New build pc confused what to get

[shrek101]

hi thanks for any help

I been planing for sometime to get a new pc (home build) and a new 24" monitor to come probably Samsung T220HD but may wait to get T240HD have to save a little more so need a good card to go around 1680X1050 or 1920 x 1200 resolution

Anyhow I got some parts in mind but unsure what else to get

Case: Antec p182
PSU: 620W Corsair HX Series Modular or something else quiet
CPU: Intel Quad Core Q9550 or Intel Core 2 Duo /E8500/E8600
Cooler: unknown probably not stock
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS4 or do you advise something better
Graphics: Sapphire HD 4870 or Asus HD 4870
Hard drive: Samsung SpinPoint F1 HD103UJ 1TB I be adding another sata drive to system which is from old pc
Ram: 4GB Unsure which I will be running dual boot XP/Vista I know XP only addresses 3.5gb Would 64bit versions be better?
DVD: Tempted to go for a blue ray reader maybe writer


Pc Used mainly for gaming/and watching video, music


I saved about £800 so far. I dont want to make a mistake as its taken us ages to save and itching to get a newer pc before kids go back to school, as one of the daughters wants my old pc

[staffsMike]

That's a very nice build. 64bit will allow you to use all 4GB and has very few compatability issues, unless you have older hardware or software to support and even then you will probably be alright.

Are the very expensive chips for serious overcock? The Q9550 and E8600 are nice chips for sure but 4-5GHz isn't reallt required for any of your mentioned uses so the Q6600 or E8400 makes far more sense.

If you are going for P35 then I would get the Abit IP-35 PRO. There are nice P45 DFi boards though

The HD4870 will be overkill for 1680 x 1050 right now but perfect for 1920 x 1200. The HD4850 will still handle 1920 x 1200 very well though if you want to save money there

It's certainly a nice quiet setup for a media setup so blu ray is a nice touch.

What HSF will you be getting?

[Mossy]

Anther on the Abit IP35 Pro but I would get the XE version now with the 1600FSB native

http://www.scan.co.uk/Product.aspx?WebProductId=819506

[shrek101]

Thanks Mike. I like to do a but of overclocking not much (added dont want stock cooler)

I would like a quiet pc if possibly

Thanks for input for cpu, if I can get a decent speed and save money thats great

I tend to do major upgrades every few years and hand computer to kids when done

I do have a couple of usb 2 hard driver to add to pc as I like to keep backups of photo's/video on them plus dvdr

I would like a blue ray for as I dont have one at mo and would probably use it for pc first than main tv, also planning on getting a freesat pvr when they come out for that

[shrek101]

Thanks Paul

I used like to abit boards but you never hear much of them now

My last board was a gigabyte board 2 years back

Anther on the Abit IP35 Pro but I would get the XE version now with the 1600FSB native

http://www.scan.co.uk/Product.aspx?WebProductId=819506

[staffsMike]

Well a Q6600 will run 3.2 - 3.4GHz all day under a good cooler. I havn't tried it myself yet but feel compelled to recommend the Scythe Ninja 2, given my 3 ninja's are perfect for me. I run one in my P182 and its perfect in there, so much so that to a point you can run in passive. The fan it comes with is quieter than the antec tricools on low though so it makes little difference to noise whether you use it not.

A decent cheaper cooler is the Xigmatec tower available at scan.
http://scan.co.uk/Product.aspx?WebProductId=700899

Can be had for as little as £17 on scans today onlys.

There is always the Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme for the ultimate air cooling, you need to buy a fan with it though.

Abit have gone a little quiet since the release of P45.. we should have had the boards by now but no word yet afaik. The IP-35PRO is one of the best overclockers out there though and XE even more so.

[shrek101]

Is the Asus P5Q PRO any good that seems to have the p45 chip, not sure what difference is between p45 and p35?

[staffsMike]

Differences are

1600MHz FSB (useless)
Crossfire 8x (as opposed to 4x when offered on P35, probably useless to you)
PCIe 2.0 (useless at the moment, nothing uses the bandwidth that PCEe 16x uses).

