New build, need some advice

[burgers]

Hi all,
Am looking to build my new computer this Easter break so within the next 2 weeks and could do with some advice. It will be used for light gaming, internet browsing, blue ray playback and work. It will have windows 7 64bit.
My budget is probably £400 - £450, but would like the most bang for my buck.
All parts will be purchased from the UK, probably either from www.scan.co.uk or www.ebuyer.com
I already have the case (Coolermaster CM-690), PSU (Enermax 620W Liberty) and RAM (4GB G.Skill DDR3 1600) to use.
I don't intend to OC, however I could be easily persuaded and is something I would be interested in, just not sure if it's necessary.
I will be using a 23" Samsung 1920x1080 monitor.

Now I was initially looking at this sort of setup:

i5 750
Gigabyte GA-P55A-UD3
Samsung F3 500GB
XFX 1 GB HD5450
Sony x24 Dual Layer DVD+-RW

Which comes to about £380 + a wireless PCI card so.....

Is a HD5450 to much? Should I just get a 1GB HD4650 and save £10 considering I won't really be gaming?

Could someone suggest a decent PCI wireless card from either of the two sites above?

And lastly, is i5 the way to go? Or should I look at AMD and possibly save enough for a 60GB SSD (Don't think I could do with 40GB)?


Thanks for your help

 

[mfenn]

Hi all,
Am looking to build my new computer this Easter break so within the next 2 weeks and could do with some advice. It will be used for light gaming, internet browsing, blue ray playback and work. It will have windows 7 64bit.
My budget is probably £400 - £450, but would like the most bang for my buck.
All parts will be purchased from the UK, probably either from www.scan.co.uk or www.ebuyer.com
I already have the case (Coolermaster CM-690), PSU (Enermax 620W Liberty) and RAM (4GB G.Skill DDR3 1600) to use.
I don't intend to OC, however I could be easily persuaded and is something I would be interested in, just not sure if it's necessary.
I will be using a 23" Samsung 1920x1080 monitor.

Now I was initially looking at this sort of setup:

i5 750
Gigabyte GA-P55A-UD3
Samsung F3 500GB
XFX 1 GB HD5450
Sony x24 Dual Layer DVD+-RW

Which comes to about £380 + a wireless PCI card so.....

Is a HD5450 to much? Should I just get a 1GB HD4650 and save £10 considering I won't really be gaming?

Could someone suggest a decent PCI wireless card from either of the two sites above?

And lastly, is i5 the way to go? Or should I look at AMD and possibly save enough for a 60GB SSD (Don't think I could do with 40GB)?


Thanks for your help

Either GPU is fine if you won't be gaming. A 4650 is way faster than the 5450. A 1GB framebuffer is ridiculous on either card, see if you can get one with 512MB for cheaper.

 

[burgers]

Ok thank you, will drop it down to a 512MB HD4650, maybe even a HD4550 and save £15.

Does anyone have any advice on AMD vs Intel at the moment and which route I should take?

Thanks again

 

[fffblackmage]

Ok thank you, will drop it down to a 512MB HD4650, maybe even a HD4550 and save £15.

Does anyone have any advice on AMD vs Intel at the moment and which route I should take?

Thanks again

At that point (the HD4550), you might as well save some money and just get a mobo with an IGP. Going with a Athlon II or Phenom II paired with a 785G-based chipset (which has an IGP) would probably save you $100-ish? That''ll definitely help with getting the 60GB SSD. I don't think you're losing out on too much performance by going with an AMD cpu.

If you get an X2 or X3, there's possibility of unlocking cores, or even the L3 cache on the Athlons. Of course, there is the possibility of the cores/L3 being actually defective. So, that means you must be prepared to be stuck with a dual or tri-core, or no L3 cache, if that happens. Anything that unlocks successfully is just a bonus.

 

[burgers]

Thanks fffblackmage. I think if I was to go with AMD I would probably go with the Phenom II X4 955/965 Black Edition and not risk unlocking cores.
Looking at the 785G Mobo's I can only find a mATX board that provides USB3 (GA-785GMT-USB3), which I was kind of hoping to have. What restrictions (if any) does the MATX impose or is it just a case of less PCI slots?
Just out of curiosity, will the 785G be ok with the orange box for example?

