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How does it stack up (6 months on)?

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  • Components
August 19, 2014 6:36:50 AM

So, the 2014 upgrade cycle is complete, bar replacing anything that breaks. At least I hope so, because my wallet won't be able to take too much more.

A while ago I described my rig as being the fat kid stuck in the door between mid range and high end which isn't what I was aiming for, so after some upgrades this is where it stands:

CPU: Intel i5 4570 @ 3.2GHz
GPU: GTX 780 Asus DCU II edition
Board: Gigabyte H87 HD3 w. On/Off charge support
Memory: 16GB (2 x 8) Corsair Vengeance LP RAM @1600MHz
Optical drive: 16x LG Blu Ray drive/rewriter with Blu Ray playback software
Storage: 2 x 2TB HDD (1 x WD Black @ 7200 RPM and 1 x WD Green @ 5400 RPM) and 1 x 120 GB Samsung 840 Evo SSD
Wireless: 802.11n WiFi 2.4GHz
Bluetooth: Bluetooth 4.1 USB adaptor
PSU: Antec 750W True Power Classic 80+ Gold
Cooling: Air, 7 fans
Case: Zalman Z11 Plus Mid Tower ATX
OS: Windows 8.1

Total build cost £1480 after returns and replacement of parts and OS and Office etc. This is twice what I intended to spend initially, but I found the kind of power couldn't be done for the price I wanted (or at least from the retailers I looked at). I would have put an overclocking board in there had I deemed overclocking worth the extra money. With the WiFi I went 2.4 GHz rather than dual band to save a bit of money and I've compared wired and wireless performance and it's exactly the same. Overall I've deemed the price worth every penny. I did some running round and I saved about £200 compared to buying a same/similar spec system prebuilt. I saved about £700 compared to Alienware (Alienware prices are just insane!) and that's still lacking the Blu Ray drive and the storage space.

I've since sorted all the bugs and issues that plagued this system in the first few months and have rock solid reliability now. I also once managed to get it dead silent last week where I actually had to put my ear to the machine to check my fans were working, but sadly it's back to being quiet but not dead silent (I have changed PSU in between).

Performance-wise it's just been awesome. After going back to my laptop these last few days and coming back to my gaming PC it's night and day. It's ready to log in before my TV (which I use as my monitor is even on).

The graphics are just beautiful. Even a game like The Sims (yes I play it) where the graphics aren't exactly demanding, my computer just makes it look so much better. I can ALT and Tab out of games and leave it running all day and not take a performance hit at all (fact that's what I'm doing now).

If I were to build it again I'd put the dual band WiFi in there and maybe an i7 like originally planned, but I doubt either would make too much difference

Also, how long will a rig like this last before games start exceeding its capabilities

More about : stack months

!