£800 Gaming PC

[CraigDnB]

I turned 21 yesterday, and looking to build my first high end PC.

I will be using this PC for general tasks, gaming, 3D modelling, writing my own games in Unity3D engine and also music production using FruityLoops.

Been doing some research the past few weeks and I have come up with this...

Asus Crosshair V Formula AMD 990FX AM3+ DDR3 £175
AMD Bulldozer FX-8 Eight Core 8150 Black Edition 3.60Ghz AM3+ £175
MSI GeForce GTX 560 Ti Twin Frozr II/OC NVIDIA Graphics Card (2GB) £198
Corsair Memory Vengeance Jet Black 8GB DDR3 PC3-12800 (1600) Dual Channel £50
OCZ ZS Series 750W 80 Plus Bronze Power Supply (PSU) £65
Seagate 2TB SATA III Performance Hard Drive ST2000DM001 7200rpm 64MB Cache £94
Z9-Plus Zalman Black Mid Tower Case £45
Total: £800

Approximate Purchase Date: This week, before wednesday

Parts Not Required: Keyboard, Mouse, Monitor, Speakers.

Country: UK

Overclocking: Maybe

SLI or Crossfire: Yes

Monitor Resolution: Will be using my HDTV 1080p until I have funds for a monitor.

Additional Comments: Will be buying Windows 7 OS, and also a disk drive.


Would be nice for a few people's opinions before I go ahead with this, new to the PC scene as have been gaming on PS3 since PS3 came out and only owned laptops before now.

Looking for some inside info on all the parts if you have used them before or heard things about them.
Price range is about £800, but will probably be £900 with disk drive and OS

And if I have listed something that isn't compatible with other things in my build, please let me know, for all I know, they will all work together.

Also, if anyone could recommend a disk drive, looking for Blu ray, but doesn't have to be.

Cheers guys.

 

[Joedodds1]

The rig I'm looking into is for a similar price range

Intel i5 2500k
Asus p8z68 gen 3
8gb Ram
2tb HDD
Corsair HX850
NZXT Phantom 410

Looking to get a GTX 570, but will wait to see price of 670.


Just wondering how different the 2 rigs will be, seen as though there both a similar price.

Thanks, Joe.

 

[Joedodds1]

Sorry for the double post, wouldn't allow me to edit.

Is it worth getting Sandy Bridge when Ivy Bridge is soon to be released?

 

[jerreddredd]

I built this on Ariapc https://www.aria.co.uk/
it will be much faster and serve you well. they didn't have a Zalman Z9Plus case, but there is plenty of budget left over for it. I didn't add an aftermarket cooler for the cpu, so if you want to OC then you'll need one (plenty of budget left for that also).

i5 2500K vs AMD's FX-8150
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/windows-7-hotfix-bulldozer-performance,3119.html

I selected a GTX 560 ti 448 instead of a normal 560ti as it is much faster. you can change if you want to

GIGABYTE GA-Z68X-UD4 Intel Z68 (REV B3) Socket 1155 DDR3 PCI-Express Motherboard #44417 £ 79.99
PALIT GeForce GTX 560 Ti 448 Core 1280MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card #48959 £ 158.29
Corsair Vengeance Low Profile 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CML8GX3M2A1600C9) #45511 £ 33.99
Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Unlocked Processor - OEM #48273 £ 135.99
2TB Seagate ST2000DM001 Barracuda 7200.12 SATA 6GB/s Hard Drive #48301 £ 75.99
750W OCZ ZS Series 80PLUS Bronze Power Supply #45459 £ 51.99
Basket Total £ 536.24
Approx. Delivery £ 6.95
VAT £ 108.64
Total £651.83


On SCAN removing the AMD CPU/MB and Replacing with Intel CPU/MB

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/intel-core-i5-2500k-unlocked-s1155-sandy-bridge-quad-33ghz-hd3000-igp-850mhz-6mb-cache-95w-retail
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/gigabyte-ga-z68xp-ud4-gen-3-intel-z68-s-1155-ddr3-sata-iii-6gb-s-raid-pcie-30-hdmi-atx

the total comes to: £772 w/VAT

for a BluRay or just DVD just pick a LiteOn, ASUS, LG that fits your budget. usually for bluray everyone only complains on how out of date the bluray player software that comes with it is. it usually doesn't work right off the cd and must be updated. most players want you to upgrade and Pay $.

 

[CraigDnB]

Cheers for the reply jerreddredd.

Got a few more questions if you (or anyone else) wouldn't mind answering.
(Also, feel free to use this as a discussion page for any of the parts mentioned in this thread.)

GPU:

So the reason I chose the 560 TI 2GB is because i'll be doing alot of rendering in 3DsMAX and using game engines, and also for gaming I generally thought that I would need more VRAM than a 560 TI 1GB or a1280MB 560 TI 448. Can you explain why I am wrong?

