C2D system for £300

Ok a mate of mine want to build a C2D system for around 300

He needs - cpu (C2D 'E' series preferably with the extra cache), 2GB ram, decent sized sata II hdd, motherboard, DVDRW, case and decent psu. He will be using a 7900GT and hopes to get 3GHZ+

Will be fine to wait for the price drops mid july(?) but there is very liddle budge on the budget.

ATM he is looking at prebuilt systems on Ebay but im desperately trying to stop him making that huge mistake.

Is this going to be easily possible?

Thanks

It'll be tight but I expect you can probably do it already. Just may have to compromise a little on things like case and PSU. £200 will get the cpu, ram and mobo, so £100 for hd, dvd, case and psu is do-able. I trust a copy of Windows is not needed?

No he is currently running a system with windows XP so i assume he can use that. If anyone could pick the parts and list them so i have evidence to show him that would be great :)

Yeah it's poosible

LN18817
Intel Core 2 Duo E2160, Socket 775, 1.8 GHz, 800MHz FSB, Conroe Core, 2x 512KB Cache, Retail £49.98 £58.73
LN14989
Abit AB9 i965, S775, PCI-E (x16), DDR2 533/667/800, SATA II, SATA RAID, ATX £58.59 £68.84
LN12200
2Gb (2X1GB) Corsair TwinX XMS2, DDR2 PC5400 (667), 240 Pin, Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 4-4-4-12 £39.54 £46.46
LN15198
Akasa Zen Case - Black Silent Cool Midi-ATX Computing case w/2 silent 12cm fans w/o PSU £24.49 £28.78
LN17225
320 Gb Samsung HD321KJ Spinpoint T, SATA300, 7200 rpm, 16MB Cache, 9 ms, NCQ £40.16 £47.19
LN17483
Optiarc (Sony/NEC) AD-7170S-0B 18x DVD±R, 8x DVD±DL, DVD+RW x8/-RW x6, DVD-RAM x12, SATA, Black, OEM £17.19 £20.20
LN11602
430w Seasonic S12-430 aPFC PSU Silent ATX2.0 *New Version RoHS £37.49 £44.05

Net Total £267.44

Carriage £11.52

V.A.T. £48.82

TOTAL £327.78

with free delivery and possibly getting better ram for cheaper else where you would be pretty much on budget.

You should be able to get a decent overclock out of that motherboard..but i don't know for sure.. you can certainly get half decent overclocking board on that budget though.

I know its got the smallest cache but its a comprimise..an e4300 would be about £14 more..but you can find cheaper ram than suggested..theres also a lower power version of the PSU (330w) which will probably work.

Ok great. The CPU does NEED to be the higher cache version though... do you think the price cuts will being them into the price range to fit the bill?

LN17304
Intel Core 2 Duo E4300, Socket 775, 1.80 GHz, 800MHz FSB, Allendale Core, 2MB Cache, Retail £61.89 £72.72

LN12201
2Gb (2X1Gb) Corsair Value Select, DDR2 PC5300 (667), 240 Pin, Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 5-5-5-15 £39.53 £46.45

LN15028
Asus P5B i965, S775, PCI-E (x16), DDR2 533/667/800, SATA II, SATA RAID, ATX £56.89 £66.85

LN11461
250 Gb Samsung SP2504C SpinPoint P120, SATA300, 7200 rpm, 8MB Cache, 9.0 ms, NCQ £31.98 £37.58

LN18713
Lite-ON 20X DVD+/-RW/RAM internal SATA black drive & s/w £17.19 £20.20

LN16907
Antec NSK4400 ATX MiniTower, inc Hi-Efficiency 380W ATX12v v2.0 £39.00 £45.83

£301.74 in total

Quote:

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Originally Posted by kungpo

LN17304
LN12201
2Gb (2X1Gb) Corsair Value Select, DDR2 PC5300 (667), 240 Pin, Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 5-5-5-15 £39.53 £46.45

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Can you overclock with 667?

yeah you can but it will be the bottle neck of an e2*** ..

