Upgrade/new gaming machine

cjhambidge

cjhambidge

cjhambidge

Associate
Joined
13 Jan 2016
Posts
5
Hi guys,

I’m looking for some upgrades at around the £550-£650 mark to bring my machine up to date, I have no idea whether I'm looking for a new graphics card or a whole new build.

Mainly I’m looking for the best gaming machine I can get – It would be nice to play something like Fallout on high settings for example. I do a bit of engineering at home sometimes (Matlab, CAD), so it’s a bonus if that’s improved too.

This isn't especially urgent, but my gfx card really doesn't like Win10, or is just dying :-( so it's going to have to happen sooner or later to even maintain a functional PC...

I'm happy to build myself (worked out ok last time anyway!).

This is what I've got:

Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-MA790X-DS4
Processor: AMD Phenom II X4 940 Processor 3.00 GHz
Ram: 4x2 GB DDR2 Dual Channel 1800MHz Unganged
Graphics: ATI Radeon HD 4870 1GB GDDR5
HDD1: OCZ AGILITY3 ATA (SSD) 120GB
HDD2: SAMSUNG HD103UJ ATA Device 1TB
PSU: Corsair CP-9020054-UK RM Series RM650 80 Plus Gold 650W ATX/EPS Fully Modular PSU
OS: Win 10 upgrade from Windows 7 Home Premium Disk on my current machine (can I transfer?)
Monitor: BENQ GL2460

Thanks
 
Hello again guys,

So, after a summer of saving I have managed to expand my budget a fair bit. I’m now looking to spend around the £900 mark in overhauling my machine. I have an old Antec 300 case, and Corsair RM650 80 Plus Gold 650W modular PSU which I intend to reuse. The old HDD and SSD can serve as secondary storage in the new build and I have windows 10, screen and peripherals.

I’m primarily looking for a gaming machine, though I also run engineering simulations from home so it seems the more ram the better in that respect.

I’d be very grateful of someone could have a look at the items I’ve put together below and suggest any improvements/savings/observations. A double check that everything is compatible and will fit would be really appreciated too.

My basket at Overclockers UK:

Total: £957.89
(includes shipping: £0.00)
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A few specific questions:

1) I’m a bit confused about whether I should be going with the i5 6600k bundle or something like the i5 6500 with another board. I’m not intending to overclock, but for the small price differential the motherboard in the bundle has some nice features (inc. USB-C port for my phone, up to 64GB ram slots if needed in future) and a faster base CPU is a faster CPU right?!

2) Also, most of the coolers (including the one I have selected) do not list Socket 1151 compatibility, yet appear as options in the OCUK build configurators and other suggested systems in this forum. Will the one I’ve chosen work? Most listed with explicit ’ Socket 115x’ compatibility seem to be water based or just very expensive!

3) I’ve selected DDR4 ram at 2400MHz, though am I right in thinking this Motherboard can only manage up to 2133 MHz? is there a saving to be made there?


Thanks,
Chris
 
I see, thanks very much for that.

I was originally looking at the Sapphire Radeon RX 480 card, does that sound a more reasonable and proportionate choice? Or can you suggest something better? Perhaps a straight swap and £180 in my pocket may be the way to go here as I think it might be diminishing returns on benefit of a better processor per £ and ECC is not crucial here.

Will this work?

My basket at Overclockers UK:

Total: £777.89
(includes shipping: £0.00)
​


​

Cheers,
Chris
 
Thank you jigger.

As for the ram Daaaveee, my understanding is that more is better than faster when it come to CAD and number crunching codes. That being said, I'm certainly happy to consider upping the speed with some of graphics card savings. Do you think the extra £100 would to be noticeable though?

The basket below is within my budget,

My basket at Overclockers UK:

Total: £887.89
(includes shipping: £0.00)
​


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