Building New High End PC - Need Help ($2000 budget)

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CreepStar

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Hey all, so I'm building a new PC myself for the first time ever and I need some advice/critics etc.Ive read all the reviews I can but specific help from the community will be really useful.

I primarily use my PC for a lot of gaming, the odd movie and occasional video editing. (very occasional)

Here's my current shopping basket.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-358-IN - CPU - Intel Core i7-2600K

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-051-AK - Mobo - Asrock Z68 Extreme4 Intel Z68

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-249-AS - Graphics Card - Asus GeForce GTX 580 1536MB

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-062-GS - Memory - G.Skill RipJawsX 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C8 1600MHz

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-233-CM - Case + PSU - Cooler Master HAF X with Coolermaster GX 750W PSU

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MO-041-DE - Monitor - Dell UltraSharp U2711 27" Widescreen LCD Monitor

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-082-SA - Hard Drive - Samsung SpinPoint F3 1TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HS-046-ZA - CPU Cooler - Zalman CNPS10X Flex CPU Cooler

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CD-090-LG - Optical Drive - LG GH22NS70 22x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=KB-187-LG - Keyboard - Logitech G510 Gaming Keyboard

Don't worry too much about the keyboard but this is my current selection.

It totals to £1789.66. If you need a figure in $$ I dont know what to tell you as the exchange rate is pretty useless due to differences between USA and UK prices.

My hardest decision so far was whether to go 2560x1440, or 1920x1200/1080. I'm leaning towards 2560x1440 now for the superior resolution it gives but now I'm unsure of what card best supports resolution and whether my PSU is good enough as I only picked it due to a bundle offer with the case.

Please leave your comments on what you'd change, what you agree with, whether I'm being an idiot with any particular component and so on.

Many thanks in advance.






 
C

CreepStar

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I wrote $2000 budget, but that may be wrong. Its hard to judge with the difference between what you get for your $$ and what you get for your ££.

I'm sure you lot will figure it out xD
 
C

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Well, as much as I wanted an SSD. I felt like I couldnt get a decent SSd that was worth the money into my build without it really pushing my budget. I may lose sleep if this starts hitting £2000 xD.

As for the PSU, a friend told me that I would for sure want a modular PSU but didnt really explain why. I dont think I'll be pushed for space inside my case.

Any suggestions on a different PSU? Bear in mind this PSU is a fairly good bargain if I buy the case + PSU bundle and shaves essential ££ of my build. I am willing buy the case separate and spend more on a PSU if it truly is worth it, performance and value wise.

P.S. ty for the link I will read through this now
 
C

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It won't let me edit my posts unfortunately.

I forgot to mention, already sorted an OS so that does not factor in to my budget.
 
grody

grody

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Yeah, looking on that site, that is a really good deal for a psu. You're essentially getting it for free. Well, if you don't mind the cable management, I think you'll be fine.
 
C

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Yeh, I've seen the same case on ebuyer for £30 cheaper though. Yet to completely look around for super bargains before I confirm every component I want.

Overclockers is such a reliable website support wise though. I will go ahead and buy this if its as good as I can get for the money. Im just curious if anyone has opinions of any better components I could get for slightly less or slightly more ££
 
Why_Me

Why_Me

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First off you want a 900+w psu in order to run dual 580's in SLI. Not only is that CM psu short in wattage and amps, it's not a psu that would be recommended by anyone on this site. Also that Zalman cpu h/s you have up there doesn't come with the fans, so you need to put those on your list if you plan on using it.

I added the extra case fans to this build not to mention that Asrock board down below comes with a black front usb 3.0 panel and SSD cage that matches that case down below perfectly. That case says it's a mid tower, but it's as large as some full tower cases. That XFX psu is manufactured by Seasonic...it's as good as it gets, not to mention it's "modular". But if you look at the link on that Asrock board I posted (Asrock site) and scroll half way down on that page you will see that black usb 3.0/SSD panel I'm talking about.

Dual factory over clocked gtx 560's in SLI along with Windows 7.

