Page 2 of 2 FirstFirst 12
Results 17 to 30 of 30

Thread: Small General Use/Gaming PC

  1. #17
    Evil Monkey! MrJim's Avatar
    Join Date
    Aug 2012
    Location
    London
    Posts
    2,313
    Thanks
    300
    Thanked
    472 times in 362 posts
    • MrJim's system
      • Motherboard:
      • MSI Tomahawk X570
      • CPU:
      • AMD Ryzen 5900X
      • Memory:
      • 32gb Kingston 3600 DDR4
      • Storage:
      • Aorus 1Tb NVME SSD, Samsung 1Tb 970 Evo SSD, Crucial 2tb MX500 SSD, Seagate Ironwolf 4Tb SSD
      • Graphics card(s):
      • EVGA 3080Ti
      • PSU:
      • Seasonic Prime Ultra Platinum 1300W
      • Case:
      • Fractal Meshify 2
      • Operating System:
      • Windows 11 Pro
      • Monitor(s):
      • Viewsonic 27" XG2703-GS
      • Internet:
      • BT 900 mb/s FTTP

    Re: Small General Use/Gaming PC

    Quote Originally Posted by krazy_olie View Post
    CPU Cooler: RAIJINTEK PALLAS 56.5 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler (£35.76 @ Amazon UK)
    If you're not overclocking, do you really need a £35 cooler? You could just use the box cooler, or a £20 cooler like the Zalman CNPS10X if you want something with a bit more cooling power?

  2. #18
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2005
    Location
    London (almost)
    Posts
    1,080
    Thanks
    20
    Thanked
    34 times in 28 posts

    Re: Small General Use/Gaming PC

    Quote Originally Posted by CAT-THE-FIFTH View Post
    I would get the Xeon E3 1230 V3 for a few quid more. Used it and the same motherboard in a Bitfenix Phenom build I helped with last weekend.
    Hmm I could stretch to it. I was looking at the 1231 and decided it wasn't worth it but the non 1230 is a fair bit cheaper right now.

    Quote Originally Posted by MrJim View Post
    If you're not overclocking, do you really need a £35 cooler? You could just use the box cooler, or a £20 cooler like the Zalman CNPS10X if you want something with a bit more cooling power?
    Ideally not, the other one I was looking at could be had for less. My experience on the stock cooler is that it's kinda loud.. That said, I could go for the aforementioned Xeon and ditch the cooler for roughly the same cost.

  3. #19
    Treasure Hunter extraordinaire herulach's Avatar
    Join Date
    Apr 2005
    Location
    Bolton
    Posts
    5,618
    Thanks
    18
    Thanked
    172 times in 159 posts
    • herulach's system
      • Motherboard:
      • MSI Z97 MPower
      • CPU:
      • i7 4790K
      • Memory:
      • 8GB Vengeance LP
      • Storage:
      • 1TB WD Blue + 250GB 840 EVo
      • Graphics card(s):
      • 2* Palit GTX 970 Jetstream
      • PSU:
      • EVGA Supernova G2 850W
      • Case:
      • CM HAF Stacker 935, 2*360 Rad WC Loop w/EK blocks.
      • Operating System:
      • Windows 8.1
      • Monitor(s):
      • Crossover 290HD & LG L1980Q
      • Internet:
      • 120mb Virgin Media

    Re: Small General Use/Gaming PC

    Quote Originally Posted by krazy_olie View Post
    Hmm I could stretch to it. I was looking at the 1231 and decided it wasn't worth it but the non 1230 is a fair bit cheaper right now.



    Ideally not, the other one I was looking at could be had for less. My experience on the stock cooler is that it's kinda loud.. That said, I could go for the aforementioned Xeon and ditch the cooler for roughly the same cost.
    At stock a freezer 7/hyper212 is fine, neither should set you back more than £15/£20.

  4. #20
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2005
    Location
    London (almost)
    Posts
    1,080
    Thanks
    20
    Thanked
    34 times in 28 posts

    Re: Small General Use/Gaming PC

    Quote Originally Posted by herulach View Post
    At stock a freezer 7/hyper212 is fine, neither should set you back more than £15/£20.
    That's what I would go for but this case needs low profile.

