Suggestions for first £1000 - £1500 Films / Games / Internet machine

[ssp212]

Hi,

I posted on here a couple of months ago and it was suggested I should possibly wait a few weeks for prices to change, etc. My budget and requirements have changed slightly and I wondered if anyone could offer any suggestions.

I'm new to building a complete system, although I have opened up PCs and changed / upgraded components like RAM, drives, etc. I'm a bit nervous about things like cooling and exactly what extra stuff I'll need on top of the obvious bits like motherboard, processor, graphics card, drives, case, PSU, etc.

APPROXIMATE PURCHASE DATE: Next few weeks

BUDGET RANGE: £1000 - £1500

SYSTEM USAGE FROM MOST TO LEAST IMPORTANT: Watching TV / films (Downloaded / streaming content and DVD currently, but may well want HD stuff later) Gaming, Internet, Music production

PARTS NOT REQUIRED: Speakers, keyboard, mouse

PREFERRED WEBSITE(S) FOR PARTS: UK based

PARTS PREFERENCES: At least 24" LCD monitor

OVERCLOCKING: Not planning to

SLI OR CROSSFIRE: Maybe later if necessary, but would prefer not to for now

MONITOR RESOLUTION: -

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS: I really would prefer a quiet, small, plain looking PC, but I want enough power to be able to run games at a decent level of graphical quality now and at least a little way into the future. I would also like to be able to upgrade individual parts easily. Is it possible to build a decent games machine in a smallish case? I only need one optical drive and one internal hard drive really. I just want to get the balance right as my old case was gigantic and had loads of space (not what I really wanted).

I've looked through quite a few threads and lots of people seem to be basing new systems around an i7 processor and ASUS P6T motherboard. Would that be a good place to start for what basically needs to be an all rounder? I really would appreciate some help! Cheers.

 

[Helloworld_98]

£1500, that's a nice amount of cash you have there, I would suggest a 30" monitor but go for an amd 720 based system with a 4890 as the i7 will put you out of your budget.

but if you can live with a 24" then,

i7 920 D0 (base of your system, overclockers has one which includes a game for £235)
Gigabyte EX58-UD4 (overclockers has one on their clearance line down from over £200 to £150 and it's still new so why not?)
3x2GB G.skill ram (£45 and you won't need any better ram, this will do the job.)
4870 X2 by XFX and a Sapphire 4870 1GB(don't worry, they will CF together, they're the same gpu's after all.)
Corsair 1000HX
Lian Li armorsuit PC-P60 (plainest looking case I could find which would cool those cards, £160)
Sanusng Spinpoint F1 1TB (fastest 1TB HDD on the market and 2nd cheapest too.)
Titan Fenir (best cpu cooler you can buy in the UK, quiet and cheap too)
Samsung DVD-ROM
Akasa SATA cable (so you can hook up the HDD since the mobo only comes with one sata cable)
Samsung SM2494HS 23.6" monitor (50,000:1 contrast and 16:9 aspect ratio for watching video's.)

 

[ssp212]

Thanks for the reply. I should have mentioned I need a DVD burner. Would any Samsung do? Also, I need to include an OS in there. Is there any particular reason for using that configuration of graphics cards? Isn't that effectively three 4870s? Do I need that much? Would two cards generate more noise and heat or less than one more powerful (expensive) card? Also, I'm not sure I'm massively keen on the look of that case. Really appreciate the advice though. Thanks again.

 

[Helloworld_98]

Well 4870 X2's are pretty loud at the start but if you really wanted it to be quiet you could invest your money (about £250) and time in building a water cooling system, you would have to drop the extra 4870 for that to fit in and possibly some other things.

and for the OS you can just use se7en64.

also you said you wanted a plain looking case, but for your budget you were going to end up with a lot of high-end components and they need their space. Try the CM 690 since you'd only be using the 4870 X2, it looks quite plain and can cool upto 3 cards.