The Time has come(upgrade Time!)

[Thorsson]

22 Mar 2007
Geil Ultra DDR2 2.0GB PC6400 DUal Channel memory kit (2 x 1GB) 800MHz (4-4-4-12) = £118

I paid £140 for 4Gb Crucial Ballistix in July, that's nearly £100 difference in 4 months. My Q6600 cost £140 at the same time, which was when it became a super bargain. That was 11 months after the release of C2D.

Now the first C2Ds were issued in July 2006, so buying the E6600 2 years ago wasn't quite at the bleeding edge, so Infinite is not comparing like with like at all. But still, his E6600 & 2Gb of RAM will have cost ~£350, while 6 months later a Q6600 and 4Gb RAM cost £280.

Now the launch for i7 is rather different than C2D, the £:$ ratio has changed dramatically, and the Q6600 price drop was dramatic, so you can't take what happened to C2D as being duplicated by i7. However you can be fairly sure that in 6 months you will get better for less, and in 12 months that will repeat itself.

[j.o.s.h.1408]

right fella's back on topic lads. dispite all the debating on weather i7 is worth it, i am still convinced that it is imo as despite the cost of it, their seems to be no real disadvantage of buying one.

no major bugs or isssues have been identified in nearly 2 months that these baby's have been out. seems stable and rock solid to me!

anyways what do you guys think of this build:



is that PSU any good? can it power all of the above stuff plus maybe 2-3 more hdd's in the future plus an extra 260gtx for SLI if i chose to do so in the future? Is the cable on the PSU long enough to be run behind the mobo tray and into its destination on the mobo as i have heard that to do this in that case, you need a very long cable to do so?

What about the RAM. is it good enough to OC the 920 cpu into at least 3.2ghz without OC the ram ie run the ram and 920 cpu on a 1:1 ratio?

How does the i7 overclock? same as core 2? just tweak the FSB? Thanks guys in advance

[Blitzen]

is that PSU any good?

Its the best out there at the moment in the sub £100 price range.

can it power all of the above stuff plus maybe 2-3 more hdd's in the future plus an extra 260gtx for SLI if i chose to do so in the future?

With ease and more.

Is the cable on the PSU long enough to be run behind the mobo tray and into its destination on the mobo as i have heard that to do this in that case, you need a very long cable to do so?

My cables from that PSU run behind the mobo tray in Antec 900. So yours should be fine.

[kalniel]

anyways what do you guys think of this build:

Looks nice to me. Maybe consider a 32mb cache HDD.

is that PSU any good?

Yes.

What about the RAM. is it good enough to OC the 920 cpu into at least 3.2ghz without OC the ram ie run the ram and 920 cpu on a 1:1 ratio?

Nothings guaranteed, but the RAM will run at it's rated speed at the rated voltage as it's sold - that doesn't tell you much about how you'll be able to OC the CPU though.

How does the i7 overclock? same as core 2?

Nope, more or less completely different There are guides appearing out there now though.

[j.o.s.h.1408]

Looks nice to me. Maybe consider a 32mb cache HDD.


.

Are sansung hdd's any good? i have been hearing that they are not very reliable. who are the best and most reliable brand? seagate? WD?

[PeterStoba]

Samsung are very reliable, because they sell so many you hear more failures, there percentage is probably the same as everybody else

[j.o.s.h.1408]

In regards to the cpu cooler i chose. will it fit fine on that asus mobo along with a fan on it without any issues. Also, does that Lian Li case provide sufficient room at the top of the case to fit that cpu cooler?

[GSte]

I go Western Digital every time now..... Seagate seem to have declined in quality.

The TRUE fits fine on the P6T Deluxe mate.

[j.o.s.h.1408]

whats the difference between this corsair PSU and the one i chose on my latest build spec

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/620W-...ty-NEW-VERSION!

is it really worth the extra £20+ for it?

[prehensile]

http://hothardware.com/Articles/Over...cessor/?page=6

i can play everything at high quality on a platform i bought 2-3 years ago. gta 4 needs a better gpu though with 1gb ram which is outragerous.

[j.o.s.h.1408]

im sure that in 2-3 years time i will be able to say the same thing with my i7 920 rig . quick question againt about that PSU. does it have all the necessary connectors to connect to a 260gtx and the i7 mobo?

is it worth the extra £20 for this PSU? http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/620W-...ty-NEW-VERSION!

does the i7 mobo's have different mobo and cpu connectors like how the socket 478 to the 775 have?

Are their any guides on how to oc a i7 920? can i OC my cpu without touching the ram i chose or do i need a faster one? i only want to achieve between 3.2-3.4gh OC on it

cheers in advance and will be ordering this after AMD launches its phenom cpu's on the 8th of jan to see if the prices of the i7 will go down abit more

[GSte]

http://hothardware.com/Articles/Over...cessor/?page=6

i can play everything at high quality on a platform i bought 2-3 years ago. gta 4 needs a better gpu though with 1gb ram which is outragerous.

