So Zoots has inspired me to get a new PC and I'm breaking the mould which is rare for me and going for something other than a dell :rolleyes:
That PC Specialist place looks neat so I've built a machine there but need you wonderfully intelligent people to confirm it's all OK. It's things like the cooling fan and stuff which I have no idea about.
Is this OK? Is there anything wrong with this? Am I missing something? (in addition to the below I'll use my own XI-FI Extreme sound card)
(http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h284/mpppen/pc.jpg)
REALLY appreciate the help .... thanks :D
PEN
only thing i would say m8 is get a bigger psu i have a ati hd 6850 gfx card and i had to upgrade my psu i have a 1000w psu but anything from a 600w-1000w should surfice.
Agreed, 450W is pushing your luck with these new 4-series cards - they're thirsty beasts! Upgrading to a 600W should give you enough, and wouldn't cost much more.
I'd also reccomend getting a RAID set up. It means spending on a 2nd hard-drive, but drives dead cheap these days and the benefits are pretty huge (either drive failure protection, or uber-speed depending on how you set it up).
Don't worry about cooling fans. The i-series CPU's aren't that hot, even if you overclock them you can use the stock cooler without any problems.
Thanks chaps
I may well go raid but only specified one drive as I have a couple of 1tb sata drivers here which I'll also add into the machine.
OK I'll go for a 600watter.
Is there anything else? Is the Motherboard OK and processer etc all OK? I'm happy to spend a bit more money if it's worth pushing to something else!
(I may also swap out the C: HDD for a SSD one. Not huge but maybe 120gb or something and then use the extra HDD's for data.)
Thanks
SSD = Massive Goodness.
That is all.
OK thanks chaps.
I've had a couple more comments - particularly about the Mobo so here's pahse II
(http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h284/mpppen/pc2.jpg)
Better all round?
You'll notice I haven't included a graphics card as yet.
I presume my Geforce8800GTX will not longer cut the mustard for this machine?
If not then my revamp is here:
(http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h284/mpppen/pc3.jpg)
So.
1. Incumbent GeForce 880GTX or not?
2. Anything wrong with the rest (bearing in mind I'll add my own 1no. or 2no. 1TB sata drives and xi_fi Gamer sound card
I guess I'm a little disappinted that it hasn't got e-sata but I think I can solve that by one of these (http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Akasa-ESATA-45-EX-Internal-SATA-to-External-ESATA-PCI-backplate-adaptor).
Again, thanks and If I can get a consensus I'll order it on the morrow.
8800GTX will most definitely not do the job. Upgrade it to something current and in budget.
Personally I'd still add more PSU, 1k is where I sit atm mainly because you never know what you'll be adding to the case in future months and rail stability is *all* on most systems.
And as Lion said - SSD's rock. I have aCrucial C300 256GB SSD and it is blindingly fast and makes a massive & noticeable difference to system response in daily use. Combined with your selected SATA III mobo you'd see monster performance gains with an SSD installed.
Ok thanks again.
With Gandy's help I've revised the spec and it is now thus:
(http://i67.photobucket.com/albums/h284/mpppen/pc4.jpg)I take on board the comments above
Any last comments on this beast.
Thankyou
One tweak, stick the Titan Fenrir on as the CPU cooler. Far better than the stock intel coolers which really are not that good.
Great done and done.
Thanks all.
Do you know what make the GTX460 is? Some can be better than others with regards cooling and noise.
good question. No idea. I'll ask them to see if they know.
If you get the choice go with either Gigabyte or MSI.
It's a Palit brand ! ? ! ?
Heres (http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18163265&page=2) a thread on OCUK about the GTX460, it seems to say that Palit is one of the worse with regard cooler quality and noise.
The thread is long but the Palit is mentioned early on.
Maybe you can upgrade the brand?
Thanks for the heads-up.
I'll just buy it without the graphics card and then source it from elsewhere
The price on PC Specialist is Ã,£175 SCAN (http://www.scan.co.uk/Product.aspx?WebProductID=1272322&source=froogle)are doing it for Ã,£176 so job done.
Cheers for the heads-up
I think Oldie has a Gigabyte one, may be worth getting his opinion on it.
Hey Pen, what spec did you buy in the end and how much did it cost?
I haven't gotten round to doing it yet tbh. I think it came in at about Ã,£1300 in the end.
I still haven't quite decided on the final spec but have ordered the graphics card so have started :).
The card is great. Apparently I need to o/c it so I may be asking someone to tell me how to do it if it's easy and worthwhile.
I also bought a 120gb SSD and I can't believe the difference it makes. I'm trialling it in my office machine and opened the complete CS4 suite of indesign, photoshop and illustrator almost as quick as I could press the buttons - amazing.
Pen, don't upgrade anything yet.
The new sandybridge cpu's from intel should be out shortly(Q1 2011) and as usual there will be quite a price drop on current mainstream hardware.
