First Gaming PC

[Jingles762]

Hi,
I'm a noob who has decided to build my first gaming pc since the laptop Im currently using is almost dead.... I've been looking round this and other computer sites reading reviews to get a list of components, and I think I'm pretty much there, but I thought it might be a good idea to get other opinions before I commit:

Corsair 550W VX550W PSU
Intel Core 2 Duo, E7200, 45nm
Asus P5KC P35 motherboard
Asus 512MB HD4850 graphics card
Zalman 9500 cooler
Antec 300 case
Corsair DDR2-800 2Gb
Samsung HD502IJ F1 SpinPoint 500Gb
Running on Win XP

Would you recommend any changes for similar price? Is any of it overkill? I want a PC that will run most newer games on fairly high settings without melting a hole in the floor.

Many thanks for any help

[rufeo]

Hi, welcome to hexus! What's your budget and at what resolution will you be gaming at? That has a lot of bearing on what components you'll likely be needing

[staffsMike]

It does depend on your settings and resolution of course but that is a fine midrange PC. The only thing I would change is the zalman cooler.

This is very good bang for bucks,
http://scan.co.uk/Product.aspx?WebProductId=700899

I'd also change the hard drive to a western digital 640GB AAKS. At £50 this is a relative bargain as it's a great performer, in fact one of the very best available
http://scan.co.uk/Product.aspx?WebProductId=798906

You could also check out the new E5200 CPU. It has slightly less cache but will overclock fantastically on pretty much any board given it's super low 800MHz FSB

[NovaSphere]

Welcome to Hexus

About your choices;
PSU; I would personally go for the Corsair HX520W PSU, it will cost a little more but it's modular, will help with tiding up your case and better airflow. (no spare cables)
CPU; Good choice, I'm sure Mike will love you for it
Motherboard; P5K series are good boards I believe (my personal choice went for the P5Q Pro though)
Gfx Card; Good card, should run any new game on good settings (depends on your resolution though)
Case: Same as I picked, so gj ^^
RAM; You might want to consider getting 4GB of RAM straight away, it's so cheap now, anyhow 800mhz RAM will be plenty.
HDD: Samsung is a good drive, I went for the WD6400AAKS though, many people recommend it, it's 640GB.
OS: Win XP is good enough, Vista might be better since it supports DirectX10, but either way it's good.
Is your OS 32-bit or 64-bit? If it's 32-bit, you can ignore the thing I said about RAM, since 32-bit won't be able to use the 4GB of RAM, so 2GB is better for a 32-bit OS.

Anyhow, to give you any good recomendations, give us your budget and on what resolution you wish to play ^^

[jeffel]

Personally i wouldnt recommend the asus p5kc mobo.Its a poor overclocker.Get an asus p5Q pro,Asus p5k-e etc.

Also i had the cnps 9500 cpu cooler in my pc sometime back.The are quite hard to mount and very noisy unless u put it under Q-fan mode in bios.Cooling is quite good Q6600 idle@45 c.

[kalniel]

Personally i wouldnt recommend the asus p5kc mobo.Its a poor overclocker.Get an asus p5Q pro,Asus p5k-e etc.

Unless lack of overclocking is symptomatic of other quality issues, is overclocking all that relevent for a first gaming computer?

[Jingles762]

Hi all, thanks for your advice.

My budget is ~ £650, but I will need to get a monitor for that as well, Im hoping to able to pick one up cheap from somewhere.

In terms of resolution, Ive never played any of my games anywhere near what they are capable of, such is the rubbishness of my current system, so Im afraid I don't really know what I should be expecting. What Im aiming for with this build is to be able get the most out of the games' graphics so everthing looks pretty whilst still playing smoothly... Im not wanting to run Crysis with everything set to 11 Just trying to get maximum bang with minimum buck.

Im treating this project as a learning exercise, so I can upgrade and overclock as I figure things out....

Thanks again

[staffsMike]

http://scan.co.uk/Product.aspx?WebProductId=628496

this isn't a bad monitor, it's usally about £130 on www.scan.oc.uk/todayonly. It's not there today but was yesterday and will be again I'm sure

If you aim for about 1680 x 1050 which is genereally the resolution found on 20 - 22" screens, you will get the best from the system you have specified.

You get good value for money with monitors this size too. You can get 24" screens for about £200 right now but the resolution kicks up a notch to 1920 x 1200. Now your system will still do very well at this resolution but as games advance the HD4850 will probably not want to do high settings anymore and certainly crysis will have to be kicked down from the get go.

Just to stick all my thoughts into one order



Only changes I would make are,

Wait for fridays Today only, bound to be some good deals on these bits. And get 18 more posts which means you get free delivery
Also the HD4850 I would buy is this one
http://www.ebuyer.com/product/148468

same price, free supersaver delivery, better temps

With those savings the O/S will slide into the £650 budget easily.

[Jingles762]

Thanks for this.

Out of interest, why the different motherboard?

I shall hopefully get purchasing tomorrow

[staffsMike]

Both motherboards are fine. I just prefer the DFI one

There's nothing particuarly better or worse about them though.

[Jingles762]

One last question

Is 450W PSU sufficient? Im not sure how you go about calculating the required power, some websites seem to suggest a bit more - but maybe that's for higher end systems?

Can't wait to build it

[rufeo]

One last question

Is 450W PSU sufficient? Im not sure how you go about calculating the required power, some websites seem to suggest a bit more - but maybe that's for higher end systems?

Can't wait to build it

Here's an online psu calculator

http://www.extreme.outervision.com/p...ulatorlite.jsp

if you want to make sure that the psu is enough then just go a bit overboard with the components. at the specs mikestaff has put up t'll draw just over 300w at 90% load, so the 450w psu will be more than enough.

since you have a bit of money left over I'd suggest going for 4gb ram and vista 64bit if you can stretch your budget. I've noticed that the OS was left out from the spec though so don't know if that's been counted into your budget or not

[staffsMike]

450W is plenty for that yeah, if you have big future plans for the PC though you might want more. As is stands though that is more than enough.

[tcorbyn]

for £650 you could build your self a nice system just hold on a bit everuting is going to plummet in price soon, Watch!

[Jingles762]

Got it all built

Went with your suggestions, except I stuck with the Asus motherboard. Booted up fine, have got Vista 64 on, seems to be ok.

One problem I had when building was mounting the heatsink (Xigmatek). Those stupid little plastic pins almost finished me; they kept springing out when I thought that they had seated correctly. The instructions said I should hear 'a satisfying click' when they were in, all I heard was my motherboard creaking... all it needs is some kind of lever mechanism to make it simpler...

Is uneven loading due to the pins springing out likely to have caused any damage to the processor / socket mount? I was being as careful as possible but those pins required what seemed like a lot of force. When I first booted up temps in the BIOS were 37, PC Probe in Vista marks them at about 31 idle, are these normal temps? If the temps are off then I guess the hs isnt mounted properly, although I did wiggle-test all 4 pins. I wouldnt be suprised if they pinged out when transported.

Secondly, could anyone recommend some software to load-test my comp? There's a few different things and Im not sure what's best, is there a 'standard'?

Many thanks for helping this noob.

*PC specs as listed by staffsmike above, but with P5KC Asus mobo*

[staffsMike]

Nice glad it all went together OK.. well with a bit of fuss but OK lol

You won't have done any damage, it'll be fine. There is a different mounting kit you can buy for that cooler, I can't remember exactly what it is though. I think both xigmatec and thermalright do them and they might be interchangeable.. don't quote me though lol

The push pins are annoying but when you've used them on a Scythe Ninja you can use them on anything cooler lol