Help building a PC please

[Gazza4354]

Hi Guys/Girls,

I'm not all that into whats good and not that good in computer parts so I would probably get all the wrong stuff for my money that is why I usually just get a pre-built one.

So here we go could someone please suggest a decent gaming pc for around £900-£1000. I play Counter-Strike Source, DOD Source and Americas Army (would like the machine to be able to play AA v3 when it comes out I don't what the specs will be for it but I've read that they will be similiar to Unreal Tournament 3)

Unreal Tournament 3

Minimum System Requirements
• Windows XP SP2 or Windows Vista
• 2.0+ GHZ Single Core Processor
• 512 Mbytes of System RAM
• NVIDIA 6200+ or ATI Radeon 9600+ Video Card
• 8 GB of Free Hard Drive Space

Recommended System Requirements
• 2.4+ GHZ Dual Core Processor
• 1 GBytes of System RAM
• NVIDIA 7800GTX+ or ATI x1300+ Video Card
• 8 GB of Free Hard Drive Space


Thanks,
Gary.

[Ciber]

I would suggest a Q6600 G0 CPU and 8800GT as starting points. I would also suggest readin custom PC magazine, lots of good stuff on building PCs there. They did a massive guide on building a perfect pc a couple of issues back (october 07 issue), maybe get the back issue, part of it is here: Build a perfect PC | Features | Custom PC

[hse180]

Have a look here.............would last for a bit


http://forums.hexus.net/hexus-hardwa...need-help.html

[Cornholio]

Does this price inc a monitor ? One thing you get with custom/personal builds is quality components, in most cases prebuilt pc's ( unless bought from custom builders like scan etc ) come with generic parts ie ram/power supply which will not be up for the job of powering a decent graphics card correctly.

Secondly where abouts are you located, i know i have helped a decent amount of people who are local to me build pc's so if your local to somebody on here maybe they can offer a hand.

Heres my words of wisdom :

CPU : Currently i think the Q6600 G0 ^^ like mentioned in Cibers post are worth looking at.

Power Supply : Few different opinions from various people here, i own a hiper 680w modular which is enough to run my rig but...if i was to buy a new one possibly one of the corsair series ?

Ram : Depending where your buying from depends on what you get as many shops only stock a few manufacturers, Ide be looking at OCZ/Corsair/G.Skill before anything else though ( personal opinion ). As they offer great warranty.

Motherboard : Now i can't fault gigabyte as i have had no trouble with my DS3 rev 2 mobo but i can say from personal experience i would avoid the Asus Striker Extreme as it...sucks basically. The latest mobo's from abit seem to be promising though.

Hard drive : Ide stick with samsung, i own nearly every brand of hard drive but i think my samsung is by far the quietest and fastest. The 320gb sata II from samsung or even a 500gb samsung spinpoint ( sata II obviously ) maybe be better as the price difference is tiny.

Graphics Card : How desperate are you ? i sold my 512mb 7950gt a few weeks ago and bought a gainward 512mb 8800gt it performs really well and i love it but theres talk that the new 640mb 8800gts is going to have better performance ( but @ what cost ? )

Case : Personal Preference, i dont like things with doors so i generally stick to lian li and silverstone as i love the quality, alot of people who like doors use the Antec series like the P180 and P182 ?

DVD-RW or even blueray it depends on what your using it for really, i love my samsung although have always used pioneer/nec ( built in same factory just diff firmware ) in the past.

Hope i was of some assistance.

[Gazza4354]

Thanks for the replies,

Thanks modd1uk. I live in Leigh and I would be using scan for items most probably as it's the cheapest/closest place for decent stuff. I do have a monitor so that will be ok for the new pc.

I will need afair bit of ram and for the graphics card well I would like a good one but I'm not willing too spend like £500 on one just a good mid range one that will easy play Americas Army 3 when it comes out.

[MSIC]

Hi Guys/Girls,
I'm not all that into whats good and not that good in computer parts so I would probably get all the wrong stuff for my money that is why I usually just get a pre-built one.

Do you want help choosing the components, or advice on how to screw it all together too? As above, CustomPC is a good and trustworthy magazine, so that'll help.
There are a few other questions that i think are important to ask first too before you commit to buying anything
1) Is size important? Does the PC need to be portable, move-able or just basically fixed?
2) Is noise a factor? PCs can be a bit fan-ny (), quite loud some of them, or very quiet indeed.
3) Are you using it for anything else other than gaming? If its gaming only, you may be better to consider a console from a price point of view.

That said, i've given some thought to a good example set-up:

The Base Unit

MSI P35 motherboard £68
Core2Quad processor £155
2 x 1GB Corsair TwinX RAM £38
Antec Solo Piano Black Case £54
Corsair VX 550W Power Supply £55
GeForce 8800GT 512MB £176
Samsung SATA DVD-RW £17
Samsung SATA 500GB hard drive £60
Internal memory card reader £10
That comes to £651

The Operating System
Windows XP 32bit - £51

Peripherals
Samsung 24" Monitor (1920 x 1200 resolution) £305
Microsoft Mouse £18
Microsoft keyboard £18
Creative i-Trigue 2.1 Speakers £48

Grand Total £1,087.

