Need help with choose pc upgrade

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

The problem with AM3+ is that all the mATX motherboards are based on old chipsets and old designs. The few 880G based AM3+ motherboards which have the SB850 southbridge are not cheap either and are hard to get.

The Biostar 970 motherboard has VRM cooling too,and at least AFAIK Biostar has made solid budget AMD motherboards. The Gigabyte one does not have this,although I suppose you could always add your own heatsinks at some point.

Looking at the postage situation,Ebuyer does free supersaver postage,Amazon does free postage and Dabs will charge a few quid for postage,and you get free games. You can get a HD7770 from Amazon or Ebuyer though,and this case might be an alternative to the Merc Alpha:

http://www.ebuyer.com/390898-casecom-cs-13-case-cs-13

I suppose you could get everything from Ebuyer instead,but you will get less for budget.

[nasorpc]

Cat i'd rather go with your advice as i know that you know what your talking about. I will stick with the Biostar motherboard if its that good as cooling can be a big issue.

whats the difference between this case and merc alpha? does one have more features than another?

Also where do u recommend i get the xfx psu from? If it's amazon then i guess i can get the merc alpha case too, although the casecom case seems cool too!

PS: Have a look at these cases:-

http://www.ebuyer.com/343262-cit-van...-card-cscitvan
http://www.ebuyer.com/390900-casecom...9-case-kk-9949

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Gigabyte are good,but it appears they and Asus started relaunching 970 models with more VRM cooling,which the £50 Gigabyte 970 motherboard does not have. Regarding the cases,the Merc Alpha and the other one are listed as being able to take at least 300MM long GPUs. I am not sure with the ones you mentioned. I suspect they might but I am not sure.

Pob255 tends to know more about those cases then me TBH,so it might be worth asking him.

The XFX 450W is on Ebuyer for around £43,which is a tad expensive,but OTH it reduces the number of suppliers you need to deal with. IIRC,Novatech and CCL might be cheaper for the PSU although I could be wrong.

Also,you can get cashback from Top CashBack and Quidco on Ebuyer and Dabs purchases IIRC, and Nectar points on the Amazon ones.

[scaryjim]

I'd personally go for the Casecom out of those two, really well built budget cases. This one is a little cheaper and less ... garish? http://www.ebuyer.com/390899-casecom-cs-14-case-cs-14

The only thing to watch for with the casecom's is that they have a bottom mounted PSU, which can be an issue if the 4pin CPU lead on the PSU is quite short. The CiT case you linked to has a top mounted PSU which avoids this (but has issues of its own). They should both comfortably take most graphics cards - I think you were looking at a 7770 which will be fine. Cases really are a matter of personal preference - I don't think you'll go wrong with either of the ones you linked tbh...

[nasorpc]

Thanks...in that case i'll stick with the biostar and the Merc Alpha as i'll have to order the xfx psu from amazon anyway. Although I'm concerned that the Merc Alpha case comes with no extra case fans and my cost is already close to £500 and i don't know if i need any.

Here is my order:-
EBUYER:-
Crucial 8GB DDR3 1600Mhz Ballistix Sport Memory - £32.99
AMD FX-6300 3.5GHz Socket AM3+ 14MB Cache Retail Boxed Processor - £101.96
Biostar TA970 Socket AM3+ 8 Channel Audio ATX Motherboard - £50.15
Samsung 250GB 840 Series SATA 6Gb/s 2.5" Solid State Drive - £130
Sub-Total= £315.10

AMAZON(*** Delivery charges £2.30 ***):-
BitFenix Merc Alpha Midi Tower Chassis - Black - £32.90
xfx 450w PSU - £36.76
Sub-Total= £71.95

DABS (*** Delivery charges £1.99 ***):-
Asus AMD Radeon 7770 HD 1GHz 1GB PCI-Express 3.0 HDMI - £91.99
LiteOn IHAS124-04 24x SATA DVDRW HH Internal Drive - Black - £12.76
Sub-Total= £104.75

TOTAL= £491.80
(Will still need a large 1-2tb hdd, but i can get that later as i currently can survive on a 500gb hdd)

[nasorpc]

Bump!

[kmac]

Don't know why you need a bump - looks al sorted, just need to pull the trigger......

Take it you are planning on using the stock cooler for the AMD CPU?

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

That PSU is from a third party seller,so I cannot vouch for them!

It is £4 more expensive(if you include postage) at Ebuyer :

http://www.ebuyer.com/264381-xfx-450...u-p1-450s-u2b9

There is this OCZ for a bit more:

http://www.dabs.com/products/ocz-tec...H49.html?src=3

[nasorpc]

hi guys, sorry for bumping, but i was desperate to place the order yesterday. I decided to place the order to day instead.

@ kmac - yes i plan to use the stock cooler...why? is it no good? surely it'll do the job for me as i don't plan to overclock

@ cat - i don't want to pay anymore mate....i would have even gone for a cheapy psu for the sake of saving some money.

What shall i do about system cooling fans? shall i order some? if so, how many and what sizes?

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

That Amazon seller is also on Ebay:

http://feedback.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayIS...edbackAsSeller

Feedback appears OK,considering the volume of sales.

BTW,don't forget the Top CashBack and Quidco cashback and Nectar points you can get!

Regarding the CPU cooler and case fans,you can always get some better ones later.

[nasorpc]

Thanks for the link to the xfx psu seller. Never ordered via quidco or top cashback mate. But do you think my pc will stay cool enough without any additional case fans? I mean i can order them now as they aren't expensive....just don't know how many or what size to order.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Thanks for the link to the xfx psu seller. Never ordered via quidco or top cashback mate. But do you think my pc will stay cool enough without any additional case fans? I mean i can order them now as they aren't expensive....just don't know how many or what size to order.

Top CashBack has no fees. Here are the links:

http://www.topcashback.co.uk/dabs/

http://www.topcashback.co.uk/ebuyer/

You should get around £5 to £6 back in cashback.

The AMD cooler can be noisy under load,but YMMV. AMD supposedly has changed the heatsink of the FX6300 to have a better fan too. My mate has an FX6300 but he already had a water cooler,so he never bothered to try it out though.

My Intel stock cooler was OK but temperatures were not good.

I would try it first to see,how it goes.

In fact the cheapest way to get better cooling for the FX6300 is to get one of the 125W TDP AMD stock coolers. They are quite heavy and have heatpipes and can be had for as little as £5 to £6.

[nasorpc]

i'm not hugely concerned about noise mate as i am hard of hearing. Not only that, but the pc tower will be kept inside a desk drawer, so very little noise should be heard. I can always change it at a later date when i buy a larger hard drive for my system.

What about case fans? shall i buy one or two? if so, what sizes?

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I would at least get one intake fan which should work in concert with the single exhaust fan. The case uses 120MM fan.

[nasorpc]

brilliant thanks very much! The only thing i noticed with this case which from reviews seems to be absolutely brilliant, is that the psu has to be placed at the bottom. I just hope that i don't have any graphics card or hard drive issues. I currently have 1 3.5inch hard drive and plan to of course get an ssd. I also plan to get a larger 1-2tb hard drive, although i'm not sure if i should get an external, so that it's portable.

[nasorpc]

you won't believe this! crucial memory sport has gone up and is now out of stock on ebuyer