Attempt to build my first PC with £1500-£2000 budget

[chobits]

hello everyone, i dont know much at all about PC hardware. i have done some research... been on overclockers.co.uk, bought custompc mag, tried learning about motherboards, graphic cards and cpu's, cases. now i feel the more i learn the more confused i get (

my budget basically means money isnt much of an issue, but obviously i dont want to spend £600 on something that will do the same job for £200. also id like to reasonably future proof my pc meaning ddr3, 45nmm, sli ready. ( apparently crossfire isnt as good?)

so far ive come up with this

Q6600 GO
EVGA GeForce 8800 Ultra SuperClocked SILENT 768MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail

the motherboards confuse me, i cant find one that is sli ready and ddr3. seems like there arent any SLI ready mobo's that take DDR3, most if not all DDR3 mobo's support CROSSFIRE

i think ive waffled on to long, and im sure ive contradicted myslef somewhere, anyway is my choice of cpu and Graphic card good? which mobo would go with them? Is having DDR3 that important?

oh yeah and if you have any links that can explain mobo's grap cards cpu's cases and all that crap, would be great

[Lucio]

Out of interest, why do you want to take a step to DDR3? Sure it's the "new" technology, but even in a year's time DDR2 will still be reasonably priced if you want more for some reason.

Since you want an SLI motherboard, you choice is made for you, pick up a 780i reference motherboard and you're set.

[staffsMike]

You don't need links.. just hexus and hexites

As you say with that budget you aren't really limited. Is it just the PC or monitor..keyboards etc..?

Don't bother with DDR3 it's a waste of money and no particualr gains over DDR2 at the moment.

I wouldn't bother with SLi either. The gains are very limited in a lot of games. If you do want it though, the new 780i boards are your best bet.

I would buy the following

CPU: Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 (dont bother with extreme and all that mess)
HSF: Scythe Ninja/infinity or Thermalright ultima 90 Heat sink for Q6600
Motherboard: Abit IP-35 pro motherboard ( for overclocking)
RAM: 4GB of DDR2 PC6400 (enough to overclock the Q6600 to 3.6GHz)
4GB GeIL Black Dragon DDR2 PC2-6400 (5-5-5-15) Dual Channel kit (2x2GB)
i like geil but OCZ, corsair, crucial, gskill are all good brands.

Power Supply: Corsair 520W HX Whisper
Graphics: 8800GTX or New 8800GTS (fairly similar performance)
Case: Antec P182 (fantastic for cool and near silent performance)
Or Antec 900 for better cooling and quiet operation.

Hard Drive: Western Digital 500GB AAKS (as many as you think you need)
Optical: Samsung SATA dvd writer.

I would advise buying from scan (Computer hardware and software at amazing prices, available online from Scan Computers UK) they often have even better prices on their today only section.

All of that I would think will come to just under £1000 (perhaps closer to £800). I really wouldn't bother spending much more as the gains will be limited at best.

There are considerations like the X38/X48 motherboards but they don't offer a lot of value for money imo apart from the abit quad GT which has been riddled with problems.
The new quad cores are coming soon from intel so if you don't need the pc now it may be worth waiting for them. (Q9450 seems to be the most anticipated)

[b0redom]

The best place to start is telling us what you want to do with the box. You can literally spend thousands if you really want, but you'd probably be wasting your money.

Are you going to be playing games? Are you going to be doing 3D rendering? Are you going to just be using Office, and Internet browsing? What monitor/resolution are you after using, and does this form part of your budget?

Currently the best bang per buck graphics card is the new 8800GT. It could be worth getting this and then upgrading when the replacement for the 8800GTX is out.

[b0redom]

Dang - just beaten by StaffsMike.

What he says is pretty good advice, although if money is no problems, maybe consdier 8GB RAM - it won't make much difference now, but down the line a couple of years, it definitely will, and it's not a lot of extra cash.

Consider the Samsung spinpoints for your hard disks, as they are very fast and very quiet.

One other thing to consider is that Intel have just announced a new range of chips. As people upgrade to these (rumour is that they'll start to appear on Jan 20th), the existing chips will drop in price - so it may be worth holding off a week or so.

[Jay]

Can i give a couple of bits of advice.

Number 1

Stay away from overclockers.co.uk, they are nothing but trouble. SCAN are WAY WAY WAY better.

Number 2

I think its always best to build your first PC with a very low budget, second hand parts etc just so if you make a mistake its not going to cost a lot to put right.

[moogle]

Instead of spending 2k on a pc, spend 800 or so or 1000 and use the rest to upgrade bits over the years. DDR3 has no major performance gains over DDR2, until it becomes cheaper than DDR2 then its DDR2 for pc builds. sli or crossfire is quite a waste of money and power.
staffsmike has suggested quite a nice setup.
get 6400 ddr2 and a quad core cpu, wait till end of jan for the new native 45nm quad cores. if you're getting a huge pc monitor you will need a powerful graphics card, but you could buy a decent graphics card now and sell it off and use some money from your budget to pay for a more powerful one etc.

[cotswoldcs]

I have to agree with others in reiterating that DDR3 is not viable at present. The beauty of building yourself is that you can upgrade as often as you like and buy products when the time is right (and your wallet can afford it!). X38/X48 motherboards & DDR3 is the future but not worth the money yet.

