I'm thinking of getting me a new PC, but if i'm honest i don't know a lot, if anything, about PC hardware. I've done some research but i'm really struggling on deciding a good balance on what to spend on the mobo, CPU and graphics card. I don't know weather i need a brilliant mobo or if i'm not investing enough in it. I basically don't know what i'm doing and trying to jump in the deep end. I used the template to quickly show my needs; I have found a site called computerplanet.co.uk which i'll probably use for getting this built up. Any help will be greatly appreciated, even if it's just helping me understand where i should be putting my money. Also, one burning question, i've noticed that when i use the design feature it doesn't include a sound card, doe this mean that my computer would not be able to play sound or will it be integrated with something else? I'm not bothered about high quality sound, but i still don't want the computer to be a mute. Thanks in advance guys.
For the money I don't believe you'll get the system you want should it be built by a third party! Just don't rush things and you should be fine. Probably the biggest thing you will have to do yourself is install the CPU and apply some TIM (thermal interface material) so that it makes good contact with whatever CPU cooler you chose. It's a pretty sweet time to build a PC, you go Quad Core and 4GB for not that much money compared to a year ago! Here's the system I would recommend with prices taken from SCAN. I should mention they are a highly rated retailer on these froums and if you get 20+ posts on these forums you can get free weekday delivery! So here goes... MOTHERBOARD: MSI P67A-GD53 (B3) £108.88 (read review here) CPU: Intel CPU Core i5 2500K OEM £148.98 MEMORY: Corsair Memory XMS3 Classic 4GB DDR3 1600 MHz 1.5v £39.74 CPU COOLER: Gelid Tranquillo £23.03 CASE: Fractal Design Define R3 £80.27 POWER SUPPLY UNIT (PSU): Antec True Power New 650W Modular £89.87 GRAPHICS CARD: Sapphire Radeon HD 5850 1GB £120 with P+P (from yoyotech.co.uk) DVD DRIVE: Samsung SH-S222AB/BEBE £14.66 HARD DRIVE: Samsung 1Tb Spinpoint F3 £40.43 That's all the difficult parts of the system done for £665.86 total! The 5850 is best bang for your money at the moment, it'll play most games very well but with new releases depending what resolution you game at it would begin to show its age. Still the motherboard is both SLI and Crossfire capable so you have options!
Do you need to purchase an OS as well and to answer your question the motherboard will have onboard sound so you won't need to buy a seperate sound card.
The Define R3 and the PSU are a bit overkill for the budget aren't they? Drop it down to an Antec 100 and a CX500 (or something non-modular around 600W) and you can bump the graphics up a bit (or just stay in budget lol).
Good options, dropping to an Antec 100 will save you £40 and it's a good enough choice for beginners. My thinking with the PSU is to have something that is easy to play with and has enough head room for future upgrades. Being modular will save cable clutter when it comes to building the machine and 650W is enough power for most applications. Beyond that and we're talking a couple of high powered graphics cards in SLI or Crossfire which I doubt you'll be doing anyway! However it'll be capable of handling a couple of 5850s in Crossfire mode or perhaps two mid-range Nvidia cards in SLI. Investing in a good all round PSU is never a bad idea when starting a build. I'd only drop to a CX500 if the build was going to be maintained in a static state of one CPU one mid-range GPU to be honest, but that's just my thinking!
My main concern isn't really putting it together, it all sounds pretty simple (i am an engineer, so i'm used to taking things to pieces, it's just normally my car not my computer). I'm more worried about hitting the power button and nothing happening or bits not working and getting error messages. If i get in that situation i probably don't know enough to get myself out of it. The specs are looking cool though. I've been looking at processors and i agree with IronDoc, you can get an AMD Phenom 2 quad core 955 black edition for like £90, that's an extra £50 to put into a better GPU, or do you think that the extra processor power will be needed? Or is that processor just not that good, i've seen a couple of people gaming with one on YouTube and it seemed to do fine. I'm just concerned that 6 months down the line i'll have to shell out a couple of hundred quid for a graphics card because of the latest game specs or something. That said i would probably struggle to find £700 in the next few weeks. The thing with the free weekend delivery is brilliant, that could be very handy as i'm at work all weekdays so i would have to get it delivered to work, which i would have preferred to avoid. I do need an OS yes, and sadly i am not a student. Just going for Win 7 64 bit i think, not sure where to get that from. Ah good, that's £20 at least saved anyway, i don't need anything special in that department. Also, i had a quick play around with the site i posted earlier before coming here and got this; Which also came out at about £670. I've not given myself as much CPU power there and i'm not sure about the motherboard, if i need any extra cooling or the power supply (i just guessed), so that might be a pile of crap anyway. I do like the way the 4GB RAM is a single stick, so if i fancy changing up to 6GB it wont be difficult and that they assemble it for you so it should work. However i was a little worried about weather these parts are even compatible, none of the options seemed to change regardless of what i chose. Thanks very much for your help so far guys.
Dropping it even further to a Coolermaster 430 Elite will save another £8. And you'll get a side window to boot! Excellent build quality with an all black interior.
I think you lose a little too much dropping to a Coolermaster 430 Elite, especially when it comes to trailing cables behind the motherboard tray. At least you can do this with the Antec 100, I don't think the Coolermaster 430 Elite can accommodate that without the use of a Dremel?
Yeah I take your point. But you save £50 now and you can spend it (plus interest ) when you upgrade 1-2 years down the line (presumably getting more for your money). Just down to OP's preference really.
