Help me build a system?

bit4bit

New Member
I'm thinking of getting a new system, and was hoping for some suggestions for a setup. I've got a budget of £1000 (~$2000). Heres what I have and haven't decided:


***********CASE*********

Antec P182 Super Midi Tower Case - No PSU (Gun Metal Black)

£88.11 inc VAT

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-070-AN&tool=3

*****PROCESSOR***********

Intel Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient SLACR 95W Edition" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - Retail

£168.01 inc VAT

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-161-IN

*************RAM*************

???
2GB DDR2 (DD3 too much) good brand...Corsair?
(Maybe 4GB depending on how much I have left after the rest)


*********GRAPHICS***********

???
DX10

**********MOBO***********
???
Support SLI......Good brand (In other words reliable).

*********STORAGE*************



2X Samsung SpinPoint T 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (HD501LJ)

£66.96 inc VAT x2= £133.92

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-036-SA&groupid=701&catid=14&subcat=

***********OPTICAL*************

???
1x DVD +/-RW dual layer. RELIABLE, FAST, and CAN HANDLE BADLY WORN DISKS. Not prepared to pay extra for lightscribe gimmick. :)


***********COOLING************
???
A good cooling system. Must be EFFICIENT and QUIET. water cooling?

**********************************

The total cost for case/processor/storage is:

Case: £88.11
PROCESSOR: £168.01
STORAGE: £133.92
TOTAL : £390.04

So I've got £609.96 to play with for the rest.

Please help me decide the rest, and let me know if you have any better suggestions for storage/processor. The case looks bang on for me in terms of simple design, but I'd quite like to have side-loading HD bays, and I'm not sure if it's got it?

I'd also quite like to stay with overclockers UK, cos I've heard good things about their service...Pretty much one of the cheapest anyway?....http://www.overclockers.co.uk/

Anyway, thanks alot for your help! :)
 
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Id say get a WD 150gb Raptor, way good for gaming. And get an external for all you unessecary movies and pics and shit like that.

id say get either that intel or a phenom

8800 gtx and get 2 for sli

and 4 gigs of ddr2 or ddr3 of any amount whatever you want.

that should be less than 2k
 
I was going to put the two Hard drives in RAID, so sharing the cache they will be fast enough anyway?

For the processor, to be honest I've always stuck with intel, and AMD is out of the comfort zone. :)

For the graphics I am really interested in the 8800, but whch one I'm not sure. There seems to be about 50 graphics cards on overclockers alone with '8800' in the title. It seems the GTX's are more expensive. Is it worth paying the extra?

Also what would be the difference between:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-071-OK

AND

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-127-LT

..for instance? seems they have the same amount of DDR3 RAM onboard.

Maroon1: What brand is that mobo? XFX? I've never heard of them. The description certainly is good (of course), but from the pic it looks a bit cheap. I've been recomended 'Gigabyte'.

Also out of Corsair, Crucial ballistix, and OCz, what would be the best brand for RAM?...Is this more a matter of preference than there being a clear leader?


Thanks alot for the help, I'm not up to scratch with hardware at all at the moment. :)
 
It seems the GTX's are more expensive. Is it worth paying the extra?

No, because it performs just slightly faster than GTS 512MB


Also what would be the difference between:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-071-OK

AND

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-127-LT

..for instance? seems they have the same amount of DDR3 RAM onboard.
The second one have more stream processors and faster clock speed

Maroon1: What brand is that mobo? XFX? I've never heard of them. The description certainly is good (of course), but from the pic it looks a bit cheap. I've been recomended 'Gigabyte'.

You can get Asus for the price. I think it is better than XFX, but this doesn't mean that XFX is bad

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-261-AS
 
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OK, well this is what the setup is looking like at the moment:

*****PROCESSOR***********

Intel Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient SLACR 95W Edition" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - Retail

£168.01 inc VAT

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-161-IN

*************RAM*************

OCZ 4GB (2x2GB) PC2-6400C4 800MHz Reaper HPC Enhanced Bandwidth Edition Dual Channel DDR2 (OCZ2RPR800C44GK)

£88.11 inc VAT

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-096-OC

*********GRAPHICS***********

OcUK GeForce 8800 GT 512MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail

£164.49 inc VAT (x2) = £328.98

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-071-OK

**********MOBO***********

Asus P5N-T Deluxe nForce 780i (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard

£187.99 inc VAT

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-261-AS

*********STORAGE*************
2X Samsung SpinPoint T 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (HD501LJ)

£66.96 inc VAT x2= £133.92

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-036-SA&groupid=701&catid=14&subcat=

***********CASE*********

Antec P182 Super Midi Tower Case - No PSU (Gun Metal Black)

£88.11 inc VAT

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-070-AN&tool=3

************PSU****************

Not sure? Would I need about 800W? What brand is the most reliable/ well established?

