Another Boring Build :)

[holy god of nil]

So I've been out of the game for a LONG time and it's time to build me a new pc I think. This is a pretty boring/annoying question, but seeing as my most up to date pc knowlege is stuck about 2 years ago, what am I looking at for about £1000. Amd vs Intel, Ati vs Nvidia etc etc.

I'll obviously be reading up, searching the forum etc, but any help much appreciated.

[Ronaldo-7]

with 1K to spend get a i7 setup and a nvidia.

I'd get a x58 mobo that supports SLI and Crossfire (dual nvidia or ATI cards support)
i7 and a decent cooler
6GB DDR3 for tripple channel
a Antec 850w modular PSU
a V raptor HDD for OS and 1TB for storage (seagate do good ones)
a BlueRay /DVDRW drive
a Antec 900 case
a Nvidia 260 x2 (cheaper then 295 and can perform better once OC)

[holy god of nil]

Have been reading up, is i7 going to be better in terms of future-proofing than buying an an AMD x3 and trying for the 4th core? Are the newer batches of the x3's still unlockable to the 4th core?

[burrellhead]

with 1K to spend get a i7 setup and a nvidia.

I'd get a x58 mobo that supports SLI and Crossfire (dual nvidia or ATI cards support)
i7 and a decent cooler
6GB DDR3 for tripple channel
a Antec 850w modular PSU
a V raptor HDD for OS and 1TB for storage (seagate do good ones)
a BlueRay /DVDRW drive
a Antec 900 case
a Nvidia 260 x2 (cheaper then 295 and can perform better once OC)

This looks a great build exept i have heard reviews on the antec 900 case has awful cable mangement

But everything else is great.

burrellhead

good luck

[Ronaldo-7]

I got Antec 1200 case and i like it alot, i thought the 900 might be good as its bit smaller, i wish mine was little bit smaller lol. cables in mine is great looks neat through the window lol

[Ronaldo-7]

Have been reading up, is i7 going to be better in terms of future-proofing than buying an an AMD x3 and trying for the 4th core? Are the newer batches of the x3's still unlockable to the 4th core?

yes get a i7, performace is good and its worth it with your budget

[nvening]

maybe consider an SSD as an OS drive?

im not sure what the best choice is atm tho

[shaithis]

im not sure what the best choice is atm tho

OCZ Vertex are probably the best value atm.

[Haiku32]

Antec 900 is a very good case imo. Cable management is kinda rubbish to be honest, but I love everything else about it .

[Grymdawg]

The raptor is the cheaper option, depends how mad you want to go on an HD.

I would settle for a 74gig raptor or a 150gig.

As discussed i would go for:

i7 920
ASUS Rampage extreme 2
6 gig 1600 ram
850w PSU
ATi 4870X2
DVD RW
1TB for storage. WD or samsung spinpoint

The antec 900 i have heard good things about but i am pretty particular about cases.

I chose the rampage 2 as it does both crossfire and SLi.

[holy god of nil]

What's faster, crossfired/sli'd cards or one of the double gpu cards?

[jim]

Individual is usually a touch faster, but just get the double GPU cards and have the opportunity to get another one later and go quad.

I'd be looking at a cheap i7 setup, with i7 920 and £150 board, 6GB cheap RAM, nice case, an OCZ Vertex SSD boot drive, and a 4870X2 for £240.

Might be a bit tough to cram all of that into the budget, but you could probably get something close, depends which areas you want to focus on. You could always hold off an SSD for another 6-12 months, they're not exactly cheap at the minute.

[holy god of nil]

Tbh, I don't think it's possible to get an SSD into a 1k budget without cutting corners somewhere.

[jim]

No, that's what I was thinking. I'd always put it in, given the chance, but the pricing is a bit prohibitive. You would probably be well advised to save money on the storage front, and just get one drive of whatever size suits you best - say 640GB - and go with that.

Don't bother with a Raptor or similar for negligible performance gains, just hold onto the cash that you would have spent and wait until an SSD is more affordable, then go for it, for unbelievable performance gains.