Hi, going to buy my first pcs pc- built this spec and would really appreciate advice

[andcla]

EDIT: Added bold to the subtitles and italics to the comments to make the specs easier to read.


Hi everyone.

I've always bought Dells in the past but now I've found pcspecialist which is exactly the sort of "build your own with help" desktop pc that I'm looking for.

I'm going to buy a desktop pc for a combination of internet, word processing - lots of stuff open at once basically, as well as gaming- mainly first person shooters and shogun 2 total war, and also a bit of photoshop and photo editing.

I don't have an ultra rigid budget (roughly £1000, although cheaper is always good, and definitely not over £1500), but want something that's built to last, high performance, but not paying massively over the odds e.g. 30% more £ for only a small increase in performance.

Here's the specs I picked (with my comments next to some of the sections):

Case
COOLERMASTER CM STORM ENFORCER - GAMING ENTHUSIAST CASE – I really don’t know what case to get (my previous desktop is a dell dimension 9200 so fairly bulky, but definitely wouldn't want a case larger than the dell)
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™i7 Quad Core Processor i7-3770 (3.4GHz) 8MB Cache -(is this worth it?)
Motherboard
ASUS® P8Z77-V PRO: PCI-E 3.0 READY,WIFI, SLI, CROSSFIREX -(Don’t really know how to compare motherboards, although I’d like USB 3.0, SLI, and PCI-E 3.0)
Memory (RAM)
8GB KINGSTON HYPERX GENESIS DUAL-DDR3 1866MHz X.M.P(2 x 4GB KIT) -(is this worth it?)
Graphics Card
1GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTS 450 - DVI,HDMI,VGA (Special Offer)
For graphics cards I’ve thought about two options, but not sure which is better.
Option 1 is to buy one gts 450 from PCS and to SLI with my current gts 450 which is pretty new and hasn’t been used much, and then to run on two gts 450 until that can't handle current games on decent settings, and then to upgrade to the latest value for money high performance graphics card at that point in time.
2) The other option would be to just splash out on a single gtx 670.

Memory - 1st Hard Disk
180GB INTEL® 330 SERIES SSD, SATA 6 Gb/s (upto 500MB/sR | 450MB/sW) - definitely want an SSD- things loading quickly matters to me a lot (is intel 330 the wisest choice for an ssd though?- dont really know how to compare)
2nd Hard Disk
1TB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD1002FAEX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE (7200rpm)
1st DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM
Memory Card Reader
INTERNAL 52 IN 1 CARD READER (XD, MS, CF, SD, etc) + 1 x USB 2.0 PORT
Power Supply
CORSAIR 750W ENTHUSIAST SERIES™ TX750 V2-80 PLUS® BRONZE (£86) - not sure exactly how much powersupply to have, but would like to future proof it a bit, and also I guess it depends on whether the graphics card option is SLI or a single one
Processor Cooling
SUPER QUIET 22dBA TRIPLE COPPER HEATPIPE INTEL CPU COOLER (£19) – is this sufficient cooling?
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Facilities
GIGABIT LAN & DUAL-BAND WIRELESS 802.11N 450Mbps PCI-E CARD (£35)
USB Options
6 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL (MIN 2 FRONT PORTS) AS STANDARD – how do you get usb 3.0 built in i.e. not a PCI expansion or some sort of conversion?
Operating System
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64 Bit w/SP1 - inc DVD & Licence
Office Software
FREE Microsoft® Office Starter 2010 (Limited functionality Word & Excel)
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour) (£5)
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 10 to 12 working days
Quantity
1

Price: £1,169.00 including VAT and delivery.

Thanks for reading and I massively appreciate your expertise and recommendations

Andrew

 

[lady0sheep]

I just ordered mine so I can't comment on what it's actually like yet but here are a few things I've picked up from reading a lot while designing it:

Processor: Most games don't use the hyperthreading that i7s use, so an i5 is probably absolutely fine, something like a 3550 would be really good, the 3570k is pretty much the same but a tiny bit faster and unlocked for overclocking if you want to do that in the future.

Ram: You don't need that fast, as it won't be used. In reality without an overclocked processor you won't use more than 1333 hz. However the 1600 is only £9 more so I got that 8GB is probably fine what what you need.

SSD: Depending on what you want on it, but 120GB should be plenty for your OS and some games, however if you're like me and have 20 games installed at once maybe you should stick with 180 GB

GPU: I guess this is really up to you. The 450 isn't a terribly old card, I'm still using a 8800GTS until my new PC arrives, so the 450 or SLI'd with another one would probably last you a good while, and then new card will be out next year or the one after if you want an upgrade, there is a huge price difference which I guess would go nicely towards a new card when you wanted. Saying that, the 670 would last you years and years, so I guess it depends if you want to get a bit more use out of the 450 or just get one card and max everything (450s SLI'd might be able to cope with maxed everything on quite a lot of games that are out currently though I don't know really).

