First-time build: I've picked out the parts, but I'd really appreciate some input

[LMF5000]

Building my first ever PC from components - and also my first experience with a modern desktop since I've only owned laptops for the last 10 years .

To make things easier, I will introduce the build with the GH template:

1. What YOUR PC will be used for. Most important first:

• 3D gaming. Mainly Flight Simulator X, GTA IV, and possibly newer simulation or racing games (like Dirt 3...)
• Distributed computing - mainly World Community Grid (on BOINC) to keep the CPU at 100% utilisation, and possibly GPUgrid as well.

2. What YOUR budget is.
The limit is €2000. However the cheaper the better. But if you think going slightly over budget can produce a much better system, I'd be happy to take up suggestions.

3. What country YOU will be buying YOUR parts from.
Primarily overclockers.co.uk. Also scanmalta.com - I live in Malta.

4. IF YOU have a brand preference.
Intel, nVidia. And Asus for motherboards.

5. If YOU intend on using any of YOUR current parts, and if so, what those parts are.
Just a mouse and an optical drive!

7. IF YOU plan on overclocking or run the system at default speeds.
Yes, a slight overclock to a little over 4GHz (just to break the 4 GHz barrier )

8. What resolution will you be using?
1920x1080 probably.

9. WHEN do you plan to build it?
This week

X. Do you need to purchase any software to go with the system?
Nope

---

So, without further ado, here are the parts I've chosen. It took me 2 solid days of scouring reviews and forums but I'm still not 100% convinced with some of my choices :'(. I've also included the prices from overclockers.co.uk:

---

Motherboard:
Asus P8Z77-V £141.59

CPU:
Intel Core i7 3770K OEM £247.79

RAM:
Corsair XMS3 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit £42.47

GPU:
Asus GeForce GTX 670 DirectCU II 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £342.19

SSD :
Mach Xtreme Technology 120GB 2.5" SATA 6GB/s MX-DS TURBO PREMIUM (uses sandforce controller) £88.49

HDD :
Seagate Barracuda 2TB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache £98.32

PSU:
Corsair HX 750W ATX Modular SLI Compliant Power Supply £104.22

Case:
BitFenix Outlaw Gaming Case - Black £39.28

CPU Cooler:
Cooler Master Hyper 212 Evo £26.99

Monitor:
Asus VG23AH 23" Passive 3D IPS Widescreen LED Monitor £224.19

Speakers:
Speedlink Gravity Wave 2.1 Subwoofer System SL-8220-SBK £38.34

Keyboard:
OcUK Black Gaming Keyboard 10.81


Shipping £133.06
Total in pounds sterling £1537.74

Equivalent in Euros (1 GBP = 1.25 EUR)
€1922.18

Thanks in advance. I truly appreciate all your replies.

 

[krnmastersgt]

Were there motherboard features that you were looking for in particular? Wasting a bit on the motherboard unless there was a specific amount of ports/features that board that you wanted.

As for the CPU, I think a 3570K would fit better and cost less than a 3770K and the games you listed don't scale beyond 4 cores iirc. As for DC projects using the CPU, I remember there being a reason why you wanted to avoid using HT when doing DC (or it might have been large overclocks, I forget).

There are a plethora of 670's for 300 or less, no reason to spend so much extra for it.

750W is overkill for a single video card option, a quality 500W unit will be enough.

 

[LMF5000]

Well, the idea was to build a rig that supported SLI, and put the second graphics card in later. Sorry I forgot to mention this in my first post.

I chose the motherboard because it was the cheapest one with wifi and SLI support.

I wanted a CPU with hyperthreading because that means it can run 8 boinc workunits simultaneously instead of just 4 - and the 3770K gets much higher benchmark scores.

You're right about the GPU. I only chose the asus over the £300 EVGA because the asus is so much quieter (see the videos here).

750 is overkill for a single card, but I wanted it to have SLI support straight away and the price difference to jump to a 750W PSU is much less than the price of buying another PSU when it's time to upgrade. Plus, a 750W will be running close to 50% load, where it's most efficient. And hopefully quiet.