Check the bargains section at the moment theres usually some decent pc6400 for around £45, I know you can get what I have (geil) for £60 at micro direct.

Although Kung Po's suggestion of a case and psu combo works out cheaply it wouldn't be my choice as it always seems to be very noisey.

Which reminds me you will need at least an arctic freezer to go with that cpu for overclocking ..another £12

But with a few bargains you will around £300 - £330

the e4300 is FSB 800, so yes indeed. I get 3 Ghz with my 667 ram without overclocking the RAM (9x 333). Just bedget a lttle extra for better cooling if you want to get to 3Ghz (or beyond).

I must be very lucky - I find my 4400 dead quiet. Just a whisper - the Arctic cooler is the noisiest bit of my rig.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by kungpo

I must be very lucky - I find my 4400 dead quiet. Just a whisper - the Arctic cooler is the noisiest bit of my rig.

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just past experience tbh..i dont know anything about the case you mentioned. If it's a good psu then certainly go for that cost wise.

- Intel Core 2 Duo E4300 ~ £72.72

- Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro ~ £12.16

- Asus P5B i965 ~ £66.85

- Geil Value DDR2 2.0GB PC6400 ~ £54.99 + delivery

- 250GB Samsung SP2504C ~ £37.58

- Antec NSK4000 ~ £29.95

- Optiarc (Sony/NEC) AD-7170S-0B ~ £20.20

- 380W Tagan TG380-U01 ~ £37.47

Total ~ £331.92

Bit of a squeeze but if he can wait a month or so I reckon you'll be able to pick it up for closer to £300.

Antec psu's are of really good quality and very quiet. I have one in my nsk2400 and it is very quiet. They are quite often recommended separately on silentpc forums.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by NightshadowUK

- Intel Core 2 Duo E4300 ~ £72.72

- Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro ~ £12.16

- Asus P5B i965 ~ £66.85

- Geil Value DDR2 2.0GB PC6400 ~ £54.99 + delivery

- 250GB Samsung SP2504C ~ £37.58

- Antec NSK4000 ~ £29.95

- Optiarc (Sony/NEC) AD-7170S-0B ~ £20.20

- 380W Tagan TG380-U01 ~ £37.47

Total ~ £331.92

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Change:

RAM: http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Produ...oductID=291364 £8.04 (and free del) less, overclock on a divider

CASE: http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Produ...oductID=509820 £21.59 saved - antec are solid and great value for money.

Lose the HSF, the stock is quiet enough and will OC fine to 2.5ish

TOTAL: 290.13 in del

£10 left over for him to buy you beer in thanks for your help :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by nvening

Change:

RAM: http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Produ...oductID=291364 £8.04 (and free del) less, overclock on a divider

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Possibly XMS2 PC5400 would be better?

Heard it overclocks to around 900+mhz if you're lucky, supposed to be able to do pc6400 speeds. I shall report once ebuyer get their act together and get some in stock.

Also, I thought you couldn't run the ram at a slower speed (only faster?) on p965/p35 boards, anyone feel free to confirm.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by p5-

Possibly XMS2 PC5400 would be better?

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yep it's a whole penny more than the Value select stuff, although I'd say the extra £8 on that faster Geil would be better for overclocking.

Although a couple of the C2D overclocking guides I've read say to advoid the vanillia P5B, but the good ones cost around £100

So are the lower end ones any good for overclocking?

You can put a reasonable rig together for £300, esp if you're recycleing graphics card and monitor
However I'm not sure on the overclocking as that's when cheaper components will start to show.

He is really adement on getting the higher cache'd CPU... so guess in answer to my question its not really possible :/ I think what he is going to do is build a system with 667 ram and a 945 chipset and run it stock for now then upgrade to p35 ddr3 next year