EDIT - Please see post #12 before replying! Thanks for all the advice guys...even when it was no longer needed! Hey, I've got plenty of experience with PC's - have built/repaired them since I was 13 (8 years ago), however I don't have much recent experience with AMD motherboards and CPU's. As such, could anyone advise firstly if theres any compatibility problems with this rig, secondly, will it overclock well, and finally, should I be spending a few £ more on X or less on Y. Thanks Proposed Spec: AMD Phenom II X4 840 - £76 Gigabyte GA-870A-USB3L AMD 870 AM3+ Motherboard - £64 Corsair Memory Vengeance 4GB DDR3 2000 MHz - £50 Samsung F3 500GB - £30 Antec 520w PSU - £55 MSI GTX460 - £113 Case - BitFenix Shinobo (already have) HSF - One I've already got (can't remember what though). The build is for a friend. Cheers,
cant see there being any problems though they always say cant guarantee memory but usually its no probs, as for the overclock, every system is different and it will depend on your cooling. It would be good if you could bump up to the X6 core 1055T around the £120 mark see link http://www.scan.co.uk/products/amd-phenom-ii-x6-1055t-thuban-sok-am3-28ghz-9mb-total-cache-125w-retail as its only 2.8 ghz and you should be able to get 3.5ghz with no voltage increase and 4ghz with voltage added.
Would of said that £50 for a 500gb drive was loads considering a F3 Spinpoint 1Tb is £39.58 http://www.scan.co.uk/products/1tb-samsung-hd103sj-spinpoint-f3-sata-3gb-s-7200rpm-32mb-cache-89ms-ncq Could use that money to get the X6?
For gaming though, I'd much rather just get the fastest quad possible (965 BE?) rather than mess around with the 6-cores. Future proofing? Meh, maybe, chances are he's going to upgrade anyway before games make proper use of 6 cores?
Sorry - that was a mis-type. It is actually £30 in Scans today only. I'll give my friend the option of 1TB for the extra £10! As for all other comments - thanks for your advice! One of my friends (who I showed the thread) has since offered: 1600mhz 4 gig ocz plat kit MSI 890FXA GD70 Phenom II x 6 1090T for £200. It's all been used for less than a month. I should think this would be the best bang-per-buck option, especially since the CPU is unlocked-multi?
You'll never get that RAM to run at 2000MHz on an AMD platform. Even 1600MHz isn't guaranteed on AMD. Also, buying a Phenom II X4 840 is a waste of time, as it's basically a Phenom without the L3 Cache (so nearer an Athlon). You can pick up 955 Black Editions, which will be easier to overclock due to the unlocked multiplier for around £85 if you look around. (So the money you save from the RAM buying some normal 2x2GB 1600MHz kit ~£35, you can put into the CPU). I'd change the motherboard to an MSI 870A-G54 as you've got 2 extra RAM slots, and otherwise similar features, but it's the same price. I'd also change the HDD - you can get 1TB F3s for less than that - 1TB 500GB That frees up another £10-20. With it, I'd get an AMD 6870 - they can be had for £124 now, and are quite a bit better than a GTX460. XFX 6870 - which comes with Shogun 2, which can be sold for around £8 or £9 which covers the shipping from Aria. As for the PSU, for a similar amount you could have a 600W Modular PSU - OCZ ModXStream Which ends up like this: CPU: AMD Phenom II X4 955 BE - £82.79 Motherboard: MSI 870A-G54 - £63.59 RAM: Corsair Vengeance 1600MHz CAS9 - £34.99 GPU: XFX 6870 - £123.98 HDD: Samsung Spinpoint F3 1TB - £39.99 PSU: OCZ ModXStream 600W - £58.99 Which comes to £404.33 plus ~£7 postage from Aria, vs the original spec of £408, and this build is faster in every regard (besides the unusable RAM speed). Edit: Sooooo ****ing slow at typing, there were no replies when I began!
lol, sorry mate! Thanks for the effort you've put in though You're advice regarding GPU though is helpful - I was hoping to get everything from Scan (as i've got next day delivery), however iirc aria do a free supersaver delivery??? Thoughts on the rig offered (in previous post)?