If I was to go with the Phenom CPU and mATX board I could stretch to a 60/64 GB SSD, which I'm already excited about. I have been trawling the Memory and Storage forums for the last 2 hours and haven't got far but at the moment I think my choices are:

64GB Kingston SSDNow V
64GB Samsung PM800
64GB Crucial M225
60GB OCZ Vertex
64GB Corsair Nova

I think they all support trim, but apart from that I'm not sure which to go for. The Kingston is the cheapest (£125), the Samsung and Crucial are £15 more and the OCZ and Corsair are an extra £10 on top of that. Any ideas?

Thank for your help

 

[mfenn]

Thanks fffblackmage. I think if I was to go with AMD I would probably go with the Phenom II X4 955/965 Black Edition and not risk unlocking cores.
Looking at the 785G Mobo's I can only find a mATX board that provides USB3 (GA-785GMT-USB3), which I was kind of hoping to have. What restrictions (if any) does the MATX impose or is it just a case of less PCI slots?
Just out of curiosity, will the 785G be ok with the orange box for example?

If I was to go with the Phenom CPU and mATX board I could stretch to a 60/64 GB SSD, which I'm already excited about. I have been trawling the Memory and Storage forums for the last 2 hours and haven't got far but at the moment I think my choices are:

64GB Kingston SSDNow V
64GB Samsung PM800
64GB Crucial M225
60GB OCZ Vertex
64GB Corsair Nova

I think they all support trim, but apart from that I'm not sure which to go for. The Kingston is the cheapest (£125), the Samsung and Crucial are £15 more and the OCZ and Corsair are an extra £10 on top of that. Any ideas?

Thank for your help

Of those, I would get the Vertex.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Did you forget the RAM? I don't see it listed in the OP?

Also, if you are on a budget, AMD is great. But Intel generally is more overclockable. So it's a tradeoff. If you are planning to overclock, then you "get more" with Intel. But it costs more.

 

[fffblackmage]

I think if I was to go with AMD I would probably go with the Phenom II X4 955/965 Black Edition and not risk unlocking cores.

Well, if you seriously cannot go over budget, then going AMD is certainly going to save you a bit of money. The PhII X4 and i5-750 are fairly close in performance, with the i5-750 probably leading in most cases (IIRC anyways). The primary reason I would choose to pay a bit more for the i5-750 is for its overclockability.

The two cpus aren't that different in terms of price, but the mobos certainly are though.

Looking at the 785G Mobo's I can only find a mATX board that provides USB3 (GA-785GMT-USB3), which I was kind of hoping to have. What restrictions (if any) does the MATX impose or is it just a case of less PCI slots?
Just out of curiosity, will the 785G be ok with the orange box for example?

Less slots. That's pretty much it. Might be a bit more crowded too.

Anandtech's 785G Review
The review shows that the 785G was capable of playing L4D at med settings, 1024*768, especially when OC'ed. Orange Box might be ok with low settings, or you might need to use a lower resolution than 1080p.

I guess it's up to you if it is worth picking up a graphics card for some more eye candy. It might be worth trading the quad core for the graphics card. You might get the quad core back through unlocking a X2 or X3. This way, you get better gaming performance (a solid gpu is more important for gaming).

HD playback seems to be the most cpu intensive thing you will be doing. I can't imagine a decent dual core would have a problem with that.

If I was to go with the Phenom CPU and mATX board I could stretch to a 60/64 GB SSD, which I'm already excited about. I have been trawling the Memory and Storage forums for the last 2 hours and haven't got far but at the moment I think my choices are:

64GB Kingston SSDNow V
64GB Samsung PM800
64GB Crucial M225
60GB OCZ Vertex
64GB Corsair Nova

I second the Vertex.

I was gonna recommend the OCZ Agility, but it was priced the same as the Vertex...


That was quite a bit longer than I expected. I'm probably just getting you more confused as to what to get that anything else. Problem is what you really want. Do you really need the quad core? How important is it that the computer will be able to play a game like The Orange Box? Etc...

 

[burgers]

Did you forget the RAM? I don't see it listed in the OP?

Also, if you are on a budget, AMD is great. But Intel generally is more overclockable. So it's a tradeoff. If you are planning to overclock, then you "get more" with Intel. But it costs more.