Edit: Oops, forgot to add a CPU Heatsink/Fan.
Arctic Freezer 7 Pro £15

I always recommend Scan, they are great for support, shipping etc.
You may well find a few better bargains here and there (even at Scan), but overall this will be one complete and kick-ass system that will last. And you will love a 24" monitor, i remember getting my 20" and thinking how brilliantly large it is.

Hope this has helped, took about 30 mins!!

[Gazza4354]

Thanks MSIC,

I will be using it for uni work aswell as gaming.

To answer your questions:
1 - Size isn't really that important
2 - Noise however is I don't want it to be waking the whole house up. I work lates so won't usually get in till about 2am so if I'm not too tired then I will play afew games.

[Cornholio]

gazza if u do need a hand with assembling it mate im more than happy to help, i live in preston which is the other side of bolton to you. Live about 30 mins away and will offer my services as its for a good cause

[MSIC]

Well even a noisy PC wouldnt wake the house up - i meant noise as in Fan / case noise, not deliberate speaker output! Anyway, you can't go wrong with the Antec case above as it's not too big (like mine - great but huge) but dulls the noise of the components.
The only component that might make some degree of unwanted noise would be the graphics card, but that is fix-able.

Given that you have a monitor, we could spend more on components, but i'm not sure there is much that is worth it (price/performance at least). Let us know if you also want new keyboard/mice stuff or are happy wih current stuff

[Cornholio]

MSI P35 motherboard £68

Are you mad ? i agree on the p35 chipset but MSI ? would avoid and go gigabyte/abit and possibly asus/evga.

[MSIC]

I don't have a strong opinion about MSI as such (i've had a couple of boards in the past, they've been fine) and i liked the nice looking heatsink on it.
Agreed though, Abit, Gigabyte, Asus are all worth looking at too.
Whichever, a P35 chipset appears to be good value, stable, and i'd strongly recommend a motherboard that works (well) without any fans on (for noise but also no future points of failure)

[Ciber]

Another vote for scan as a retailer, they are good and you can get free carriage with the scan 2 hexus thing. If you're not that confident on building your PC you could buy a pre built one and avoid some work. 2 of my freinds have bought mesh PCs and you get good spec for the money and they seem well put together. Like maybe this one MESH Computers - Award Winning PCs Since 1987 you could ask them to sell it to you without the speakers and screen.

[moogle]

wow another AA player finally
I'd say... get a retail q6600 for £10 more thats 2 years more warranty under the hood incase of problems. Agree with mod on the samsung drives. I got two SP2504C's (I researched into them that much I know their names by heart! and they are quiet! You can't hear the itty bitty noises normal hd's make. Artic Freezer is alright for normal overclocks. DVD drives it's up to you.
Apart from that I don't know what else. Get some quiet case fans if you're really worried about noise.

[Gazza4354]

I've been having a look on Scan and here is what I have come up with:

CPU
Intel Core 2 Quad-Core Q6600, S775, 2.40 GHz, 1066MHz FSB, 8MB Cache, OEM - 155.32

Motherboard
XFX MB-N680-ISH NF680i SLI, S 775, PCI-E (x16), DDR2 533/667/800, ATX - £138.68

Graphics Card
512MB EVGA 8800GT Superclocked - 199.61

Memory
4GB (2x2GB) Corsair TwinX XMS2, DDR2 PC2-6400 (800), CAS 5-5-5-18 - £93.58

Hard Drive
150 Gb Western Digital Raptor X, SATA150, 10000 rpm, 16MB Cache, 4.6 ms, NCQ - £123.36

Case - was one of the 1st on the page and I think it looks pretty good
Antec 900 - Nine Hundred Ultimate Gamer Case with 200m Top Fan w/o PSU - £67.79

PSU
700W FSP Sparkle Epsilon FX700-GLN SLi/Xfire, 12cm Fan ATX2.0 (20+4Pin) SATA/PCI-E - £101.63

Soundcard
Creative SoundBlaster X-Fi Xtreme Gamer Fatal1ty Professional - £88.94

DVD Writer
Lite-ON LiteOn 20x DVD±R, 8x DVD±DL, DVD+RW x8 / -RW x 6, DVD-RAM x12, SATA, Retail - £20.32

CD Drive
Sony x52 Speed (Version 2) CDROM Drive IDE - £5.86

Card Reader
AKASA 3.5" AK-ICR-01E Internal Multi Memory card reader Black inc USB 2.0 Port - 9.39

Totals upto - £1,019.25

What do you think? Is there any stuff I could swap maybe? I know it's more than what I wanted to spend but I think that this computer would last me along time or won't it?

[moogle]

if you didnt see before OEM cpu's are only covered by 1 year warranty, and if it breaks after that you're on your own... £10 more for 2 more years warranty.

[Blitzen]

I would suggest a Q6600 G0 CPU and 8800GT as starting points. I would also suggest readin custom PC magazine, lots of good stuff on building PCs there. They did a massive guide on building a perfect pc a couple of issues back (october 07 issue), maybe get the back issue, part of it is here: Build a perfect PC | Features | Custom PC

Thats not good advice.

The new Quads will be faster and cheaper.
The new GTS will be quicker than the GT at around the same price (well £200).