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/164961 £76.77 inc. vat Free Delivery
Coolermaster HAF 922 Mid Tower Case - No PSU

http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Fans%2C+Heatsinks%2C+Coolers/Case+Fans/120mm+Case+Fans/Coolermaster+SickleFLow+Red+LED+Quiet+Case+Fan+120mm+?productId=44309 £6.42 inc. VAT
Coolermaster SickleFLow Red LED Quiet Case Fan 120mm

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/200mm-coolermaster-megaflow-700rpm-110cfm-19db-silent-case-fan-with-red-led £10.78 Inc VAT
Coolermaster Mega-Flow 200mm Red Case Fan

http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Power+Supplies/Modular+700-950W/750W+XFX+Black+Edition+80PLUS+Silver+Power+Supply+?productId=45337 £92.99 inc. VAT
750W XFX Black Edition Modular 80PLUS Silver Power Supply

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/261255 £113.73 inc. vat Free Delivery
Asrock P67 EXTREME4 V3 1155 Socket 7.1 Channel HD Audio ATX Motherboard

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/251596 £162.48 inc. vat
Intel Core i5 2500K 3.3GHz Socket 1155 6MB Cache Retail Boxed Processor

http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Fans%2C+Heatsinks%2C+Coolers/CPU+Coolers/Coolermaster+Hyper+212+Plus+CPU+Cooler+?productId=39577 £18.74 inc. VAT
Coolermaster Hyper 212 Plus CPU Cooler

http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Memory/DDR3/Dual+Channel+1600MHz/8GB+Mushkin+Radioactive+%23997005+%282x4GB%29+DDR3+1600MHz+9-9-9-24+?productId=44825 £62.68 inc. VAT
8GB Mushkin Radioactive #997005 (2x4GB) DDR3 1600MHz 9-9-9-24 1.5v VDIMM, Lifetime Warranty

http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Hard+Drives/SATA+%28Serial+ATA%29/500GB+to+1TB/1TB+Samsung+HD103SJ+SpinPoint+F3+SATA-II+3.5%22+Hard+Drive+?productId=37726 £39.30 inc. VAT
1TB Samsung HD103SJ SpinPoint F3 SATA-II 3.5" Hard Drive

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/190838 £14.49 inc. vat
LiteOn iHAS224 24x DVD±RW DL RAM & Lightscribe SATA Optical Drive - OEM Black

http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Graphics+Cards/NVIDIA/NVIDIA+GTX+560+Series/Asus+GeForce+GTX+560Ti+DirectCU+II+1024MB+GDDR5+PCI-Express+Graphics+Card+?productId=43564 £173.99 inc. VAT
Asus GeForce GTX 560Ti DirectCU II 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card

http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Graphics+Cards/NVIDIA/NVIDIA+GTX+560+Series/Asus+GeForce+GTX+560Ti+DirectCU+II+1024MB+GDDR5+PCI-Express+Graphics+Card+?productId=43564 £173.99 inc. VAT
Asus GeForce GTX 560Ti DirectCU II 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/259863 £67.29 inc. vat Free Delivery
Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium w/SP1 - Licence and media - 1 PC - OEM - DVD - 64-bit - English

Total: £1,013.65 inc. VAT

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/263935 £149.89 inc. vat Free Delivery
Asus VE247H LED LCD 23.6" HDMI Monitor

http://www.asrock.com/mb/overview.asp?Model=P67%20Extreme4 <----- Halfway down on this page is the black 3.0 USB panel w/SSD cage.

http://www.madshrimps.be/articles/article/1000116#axzz1EqpvWFEN <---Review on that Asrock motherboard

http://www.guru3d.com/article/asus-gtx560-directcu-ii-review/1 <----- Review on that Asus gtx 560 ti graphics card.

http://www.coolermaster-usa.com/product.php?category_id=19&product_id=2919 <----- more pics, specs, and professional reviews on that CM 922 HAF
 
IntelEnthusiast

IntelEnthusiast

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+1 to Why_Me's build. He does do a good job of putting everything together for you. I was going to talk about dropping down to the Intel® Core™ i5-2500K but he beats me to it, but since he did make the change I will go over what it means to you.

