Help With Setup

[Bshah]

Hey!

I have been visiting these forums for years, but this is my first post. Hope it is in the right place.

I am building a gaming rig (flight sim mainly) and was wondering if my selection was compatible and good. My budget is about a £1000.

I would say that my comp knowledge is a bit on the embarrassing side when compared to some of you guys. I am hoping to learn and do a bit of overclocking to save some money (UK is bloody expensive).

This is what i have in mind:

Gigabyte GA-MA790GP-UD4H AMD 790GX £136.84

AMD Phenom II X3 Tri Core 720 Black Edition 2.8GHz £120.74

Corsair XMS2 4GB DDR2 PC2-8500C5 TwinX (2x2GB) £39.99

Sapphire ATI Radeon HD 4870 1024MB £160.99

Coolermaster HAF 932 Case - Black (No PSU) £109.24

Corsair TX 750W ATX SLI Compliant Power Supply £103.98

Asus Xonar D2 7.1 PCI Sound Card £97.74

Sunbeam Core Contact Freezer CPU Cooler £28.74

Arctic Silver 5 Thermal Compound (3.5g) £6.00

HP 24" HP W2448HC £260.00

Total £1100.00

Thanks in advance,
B

MOD EDIT: PC builds belong in General Hardware. - Zap

 

[Bshah]

Sorry.

 

[Zap]

Welcome to Anandtech Forums, Bshah. No need to apologise.

You say you want to overclock to save some money, yet you choose a sound card that is 1/11 of your total cost? Unless you have some specific reason for that sound card choice, my suggestion would be to save that money and use onboard sound... and if after using onboard sound you find it lacking, then spend the money for a separate sound card. IMO onboard sound has come a long way from the crappy 2-channel AC'97 of last decade. Out of four systems in my household (that are put together and regularly used) only one of them is not using onboard sound, and that is because there was something wrong with it (mic input didn't work and it kept sensing random stuff being plugged in). The motherboard otherwise worked and overclocked great, so instead of RMAing it, I just tossed in a random PCI sound card I had laying around.

 

[Bshah]

Zap,

Thanks for the input. I have a set of Z-5500 but don't have a separate tv or a HI-FI system and so need this to be an all in one entertainment system (which I should have mentioned). If I can do that with on-board than I would be more than happy to ditch the sound card or even go for a cheaper option.

B

 

[somethingsketchy]

Originally posted by: Zap
Welcome to Anandtech Forums, Bshah. No need to apologise.

You say you want to overclock to save some money, yet you choose a sound card that is 1/11 of your total cost? Unless you have some specific reason for that sound card choice, my suggestion would be to save that money and use onboard sound... and if after using onboard sound you find it lacking, then spend the money for a separate sound card.

Seconded with Zap. Also the 750w PSU is excessive for what you have in the build. I would recommend a 550w or even 600w just to be safe. 750w would be a minimum if you were running Crossfire. But what you have running is excessive.

I don't have a PSU link atm, but one that I have been using for over a year with a good amount of success is the Cooler Master 550w. Sorry in advance for the USD price instead of a Euro price.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16817171038

Unless you plan on adding a second 4870 in the future, I wouldn't recommend a 750w.

 

[Bshah]

Somethingsketchy,

Thanks mate. As you mentioned, I was hoping to add another hd4870 in the future when the need arises. Another reason being that if I wanted to upgrade my CPU, I may need a more powerful PSU (need to change board and mem to AM3 advised by someone on another forum).

B

 

[somethingsketchy]

Ah ok, then you can pretty much disregard my last post since you will be adding on in the future. Good luck with the build!