First Ever Build (Opinions Please)

[scottb777]

Hi guys,

This is my first post on Tom's Hardware. I've been following so many posts to try to get a good understanding of the specs I'm looking for in my home build and what has/hasn't got good reviews. I'm more or less ready to buy the following parts, please could you guys give me any of your ideas on what you reckon to my potential new build.

This PC is going to be used mainly for watching 1080p films through my TV, software testing for work, running at max two virtual workstations at a time (mostly just one at a time) and playing a few un-intensive games such as Football Manager. I realise the PC I'm hoping to build will be a little bit overkill, but I wanted my first build to be a bit of a budget 'beast'. I I'd love to try to stick to a blue scheme for the machine.

The build is below:

Processor:
i5-4670k £131- I will probably overclock this as people are stating it's easy to do with the Haswell chips. Will look to OC to around 4.1 to keep it stable. I'll get a CPU cooler ready for OC, probably the 'Master Cooler EVO 212'.

Motherboard:
The following board has been mentioned a few times:
ASRock Z97 Extreme4 £87
http://www.newegg.com/global/uk/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157503&nm_mc=AFC-C8Junction&cm_mmc=AFC-C8Junction-_-na-_-na-_-na&cm_sp=&AID=10446076&PID=3938566&SID=
- It looks like a good board and it fits in with my whole blue colour scheme that I'm planning. Does anyone have any comments on this board or if another one is recommend over it?

PSU:
Corsair Gaming Series 2013 Edition GS 600W £70
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Corsair-Gaming-Series-Edition-Bronze/dp/B00AMLKARU/ref=dp_ob_title_ce
- I know nothing about PSUs, this one has been chosen literally because of the blue LED lighting... I would really appreciate any advice on what PSU to purchase.

Case:
Corsair Carbide Series 200R £45
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Corsair-Carbide-Series-Compact-Computer/dp/B009GXZ8MM
- Looks like a popular case, I might look into modding it slightly further down the line as the cases with the 'window' in look very smart. Does any have any advice on if there are any cases similar to this, but with a 'window' or transparent side?

RAM:
G.SKILL Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1866 (PC3 14900) £51
http://www.newegg.com/global/uk/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231538
- This RAM again looks pretty popular and fits in again with the blue scheme for the build. My colleague advised there was no point in looking at RAM over 1866 as it might blow the CPU?

GPU:
Very much undecided on the GPU. I think this will be purchased after this PC has been built as the integrated graphics should get me by at the start.

SSD + HDD:
Samsung Evo 840 £55 and Seagate ST100 1TB 7200RPM £45 - Pretty standard.

I'm really looking forward to reading any comments and suggestions, thank you very much for taking the time to read my mini essay.

Scott

 

[Suztera]

Try out pcpartpicker in finding products and list them using the permalink or the BBCode Markup.
http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/parts/partlist/
Alos what is your full budget?

 

[scottb777]

Hi Suztera,

Thank you, I've put the BBCode Markup below. I don't really have a budget at the moment, possibly £500-600 without the graphics card looks like it's going to get a decent machine?

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Core i5-4670K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor (£155.99 @ Aria PC)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler (£25.24 @ CCL Computers)
Motherboard: ASRock Z87 Extreme4 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£97.02 @ Ebuyer)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1866 Memory (£64.99 @ Aria PC)
Storage: Samsung 840 EVO 120GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£59.99 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£35.94 @ Aria PC)
Case: Corsair 200R ATX Mid Tower Case (£44.99 @ Amazon UK)
Power Supply: Corsair CX 600W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply (£52.27 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £536.43
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-06-01 20:31 BST+0100)

 

[CTurbo]

The 4670k is a very very good cpu, but I think overclocking is a waste of money so I would get the i5 4570 or 4590 instead and save about £25

The Z97 motherboard is also very good, but it is unnecessary and you could save another £50ish here by getting a H87 or H97 motherboard.

The Cooler Master 212 is also not necessary without overclocking so you could just scratch it off the list and save that £25

The Corsair GS600 is a fine psu, but stay away from the CX series

The Corsair 200R is a good budget case, but the 300R is better for just a little more. You could always add blue LED fans to any case.

There's no point in getting over 1600mhz RAM as none of the Intels support anything faster(without overclocking the RAM) than 1600mhz anyway. But it's not going to "blow the cpu" lol

 

[CTurbo]

PCPartPicker part list: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/GpH66h
Price breakdown by merchant: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/GpH66h/by_merchant/
Benchmarks: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/GpH66h/benchmarks/

CPU: Intel Core i5-4570 3.2GHz Quad-Core Processor (£136.79 @ Aria PC)
Motherboard: ASRock H97 PRO4 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£74.59 @ Overclockers.co.uk)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (£60.34 @ Ebuyer)
Storage: Samsung 840 EVO 120GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£59.99 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£35.94 @ Aria PC)
Case: Corsair 200R ATX Mid Tower Case (£44.99 @ Amazon UK)
Power Supply: XFX 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply (£46.98 @ Aria PC)
Total: £459.62
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-06-01 20:39 BST+0100)

 

[scottb777]

Thank you CTurbo, I'll definitely have a further look into them processors and the motherboard for sure! That Corsair 300R case you mentioned is EXACTLY what I've been looking for - thank you! Thank you for clearing the RAM as well, I'll have a giggle with the bloke tomorrow!

Is there anything else you think I should look into for the build? Do you know if the the ASRock H97 or the Z97 have built in WIFI? That's something I've been Googling without any luck.

Thank you in advance,
Scott

 

[CTurbo]

regular ATX and microATX motherboards don't usually come with wifi until you get into the really expensive versions. A lot of miniITX boards do though. Of course you could just but a £10-20 wifi adapter and plug it in.


The reasons I'm so "against" overclocking are

1. It's truly not necessary
2. It's expensive
3. It doesn't really make that much of a difference
4. That money is much better spent elsewhere like towards a better video card, ssd, or bigger better case and/or psu

 

[scottb777]

That's true, thank you for your advice. I'll have a good research into it tomorrow