What PSU for new rig?

Thanks, another question is would you hang on and see what the bulldozer core AMD CPU's bring before ordering this or am I gonna be looking at spending loads more on a bulldozer setup rig.
 
If you can wait it wouldn't hurt to do so.

At worst you may be able to get the parts you originally wanted a bit cheaper if you decide against BD.
 
Killswitch said:
So this would be better

Krypton Z68 590i Intel Core i5 2500K 3.30GHz @ 4.40GHz Overclocked Bundle
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=BU-080-OE

I have always prefered intel and nvidia and those benchmarks are pretty sweet!
Click to expand...

You don't want the standard motherboard with that bundle if you ever plan on using SLI. It's Crossfire only and that at only x16/x4 speed.

Sandy Bridge is very easy to overclock with the "K" series processors and a P67/Z68 motherboard.

You could likely save some money, or get better components, by overclocking the processor yourself.
 
-MSI GeForce GTX 570 OC Twin FrozR III Power Edition 1280MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card
-Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - OEM
-MSI P67A-C45 Intel P67 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard ** B3 REVISION **
-Kingston HyperX Genesis Grey 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX1600C9D3X2K2/8GX)
-Kingston HyperX Genesis Grey 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX1600C9D3X2K2/8GX)

£635 - £25 less than the above bundle + card. This be the optimal setup for those components?
 
8GB ram should be enough. Add a Gelid CPU cooler instead.

Only one PCI-E slot on the motherboard, if you want to SLI at a later date i'd change that
 
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If you buy the OEM processor you need a CPU cooler as it doesn't come with one.

The retail i5-2500K for £8 more comes with a stock heatsink but you'd want to replace that for overclocking. It also comes with a 3 year warranty instead of 1 year with the OEM.

There's cheaper 1600MHz RAM but you want to avoid RAM with large heatspreaders depending on the CPU cooler you use as the RAM can interfere with the cooler.

8GB is also plenty for a gaming rig.

You may want to consider a Z68 chipset board over P67. The additional features are explained here.

You may also want to consider an SLI compatible motherboard if that's a possibility in the future.
 
Something like this:



You qualify for free shipping.

It works out about the same price as an overclocked bundle but you get a better motherboard and 8GB of RAM instead of 4GB.

The graphics card you wanted.

Low profile RAM.

The motherboard will do SLI at x8/x8 if you ever wanted to. You current PSU will be fine for 1 GTX 570 but you'd need to upgrade for 2.

The Gigabyte boards don't have a graphical BIOS but they have Touch BIOS which is used from within Windows.

Review of the motherboard here in a group test.

Retail processor for the 3 year warranty.

Feel free to upgrade the CPU cooler if you're happy to spend a touch more.

If you're never going to use SLI you could get a slightly cheaper motherboard.

I assume you have everything else needed including a SATA HDD and DVD drive as there's no IDE connector on the motherboard.
 
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I waited and Tom's Hardware review still suggests the i5 2500k so I specced up.

Asus GeForce GTX 570 DirectCU II 1280MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £257.99
Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - Retail £167.99
Gigabyte Z68XP-UD3 Intel Z68 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £99.98
Corsair Vengeance Arctic White 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit £47.99
Gelid Tranquillo CPU Cooler £23.99

Total 609.94 due to almost all of it being in "this week only" sale.
 
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