The major differences between the Intel Core i7-2600K and the Intel Core i5-2500K come down to two things, hyper-threading and 100MHz clock speed difference. Now since very few games can take advantage of more than 3 threads the hyper-threading for gaming is have a very low value. Now there is a little better value for hyper-threading in video/audio or some other heavily multi-threading applications.

So you need to ask yourself if the difference in price is worth the little performance increase when you get when you are doing video work.

Christian Wood
Intel Enthusiast Team
 
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Thanks alot for your informative post Why_Me.

Excuse me if I sound ignorant or dumb form anything I say from here on. Its not my intention :D.

I noticed in the suggested build you made that you made price cuts on pretty much every component. Including the monitor.

Are all these cuts really neccessary in terms of value? I read that the CM HAF 922 is a great case but I also read the CM HAF X is alot better. Bear in mind I really do have close to £2000 to spend and I'm curious if that build you posted has the same lifespan as a "high-end" build as my previous one does.

Clearly you know what you're talking about. I can tell that from reading your post but if you could just tell me why exactly you made changes to the card, the monitor, the RAM etc. I don't really understand how the build has gone from £1800 - £1200 or so inc monitor xD.




 
C

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Also, what the hell is the difference between all these motherboard chipsets? I read the Z68 was better. Maybe I read wrong. I noticed you picked P67 azboard instead of Z68? Can anyone explain the difference?

TY in advance
 
IntelEnthusiast

IntelEnthusiast

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Sure, the real difference between the P67 and the Z68 come down to two features that the Z68 has that the P67 doesn’t have. Because of these 2 features the Z68 chipset costs a little more.

The first feature that the Z68 offers is the Intel® SRT (Smart Response Technology). What this Intel SRT does is that it will check which programs that you commonly use and cache (store) them on a SSD (Solid State Drive). By caching the software this way you will pick up SSD performance on your commonly used applications. So your boot times will be faster, access for the game that you play every day will be faster etc.. Because this caching is flexible in that it can change with your playing habits it can give you performance as if you had a much bigger SSD.

The second feature that is on most of the Z68 boards (About half of Gigabyte’s Z68 don’t have this feature) is support for the IGP (Intergraded Graphics on Processor). Support for the IGP unlocks a couple of nice things. First you can use the IGP instead of a dedicated graphics card. This won’t give you high end graphics performance but it will not have you without while you wait for a new video card. Also with the addition of the Lucidlogix Virtu software, you can switch between the IGP with the Intel QuickSync and Dedicated video to get the best performance for the application that you are running. So if you are doing some digital encoding you might find that the Intel QuickSync does a better job. For gaming might get the best performance form the dedicated video. In the end it is all about getting you the best performance from your system.

Christian Wood
Intel Enthusiast Team
 
grody

grody

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I think it's worth noting that p67 is dead and that all the newest bios and driver updates will be for the z68. With this budget I don't think p67 is the way to go.
 
IntelEnthusiast

IntelEnthusiast

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Wow, we update the USB 3.0 drivers only 4 days ago on the Intel® Desktop Board DP67BG and the audio drivers 6-22-11 about 3 weeks ago but we have stopped supporting the P67 boards. We have not stopped supporting the P67, H67, Q67 or even the H61 chipsets with updated drivers and Bios.

Christian Wood
Intel Enthusiast Team
 
C

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TY for the explanation IntelEnthusiast.

I think im close to deciding what to buy now. As much as I Why_Me's.

Also in Why_Me's previous post he stated that my CPU Cooler/hs came without fans thus I cannot use it alone? I'm confused at what he means by this. As far as I can tell the cpu cooler I chose is fine alone no?
 
C

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Sorry, I now see what he means about the CPU cooler o_O. Completely did not see that. Now just to decide whether to drop down to a CM HAF 922 or stick with my CM HAF X.
 
C

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Another question. Remember I am planning to go 2560x1440 monitor. Will the 560ti SLI be able to handle this aswell as say a 580gtx?
 
grody

grody

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What matters at high resolutions is vram. I think the 560ti comes in 1gb and 2gb flavors, so consider the 2gb if you have the choice. But of course, those end up costing more than the 580...
 
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