Any opinions on my choice of SSD and PSU brand? I had a hard time choosing them and I'm still not convinced I've made the right choices.

 

[lehtv]

If you absolutely need wifi the Asus board is great, but if you could do without that you should be able to find a Gigabyte Z68X-UD3H or Asrock Z77 Extreme4 for cheaper.

Asus 670 is great but usually Gigabyte 670 is just as quiet and cool but noticeably less costly. Uses a 680 PCB with an extra power phase.

Don't buy a Sandforce SSD, they're comparably unreliable. Get a Samsung 830 128GB or Crucial M4 128GB, whichever costs less.

HX750 is a bit overkill even for 670 SLI. Would be fine with a 650W unit, e.g. XFX 650W and NZXT Hale82 650W, among others, come with four PCIe connectors to support 670 SLI.

Bitfenix Outlaw is woefully underachieving for a £1500 build. Only one 120mm fan included, no USB 3.0 on the front panel. I'm also a bit skeptical whether the upside down orientation is good for SLI. I'd just stick to a normal orientation case. Try to find an Antec 302, NZXT Tempest 410, Fractal Design Core 3000, Corsair 300R etc. Even better if you can afford Fractal Design Arc Midi or Antec 1100.

I don't know if that monitor is any good, hope you've done research on that. Cheap IPS panels may not have good response time for gaming.

 

[LMF5000]

1. If you absolutely need wifi the Asus board is great, but if you could do without that you should be able to find a Gigabyte Z68X-UD3H or Asrock Z77 Extreme4 for cheaper.

2. Asus 670 is great but usually Gigabyte 670 is just as quiet and cool but noticeably less costly. Uses a 680 PCB with an extra power phase.

3. Don't buy a Sandforce SSD, they're comparably unreliable. Get a Samsung 830 128GB or Crucial M4 128GB, whichever costs less.

4. HX750 is a bit overkill even for 670 SLI. Would be fine with a 650W unit, e.g. XFX 650W and NZXT Hale82 650W, among others, come with four PCIe connectors to support 670 SLI.

5. Bitfenix Outlaw is woefully underachieving for a £1500 build. Only one 120mm fan included, no USB 3.0 on the front panel. I'm also a bit skeptical whether the upside down orientation is good for SLI. I'd just stick to a normal orientation case. Try to find an Antec 302, NZXT Tempest 410, Fractal Design Core 3000, Corsair 300R etc. Even better if you can afford Fractal Design Arc Midi or Antec 1100.

6. I don't know if that monitor is any good, hope you've done research on that. Cheap IPS panels may not have good response time for gaming.

Yikes. Lots of things to change! Let me answer your points individually:

1. I kinda do need wifi because our main internet connection is rather unreliable and I sometimes need to use my HTC phone's internet connection (through the HTC portable wifi hotspot). The Asrock is £40 cheaper, but I've always dreamed of having an Asus motherboard, and in my opinion the extra wifi and slots and connectors of the Asus are probably justified.

2. Agreed! My GPU of choice has now changed to the Gigabyte GeForce GTX 670 Windforce 3X 2048MB (£318.59)

3. Agreed. No end of horror stories in the reviews, especially for the OCZ drives. The samsung and crucial cost EXACTLY the same as the Mach. So I've switched to the Samsung 128GB SSD 830 Desktop Series. Should I have gone for the crucial?

4. Agreed. But I can't for the life of me find a roughly 650W PSU that is silent, cheaper than the HX750, in stock at ocuk, and doesn't have hundreds of horror stories on newegg from users who've had them fail on them within 2 weeks to 2 years after purchase. Maybe I'm missing one - could you have a look and see if I've missed one? (here's the list in alphabetical order)?

5. I chose that case because due to the layout of my house the best place for the PC will be under my desk, with a wall to its left. So having the side fans on the right is perfect for me because they won't be blocked. But you brought up some good points (and I noticed the bitfenix has no large front intake), so I switched to the Corsair Carbide 300R Mid Tower Case because it was the nicest looking of the ones you recommended, it has 2 USB3 ports and it includes dust filters and uses 140mm fans in place of some 120mm ones. I suppose I can always put the tower on the desk or do without the side fans.

