New Build Thoughts & Opinions

[nadfink45]

Apologies for another one of these threads! but i'm about to spend big on my first custom build and would like some feedback on the specs i'm looking at. I set my budget around £1200 and have been reading around for weeks now piecing together the best componants for my price range....This is what I have in mind.... Will this spec be as awesome as I hope it will be???

I7 950 ( I intend to overclock, again my first attempt at this)

Asus Sabertooth

6GB Corsair XMS3 Classic CMX6GX3M3C1600C7

Themaltake Frio Cooler

Antec TP650 Modular PSU

1TB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD1002FAEX

Evga or KFA GTX 570

Antec DF-85

Would appreciate your comments!

 

[nadfink45]

Thanks, hope i I will.....

There are some difficult decisions to make though! The three things that i'm still unsure of are the mobo, GPU & Case...

Mobo - Asus or Gigabyte? As a first time oc'er, a user friendly BIOS is preferable so is it worth the stretch to go for the R3 extreme?

Case - Antec or CM? maybe the HAF X or even the NZXT phantom?

GPU - While i'm more or less set on Nvidia, the 6970 is appealing....

Thoughts?

 

[13thmonkey]

consider waiting for sandybridge? its so close it'll either reduce the prices of i7's or be better than them, either way you win.

 

[nadfink45]

Thanks for the replies...

As for the cases, the ones you mentioned are up there, except from the HAF X Nvidia edition - a bit of an ugle number that one! But i guess so is the DF-85

Good shout with the Zalman cooler too.

As for the Mobo's, I seriously thought about the Rampage III, I just don't know if i'd use it to its full potential having limited overclocking exp. Will have to look into that ASRock too.

As for the Sandy Bridge, yes I have thought about that, do you think it will affect the price of the I7's?

Thanks for the suggestions

 

[sportsfanboy]

The i5 760 performance is close to the i7 950 and is about 100 dollars cheaper. You will also save money on a motherboard as good socket 1156 mobos are a bit cheaper. The only real difference in performance is because of the 200mhz difference in clock speed at stock settings. You will be overclocking so that will negate that advantage, both chips will clock to around the same frequency.

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/100?vs=191