First Build - £800 to £900 Budget

First time posting here, thought i'd share my spec for first build;
Currently have a laptop which has mid level gaming performance, had enough of getting 20-30fps on supreme commander, so decided its time to get on and build a decent spec machine.

I have already checked out going intel i7, thought about the 920, but price difference is an extra £200+ taking into account motherboard.

Requirements; Gaming, HD Movies

Antec 300 - £55 (Purchased)
ASUS M4A78T-E 790GX | £100
550w Corsair VX Series PSU | £65
AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition AM3 | £105
BFG GeForce GTX 285 OCX | £300
BenQ E2200HDA 21.5" TFT Monitor| £120
4GB DDR3 Ram | £40/£50 (Purchased)
DVD RW / CD Drive | £20 (Purchased)
320 GB Samsung HD322HJ Spinpoint F1, 7200rpm, 16MB Cache | £33 (Purchased)

TOTAL: £848

So what do you think?

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Extras:

Extra Case Fans
CPU & GPU Cooler
Case Soundproofing Foam

---= CHANGES THUS FAR =---

-- BFG GeForce GTX 285 OCX | £300 *REMOVED*
++ Sapphire HD4890 1GB VAPOR-X | £160 [£140 saving]
-
--550w Corsair VX Series PSU | £65 *REMOVED*
++ 520W Corsair HX Series Modular PSU | £74 [£9 Additional]
-
-- ASUS M4A78T-E 790GX | £100 *REMOVED*
++ Gigabyte GA-MA770T-UD3P | £72 [£28 saving]
-
-- BenQ E2200HDA 21.5" TFT Monitor| £120 *REMOVED*
++ BenQ G2410HD 24" TFT Monitor | £152 [£32 Additional]
-
-- AMD Phenom II X3 720 Black Edition | £105 *REMOVED*
++ AMD Phenom II X4 955 BlackEdition | £160 [£55 Additional]
-
++ 1x Noctua NF-P12 120mm Case Fans | £15
TOTAL: £829

Graphics is supreme overkill for the monitor. check out the ATi HD4890 or Geforce GTX275 :) Even they are overkill but cost half as much (in ATi guise)

Oh and easy on the yellow, it's impossible to read without highlighting it.

Maxtor wouldn't get my money either.. yuck. Western digital, samsung or Hitachi for me.

Great otherwise, well researched :)

Have you thought about aftermarket cooling for the CPU?

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/320-G...MB-Cache-89-ms Sammy F1 for the same money :)

Plus 20 'constructive' posts gets you free delivery from Scan ;)

max res 1920 x 1080 on the monitor, i guess for the resolution a gtx 275 would be more suited. will check it out

aftermarket cooler, was gonna go for coolermaster v8, or either a thermalright of some sort.

dont know why i still have the maxtor on the list, was gonna go for a 320gb samsung with 16mb cache.

I agree the 285 is overkill and over priced.

4890 for £137 - £160
http://www.scan.co.uk/Index.aspx?NT=1-0-94-297-0

Will do you nicely. The black edition is 17% faster than the stock edition so worth the money IMHO.

If you going for a gaming machine you will need a bigger drive or another drive so use the money saved to buy a 1 terabyte drive like samsung spinpoint or a WG black/green edition or buy another 320 drive (or 2 the same brand and model) and raid them for better performance(or buy a 10000rpm raptor http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/74-GB...MB-Cache-52-ms) and use the wd green drive as a storage drive.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by greenpanda

aftermarket cooler, was gonna go for coolermaster v8, or either a thermalright of some sort.

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I would go with the V8 personally, gets top review, however no doubt the Hexus readership will have practical experiences of various other coolers.
http://www.frostytech.com/top5heatsinks.cfm

I'd go for a 4890 or nv equiv as stated above, then use the savings to get an i7 system. You will then have a system whereby upgrading the gfx card later (or adding a second) is worthwhile.

Dont listen to those that suggest cpu speed is of little importance for gaming. Your minimum FPS is hugely affected by the cpu power. There's not much point having a graphics card that provides 500fps most of the time, but then drops to 30fps in a firefight due to a cpu bottleneck.

looks like your right on the money there.
xfx 4890be, better performance than 275 of equivalent value.
will probably get an aftermarket cooler, as reviews say its a bit of a vacuum cleaner.

scan are doing one for £160ish at the moment - scane code; LN27747

saving me £140 so far :P
in regards to the hard drive, i have a laptop i use for most things, net/music/emails etc.
i guess im not upto date with how large newer games can get, 10gb+ im guessing.

Quote:

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I'd go for a 4890 or nv equiv as stated above, then use the savings to get an i7 system. You will then have a system whereby upgrading the gfx card later (or adding a second) is worthwhile.

Dont listen to those that suggest cpu speed is of little importance for gaming. Your minimum FPS is hugely affected by the cpu power. There's not much point having a graphics card that provides 500fps most of the time, but then drops to 30fps in a firefight due to a cpu bottleneck.

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in regards to i7 system, i could go for a i7 920, which means an extra £100, also the cheapest mobo on scan.co.uk i could find for 1366 socket is £132

So an additional £132 ish, so the saving on the graphics card is redundant, but i guess the performance i would get would be 20% + ???

I would save a bit more money on the motherboard TBH!

This motherboard will do the job:

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/GIGAB...770T-UD3P-MOBO

It has the SB710 southbridge,all solid capacitors and 8+2 phase VRM:

http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Products/...ProductID=3096

Here are some reviews:

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/985/1/

http://www.guru3d.com/article/gigaby...rboard-review/

It seems to have ACC enabled in the BIOS and is a decent overclocker.

Also look at the Phenom II X4 955 for around £160:

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/AMD-P...he-125W-Retail

Here is a review:

http://techreport.com/articles.x/16796

I would also look at getting a modular PSU too as the case will be less cluttered with cables.

One of these PSUs will do the job nicely:

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/520W-...-year-warranty

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/500W-...PeakPower-550W

Remember to check the Scan Today Only webpage as many items could be on special offer.

so the case arrived today :rockon2:

http://f.imagehost.org/0851/back.jpghttp://f.imagehost.org/0858/front_2.jpghttp://f.imagehost.org/0261/front_open.jpghttp://f.imagehost.org/0152/parts.jpg

:)

if your a good couple hundred under budget then why not look into getting a bigger/better monitor?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Russ

if your a good couple hundred under budget then why not look into getting a bigger/better monitor?

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defo a good idea, any suggestions for a decent 24"?
seems to be some decent asus/iiyama ones floating around.

The Phenom II X4 955 is down to around £149 now:

http://www.scan.co.uk/Index.aspx?NT=1-0-0-0-0

Quote:

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Originally Posted by CAT-THE-FIFTH

The Phenom II X4 955 is down to around £149 now:

http://www.scan.co.uk/Index.aspx?NT=1-0-0-0-0

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think it might be an error, if you click on the item it goes back upto £160

Quote:

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Originally Posted by greenpanda

think it might be an error, if you click on the item it goes back upto £160

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All the items on the page are on special offer. You can add them to the basket at the stated price. As with the Today Only offers if you click on the info link it will display the normal price.