6. Neither do I! I chose it because it was the only affordable passive 3D monitor in stock. The response time is 5ms (Asus product page). Not as good as the 2ms found in the best displays, but as I'm used to laptop displays I'm hoping I won't find it too slow.

 

[lehtv]

Get Samsung 830, it's slightly better and newer than Crucial M4.

Too bad XFX 650W (£65) and XFX 650W XXX (£73) are out of stock. You could ask them when they're getting more, they're high quality Seasonic builds but pretty affordable.

Antec TruePower New 650W (£90) is another excellent unit with 4 PCIe connectors, but not sure if it's worth it at that price. Review of the 750W version here and here.

Corsair HX650 (£90) is in stock, also has four PCIe.

 

[LMF5000]

Get Samsung 830, it's slightly better and newer than Crucial M4.

Too bad XFX 650W (£65) and XFX 650W XXX (£73) are out of stock. You could ask them when they're getting more, they're high quality Seasonic builds but pretty affordable.

Antec TruePower New 650W (£90) is another excellent unit with 4 PCIe connectors, but not sure if it's worth it at that price. Review of the 750W version here and here.

Corsair HX650 (£90) is in stock, also has four PCIe.

Thanks for your suggestions. I might consider getting an XFX from ebay, but the price is £88 including shipping. The HX650 seems to have a tendency of not working after a while - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817139012 - 10% of the reviews are 3/5 or worse. I'm not sure if it's worth the risk to save £15.

Also forgot to mention, I've upgraded the RAM to Patriot Viper Xtreme 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 PC3-15000C9 1866MHz Dual Channel Kit (£73.15). They have a lifetime warrany, but I'm not sure if they're as good as corsair. Certainly cheaper though.

 

[lehtv]

Thanks for your suggestions. I might consider getting an XFX from ebay, but the price is £88 including shipping. The HX650 seems to have a tendency of not working after a while - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817139012 - 10% of the reviews are 3/5 or worse. I'm not sure if it's worth the risk to save £15.

People who receive a faulty unit have a much higher tendency to post a review about it than people who have a properly working unit. I'd say the failure rate of HX650 is nothing to worry about. However, £90 for a 650W unit is a bit steep anyway. Let's see if there are any 750W units other than HX750 that you could consider.

XFX 750W £83
- 80+ Bronze
- non-modular
- equal to TX750 V2

XFX 750W XXX £97
- 80+Silver
- semi-modular
- equal to HX750

Silverstone Strider Gold 750W
- £80+ Gold
- fully modular £100
- can't find reviews on it but based on other units, Silverstone is very good, given the Gold rating and full modularity this is a pretty good deal

Also forgot to mention, I've upgraded the RAM to Patriot Viper Xtreme 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 PC3-15000C9 1866MHz Dual Channel Kit (£73.15). They have a lifetime warrany, but I'm not sure if they're as good as corsair. Certainly cheaper though.

That voltage is specced too high for LGA1155. Needs to be 1.5V or lower to be safe. However it's also 1866MHz... you could be able to run it 1600MHz 1.5V, if not that then 1333Mhz 1.5V. At that price it could be worth a shot.

Do you really think you'll need 16GB though? Is distributed computing RAM-intensive? One of these Corsair kits (or the black ones if you prefer), add another for 4x4gb

 

[LMF5000]

- can't find reviews on it but based on other units, Silverstone is very good, given the Gold rating and full modularity this is a pretty good deal

Wow, realhardtechx is an awesome website. I wish I knew about it yesterday, it might have saved me a few hours of searching for OEMs and reviews!

But the choice is still driving me nuts :'(. The non-modular XFX seems ok, but I don't think it's worth giving up modularity and a silver rating for the £25 saving. The 750W XXX has a fluid dynamic bearing fan with a reputation for developing clicking noises and is only £8 cheaper than the HX750.

The silverstone strider gold looks good but again the FDB seems to develop clicking noises (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817256066 ). True that's a small sample size, but for just £5 extra I think it's worth opting for the peace of mind of the double ball bearing fan in the HX750.

