could go on, but im not going to because im sure you get my point that building yourself is a much better deal

sk82jack · 16 Jun 2011 at 21:16

Yeah it will be cheaper building it yourself as there are no labour costs involved.

You will also be able to choose each component based on your needs rather than not having a big enough HDD, big enough monitor, etc.

Phenomenologica · 16 Jun 2011 at 21:17

How can you play games in the background whilst using photoshop? I'm all for multitasking but that seems mildly impossible.

You can get a better system for less money if you build it and overclock it yourself. It'll be more fun too.

simpleas123 · 16 Jun 2011 at 21:20

Reaper 392 said:
it will be WAY cheaper to build it yourself. also, that XPS 8300 is delightfully vague:

- it says i7 processor, but which one? we could e talking a £75 processor, or we could be talking a £750 processor
- it says a 1GB graphics card, but again, which one, it could be an ATI 5450, or it could also be a GTX 560 Ti
- with the monitor it says 24 inch, nothing about resolution, brightness, refressh rate, etc

i could go on, but im not going to because im sure you get my point that building yourself is a much better deal

Sorry I should have included more detail - heres the extra bits.

MONITOR 24in ST2420L UK/Irish Full HD WLED Widescreen Monitor (VGA, DVI-D and HDMI)

OPTICAL DRIVE Blu-Ray ROM combo (Blu-ray read only, DVD, CD read & write)

MEMORY 8192MB Dual Channel DDR3 1333MHz [2x4096] Memory

HARD DRIVE 2TB Dual Hard Drive RAID 0 "Stripe" (2x1TB - 7,200 rpm)

GRAPHICS CARD Graphics : 1GB AMD Radeon HD 6670

KEYBOARD Dell™ USB Entry Keyboard - UK/Irish (QWERTY)

MOUSE Dell Laser Mouse USB (6 buttons scroll) Black

WIRELESS SOLUTION Dell Wireless 1501 Mini Card (802.11g/n) - ROW

SOUND SOFTWARE Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Music (using PCI slot)

Phenomenologica said:
How can you play games in the background whilst using photoshop? I'm all for multitasking but that seems mildly impossible. You can get a better system for less money if you build it and overclock it yourself. It'll be more fun too.

Football manager simulates games in the background

sk82jack · 16 Jun 2011 at 21:34

simpleas123 · 16 Jun 2011 at 21:47

Was considering these two so far then carry on from here any suggestions?

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-443-AS&tool=3
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-359-IN

sk82jack · 16 Jun 2011 at 21:51

Get the 2600K version to overclock.

Also there are better boards out there for a lot cheaper - Asrock Z68 Extreme4 being one example

simpleas123 · 16 Jun 2011 at 21:52

sk82jack said:
Get the 2600K version to overclock.

Also there are better boards out there for a lot cheaper - Asrock Z68 Extreme4 being one example

Pretty new to overclocking - What could I get it up to? / is it difficult?

Yeah I see what you mean, thats pretty nice

Phenomenologica · 16 Jun 2011 at 22:03

As a rule for the 2*00K chips you can almost effortlessly get it to 4.4 - 4.5 Ghz. Above that it takes a bit more effort but is hardly particularly strenuous as long as you read up on what you're doing first!

simpleas123 · 16 Jun 2011 at 22:07

Phenomenologica said:
As a rule for the 2*00K chips you can almost effortlessly get it to 4.4 - 4.5 Ghz. Above that it takes a bit more effort but is hardly particularly strenuous as long as you read up on what you're doing first!

Looks like I better get reading!

A concern of mine when building my own would be overheating could anyone give me a bit of a insight to it before I do even more reading.

Thanks for your help everyone

jax_5 · 16 Jun 2011 at 22:07

sk82jack said:
Also there are better boards out there for a lot cheaper - Asrock Z68 Extreme4 being one example

simpleas123 said:
Pretty new to overclocking - What could I get it up to? / is it difficult?

Yeah I see what you mean, thats pretty nice

Overclocking is extremely easy to achieve with that board. Only a few clicks on the BIOS. Takes a few seconds

jax_5 · 16 Jun 2011 at 22:09

simpleas123 said:
Looks like I better get reading!

A concern of mine when building my own would be overheating could anyone give me a bit of a insight to it before I do even more reading.

Thanks for your help everyone

With a good third party cooler you won't have to worry.

Just state your budget and your use. The members at Overclockers will spec you a great build and give you all the answers you need.

Phenomenologica · 16 Jun 2011 at 22:10

simpleas123 said:
A concern of mine when building my own would be overheating could anyone give me a bit of a insight to it before I do even more reading.