What system do you have mate? You sure it can handle Crysis and Far Cry 2? (not that you'd necessarily want to play either of them. )

[grizzla]

Sorry to hijack but i too am in the upgrade/new system market, my last PC died in September after moving house and as yet i have not got round to replacing it. I was thinking of self build again but after last time with the hassle of returning DOA items and all the troubleshooting to end up with a complete system i cannot be bothered. I'd rather pay a bit extra to have someone else deal with that and have the knowledge that i have a 3 year warranty if any problems arise further down the line.

After looking around i have plumped for www.cyberpowersystem.co.uk and have come up with this so far. I know the graphics card is brand new and seems incredibly cheap (probably a typo) but i think what i get out of it is fairly good value. i did a comparison in December and to buy the parts sepearately and self build will only save £100ish unless i completely mis calculated.

Below is the system i configured, all in with VAT etc it will cost £1741.44

# CAS: CoolerMaster Cosmos Silent Gaming Tower Case w/ 420 Watts Power Supply [+2] (Original Color)
# CASUPGRADE: NONE
# CS_FAN: Default Case Fan
# CPU: (Quad-Core)Intel® Core™ i7 920 @ 2.66GHz 8 MB cache LGA1366 ***Overclockable XXX*** [+1303]
# CD: NONE
# CD2: LG GGC-H20L BLU-RAY/HD-DVD Reader / DVD±R/±RW Writer (Black Color)
# CABLE: None
# FLASHMEDIA: None
# FA_HDD: None
# FAN: CoolerMaster V8 Gaming CPU Cooling Fan (Extreme Silent Operation at only 22dBA + Overclock Proof) ***Overclockable S&S*** [+65]
# FLOPPY: NONE
# FREEBIE_CU1: FREE! (FarCry2) Game
# FREEBIE_CU2: FREE! CyberPower Multi-Purpose Carrying Case
# FREEBIE_CU3: FREE! Cyberpower Unleash The Power T-Shirt
# HDD: Single Hard Drive (1TB SATA-II 3.0Gb/s 32M Cache 7200RPM Hard Drive [+16])
# HDD2: NONE
# IEEE_CARD: NONE
# KEYBOARD: Logitech G15 Gaming Keyboard -USB [+46]
# MOUSE: Razer Copperhead™ Gaming Laser Mouse BLUE [+33]
# MODEM: NONE
# MOTHERBOARD: Asus P6T Deluxe Intel X58 Chipset SLI/CrossFireX Mainboard SAS Triple-Channel DDR3/1600 SATA RAID w/ eSATA,Dual GbLAN,USB2.0,IEEE1394a,&7.1Audio ***Overclockable XXX*** [+49]
# MEMORY: (Req.DDR3 MainBoard)(3x2GB) PC12800 DDR3/1600mhz Triple Channel Memory [+16] (G.SKILL PI Series w/Heat Spreader ***Overclockable XXX*** [+15])
# MONITOR: NONE
# MONITOR2: NONE
# NETWORK: ONBOARD 10/100 NETWORK CARD
# OVERCLOCK: No Overclocking
# OS: Microsoft® Windows Vista™ Ultimate w/ Service Pack 1 [+50] (64-bit Edition [+10])
# PS_VGA: NONE
# POWERSUPPLY: 1000 Watts Power Supplies [+73] (CoolerMaster Real Power PRO 1000W Modular PSU SLI Ready [-8])
# PRO_WIRING: Professional Wiring for All WIRINGs Inside The System Chasis with High Performance Thermal Compound on CPU [+11]
# RUSH: NONE
# SOUND: HIGH DEFINITION ON-BOARD 7.1 AUDIO
# SPEAKERS: NONE
# TEMP: NONE (AS SHOWN)
# TVRC: NONE
# UPS: Belkin 4-Socket Surge Protector [+7]
# USB: Built-in USB 2.0 Ports
# USBHD: NONE
# VIDEO: NVIDIA GeForce GTX295 1792MB 16X PCI Express [+81]
# VIDEO2: NONE [-175]
# VIDEO3: NONE
# WEBCAM: NONE
# WNC: NONE
# WAP: NONE
# WARRANTY: STANDARD WARRANTY: 3-YEAR LIMITED WARRANTY PLUS LIFE-TIME TECHNICAL SUPPORT
# _PRICE: (+1594)

[j.o.s.h.1408]

doesn't look too bad. hard to read that list though. couldn't you print screen the checkout screen of the website?

anyway i have another question in regards to sound cards. i have a XFI creative sound card from my old pc(Normal PCI). is it better then the onboard one inside that ASUS P6T Deluxe Board? Is the board compatible with it?

[vincent.m]

doesn't look too bad. hard to read that list though. couldn't you print screen the checkout screen of the website?

anyway i have another question in regards to sound cards. i have a XFI creative sound card from my old pc(Normal PCI). is it better then the onboard one inside that ASUS P6T Deluxe Board? Is the board compatible with it?

what speakers do you have? even if you have the best sound card and poor speakers it is pointless...
on board sound is very close to sound cards nowadays..

[grizzla]

doesn't look too bad. hard to read that list though. couldn't you print screen the checkout screen of the website?

That is the check out view, its is all text...

I have an X-Fi Fatality from my old system that i may or may not put into my new system when i get it. Not sure how it compares to the onboard on the P6T