You're right about the ram. Dunno how I missed that. I must admit I can't find anything with better price/spec ratio than what you selected. So that's changed to 2x Corsair Vengeance Blue Low Profile 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (total 16GB, £90)

Distributed computing doesn't use that much memory, but this is a case of "better have it and not need it than need it and not have it" I think . Might also come in useful for running many virtual machines and programs at once

 

[LMF5000]

Just to make things organised, here's the proposed system at this point:

Gigabyte GeForce GTX 670 Windforce 3X 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £318.59
Intel Core i7-3770K 3.50GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - OEM £247.79

Asus VG23AH 23" 3D IPS Widescreen LED Monitor - Black £224.19

Asus P8Z77-V Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £141.59

Corsair HX 750W ATX Modular SLI Compliant Power Supply (CMPSU-750HXUK) £104.22

Seagate Barracuda 2TB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST2000DM001) £98.32

Samsung 128GB SSD 830 Desktop Series SATA 6Gb/s KIT with Norton Ghost - (MZ-7PC128D/EU) £88.49

Corsair Carbide 300R Mid Tower Case - Black £58.99

2x

Corsair Vengeance Blue Low Profile 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CML8GX3M2A1600C9B) £44.24 x2 = £88.48

Speedlink Gravity Wave 2.1 Subwoofer System SL-8220-SBK £38.34

Cooler Master Hyper 212 Evo CPU Cooler (Socket Intel® Socket LGA1366/1156/1155/775/AMD Socket FM1/AM3+/AM3/AM2+/AM2) £26.54

OcUK Black Gaming Keyboard (5105GU) £10.81

Sub Total : £1,225.70
Shipping cost based on delivery to Malta, with: DHL Worldwide Express (EU)
Shipping : £111.68
VAT is being charged at 18.00%
VAT : £240.73

Total : £1,578.11
(that's €1,972)

 

[krnmastersgt]

Solid looking system, aside from the fact I have no idea who Speedlink is (but that doesn't really matter).

 

[Puppies04]

Just keep in mind that passive 3D effectivly halves your resolution, half the pixels are seen by one eye and half are seen by the other. I know active 3D is more expensive but if you have the GPU to drive it both eyes get full 1080p with up to 60 frames per second on a 120hz monitor. Personally I tried both and it seemed a bit gimmicky although BF3 was ok I suppose.

If it was my money I wouldn't even consider passive 3D and would rather buy 2 or 3 decent 2D panels to game over multiple screens than stump up for active 3D. I hear flight simulator X looks awesome on 2-3 screens and seem to remember reading something about running the panels in portrait to allow you to see the full control panel of the aircraft and still get a decent view out of the cockpit at the same time.

 

[LMF5000]

Solid looking system, aside from the fact I have no idea who Speedlink is (but that doesn't really matter).

Heh. Me neither. But it's 2.1 channel with separate tweeters in the satellites, well priced, and has remote volume control - so I just added it. What could possibly go wrong?

Famous last words... :whiste:

 

[lehtv]

I'd get a Logitech speaker set, can't go wrong with them. And their customer support is rock solid. In the same vein I'd get a Logitech keyboard. http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=KB-204-LG

The rest of the system gets my approval :thumbsup:

 

[LMF5000]

Just keep in mind that passive 3D effectivly halves your resolution, half the pixels are seen by one eye and half are seen by the other. I know active 3D is more expensive but if you have the GPU to drive it both eyes get full 1080p with up to 60 frames per second on a 120hz monitor. Personally I tried both and it seemed a bit gimmicky although BF3 was ok I suppose.

If it was my money I wouldn't even consider passive 3D and would rather buy 2 or 3 decent 2D panels to game over multiple screens than stump up for active 3D. I hear flight simulator X looks awesome on 2-3 screens and seem to remember reading something about running the panels in portrait to allow you to see the full control panel of the aircraft and still get a decent view out of the cockpit at the same time.

Some good points, especially since two entry-level 23" monitors cost just £20 more than the 3D monitor. I've given it a lot of thought, but I think I'm going for the 3D monitor, partly for the novelty, but partly because the user reviews are quite good (link) - seems the cnet reviewer used the dvi cable and the monitor's built-in 2D to 3D converter, whereas he should have used the HDMI 1.4 connection and 3D output via a 3D driver. And it is an IPS display.