  5. #21
    Treasure Hunter extraordinaire herulach's Avatar
    Join Date
    Apr 2005
    Location
    Bolton
    Posts
    5,618
    Thanks
    18
    Thanked
    172 times in 159 posts
    • herulach's system
      • Motherboard:
      • MSI Z97 MPower
      • CPU:
      • i7 4790K
      • Memory:
      • 8GB Vengeance LP
      • Storage:
      • 1TB WD Blue + 250GB 840 EVo
      • Graphics card(s):
      • 2* Palit GTX 970 Jetstream
      • PSU:
      • EVGA Supernova G2 850W
      • Case:
      • CM HAF Stacker 935, 2*360 Rad WC Loop w/EK blocks.
      • Operating System:
      • Windows 8.1
      • Monitor(s):
      • Crossover 290HD & LG L1980Q
      • Internet:
      • 120mb Virgin Media

    Re: Small General Use/Gaming PC

    Quote Originally Posted by krazy_olie View Post
    That's what I would go for but this case needs low profile.
    Both the 7 and 11 come in low profile versions. http://www.amazon.co.uk/FREEZER-flue...rds=freezer+11

  6. #22
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2005
    Location
    London (almost)
    Posts
    1,080
    Thanks
    20
    Thanked
    34 times in 28 posts

    Re: Small General Use/Gaming PC

    True,

    The more I look in to the ultra sff cases the more I am put off by limitations, increased costs and general awkwardness.
    The TJ08e is quite tall in comparison but footprint wise is just as useful, will be far easier to manage and build options are increased by having less limitations.

    So my latest revision is:

    PCPartPicker part list: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/wczMmG
    Price breakdown by merchant: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/wczMmG/by_merchant/

    CPU: Intel Core i5-4590 3.3GHz Quad-Core Processor (£149.94 @ Scan.co.uk)
    CPU Cooler: Silverstone AR01 81.4 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler (£26.05)
    Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-H97M-D3H Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£68.40 @ Scan.co.uk)
    Memory: Crucial Ballistix Sport 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (£56.83 @ Amazon UK)
    Storage: Crucial MX100 512GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£149.98 @ Amazon UK)
    Case: Silverstone TJ08B-E MicroATX Mini Tower Case (£64.90 @ Scan.co.uk)
    Power Supply: Corsair CSM 450W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply (£48.99)
    Optical Drive: Pioneer BDR-209DBK Blu-Ray/DVD/CD Writer (£54.62 @ Amazon UK)
    Operating System: Microsoft Windows 8.1 (OEM) (64-bit) (£72.97 @ Scan.co.uk)
    Total: £692.68
    Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
    Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-11-03 16:51 GMT+0000

    + video card, monitor, mouse/kb (I can buy cheap for now).

    I'm fairly content with this.
    I think I will pass on the Xeon, I think I value the saved money and potentially handy IGP over the performance for now.
    I could go for a cheaper cooler, this appears to be exactly what I'm looking for, though.
    PSU is chosen as it looks to be good quality, semi modular and shallower than normal, which will help. The 550w can be had for an extra £10 or so, which might be useful as apparently the fan noise starts to ramp up a bit at load, so more headroom might help.

    Trying to stick to Scan and Amazon here, would need a significant saving to add another retailer to the list. There's a high probability of saving a few quid on Scan Today Only anyway.

  7. #23
    Senior Member Bonebreaker777's Avatar
    Join Date
    Dec 2012
    Location
    Herts, UK
    Posts
    2,035
    Thanks
    55
    Thanked
    203 times in 186 posts
    • Bonebreaker777's system
      • Motherboard:
      • MSI H97I AC
      • CPU:
      • Xeon 1225 v3 + Freezer 11 L
      • Memory:
      • 2 x 4GB 1600Mhz 1T-8-8-8-20 1.35V Crucial BallistiX Tactical VLP
      • Storage:
      • 128GB CRUCIAL MX100///XPEnology server + 3 x WD Purple 3TB
      • Graphics card(s):
      • Intel HD 4600
      • PSU:
      • be quiet! L8 300W PSU BN220
      • Case:
      • Cooler Master Elite 120
      • Operating System:
      • Windows 10 Pro 64bit
      • Monitor(s):
      • Samsung SyncMaster 226BW
      • Internet:
      • Virgin 100Mb

    Re: Small General Use/Gaming PC

    If going via Amazon,try to take advantage of Flubit.

  8. #24
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2005
    Location
    London (almost)
    Posts
    1,080
    Thanks
    20
    Thanked
    34 times in 28 posts

    Re: Small General Use/Gaming PC

    Quote Originally Posted by Bonebreaker777 View Post
    If going via Amazon,try to take advantage of Flubit.
    Had a look, bit confused as to why firework sellers are trying to sell me PC components...

  9. #25
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2005
    Location
    London (almost)
    Posts
    1,080
    Thanks
    20
    Thanked
    34 times in 28 posts

    Re: Small General Use/Gaming PC

    OK turns out that's just the name of their internal seller. Still, I'd rather try it out on some smaller items first, not things which have genuine possibility of return.

    So almost there, saving some intervention.