If I were buying now I would go with StaffsMike and get something like the Abit IP35 board and perhaps only 2Gb RAM. Get a decent quaddie, PSU etc and be prepared to ditch the mobo & RAM in perhaps 12-18 months and go with whatever is best choice then, be it X38/ DDR3 or whatever. Spending money on 4Gb RAM and a £120+ mobo isn't wise unless you're prepared to stick with it for a good long time. I'm sure you can find an aunt/ sister/ friend, etc for whom you could build a PC based on your Abit board and DDR memory, making the whole process even easier to justify to the wife/ girlfriend, etc. If you don't think like this then you obviously don't have conversations like I do with my wife about yet another PC component that has just arrived (good job wifey isn't a Hexite... )

[jackvdbuk]

Instead of spending 2k on a pc, spend 800 or so or 1000 and use the rest to upgrade bits over the years. .

QFT, the excess over 1k is very minimal in terms of extra performance.

but if you really must spend that much, thats some major pullage, the ladies will be all over you!!!!

[staffsMike]

but if you really must spend that much, thats some major pullage, the ladies will be all over you!!!!

They love it they do.. they love it

[chobits]

wow, you guys are fast, wasn't expecting so many useful comments.

well currently i have a ****ty laggy laptop, i want a new beast gaming PC, with no lagg. i will be playing counter strike source mainly, i know this game doesn't require an expensive PC, but i want to be able to play games like crysis and the likes at max settings aswell.

Because of my gaming preference im most probably gonna go for 19inch maybe 21inch, top of the range one i guess. quick response times and all that business

the budget was just for the PC unit, not screen and so on. i want to be in a position where i wont need to worry about upgrading for as long as reasonably possible, which i guess could mean over spending now....? i dont know maybe im talking bull?

oh and the case should be able to fit into a suitcase as i eventually want to take this to LAN sessions.
are thermaltake cases good?

by the way, this is the way i educated myself on alot of the hardware, went to overclockers.co.uk went on each section, cpu, graphic card, mobo's and organized it so the most expensive items where at the top of the list, thinking to myself, im gonna get me a beast! lol, silly i know

about those new chips... is it worth waiting for them, ive been dying to get my new pc for a while, i guess i could wait a couple of weeks...

[staffsMike]

Given your budget I would probably wait for the new chips. Little bit extra money but should be fantastic performers.

I have the perfect case for you
NZXT Rogue » Reviews - XSReviews.co.uk - Trusted Hardware Reviews

expensize for what it is (£130) but perfect for LAN parties..comes with the carry case and everything lol

If you go for a case like this though you will have to drop your motherboard standard from ATX (normal size) to a uATX which is slightly smaller.

You get all the features you would normally want with uATX but overclocking can be more limited.

Don't overspend now just keep your change in a "upgrade pot" that wa you can change graphics card when a better one comes out rather than wasting money on SLi when the next best single card will out perform it.

As for crysis.. nothing plays crysis on max settings but the new GTS and GTX can make it look pretty enough.

You can get a something like an antec 900 which isn't massive but perhaps too big to fit in a suitcase :S

[chobits]

nice find on the case, ill keep that in mind!

i guess i shouldnt worry about anything else at the moment other than the cpu and the mobo. ill wait for those new cpu's to come out as alot of u have suggested. until then ill keep on researching things like ram timings, cases and all this raid 0 or 1 business.......

ill make sure to post on here once they're out or earlier, or i guess one of you hexites could lol

[moogle]

wow 2k on the base unit alone. I say spend 600 - 800 on it now. Store the rest of that 2k in a kitty for future upgrades. ie a new cpu comes out or new gfx card. You sell your old one (at a small loss hopefully) and dip into the kitty to help pay for your new one. You could go on for years with that 2k after building a sturdy base unit. As long as you buy best performance for the price. ie buying 8800gts 512 instead of a 8800 ultra etc etc. rumors are that the new intel chips will be out near the end of jan. So start building it around then. You can wait can't you Nothing right now will play Crysis at max ultra smoothly, but it can still be played at less than ultra high settings with decent framerates so don't worry. So, don't go blowing that 2000 on just the base unit and read around the forums, you will see when the newest toys are out

[grayg1]

£2k budget? Not worth spending that much. Nothing atm can run Crysis at high resolution and Very High settings.

If you love your games then my advice is spend about £800 max on PC base unit and then go buy a HDTV for about £600-700 and take your pick with PS3 or Xbox 360.

[Dreaming]

You could build an almost identical system to mine!

Start with the case, Lian Li PC-A05B is tiny for a full sized ATX case, and is really good at cooling the cpu / memory and that (20*C idle ). Although can get hotspots at the top with hot running graphics cards. You can either mod in a fan (what I intend to do) or if you go on performance pc's they sell a replacement side panel for $29.99 that has holes in it for you.

The case is fantastic! Lol, mini rant. Whatever happens, don't get a P180 I had one, they're great but you will cry every time you end up going to a LAN.

For your budget I might push the boat out and get a 24" monitor, you may well be able to afford a nice one - my 22" samsung 226bw does everything I want and it's now just shy of £200.

The rest of my specs are in my sig. But it serves me very well for LANs and storing bits