Just a though. Qty Link No. Description Scansure Available Ex VAT Inc VAT LN28010 Samsung SH-S223L/RSMS 22x DVD±R, 8x DVD±DL, DVD+RW x8/-RW x6, x12 RAM SATA L/scribe Retail £13.98 £16.78 LN28632 Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro v2 - S1366/1155/1156/775/AM3/AM2+/AM2/939 Up to 130 Watts £12.98 £15.58 4GB (2x2GB) Corsair XMS3 Classic DDR3 PC3-12800 (1600), Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 9-9-9-24, 1.5V LN37493 4GB (2x2GB) Corsair XMS3 Classic DDR3 PC3-12800 (1600), Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 9-9-9-24, 1.5V £29.99 £35.99 Asus P8P67 Rev3, Intel P67, S1155, PCI-E 2.0 x16, DDR3 2200(OC), SATA 6Gb/s, SATA RAID, ATX LN38032 Asus P8P67 Rev3, Intel P67, S1155, PCI-E 2.0 x16, DDR3 2200(OC), SATA 6Gb/s, SATA RAID, ATX £89.99 £107.99 LN34937 Coolermaster Elite 430 Black, With Side Window with Coolermaster Elite 500W PSU £45.98 £55.18 LN38197 1280MB EVGA GTX 570 HD Superclocked, 40nm, 3900MHz GDDR5, GPU 797MHz, Shader 1594MHz, 480 Cores £209.57 £251.48 Intel Core i5 2500K Unlocked, 1155, Sdy Bridge, QuadCore, 3.3GHz, GPU 850Mhz, 95W, Retail +Free Game LN36726 Intel Core i5 2500K Unlocked, 1155, Sdy Bridge, QuadCore, 3.3GHz, GPU 850Mhz, 95W, Retail +Free Game £128.99 £154.79 1TB Samsung HD103SJ Spinpoint F3, SATA 3Gb/s, 7200rpm, 32MB Cache, 8.9ms, NCQ LN28746 1TB Samsung HD103SJ Spinpoint F3, SATA 3Gb/s, 7200rpm, 32MB Cache, 8.9ms, NCQ £30.99 £37.19 Recalculate Basket Save Basket View Saved Baskets Net Total Carriage VAT £562.47 £13.98 £115.31 Total £691.76
I'm curious why the Antec has jumped in price in recent times didn't it used to be around the £50 mark? In any case for a new builder the PSU would be a pain to replace seeing as it is hooked up to everything. So it might be a good idea to install it right now so it's in place for the next 2 years of upgrades and tweaks once the OP gets the build bug!
I just built my step son a new PC for around the £600 mark (albeit without monitor). I chose the Coolermaster Elite 430 Black Mid Tower Computer Case: http://www.scan.co.uk/products/cool...-side-window-120mm-front-led-blue-fan-w-o-psu And with the money I saved on that, I added 8GB of Corsair Vengence RAM (Along with Intel Core i5 2500K, Asus P8P67 Pro R3 P67 MoBo, because the non pro was out of stock..,Corsair A50 CAFA50 CPU heatsink, DVD drive, 1TB Samsung HDD, W7 Pro - already had good PSU) The case isn't bad at all for just over £30, and had better instructions than the Corsair 600T I have for my PC, and looks quite nice. Build took less than an hour. Personally, I would go Sandybridge (2500K cannot be beaten on price/performance right now)if you can, as that PC should last you the next few years, so a sound investment. ETA - Just bought a 5850 for him, too....
Compared to the MSI P67A-GD53 (B3) the ASUS P8P67 offers poor value because it is more expensive and offers less features. I believe the same can be said for going 8GB. At the moment I have an ASUS P8P67 with 4GB and everything is flying including intensive games like Battlefield 2! However I do agree going Sandy Bridge is the best option. You get Quad Core and excellent overclocks at a great price.
4GB (2x2GB) Corsair XMS3 £35.28 1TB Samsung HD103SJ Spinpoint F3 £40.43 1280MB MSI GTX 570 £233.48 Samsung SH-S222AB/BEBE DVD+RW £14.66 530W Be Quiet BN106 Pure Power L7 £45.32 Asus P8P67-M Rev3 £94.40 Intel Core i5 2500K £154.79 Coolermaster Elite 430 £29.99 Total £648.35
This looks solid. I would change the PSU t the coolermaster 600w gold as its nicer looking, more efficient and it's cheaper. Drop the case down to something like the 690II advanced and spend the cash on a 560 GTX for a about 150+ pounds.
I like the GTX 570! However I have to rebuff the Asus P8P67-M, yes it is cheaper but the SATA connections are not at right angles to the board which is a pain when building a PC. Also it lacks SLI has a Micro-ATX form factor whereas the MSI P67A-GD53 (B3) benefits from proper ATX including a single PCI-Express lane above the graphics card slot which is really handy should the original poster wish to upgrade to a dedicated sound card. Also the VRM heatsinks on the ASUS are nothing compared to that of the MSI as indicted in the Bit-Tech review following publication of the same article in Custom PC.
I have a Asus P8P67 Pro and its been without fault, I here very little about the GD53...but on the specs alone its an amazing bargain! But reviews on it are sparse......really you have to base your opinions on the reviews of the other mobo's in the range as they are essentially the same. 8GB ram??? why, easy to change out later if you really need it, but unless your gonna be folding loads it'd just be spec candy and a waste of money, as Blogins says, 4gb will run every game out there fine? Also dont cheap out on the psu....you really wnat to get one you can trust! if it goes, it wont go alone!