    PCPartPicker part list: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/Wjt8zy
    Price breakdown by merchant: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/Wjt8zy/by_merchant/

    CPU: Intel Core i5-4590 3.3GHz Quad-Core Processor (£149.94 @ Scan.co.uk)
    CPU Cooler: Silverstone AR01 81.4 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler (£26.05) (scan)
    Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-H97M-D3H Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£68.40 @ Scan.co.uk)
    Memory: Crucial Ballistix Sport 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (£56.83 @ Amazon UK)
    Storage: Crucial MX100 512GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£149.98 @ Amazon UK)
    Case: Silverstone TJ08B-E MicroATX Mini Tower Case (£64.90 @ Scan.co.uk)
    Power Supply: Corsair CSM 550W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply (£59.99) (scan/amazon)
    Optical Drive: Pioneer BDC-207DBK Blu-Ray Reader, DVD/CD Writer (£39.42 @ Scan.co.uk)
    Operating System: Microsoft Windows 8.1 (OEM) (64-bit) (£72.97 @ Scan.co.uk)
    Total: £688.48
    Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
    Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-11-05 12:59 GMT+0000

    CPU I think is ok, I think. Xeon is on the table still, but would have to buy GPU. 970 for < £280 witha free game may be worth it in the long run, in the sense that I wouldn't have to upgrade for yonks
    Cooler could be cheaper but I like the white/blue look...

    Motherboard - Alternatives are the asus h97m plus and the z97 version of this, which would enable overclocking and faster ram, if I had.. but I don't... Amazon have it £4 cheaper but prefer to buy cpu and mobo from Scan

    Cheap and cheerful Crucial low voltage RAM, single stick and can add another later if I want. Would prefer to buy this from scan, too, but they seem to be almost exclusively Corsair.
    Hard to beat this SSD
    Settled on this case
    PSU seems like a reasonable deal, shorter length helps. (550 over 450 as latter has very few connections). Flat cables included is a nice touch.
    Dropped to blu-ray reader. I have a writer I could swap for if I needed.
    Windows.. is windows

    I also found a cherry media keyboard and gigabyte mouse to go with for ~£25.

    Settled on the Dell monitor, need to chose a vendor (Amazon out of stock), doesn't need to come with other stuff, can wait a little.
    GPU I think I need to wait for pay day, though if a bargain pops along before I can go for it. I'm thinking 970 but a super cheap 280/290/760/770 could sway me before then.
    Last edited by krazy_olie; 05-11-2014 at 05:39 PM.

  10. #26
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Jun 2012
    Posts
    2,401
    Thanks
    87
    Thanked
    151 times in 145 posts
    • Willzzz's system
      • Motherboard:
      • Gigabyte
      • CPU:
      • 4670K
      • PSU:
      • FD Newton R3 600W
      • Case:
      • Corsair 350D

    Re: Small General Use/Gaming PC

    Quote Originally Posted by krazy_olie View Post
    Cooler could be cheaper but I like the white/blue look...
    So get the cheaper AR02, exact same colour scheme and can easily cool your CPU.
    http://www.scan.co.uk/products/silve...m2-am3-fm1-fm2

    Quote Originally Posted by krazy_olie View Post
    Motherboard - Alternatives are the asus h97m plus and the z97 version of this, which would enable overclocking and faster ram, if I had.. but I don't... Amazon have it £4 cheaper but prefer to buy cpu and mobo from Scan
    I'd consider the cheaper H81, same Gigabyte quality, same performance, you can attach fewer disks etc, but this isn't exactly a file server.
    (link for comparison purposes only, I'd buy whichever you choose from Scan)
    http://www.newegg.com/global/uk/Prod...24%24%24%24%24

    Quote Originally Posted by krazy_olie View Post
    Settled on the Dell monitor, need to chose a vendor (Amazon out of stock), doesn't need to come with other stuff, can wait a little.
    GPU I think I need to wait for pay day, though if a bargain pops along before I can go for it. I'm thinking 970 but a super cheap 280/290/760/770 could sway me before then.
    I bought mine here:
    http://www.ballicom.co.uk/860bbec-de....p1089399.html
    I know the lack of picture is disturbing, but they were very professional on the phone, the price is great and their free delivery turned up in less than 24 hours.
    I checked the tracking info the next morning and was amazed to see it had already been delivered!

  11. Received thanks from:

    krazy_olie (06-11-2014)

  12. #27
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2005
    Location
    London (almost)
    Posts
    1,080
    Thanks
    20
    Thanked
    34 times in 28 posts

    Re: Small General Use/Gaming PC

    dammit, massively overspent by buying up discounted items on OCUK.

    So my OTT system will be
    Asus rog impact vii z97 +4790k. This was a significantly discounted bundle so I haven't really paid extra for the ROG board over other z97 (I wouldn't normally buy a ROG board). On the plus side that particular board has a unique layout which will make it a touch easier to work in, respectable inbuilt sound card (useful until I find a replacement for my broken FIIO), some potentially useful fan features etc, m2...