Also, another GPU question. I have recently noticed that the Radeon HD 7850 is rated 3,732, while the 560TI 1GB is rated 2,983.
Refference: Video Card Benchmark
So why should I not be going with the Radeon HD 7850, as it seems to perform better and has more VRAM.
And is actually the same price as the 560 TI 2GB. Link

Relating to the above question, the Radeon HD 7850 seems to be PCIe 3.0 compatible, would that not also push me into getting that card as I can then make full use of it when new CPU's can take advantage of PCI 3.0 functionality.
Note: I know I would also have to get the mobo that Joedodds1 posted as that mobo has 3.0 PCI slots and also is compatible with new Intel® 22 nm CPU's (whenever they be released)
Also seen you have chosen a Gigabyte mobo for me in your proposed build post, heres a Interesting link for you about Gigabyte PCI3.0 motherboards

Is it worth getting a Sandy Bridge i5 2500k or waiting a month or so for the new Ivy Bridge models to be released, as they will also be PCI 3.0 compatible and should therefore boost performance overall.
And maybe even waiting to see the specs of the soon to be released Z77 boards?

Cheers in advance.

 

[Joedodds1]

I think waiting on the new gen ivy bridge is the best option.

If it's too expensive on release, at least a price drop on z68 mobo's might happen.



Also, Is paying an extra £15 for one 8gb Ram, rather than having 2 x 4gb worth is?
Freeing up 3 slots for future expansion?


Thanks, Joe.

 

[jerreddredd]

Cheers for the reply jerreddredd.

So the reason I chose the 560 TI 2GB is because i'll be doing alot of rendering in 3DsMAX and using game engines, and also for gaming I generally thought that I would need more VRAM than a 560 TI 1GB or a1280MB 560 TI 448. Can you explain why I am wrong?

generally 1GB is fine for resolutions at 1080p. when you go higher resolution like on a 30" monitor where its 2660 x 1440 or1600, then 2GB of Vram becomes more of a necessity. Rendering (3DsMAX) is processor intensive (CPU), not Graphics (GPU) intensive.
I wasn't saying your choice was wrong, just the the GTX 560ti 448 was a better deal (cheaper/faster for gaming)

Also, another GPU question. I have recently noticed that the Radeon HD 7850 is rated 3,732, while the 560TI 1GB is rated 2,983.
Refference: Video Card Benchmark
So why should I not be going with the Radeon HD 7850, as it seems to perform better and has more VRAM.
And is actually the same price as the 560 TI 2GB. Link

HD 7870/7850 review.
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/radeon-hd-7870-review-benchmark,3148-21.html
I'm biased to be pro nVidia. AMD is just too slow in getting the bugs out of there drivers for the most part. see the Toms article notes above on issue they had with the 7850.

Relating to the above question, the Radeon HD 7850 seems to be PCIe 3.0 compatible, would that not also push me into getting that card as I can then make full use of it when new CPU's can take advantage of PCI 3.0 functionality.
Note: I know I would also have to get the mobo that Joedodds1 posted as that mobo has 3.0 PCI slots and also is compatible with new Intel® 22 nm CPU's (whenever they be released)
Also seen you have chosen a Gigabyte mobo for me in your proposed build post, heres a Interesting link for you about Gigabyte PCI3.0 motherboards

very interesting link about Gigabyte's 3.0 PCIe clam and MSI calling them on it. I chose the Gigabyte MB as I have 2 of them in my Wife and Son's Gaming systems and have had no issues with them and the price was decent. Lately all the ASUS boards I have been building with have been hit and miss.

Is it worth getting a Sandy Bridge i5 2500k or waiting a month or so for the new Ivy Bridge models to be released, as they will also be PCI 3.0 compatible and should therefore boost performance overall.
And maybe even waiting to see the specs of the soon to be released Z77 boards?
Cheers in advance.

1) right now there are not any video cards that can take advantage of the increased bandwidth that PCIe 3.0 offers.
http://www.overclock.net/t/1188376/hardwarecanucks-hd-7970-pci-e-3-0-vs-pci-e-2-0-comparison
2) Ivy bridge will be premium priced and will likely not significantly drive down the price of Sandybridge. most likely, Ivy will be targeted at the enthusiast who has plenty of $ to have the latest and greatest hardware.
3) you are on a budget remember


Joedodds1 said:

Also, Is paying an extra £15 for one 8gb Ram, rather than having 2 x 4gb worth is?
Freeing up 3 slots for future expansion?

the performance hit you will take in not having to 2 ram sticks for the CPU to utilize Dual Channel memory is not worth the extra slot gained. most programs don't benefit from more that 4 GBs. Though some video editing and engineering software will used more, windows 7 64 home premimum only sees 16gb unless you step up to pro or ultra so you can utilize more Ram.
THG's Ram article:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ram-memory-upgrade,2778.html

 

[Blarg44]

Sorry for the double post, wouldn't allow me to edit.

Is it worth getting Sandy Bridge when Ivy Bridge is soon to be released?

The only reason you would have to wait would be for a price drop in sandy bridge. Ivy bridge is intels tick, meaning that there will not be a large performance increase, the main difference will be the size.