I had RAM at 1600MHz with my AMD set up, it's dependent on the CPU. There's no real saving to be had by going for 1333MHz memory though, and the stuff I specced is lower voltage (1.5V) so even if 1600MHz isn't reachable, there's some voltage headroom for timing adjustments.
Thanks for the advice guys. I'm going to go with my friends deal. He's also got a brand new (sealed) ThermalTake 775 XT PSU (modular) which retails for £80. For that, and the mobo,cpu,ram, I'm paying him £255 inc postage, which I think is a good deal. As for GPU - it will be upto my friend (who's paying for the rig to be built), I'm going to push him towards the AMD 6870 on Aria (I know thats what I'd get if it was my money), but he's quite tight on cash. It's going to end up as: 1600mhz 4 gig ocz plat kit 1.5v MSI 890FXA GD70 Phenom II x 6 1090T ThermalTake 775W XT £255 for these first 4 items AMD 6870 (hopefully) £132 inc postage from Aria 500GB F1 - £30 BitFenix Shinobi (which I'm selling him at token price of £15! Am I a mug or what?) Whatever HSF I've got spare (along lines of Titan Fenrir) which I'm charging £5 for (again - mug). Windows 7 Pro for students - £40 Which (using my Excel Spreadsheet) totals to Approx £477 or £460 with the GTX460 GPU. Not a bad looking rig imo for that money!
What's that based on? I'm running my RAM at 1600, no problems. True you don't get XMP profiles, but some of the boards (like mine) will let you turn it up to 2000. If anything, AMD rigs are more forgiving than intel for memory; they're not fussy about voltages like Intel rigs are. You can happily use 1.5v, 1.65v or even the old 1.9v stuff. If i were the op, I'd be looking at the new AM3+ boards. Especially the 990 chipsets. Better upgrade options in the future, will run AM3 chips and have newer features like USB3 headers and even SLI support. Also the 990FX chipsets are apparently supierior than the 890FX for overclocking exsisting chips.
1600mhz ram was an issue with the older C2 stepping 955BE like I have if I recall correctly due to a weak memory controller but even then mine will run at 1600mhz if I keep the cpu at stock, if I want to overclock then I have to drop down to 1333mhz even if it's just a multi only overclock.
In the same way as the top end Intel X58 boards will 'support' 2133MHz RAM, but nothing's guaranteed. It's well known that because of the on board memory controller if you get a 'bad' CPU overclocking the memory will also suffer. It's less of an issue now given new steppings and refinement. I was just pointing out how worthless spending £15 extra on 2000MHz RAM is, when there's no guarantee of getting 2000MHz. It has been specced as an AM3+ board, so will support Bulldozer. As the 990FX is an 890FX with the 8 crossed out, there's little point in spending more for no benefit in a more basic system.
If the op does decide to go the gtx460 route, then such a board will have a benefit in the future should he decide to drop a second 460 in. There's no 890FX boards that do Sli. If it were my money, I'd absolutely pay the extra to have that option in the future. But it's not my money, so...
i think you should go with a 990fx board.... just because its more compatible with everything... and they look sexy.
As the cheapest 9xx board that supports SLI is >£90 it would be a tough sell on a £400 rig. Pretty much irrelevant now that the OP has secured an excellent deal on a X6 combo.
Well there is that, and you're right, that is a good deal on that bundle. What's the rig for? Is it a budget gaming system? It's looking pretty good.
The 840 is a glorified Athlon ii X4 i believe. You would be much better off with one of the Phenom ii X4 900s. The 900s are based off the higher performing Deneb core while the 800s are based off the Propus core. The 900s also have more cache. 970 i believe it is now.