    Don't expect to see much gain from the i7 over i5 but my hope is that it will last longer before it becomes any kind of bottleneck, will speed up things like creating mp3 of entire music library, for example.
    16GB, again no benefit now, perhaps when I'm running multiple instances of Visual studio it will be. This wasn't a bank breaker, though.

    Plonked for the rvz01, in my current room this saves me a lot of space as I can fit it under my desk, the annoying thing is the additional power supply cost and very limited optical support. Scan had a decent price on the OEM blu-ray drive but it's been delayed so had to drop it, will have to create a windows install USB for now, I guess. The ml07 was only a few quid cheaper and I didn't like the fake aluminium look and it doesn't come with case fans or dust filters.

    GPU is a Galax 970, was close to going for a 290 but in that small case having a cooler card.

    So rather above what I need for now but on the flipside I've got a fair bit of longevity in there and won't have much reason to tinker a good while.
    For a similar price I could have gone to a 980 if I'd trimmed down on the other stuff but my thinking is that it's got more than enough grunt as it is and will do a GPU switch when 4k becomes significantly relevant in a few years.

  13. #28
    Not a good person scaryjim's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jan 2009
    Location
    Gateshead
    Posts
    15,196
    Thanks
    1,231
    Thanked
    2,291 times in 1,874 posts
    • scaryjim's system
      • Motherboard:
      • Dell Inspiron
      • CPU:
      • Core i5 8250U
      • Memory:
      • 2x 4GB DDR4 2666
      • Storage:
      • 128GB M.2 SSD + 1TB HDD
      • Graphics card(s):
      • Radeon R5 230
      • PSU:
      • Battery/Dell brick
      • Case:
      • Dell Inspiron 5570
      • Operating System:
      • Windows 10
      • Monitor(s):
      • 15" 1080p laptop panel

    Re: Small General Use/Gaming PC

    Quote Originally Posted by krazy_olie View Post
    ... will have to create a windows install USB for now, I guess. ...
    if you have a spare SATA optical drive around you could always leave the case siode panel off, install windows from that, then just disconnect it once Windows is installed - that's how I sorted my last install in a no-Op case (actually, from memory I stuck a spare sata cable out of a hole in the case then shoved it back through when I was done, but same priniciple ).

  14. #29
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2005
    Location
    London (almost)
    Posts
    1,080
    Thanks
    20
    Thanked
    34 times in 28 posts

    Re: Small General Use/Gaming PC

    Quote Originally Posted by scaryjim View Post
    if you have a spare SATA optical drive around you could always leave the case siode panel off, install windows from that, then just disconnect it once Windows is installed - that's how I sorted my last install in a no-Op case (actually, from memory I stuck a spare sata cable out of a hole in the case then shoved it back through when I was done, but same priniciple ).
    Of Course! why didn't I think of that? thanks. Have a dvd drive lying around... somewhere. which should do the job fine. If I can't find it I can still rip one out. Remembered I did something similar with exactly the same drive when I wanted to write dvds from a PC that was only DVD read.
    Will want a blu ray eventually but far from urgent, I'll keep my eyes out for a nice deal on an external or compatible slot drive.

    All getting delivered today, may get to build it on Sunday. Quite looking to activating the included Far Cry 4 and running it at full whack.

    Apparently both the scan and OCUK deliveries came together from DPD.
    Last edited by krazy_olie; 04-12-2014 at 04:38 PM.

  15. #30
    Senior Member
    Join Date
    Aug 2005
    Location
    London (almost)
    Posts
    1,080
    Thanks
    20
    Thanked
    34 times in 28 posts

    Re: Small General Use/Gaming PC

    Turned out the drive I had lying around was IDE so had to rip out the sata blu ray I had replaced it with.

    Only had time to install windows but seemed to go ok.

    The build ended up being;

    Silverstone RVZ01
    "" 600w sfx
    Asus maximus impact vii
    4790k with AR06 cooler
    Galax 970 black edition
    16gb Hyperx savage
    512gb MX100 ssd

    At idle the Cpu and GPU appear to be silent but only had time to install windows. Seemed to idle at room temperature which is a good sign.
    Getting that cooler in was awkward and required some wriggling as the ends of the heat pipes (one was a tiny bit longer causing issue) were so close to the power daughter-board.
    Overall a much more challenging build than most. Hopefully future cases like this will have more in the way of thumbsrews and latches etc to make like easier

    Some issues with the case, the magnetic fan filters are not great, one is distinctly bent and doesn't sit nicely and the case fan facing the GPU appears to be faulty. Will post on the scan board and see what they say, I was probably going to take it out anyway but still not ideal. Hopefully I can get a replacement fan and maybe grills without too much hassle.

    How the windows install looked like..

    2014-12-07-1661 by krazy-olie, on Flickr

Thread Information

Users Browsing this Thread

There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •