My First Home-Build-Really Need Help!

Hey guys,

So I am COMPLETELY new to building PCs but I said I'd give it a go as I've heard it would be cheaper than buying a pre-made and I'm also incredibly curious as to how all the different part of a computer go together so I was hoping it would be a success.

I have been asking various people online for their help for the last week but a lot of the people I have asked have been like "GET THIS..AND THIS...AND THIS" with no regard for my budget so I was hoping I could post here and get some really good constructive feedback.

I'll post the thread in the format that was listed in the stickies:

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Approximate Purchase Date: This week.

Budget Range: £~700 (800 euro ish)

System Usage from Most to Least Important: World of Warcraft, Starcraft II, Photoshop, Other Games (I don't play too many other games - I will be playing Diablo 3 when that comes out)

Parts Not Required: Speakers, Mouse and Keyboard are not needed.

Preferred Website(s) for Parts: Scan.co.uk ( I am Irish and these seem to be one of the few companies who deliver here so I reckon I'm stuck with them!)

Country of Origin: Ireland

Parts Preferences: Absolutely no preference.

Overclocking: Maybe

SLI or Crossfire: No

Monitor Resolution: 1920x1080 ideally.

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I have constructed two builds on scan.co.uk that are the creation of this weeks research. One group of people believe that I should get an Intel i5 2500k and overclock it and make a sacrifice on the GPU. The others believe saving money on the CPU/Mobo by buying AMD will allow me to get a better GPU and will over all be a better system for what I need (that being said I have heard that WoW and SC2 are mainly CPU dependent, not GPU. I don't know if this is true or false). The only problem is, the Intel build is coming in at £50 more than the AMD one, so the AMD one is currently tempting me a lot as the lower the price the better!

Here are the two builds:

Intel:
http://www.scan.co.uk/savedbasket/ [...] 08e545a899

AMD:
http://www.scan.co.uk/savedbasket/ [...] 0198bc2c3f

Please keep in mind that a monitor is included in each build.

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Can anyone here PLEASE help me out and help me create a build that will be good enough for my needs. I am not sure the parts I have chosen are the best quality/price on scan.co.uk , I have currently only really chosen what I have read about/been referred to so ALL the parts are completely subject to change. If anyone would be kind enough to perhaps link a build on scan.co.uk that would be above and beyond what I expect.

I would just like to thank anyone who made it to the end of this post, I realise it's very long and probably very boring for most of the experienced builders here but its a pretty big investment for myself (just out of college and sitting on pretty big loans but my 6 year old laptop is on its last legs so this is a priority) so I really want to get it right.

Thanks once again,

Kind Regards,

Tsukimi

Build the intel , but drop the cpu to a 2400 , and spend the money you save on the better graphics card

Is the 2400 still better than the AMD one?

Go 2400k and get a 6870 AMD card and 4 gigs of ram. I had that but with an AMD Athlon and it ran great the I5 would only make it better. You would be able to run any game you want at very close to max settings and in the future you could just drop a second card in instead of getting a new system. That would last you a long time (in computer years lol) I think In US dollars you could mayby go with a 6950 AMD card that would be even better. Dont over spend on ram you will see better results getting a better CPU/GPU. WoW And starcraft do seem to be very CPU dependant but with WoW you will only see changes from 75-100+ FPS any decent cpu/gpu combo will run that game at max setting over 60 FPS and at 60 FPS the game is very smooth.

For quality anything from asus or msi I have had great luck with this biostar. I would not want to reccomend a specific mobo as I have no experiance with the sandy bridge chips. But Biostar seems to give you alot for the money.

Good job you passed my test... yeah thats my story and Im sticking to it lol

first i would replace that board with this one:
http://www1.hardwareversand.de/art [...] &agid=1601
will save you some cash (yes i speak german ) and will allow for SLI/Crossfire in the future.
i would replace that GPU with this:
http://www1.hardwareversand.de/art [...] &agid=1004
comparison of your evga 460 vs the 6870:
http://www.hardwarecanucks.com/for [...] udy-6.html

everything else is good, the reviews for that PSU seem good too:
(similar super flower): http://www.anandtech.com/show/2643

Bump...anyone?