Cooling: depends on the processor but unless you're overclocking should be ok I think.

 

[Mr.RKH]

Case
InWIN BLACK DRAGON RIDER GAMING CASE (Good case with good airflow, ideal unless your house is dusty because this case has little 'holes' inside, if you do then choose the 'The Coolermaster 690 II Case' like I did)

Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™i5 Quad Core Processor i5-3550 (3.3GHz) 6MB Cache You don't need the i7 unless you do heavy video editing or 3d programming, although it will be perfectly fine with the i5, the i7 will only quicken things like that up, but is unneccessary

Motherboard
ASUS® P8Z77-V: PCI-E 3.0 READY, WIFI, SLI, CROSSFIREX (I would change it to the second option in the list, unless you want to add another GPU a few years down the line)

Memory (RAM)
8GB SAMSUNG DUAL-DDR3 1333MHz (2 X 4GB) (8GB 1333Mhz is the maximum anyone should go for unless they're overclocking which you're not)

Graphics Card
2GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 670 - 2 DVI, HDMI, DP - 3D Vision Ready Very strong GPU, will definitely last 3-5 years on its own with the latest games

Memory - 1st Hard Disk
120GB KINGSTON HYPERX 3K SSD, SATA 6 Gb/s (upto 555MB/sR | 510MB/sW) Don't buy any SSD above 120GB because they're way overpriced; only install the OS and a few main software you regularly use and are slow so need speeding up, and then have all your games on the second hard disk (which is a HDD as you can see below), and then when you want to play that game a lot of times, just move it from the HDD to the SDD, and then once you get bored with it, move that game back to the HDD, there is enough space for at least 5 latest games to be on the SDD

2nd Hard Disk
750GB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD7502AAEX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE (7200rpm) (Unless you really want 1TB, change it to that but it will cost you more, make sure it's this make though)

1st DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM

Memory Card Reader
INTERNAL 52 IN 1 CARD READER (XD, MS, CF, SD, etc) + 1 x USB 2.0 PORT

Power Supply
CORSAIR 750W ENTHUSIAST SERIES™ TX750 V2-80 PLUS® BRONZE (£86) (If you decide you won't SLI, because it will last a couple of years, you might want to change this to the 650W)

Processor Cooling
SUPER QUIET 22dBA TRIPLE COPPER HEATPIPE INTEL CPU COOLER (£19) (Yep, don't need more than this unless you're overclocking)

Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)

Network Facilities
GIGABIT LAN & DUAL-BAND WIRELESS 802.11N 450Mbps PCI-E CARD (£35) Unless you have a router which is dual band, this will be useless, and if you have other devices in the house which don't have dual band adaptors, then you must have a simultaneous dual band router so this machine can run on 5Ghz and the other run on the 2Ghz at the same time, otherwise only one will work. So, if you don't have simultaneous dual band router, don't buy this and move it to the second option which is a LAN & Wireless N which will definitely suffice

USB Options
6 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL (MIN 2 FRONT PORTS) AS STANDARD

Operating System
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64 Bit w/SP1 - inc DVD & Licence

Office Software
FREE Microsoft® Office Starter 2010 (Limited functionality Word & Excel)

Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE

Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour) (£5)

Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)

Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 10 to 12 working days (It will cost you more money, but I chose fast track 3 days, I bought it today around 00:00, and by 10clock today I received a message saying my computer has been built and is waiting testing and quality control, so if you're very patient then I wouldn't worry)

£1215


I have added my build below, but this includes monitor, keyboard so if you want to base it on mine to save money then you can add/ remove a few things from mine

