1100-1300 euro work/gamestation

[sebastiaan]

Hi, just been reading THG(F) the last week and browsing around to find info on building a new system. I want to run it past you guys, cause it's the first system I have selected myself. Thanks for your comments and suggestions!

Approximate Purchase Date: asap

Budget Range: 1100 - 1300 euro before rebates

System Usage from Most to Least Important: Photoshop, watching movies, games, office

Parts Not Required: keyboard, mouse, monitor, speakers. OS will be Win7 Home Pro 64bit

Preferred Website(s) for Parts: http://www.alternate.be (Feel free to suggest parts based on relative pricing in your local currency. this site is in dutch)

Country of Origin: Belgium

Parts selection & current total cost: 1.158,99e
ASRock Z68 Extreme4 = 172,90e
Intel® Core™ i5-2400 = 164,90e
Corsair 8 GB DDR3-1600 Kit (2x4GB) 66,90e
ASUS Radeon EAH6850 DirectCu/2DIS/V2 = 149,90e
OCZ Vertex 2 OCZSSD2-2VTXE120G (system drive) 169,90e (alternative: OCZ Vertex 2 240GB for 299,90e total)
Western Digital 2GB WD20EARS (3x) 69,90e x3 = 209,70e
Antec TruePower New Series TP-750 = 124,90e
Antec Three Hundred = 59,90e
Plextor PX-L890SA = 39,90e

Overclocking: No (no experience, quite hesitant, I prefer my parts to live long)

SLI or Crossfire: In a future upgrade

Monitor Resolution: 1920x1200

Additional Comments:
I need RAID 5 for the 2GB drives to have first level data security for my pictures. Photoshop currently has to handle 1GB files of double A4 size.
I prefer silence over performance.
This system should last about/at least 5 years with upgrades and therefore chose Radeon 6850 to add another one when I need more graphics power for later games. However, I don't mind not being able to play recent games at end of the 5 year period.
I don't have to spend the last bit of my budget. If the system is balanced, I'm happy not to go for better parts.
Questions still going through my head right now:
* Is this balanced?
* Can I just plug in more HD's when I need more storage? The case can handle 6. How about the MoBo?
* Should I have 16GB Ram?
* I don't think upgrading CPU will bring me much. Is this correct?
Thank you for your suggestions and comments!

 

[Outlander_04]

To answer your questions
yes

yes

you will probably be OK , try 8 and add more if you need it

The 2500K is the exact same processor running a bit faster but would let you OC in the future and maybe defer buying the next computer after this one for another year . That may be worth the additional cost

 

[illfindu]

I know that some a bunch of people will most likely feel differently here but from what I'm reading of your build I don't think you need the SDD They can be very useful but consider the fact that the SDD price is almost 15% of you'r budget with that money you could get a 2500k , upgrade to a 6870 card and even get a 4th 2tb hard drive. Consider for a moment the idea of sacrificing read/write speed on one drive for a overall performance boost.

 

[sebastiaan]

Thanks for the feedback.

@Outlander_04: I had never thought about overclocking as a way of extending lifespan, thank you for that. I've swapped in the 2500K for an additional 25 euro, which is neatly within budget.

@Illfindu: I checked out prices for a 6870 but the price increase seams heftier than in the "Best graphics for the money July" article. Options at this vendor:
* XFX HD6870 Black Edition (HD-687A-ZDBC) 179,90e (+30)
* Club 3D HD6870 OC = 179,90e (+30)
* GIGABYTE HD6870 OC= 199,90e (+50)
* SAPPHIRE HD6870 Vapor-X (11179-07-40G) = 199,90e (+50)
* Club 3D CGAX-68724 (Radeon 6870) = 169,90e (+20)
I don't know the club 3D brand and have only seen a few questions about them on the forum, no reference in the reviews. Given these choices, should I trade up? I know it's within budget, but it feels like a lesser value deal. To be clear, I would buy another one of the selected card in approx 2 years, when they become bottom of the market.

I'm a bit reluctant to let go of the SSD. It would make a nice budget cut, but I fear I'll be back into long startup and loading territory if I let it go. Especially after a few years. The 4GB total HD is enough for now, so it would just save me some bucks. Further thoughts?

Parts selection & current total cost: 1.183,99e
ASRock Z68 Extreme4 = 172,90e
Intel® Core™ i5-2500k = 189,90e
Corsair 8 GB DDR3-1600 Kit (2x4GB) 66,90e
ASUS Radeon EAH6850 DirectCu/2DIS/V2 = 149,90e
OCZ Vertex 2 OCZSSD2-2VTXE120G (system drive) 169,90e (alternative: OCZ Vertex 2 240GB for 299,90e total)
Western Digital 2GB WD20EARS (3x) 69,90e x3 = 209,70e
Antec TruePower New Series TP-750 = 124,90e
Antec Three Hundred = 59,90e
Plextor PX-L890SA = 39,90e

 

[illfindu]

To be clear personally i have a 6870 I got it as a gift and it is a very fast card if you feel you wanna play some newer games but on the same note I do actually feel that a 6850 is a slightly better deal. My point on the video card and the sdd was simply that if your budget was strict that you could upgrade several features for the price of the SDD as some one with a SDD (just for OS) i will say you get much faster boot speeds but when it comes to application accesses I don't notice it much so the 120g would be plenty just for the OS 140$ more for a very very slight increase in the load times of most applications seems silly. It makes sense if you want faster OS and boot up's so i could go with the 120g.

 

[sebastiaan]

Thanks for your insight illfindu. Budget is not so limited, so I'll stick to the SSD as a boot drive then. If I can find a cheaper parts provider I'll upgrade to the 6870 on the same budget.

Can't wait till I can put my hands on that config!