Just make sure you get a decent aftermarket cooler. The hyper 212+ is a good budget option, and at the very top end of air cooling you have the Thermalright Silver Arrow and the Noctura D14. Then when you're doing the stress tests for your overclocking just monitor the temperatures with free software like Realtemp and make sure your cores don't go past about 75.

simpleas123 · 16 Jun 2011 at 22:14

jax_5 said:
With a good third party cooler you won't have to worry.

Just state your budget and your use. The members at Overclockers will spec you a great build and give you all the answers you need.

£1000 for the unit without monitor max - general gaming (swtor when it releases, battlefield) multi purpose computer really.

Phenomenologica said:
Just make sure you get a decent aftermarket cooler. The hyper 212+ is a good budget option, and at the very top end of air cooling you have the Thermalright Silver Arrow and the Noctura D14. Then when you're doing the stress tests for your overclocking just monitor the temperatures with free software like Realtemp and make sure your cores don't go past about 75.

Is liquid cooling really needed then? Or is that for hardcore gaming pc's who want better overclocks?

Phenomenologica · 16 Jun 2011 at 22:17

simpleas123 said:
Is liquid cooling really needed then? Or is that for hardcore gaming pc's who want better overclocks?

Liquid cooling allows slightly better overclocks, can result in a quieter computer, and looks absolutely drop-dead gorgeous if done correctly. That's about the extent of it.

It also theoretically extends the lifespan of the CPU, but the kind of people who water cool don't generally keep the CPU that long anyway.

simpleas123 · 16 Jun 2011 at 22:21

Phenomenologica said:
Liquid cooling allows slightly better overclocks, can result in a quieter computer, and looks absolutely drop-dead gorgeous if done correctly. That's about the extent of it. It also theoretically extends the lifespan of the CPU, but the kind of people who water cool don't generally keep the CPU that long anyway.

Its not considerably more expensive to do though is it?
Just more difficult?

Phenomenologica · 16 Jun 2011 at 22:25

simpleas123 said:
Its not considerably more expensive to do though is it?
Just more difficult?

Doing it properly can set you back hundreds, especially if you're cooling your graphics card too. A high end air cooler is more than enough for most people and comes in at around £50. My next build will be water cooled, as I've gotten very interested in the overclocking side of things, and I can't resist the way it looks. But for most people it's not at all necessary.

simpleas123 · 16 Jun 2011 at 22:43

Phenomenologica said:
Doing it properly can set you back hundreds, especially if you're cooling your graphics card too. A high end air cooler is more than enough for most people and comes in at around £50. My next build will be water cooled, as I've gotten very interested in the overclocking side of things, and I can't resist the way it looks. But for most people it's not at all necessary.

Ive only done this to get a check on the price, but how does this look?

sk82jack · 17 Jun 2011 at 00:49

Unless your big on your audio and gonna be sound editing and stuff you dont really need a sound card - onboard sound has come a long way.

You can get a lot better graphics card for not much more.

That hard drive is very slow, so I would suggest either an SSD or two 1TB HDDs.

That case is a bit rubbish too, I doubt it will have very good cable management or airflow to help keep temps down.

The PSU with the case will be terrible and unless you want it to go bang and take half of your stuff with it then get a well know brand with a higher wattage.

That cooler is OK but is the very minimum you would wan't to get. (It's not worth water cooling as Sandy Bridge runs cool anyway and there's a lot of maintenance involved)

That RAM is quite tall and will conflict with most CPU coolers, I'd suggest some low profile stuff like the XMS3.

Here's what I would go for:

MSI ATI Radeon HD 6950 OC Twin FrozR III Power Edition 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card with FREE DIRT3 Game £199.99

Crucial RealSSD M4 128GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive £174.98

Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - OEM £156.98

Asrock Z68 PRO3 Intel Z68 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £105.98

Corsair XMS3 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CMX8GX3M2A1600C9) £69.98

Cooler Master CM-690 II Lite Dominator Case - Black £59.99

Samsung SpinPoint F4 EcoGreen 2TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (HD204UI) £53.99

Antec High Current Gamer 620W Power Supply £49.99

Gelid Tranquillo CPU Cooler (Socket 754/939/940/AM2/AM2+/AM3/LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366) £25.99

Sony Optiarc AD-7260S 24x DVD±RW SATA Lightscribe ReWriter (Black) - OEM £17.99

Total : £930.88 (includes shipping : £12.50)

This includes an SSD for your OS and all your apps/games - drop down to a 60GB if you wanna save money

Also if your not a huge gamer you can drop the graphics card down to a 5850 to save a bit of money too.