My current display (and the only one I've used for the last 3 years) is a 15.4 inch 1280x800 laptop screen. The Asus is 1920x1080 so even when you half its vertical resolution for the passive 3D, you it comes to 960x1080, which is very close to what I'm using now :'(.

I've never used active 3D, but I've seen passive 3D in a movie theater. The Avengers was really nice - when iron man is flying between the skyscrapers at speed, the 3D was incredible. I can just imagine myself doing that with a helicopter in FSX .

 

[LMF5000]

I'd get a Logitech speaker set, can't go wrong with them. And their customer support is rock solid. In the same vein I'd get a Logitech keyboard.

The rest of the system gets my approval :thumbsup:

Thanks

I've looked at the logitech stuff. In fact 3 years ago my brother's PC came bundled with the cheapest logitech speakers on the ocuk list and they're admittedly quite good, but I wanted something better. The speakers in your link are £4 more expensive, have 30W RMS output (compared to the Speedlink's 37W), smaller diameter mid-range drivers in the satellites, and no remote volume control, so my gut feeling tells me to stick with the speedlink. Speedlink also seem to be a German company, so perhaps I will have some benefit from their presumably-German engineering? :wub:. I'll take a chance and report back. Unless they explode the second I switch them on, and chop my head off or something .

Logitech keyboard - IIRC I used to use one of those at a previous job, and I found it pretty awful. Especially the extra fat bottom row of buttons. Makes them need to be hit just in the center, otherwise you could feel the button scraping into its side guides on the way down.

Plus I find the volume controls on the ocuk one to be a nice addition. My laptop (Acer Aspire 5920G) has a volume control knob (a digital one that can turn infinitely in either direction, like a mouse wheel - not a hard-wired analog volume knob like you find on FM radios). It's infinitely better (especially for fine adjustments) than tapping function keys, or worse, dragging the volume sliders with the mouse. Dunno why hardly any new laptops have volume knobs any more.

I'd actually gone into the island's largest computer shop once and tried all the keyboards on show, and to my surprise I actually liked the cheapest ones best. Maybe it's because I've been using only laptops for the last 8 years?

 

[LMF5000]

Upon further thinking, I've decided to omit the keyboard from my order. I think it would be better if I go to the local superstore, try out all their keyboards and choose the one that feels best.

 

[mfenn]

Some good points, especially since two entry-level 23" monitors cost just £20 more than the 3D monitor. I've given it a lot of thought, but I think I'm going for the 3D monitor, partly for the novelty, but partly because the user reviews are quite good (link) - seems the cnet reviewer used the dvi cable and the monitor's built-in 2D to 3D converter, whereas he should have used the HDMI 1.4 connection and 3D output via a 3D driver. And it is an IPS display.

My current display (and the only one I've used for the last 3 years) is a 15.4 inch 1280x800 laptop screen. The Asus is 1920x1080 so even when you half its vertical resolution for the passive 3D, you it comes to 960x1080, which is very close to what I'm using now :'(.

I've never used active 3D, but I've seen passive 3D in a movie theater. The Avengers was really nice - when iron man is flying between the skyscrapers at speed, the 3D was incredible. I can just imagine myself doing that with a helicopter in FSX .

Passive 3D is great when properly implemented (i.e. double vertical resolution), but absolutely sucks when it isn't. This ASUS is basically the same monitor as the Viewsonic that Anandtech reviewed and found to be horrendous. The key points are:
- The panel sucks to begin with in terms of brightness, contrast, and color uniformity
- Passive 3D halves your vertical resolution and screws up text rendering in most games
- The patterned retarder (polarizing filter) necessary for passive 3D is incredibly distracting in normal use

Basically, unless you have used this monitor in person and like it, don't waste your money.

 

[mfenn]

But the choice is still driving me nuts :'(. The non-modular XFX seems ok, but I don't think it's worth giving up modularity and a silver rating for the £25 saving.