Good to know, thanks.
I've only bought the GTX460 and a 120gb SSD as yet but am not desperately desperate to upgrade so don't mind waiting a few months. Nice one.
I've moved back from Dewey's thread toi this
Can someone please double check this spec for me:
https://secure.scan.co.uk/aspnet/Shop/SavedBasket/Show.aspx?Id=f7772716e6f347dcaedf7f6d9455400d
[ATTACH=CONFIG]609[/ATTACH]
Thanks ! :)
Nice, I like all of that.
Whats your graphics card?
One thing I might add, I would imagine that you intend to over clock the processor to 4 Gig? Its insanely easy and makes the processor noticeably quicker, if so then I would get 2 of the apache fans and mount them in a push/pull config,really improves the cooling performance with a negligible increase in noise as the fans are virtually silent. You will need to get a fan mounting kit with the cooler as well, its an extra set of the wires used to attach the extra apache fan to the cooler.
Ok now just seen that its coming pre-overclocked.
And that you've got a 460.
Sweet system, and I agree with lionheart. Get another fan to do a push pull arrangement on the cooler and that cpu will easily hit 4ghz :D Only minor addition, add this (http://www.scan.co.uk/products/arctic-silver-5-thermal-compound-for-cpu-and-chipset-coolers-35-gram)
Is there any reason to get the WD HD instead of a samsung F3 (currently on offer from scan) and v.cheap at Ã,£41 inc vat?
I don't know if you'll play many games on this pc Pen? If so its well worth getting an extra gtx 460 it literally doubles the fps.
Thanks guys.
Extra fan added and I guess they'll know about the push pull arrangment on the cooler thingy?
No, no reason on the HDD Dewey so I'll checkout the F3 and also going with two GTX460's.
Thanks
Just one final thing re your system Pen....
Its going to be awsomely quick mate!
Quote from: Penfold;318986Thanks guys.
Extra fan added and I guess they'll know about the push pull arrangment on the cooler thingy?
No, no reason on the HDD Dewey so I'll checkout the F3 and also going with two GTX460's.
Thanks
Quote from: Dewey;318977Is there any reason to get the WD HD instead of a samsung F3 (currently on offer from scan) and v.cheap at Ã,£41 inc vat?
I don't know if you'll play many games on this pc Pen? If so its well worth getting an extra gtx 460 it literally doubles the fps.
Isn't the WD a lot faster at 6 GB/s? and therefore better to stripe??
[/COLOR][/SIZE][/FONT]
1TB (1000 GB) Western Digital Caviar Black Hard Drive - HDD
1TB Western Digital WD1002FAEX Caviar Black, SATA 6Gb/s, 7200rpm, 64MB Cache, 8 ms
1TB Samsung Spinpoint F3 Hard Drive - HDD HD103SJ
1TB Samsung HD103SJ Spinpoint F3, SATA 3Gb/s, 7200rpm, 32MB Cache, 8.9 ms, NCQ, OEM
Finally, I must begoingmad but when I do the same spec at PC Specialist it's Ã,£300 cheaper.
Can someone spot a blindly obvious thing I've missed? :blink:
Case
COOLERMASTER CM690 MKII ADVANCED CASE
Processor (CPU)
IntelÃ,® Coreâ„¢i7 Quad Core Processor i7-950 (3.06GHz) 4.8GTs/8MB Cache
Motherboard
ASUSÃ,® P6X58D-E: DDR3, USB 3.0, SATA 6.0GB/s, 3-Way SLI
Memory (RAM)
6GB KINGSTON HYPER-X T1 TRI-DDR3 2000MHz, X.M.P (3 x 2GB KIT)
Graphics Card
NONE, I ALREADY HAVE A GRAPHICS CARD
Memory - 1st Hard Disk
120GB OCZ VERTEX 2 SATA II 2.5" SSD (upto 285MB/sR | 275MB/sW)
2nd Hard Disk
1TB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD1002FAEX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE (7200rpm)
1st DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER Ã,±R/Ã,±RW/RAM
Power Supply & Case Cooling
CORSAIR 850W PSU (TX850) 80+ ULTRA QUIET (Ã,£99)
Processor Cooling
TITAN FENRIR EVO EXTREME HEATPIPE CPU COOLER (Ã,£39)
Sound Card
ONBOARD 8 CHANNEL (7.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Facilities
ONBOARD 10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT
USB Options
6 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL (MIN 2 FRONT PORTS) AS STANDARD
Operating System
NO OPERATING SYSTEM REQUIRED
Office Software
NO OFFICE SOFTWARE
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Warranty
3 Year Standard Warranty (1 Month Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 9 to 13 working days
Quantity
1
Price: Ã,£1,071.00 including VAT and delivery.