Case - COOLERMASTER CM690 MKII ADVANCED CASE
Processor (CPU) - Intel® Core™i5 Quad Core Processor i5-3550 (3.3GHz) 6MB Cache
Motherboard - ASUS® P8Z77-V LX: USB 3.0, SATA 6GBs, ATI®CrossFireX
Memory (RAM) - 8GB SAMSUNG DUAL-DDR3 1333MHz (2 X 4GB)
Graphics Card - 2GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 670 - 2 DVI, HDMI, DP - 3D Vision Ready
Memory - 1st Hard Disk - 120GB KINGSTON HYPERX 3K SSD, SATA 6 Gb/s (upto 555MB/sR | 510MB/sW)
2nd Hard Disk - 750GB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD7502AAEX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE (7200rpm)
1st DVD/BLU-RAY Drive - 24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM
Memory Card Reader - NONE
Power Supply - CORSAIR 650W ENTHUSIAST SERIES™ TX650 V2-80 PLUS® BRONZE (£69)
Processor Cooling - SUPER QUIET 22dBA TRIPLE COPPER HEATPIPE INTEL CPU COOLER (£19)
Sound Card - ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Facilities - GIGABIT LAN & WIRELESS 802.11N 300Mbps PCI-E CARD (£16)
USB Options - 6 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL (MIN 2 FRONT PORTS) AS STANDARD
Operating System - NO OPERATING SYSTEM REQUIRED
Office Software - NO OFFICE SOFTWARE
Anti-Virus - NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Monitor - IIYAMA E2273HDS 22" LED WIDESCREEN, HDMI/DVI-D 1920x1080 (£129)
Keyboard & Mouse - LOGITECH® MK250 WIRELESS KEYBOARD & MOUSE COMBO (£21)
Warranty - 3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour) (£5)
Delivery - STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time - FAST TRACK 3 WORKING DAY DISPATCH (£59)

£1248

 

[Mr.RKH]

I just ordered mine so I can't comment on what it's actually like yet but here are a few things I've picked up from reading a lot while designing it:

Processor: Most games don't use the hyperthreading that i7s use, so an i5 is probably absolutely fine, something like a 3550 would be really good, the 3570k is pretty much the same but a tiny bit faster and unlocked for overclocking if you want to do that in the future.

Ram: You don't need that fast, as it won't be used. In reality without an overclocked processor you won't use more than 1333 hz. However the 1600 is only £9 more so I got that 8GB is probably fine what what you need.

SSD: Depending on what you want on it, but 120GB should be plenty for your OS and some games, however if you're like me and have 20 games installed at once maybe you should stick with 180 GB

GPU: I guess this is really up to you. The 450 isn't a terribly old card, I'm still using a 8800GTS until my new PC arrives, so the 450 or SLI'd with another one would probably last you a good while, and then new card will be out next year or the one after if you want an upgrade, there is a huge price difference which I guess would go nicely towards a new card when you wanted. Saying that, the 670 would last you years and years, so I guess it depends if you want to get a bit more use out of the 450 or just get one card and max everything (450s SLI'd might be able to cope with maxed everything on quite a lot of games that are out currently though I don't know really).

Cooling: depends on the processor but unless you're overclocking should be ok I think.

Hey, check out my previous comment for the final build I went with, and guess what, within 10hours it was built!!!

 

[deh-cheesekake]

That i7 quad core will always be able to give a good kick when its got over 3GHz

 

[andcla]

Thanks a lot for the helpful comments.

I'm not going to overclock it so hopefully that cooling will be ok, and I'll definitely downgrade the RAM and processor to i5 so thanks for that.

For the GPU I think I'm now leaning towards the gts 450 SLI idea, both to save money and to make use of my otherwise useless gts 450 (that was bought about 6 months ago as a replacement of a broken graphics card).

For the motherboards is there a useful difference between the P8Z77-V, the P8Z77-V Pro and the Sabertooth? Would they all be capable of USB 3.0, SLI, and PCI-E 3.0? (I tried the compare function on the ASUS website but it didn't seem to work).

The InWIN BLACK DRAGON RIDER GAMING CASE sounds good- how do you know whether all of the components will fit well inside the case though- does PCS work this out?

Also thanks a lot for the information on the network card- I think I might use homeplugs- do you have to buy 2 for that to work (I'm guessing 1 for the PC 1 for the router)?

 

[lady0sheep]

For the motherboards is there a useful difference between the P8Z77-V, the P8Z77-V Pro and the Sabertooth? Would they all be capable of USB 3.0, SLI, and PCI-E 3.0? (I tried the compare function on the ASUS website but it didn't seem to work).

The InWIN BLACK DRAGON RIDER GAMING CASE sounds good- how do you know whether all of the components will fit well inside the case though- does PCS work this out?

Also thanks a lot for the information on the network card- I think I might use homeplugs- do you have to buy 2 for that to work (I'm guessing 1 for the PC 1 for the router)?

I'm pretty sure those three should be ok with SLI, as for the case, yes PCS will work it out but the dimensions are on the site and if you look at some of the pictures people have posted in the 'show off your new computer' thread, then you might be able to find someone with the same case and see how it all looks inside.

Edit: http://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/forum...-)-Dragon-Rider-case!!&highlight=dragon+rider Has some pics, the case is huuuge!!

Yup you have to buy two homeplugs