New build suggestions

O

OptiEng

New Member
Hi all,

I am having mixed thoughts... this i my first build and I am planning on building a high performance PC for gaming and running hardware intensive engineering programmes and analysis software.

I have decided to go for an AMD FX bulldozer Quad and 16gb RAM bundle with Asus motherboard. For now I will avop

I am not sure about cases, PSU's and cooling.

Firstly the PSU, I have read about avoid cheap PSU's like EZcool's, Alpine, etc. However, I have noticed that a lot of High spec PC's come with cheap PSU's? What are you thoughts and suggestions on this? What good budget power supplies would you recommend?

Is there any recommendations on budget cases, i.e. ones which are designed with good air flow. Does this make a difference?

With cooling I would like to stick with fan cooling, I plan to leave the PC running on for lots of periods of time under high load and also playing games. Would this be sufficient for cooling?

Many Thanks.
 
I think the general idea is that Intel i7 is better for those engineering and analysis things. Someone should probably confirm that though. But that is if you can afford it. If not, why not go for an 8 core AMD? :) FX-8120 shouldn't be super expensive. And maybe it could use all the cores for your software?

I'm going to assume you are American, so here is a case with good airflow:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119233
It might not be very big, so if you are going to fit larger graphics cards you might need to pick another one.
As for PSU, don't be cheap on it. Make sure it is quality. But it's difficult to say how powerful you need without knowing the other components. :)

Most cases will have decent enough airflow to allow cooling. Some are supposedly, better, some are supposedly worse, but I doubt any of them are horrible at it.
When it comes to CPU cooling, stock cooler will be just fine unless you are going to overclock it. But I have heard AMD stock coolers are a bit noisy, so consider getting a cheap-ish non-stock cooler.
 
Hi, thanks for your help and advice. I am in the UK, and I am not sure if we have a newegg equivalent here. Maybe ebuyer/dabs is the closet thing we have?

Yes it is purely a cost reason I was going for the AMD, it true on the cores, I have a piece of software that allows you to select the number of cores you have so you can speed up the analysis.

I read the useful sticky on this forum, and it seems that Corsair, OCZ, Antec are good PSU, hopefully I can find a good one for a good price. Yes I agree I will need to hone down a little more on my specs before I can get the appropriately rated power supply. I was just considering brands at the moment.

Could go for something like this... http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/AMD-Bulld...oards_CPUs&hash=item2c66993cb6#ht_4209wt_1037

I like the complete build bundles that Newegg do, I haven't been able to find anything like that in the UK.

Thanka again. Your post was really helpful and much appreciated.
 
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I wouldn't recommend that bundle, because:

-Has a micro ATX board. They're smaller than normal and come with less features, and get very hot. Also, I wouldn't recommend Asus. Gigabyte or MSI are good choices.

-Slow RAM. The speed doesn't matter that much in games, but with intensive programs like what you plan to use, faster RAM is better. I'd suggest 1866mhz RAM with 1.5v and the lowest possible timings.

And get an aftermarket cooler and overclock that 8-core. They can get to 4.5-5ghz easy. Overclocking seems challenging at first, but if you understand and can follow directions, it'll help a lot with your programs.
 
For the PSU I'd get either a Seasonic or a Corsair.


What claptonmain said, buy an aftermarket cooler and overclock it.
 
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