I already have 4GB DDR3 1600, its in the OP.
I would definitely prefer to go with the i5, but I wouldn't be able to afford an SSD, it would have to be a F3 500GB which would bring my total to £410. So at the moment I'm thinking that it's worth the sacrifice.

How important is it that the computer will be able to play a game like The Orange Box? Etc...

I think at the moment it's not so important, especially with exams around the corner, and if I decide that I would like to a few months down the road I could always add in a graphics card and be able to.

It might be worth trading the quad core for the graphics card. You might get the quad core back through unlocking a X2 or X3.

I am tempted to take a gamble with the Athlon X3 and see if I can unlock the 4th core. It would put me at £350 total, £50 under budget so I could easily get the graphics card if needed.

I second the Vertex.

The vertex it is then. Although they only offer a year's warranty where as the crucial M225 offers 5 years. Worth considering the M225 or is the vertex still a better deal?

Thanks for all your help!

 

[fffblackmage]

The vertex it is then. Although they only offer a year's warranty where as the crucial M225 offers 5 years. Worth considering the M225 or is the vertex still a better deal?

Oh, didn't know that. I said Vertex because that's just what I was most familiar with. That 5-year warranty certainly sounds nice.

I did a quick google for some reviews, and the Crucial M225 is a Indilinx Barefoot-based SSD, just like the Vertex.

It's probably worth going with the 5-year warranty. I don't know anything about the quality of OCZ's or Crucial's support though.

 

[mfenn]

Oh, didn't know that. I said Vertex because that's just what I was most familiar with. That 5-year warranty certainly sounds nice.

I did a quick google for some reviews, and the Crucial M225 is a Indilinx Barefoot-based SSD, just like the Vertex.

It's probably worth going with the 5-year warranty. I don't know anything about the quality of OCZ's or Crucial's support though.

Yeah, the M225 and the Vertex are basically the same drive. I recommended the Vertex over the M225 because OCZ's support is excellent. The Vertex comes with a 3-year warranty in the US. I didn't think that the warranty terms might be different in the UK.

 

[burgers]

Thanks for the info, turns out that scan.co.uk aren't an authorised re-seller so the warranty is through them and not OCZ, but I can buy it else where and get the 3 year warranty so will do that.
Also I think Im going to go with the Athlon X3 440 and try to unlock the 4th core and maybe OC slightly.
So my build looks like:

AMD Athlon II X3 440 @ 3.0GHz
Gigabyte GA-785GMT-USB3 mATX
OCZ 60GB Vertex
Linksys wireless-N PCI card
Sony 24X DVD+-RW
= £353.08

Just need to find a CPU cooler and I'm good to go. Thanks for all the help, I will be back home this weekend so will purchase everything then. Can't wait!

 

[MisterDonut]

Hey it's been a while since I recommended the Mugen 2 . $40, miracle temps, /end.

 

[burgers]

Thanks MisterDonut, will get the Murgen 2.
Have purchased the parts, an offer came up on the intel 80GB Gen2 SSD so went with that over the vertex.
Thanks for everyone's help, will update how the Athlon X3 turns out.

 

[burgers]

Just want to say thanks for all your help and advice! Am very please with the new build.

I wasn't able to unlock the fouth core of the Athlon X3 but am not to dissapointed. I have overclocked it to 3.6GHz and with the mugen2 (which is a beast!) its running at 35degC at full load.

I love the SSD, boot times are lighning fast compared to my old system. Am still trying to sort out a few things, like drivers and settings but am pretty please at the moment.

Once again thanks,
burgers

edit:
PS. Slightly worried that it hasnt quenched my building thirst!

 

[mfenn]

Just want to say thanks for all your help and advice! Am very please with the new build.

I wasn't able to unlock the fouth core of the Athlon X3 but am not to dissapointed. I have overclocked it to 3.6GHz and with the mugen2 (which is a beast!) its running at 35degC at full load.

I love the SSD, boot times are lighning fast compared to my old system. Am still trying to sort out a few things, like drivers and settings but am pretty please at the moment.

Once again thanks,
burgers

edit:
PS. Slightly worried that it hasnt quenched my building thirst!

Glad everything worked out for you!

 

[fffblackmage]

Just want to say thanks for all your help and advice! Am very please with the new build.
...

Glad to hear it.