******************

Total = £168.01 + £88.11 + £328.98 + £187.99 + £133.92 + £88.11 = £995.12

Sounds about right, but again this is without a PSU.

Thanks
 
Also what about an operating system? I can load XP onto there, but is it really worth upgrading to VISTA?...I mean will I not be able to run the hardware at its full capability on XP?...meaning games etc..

Also 32-bit or 64-bit?
And Basic/Premium/Ultimate?

Most of the bugs in Vista have been sorted out now right?
I might just dual boot Premium with XP.
 
OK, well this is what the setup is looking like at the moment:

*****PROCESSOR***********

Intel Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient SLACR 95W Edition" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - Retail

£168.01 inc VAT

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-161-IN

*************RAM*************

OCZ 4GB (2x2GB) PC2-6400C4 800MHz Reaper HPC Enhanced Bandwidth Edition Dual Channel DDR2 (OCZ2RPR800C44GK)

£88.11 inc VAT

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-096-OC

*********GRAPHICS***********

OcUK GeForce 8800 GT 512MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail

£164.49 inc VAT (x2) = £328.98

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-071-OK

**********MOBO***********

Asus P5N-T Deluxe nForce 780i (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard

£187.99 inc VAT

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-261-AS

*********STORAGE*************
2X Samsung SpinPoint T 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (HD501LJ)

£66.96 inc VAT x2= £133.92

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-036-SA&groupid=701&catid=14&subcat=

***********CASE*********

Antec P182 Super Midi Tower Case - No PSU (Gun Metal Black)

£88.11 inc VAT

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-070-AN&tool=3

************PSU****************

Not sure? Would I need about 800W? What brand is the most reliable/ well established?

******************

Total = £168.01 + £88.11 + £328.98 + £187.99 + £133.92 + £88.11 = £995.12

Sounds about right, but again this is without a PSU.

Thanks

Good build. but I will say not to order it until the motherboard in stock, as you are not able to get it run until you get the MB. And by that time, it might worth to have a look on the performance on 45nm C2D (20 Jan).

PSU: Antec TruePower Quattro 850W if you prepare to SLi + RAID + extreme OC

Heatsink: 24ZALMAN CNPS 9700 NT

Als, I suggest you cross check with ebuyer/ cclonline, you may find it cheaper
 
People have their opinions about vista. I personally despise vista, though some silly people would suggest it over XP. Dual booting doesn't sound like a bad idea.
 
Good build. but I will say not to order it until the motherboard in stock, as you are not able to get it run until you get the MB. And by that time, it might worth to have a look on the performance on 45nm C2D (20 Jan).

PSU: Antec TruePower Quattro 850W if you prepare to SLi + RAID + extreme OC

Heatsink: 24ZALMAN CNPS 9700 NT

Als, I suggest you cross check with ebuyer/ cclonline, you may find it cheaper

45nm? As in nanometer? This is referring to the width of the tracks on the wafer? I was kind of set on getting a quad core. Are you saying that this dual core that is set to come out this month will actually be better than the quad I chose? Will it have higher out-of-the-box speeds or something?

I was going to ask actually, is the Q6600 the only Intel quad out at the moment?

Thanks for the links for the PSU and cooler.

I've heard good things about Antec PSU's actually, and I'm sure I've read about that cooler somewhere too. Suppose I were to overclock the system, and push the processor speed up to 3.4GHz+ (from 2.4GHz), do you suppose that heatsink would be sufficient, or would I need to be looking into a water cooling solution?

My money probably wont come through for another 3 weeks or so anyway, so I'll keep an eye on prices/new parts in the meantime. The rate of change of prices for parts is incredible, I know. In another year I'll probably regret buying the set-up, because something bigger and better is out, but oh well, you can't think like that unless you're a millionaire. :)
 
Nope. Q6600, QX6700, QX6750, QX6850, QX9650, ect... Phenom 9500, Phenom 9600, Phenom 9700...

I've came across the QX9650 after making that post, and realized that it's selling for £700 (On overclockers UK anyway), so I don't think I'll be getting that! :) As for the other Q's, I didn't realise there was any in between like QX6700, QX6750, QX6850, so thanks for that I'll have to check out the prices. (I'm guessing as the number increases, the 'out-the-box' processor speed increases, and you are able to overclock it further?)

I also read something about a QX9700, or something like that?...but thats probably more expensive still. And Phenoms are AMD, I'm really after an intel.

Say I just got the Q6600, and overclocked it , what speed could I push it to? 3.6GHz?...and thats on each core?
 
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