against scans:
3XS Intel X58 Core i7 - Custom Series
Coolermaster CM 690 II Advanced Black Mid Tower Computer Case 32061 VAT Ã,£228.83 Company:
Corsair HX Series 850W Modular Power Supply (PSU) 27644
Asus P6X58D-E Intel X58 1366 Motherboard 33069
CPU Ã,£199.17 1 Intel CPU i7 950 Quad Core Processor 27179
CPU Cooler Ã,£39.89 1 Prolimatech Intel Copper CPU Cooler 29054
Corsair Memory XMS3 6GB DDR3 PC3-12800 (1600) Triple Channel Desktop 25348
1 1TB (1000 GB) Western Digital Caviar Black Hard Drive - HDD 32170 Reference Number:
1 OCZ 120GB Vertex 2 SSD - Solid State Drive 34716 Salesperson:
Optical Drive 1 Ã,£14.89 1 Pioneer DVD Writer, DVR-S18LBK, SATA, Black, Retail 29304 Direct Dial
Akasa Apache Black Ultra Silent Fan HDB bearing PWM fan *OEM Fan Only 33444
Akasa Apache Black Ultra Silent Fan HDB bearing PWM fan *OEM Fan Only 33444
Thermalright Chill Factor 3 33983
Cables Ã,£0.00 1 30cm Akasa 8 pin to 8 pin Extension Cable 17842
Cables Ã,£0.00 1 30cm Akasa Fan Cable 4 pin to 4 pin for x3 Fans 25096
Different Power supply, Different Ram , Pre-overclocked and a 3 year warranty seem to be the main differences, not sure that adds up to Ã,£300 though.
And a slower DVD Drive.
Yeah it's weird. I'd rather go with Scan so I can bump the order up to Ã,£2k but there's little point if it's costing me the Ã,£350 VAT saving.
Perculiar!
Update:
When you put the components into Scan directly it comes out a lot cheaper. I queried this and they told me they add on a Ã,£150 + vat build charge and Ã,£35 delivery. :eyebrow:
PC Specialist prices include that - that's why it comes out so different.
Simple then, get the parts individually and build it yourself :D
lol yeah right Gandy. You're a glutton for punishment as you know all I'll do is drive to yours and dump it on your doorstep to build it for me :)
I've speeced it up and will order from PC Specialist - except they told me to go for 750w psu not 850w psu which, they say, it totally excessive - even if I add another graphics card in it. - agree?
Depends on the PSU. You need to look at the efficiency rating of each PSU and what loads they can sustain across the rails, then you need to take into account the max power draw of each component and factor in a 10% safety margin. Then you have the required rating of your PSU.
For me, as the PSU is the most PITA piece of hardware to change, I always over spec this slightly so it'll take new components without worrying. However, most newer kit are designed for low power draw now anyway so that philosopy, while great a few years ago, may not be relevant now!
If it were me, I'd look at the two PSU's and pick the one with the highest efficiency as this will save a little bit of cash on your electricity bill.
Depends on the brand on PSU. For decent brands it'll be fine (anything 85% efficiency).
No idea what you're talking about :rolleyes:
it's either a
CORSAIR 750W PSU (TX750) 80+ Ultra quiet (Ã,£88)
or a
CORSAIR 850W PSU (TX850) 80+ Ultra quiet (Ã,£99)
I'm thinking the 80 is the efficiency?
So is 750 ok?
Ã,£11 for an extra 100w of power is a pretty good reason to get the bigger power supply, in my opinion.
Great review here for the 850 http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/psus/2009/09/14/600w-850w-psu-round-up/9
The 750 should be no different so if the PC people are saying 750 is ok, then go with it....... However, do read this first...
http://www.bit-tech.net/blog/2010/05/07/does-anyone-really-need-a-1kw-psu/
Interesting.
thanks for the advice
Pen, take a look at the Enermax line.
I have a 2007 Galaxy version and it's rock solid.
Pen i am running my 2 8800gtx band my i7 core 6 gig of ram off a corsair 750 psu been soild as a rock. but i agree with Tut for Ã,£11 more the 850 seems to be way to go along with that review.
Too late - I've ordered with a 750w. I'm sure it will be fine :)
When I was buying my PSU from Scan (corsair 850w) the guy told me that many good manufacturers of psu's ie corsair, enermax often read upto 10% more power than they are quoted to ensure they meet the minium spec. He'd tested the corsair 850 and it was actually pumping out 920w... so I wouldn't be too worried.
Quote from: Penfold;319074Too late - I've ordered with a 750w. I'm sure it will be fine :)
Quote from: Gorion;319071Pen, take a look at the Enermax line.
I have a 2007 Galaxy version and it's rock solid.
Those are rock solid PSUs - I have the 1Kw Galaxy and it has been 100% reliable and has run my watercooling system, a gfx SLI set up and the rest of the system with zero problems. Highly recommended (but I know it's too late for Pen!)