That makes the HX750 33% more expensive than the XFX Core. The difference between Silver and Bronze is a few percent at most and you'll never make back the savings in terms of efficiency. Additionally, in an SLI setup with an SSD, HDD, and ODD you will be using most of the cables anyway, so modularity isn't buying you anything. In short: save your money and get the XFX.

 

[LMF5000]

Passive 3D is great when properly implemented (i.e. double vertical resolution), but absolutely sucks when it isn't. This ASUS is basically the same monitor as the Viewsonic that Anandtech reviewed and found to be horrendous. The key points are:
- The panel sucks to begin with in terms of brightness, contrast, and color uniformity
- Passive 3D halves your vertical resolution and screws up text rendering in most games
- The patterned retarder (polarizing filter) necessary for passive 3D is incredibly distracting in normal use

Basically, unless you have used this monitor in person and like it, don't waste your money.

Ouch. Good points, but how do you know it is the same as the viewsonic? From what I've looked up, the Asus is IPS whilst the viewsonic is TN (so it shouldn't have the colour problems mentioned in the review), and it uses a non-matte coating, so the pixels aren't blurred by the coating like they are on the viewsonic. I suspect that that's what anandtech were finding difficult to live with - but they attributed it to the polariser instead of the coating.

You make a convincing argument for checking it out in person. The island's biggest computer store has an Acer GR235H monitor in stock. It's a passive 3D, 23" monitor just like the asus, only it's TN instead of IPS (and priced €235 instead of the Asus's €280). I'll go take a look and see if I can live with it and decide from there.

 

[LMF5000]

That makes the HX750 33% more expensive than the XFX Core. The difference between Silver and Bronze is a few percent at most and you'll never make back the savings in terms of efficiency. Additionally, in an SLI setup with an SSD, HDD, and ODD you will be using most of the cables anyway, so modularity isn't buying you anything. In short: save your money and get the XFX.

OK, I've switched for the OCZ ZS Series 650W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply (£ 56.04).

I've also removed one pair of 4GB ram modules.

And the gigabyte card has suddenly jumped to over £360, so I've switched to the EVGA superclocked 670, which is £325.

EDIT: The Gigabyte is back to £334, so it's back on the list instead of the EVGA.

 

[Mars999]

No no no

get either a Seasonic or Corsair PS quiet and very good ripple ratings and efficiency ratings

EVGA will be NOISY!!! Get either the MSI Power Edition or ASUS Direct CU2

 

[lehtv]

OK, I've switched for the OCZ ZS Series 650W '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply (£ 56.04).

That one is pretty good for the price. Not excellent quality like all the other units mentioned in this thread, but it does the job fine. If you want to save cash on the PSU this is certainly a good choice. Positive reviews from hardwaresecrets and techpowerup. But only 3 year warranty, only rated for 40C operating temps, only two PCIe connectors so you will have to use adapters if you decide to run 670 SLI

 

[LMF5000]

That one is pretty good for the price. Not excellent quality like all the other units mentioned in this thread, but it does the job fine. If you want to save cash on the PSU this is certainly a good choice. Positive reviews from hardwaresecrets and techpowerup. But only 3 year warranty, only rated for 40C operating temps, only two PCIe connectors so you will have to use adapters if you decide to run 670 SLI

The temperature is a problem because in Malta it sometimes reaches 35 deg. C indoor room temperature in summer. Adapters aren't a problem because two molex to PCIe adapters are included with the gigabyte 670. Thing is, at that price, I'm ok with taking the risk of having it fail (based on the hope that overvoltage and overcurrent protection will stop it from frying anything else in the PC if it does fail)...

Do you think the XFX Pro 750W Core would be better? It's £20 more. It has seasonic internals, 4 PCIe cables and same fan. Good review on jonnyguru, but no information on sound level. Though it can take more power so won't be working as hard for the same system.

I'm afraid to go for the Corsair TX 650 V2 (£78) because literally every site that lets users post reviews (ocuk, newegg...) is full of complaints by peope who've had them fail. Quite a few for the XFX, though not as badly.

 

[Mars999]

I have had many Corsairs and never had one fail....

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817139020

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817151094