The PCIe 2.0 i guess might be nice to have for later on, assuming someone makes a card worthy of it.

The P5Q is fine. Overclocking wise it's more than enough for a Q6600 as 1600MHz is enough to take the chip to 3.6GHz. Personally I still quite like the P35 boards, I don't know why really.

As I said though I would either have the abit IP-35 PRO, DFI P45 or perhaps the P5Q -E rather than the PRO (no good reason for that, I have always gone for slightly nicer asus boards for some reason).

[TAKTAK]

to save a little bit more you could drop the PSU down to a HX520w it will still handle everything, but with the HX620w you have alot of headroom for upgrades...

i would also suggest going down the Q6600 e8400 route with a good cooler, something like the xigmatec allready linked by mike or the scythe mine rev b or TRUE, i would also go for an abit p35 chipset board like the ip35 pro/xe
but a quad core vs dual core in gaming the dual cores wins by a slight margin, whereas the quad will pull away in everything else, and also the quad is more of a futureproof investment as games will eventually support quads and use them to full effect

a 32 bit OS is limited to 4GB of address space so say your graphics card has 512mb of vRAM then you would only see ~3.5GB of system RAM etc so if you had 2 1GB video cards then only ~2GB system RAM would be usable
however a 64 bit OS is limited to 16TB(iirc) of address space which is plenty of space to play with at this moment in time.

and seeing as though you will be using the system for gaming i would get vista 64 otherwise you will not have DX10 support

personally i would change the HDD to a 640GB WD AAKs as it is nice and fast and nice and quiet aswell

GFX: dependant on what resolution your going to be playing with really if it is 1900*1200 + then i would get HD4870 (actually i would get a nVidia card but i'm just stubborn ) if less than that then a HD4850 would be fine

also on the RAM side of things DDR2 6400 will be fine to get the Q6600 to ~3.6Ghz ish so there is no need in getting pc8500 (which isn't an official speed) and 4GB is the sweet spot for RAM at this moment of time

[Crevan]

P5Q Pro, and the other Asus boards, have loads of power saving features, if that's important for you. Overclocking might negate that, though. But even so, it can change the cpu multiplier on the fly, lowering it at idle and maxing out under load.

I didn't overclock mine yet, so can't say how good it is in that respect. But didn't have any problems so far.

RAM-wise, you can go with any major manufacturer, really. At current prices, you won't go wrong Scan's got a decent selection of Corsair memory. I've got OCZ Platinum rev2, works like a treat, for around 50-60 quid for 4GB.

[shadowcreaper]

I wouldnt get 4850 personally, have heard from some people who went for it that it wont last more than a year or two at best graphics wise, they said it doesnt handel very good on high settings even on 1200 res.

I suggest 4870 it cheap and a dream card for all but the hardcore manic gamers

[TAKTAK]

just a quick SCAN up

click on thumb to view fullsize, and then click on the piccy so it's not all squashed...


just to give you an idea of prices and things

you can take off the shipping charge aswell as you are entitled to free shipping from SCAN because of 'SCAN to HEXUS'

and for ~£60 you can change the GFX card for a HD4870

edit: and sorry about the size i forgot to cut the extra desktop off

[shrek101]

Thanks guys I will give this some thought some nice suggestions there

[shrek101]

Thanks for the screenshot some nice hardware there.

Have you built it yet

I am a little unsure on HSF due to layout on mobo/ram etc

I like the scythe ninja and mini

just a quick SCAN up

click on thumb to view fullsize, and then click on the piccy so it's not all squashed...


just to give you an idea of prices and things

you can take off the shipping charge aswell as you are entitled to free shipping from SCAN because of 'SCAN to HEXUS'

and for ~£60 you can change the GFX card for a HD4870

edit: and sorry about the size i forgot to cut the extra desktop off

[staffsMike]

Go for the fullsize ninja if you do, no reason to get the mini (or do you mean mine? I'd still take the ninja anyway) in that case