My first intel build

[Kurshu]

Enough AMD!

After upgrading my PC piece by piece for the last several years I have decided to do a complete (nearly) overhaul of my current PC. This would be used for gaming (WoW) primarily and also video encoding (speed of encoding is not really important as I can do other things).

I have a 5870 in my current PC which I would like to use in my "new" build as I have only had it for a couple of months. I would like the option to go crossfire/sli in future.

Antec Dark Fleet DF-85, Black - £112.66
Intel Core i5 2500K Unlocked - £163.38
MSI P67A-GD53 (B3) - £104.00
850W Corsair HX Series - £125.82
Corsair Cooling Air Series A50 - £23.78
1TB Samsung HD103SJ Spinpoint F3 (x2) - £39.58 Each
8GB (2x4GB) Corsair DDR3 Vengeance, PC3-12800 (1600), CAS 9-9-9-24 - £70.94

Total - 679.74


I would like to perhaps get a 3rd F3 and RAID 0 two of them together for higher sequential write speeds for FRAPs recording. I would prefer that everything came from Scan. I also already have Thermal Paste.

Any advice?

[Terbinator]

Save yourself £20 and get this RAM instead:
http://www.aria.co.uk/SuperSpecials/...roductId=41882

[planet436]

Wow is definitely one of those games that has a noticeable performance increase with an SSD, from personal experience it is a lot smoother and enjoyable. A 64GB model crucial m4 would be sufficient. As Terbinator says you can save on cheaper ram.

Depending on how tight your budget is, you could drop to XFX 850W reviewed at Jonny Guru as an option. The corsair you have in there is fine though and will xfire no problem.

[Kurshu]

Save yourself £20 and get this RAM instead:
http://www.aria.co.uk/SuperSpecials/...roductId=41882

Thanks, but I will not be ordering any time this week (at earliest it will be the 28th). How long do Aria keep their special offers on for? And what courier are they using now? I refuse to buy from anyone who uses Citylink.

Wow is definitely one of those games that has a noticeable performance increase with an SSD, from personal experience it is a lot smoother and enjoyable. A 64GB model crucial m4 would be sufficient. As Terbinator says you can save on cheaper ram.

Depending on how tight your budget is, you could drop to XFX 850W reviewed at Jonny Guru as an option. The corsair you have in there is fine though and will xfire no problem.

Thanks, I will definately consider a solid state and will more likely than not take the XFX Power supply recommended. The reason I was going for the fully modular version is because I am TERRIBLE with cable management.

One thing I have been torn between is the case. I am very tempted to buy the HAF X as it will be nice to have so much room to build in. So, Dark Fleet DF-85 or the Cooler Master HAF-X?

[Kurshu]

Also, as I do some video encoding would it be worth the slight price jump to get a z68 board? Do these even support crossfire/SLI at x16?

[scaryjim]

How desperate are you to rebuild? AMD's new bulldozer architecture should be released some time over the summer (although it could be up to three months away) and even if it doesn't knock intel off the number one spot in performance terms, there's every chance it will have an impact on pricing. if you can put up with what you've got for another three months it could be well worth waiting, since this is a completely new architecture rather than a tweak to the existing one.

Think of it as being like the change from Pentium 4/D to Core 2, and remember what happened then...

EDIT: I'm intrigued... how have you managed to fit a Phenom II in a socket 775 motherboard...? Or do you just need to update your system specs?

[Kurshu]

How desperate are you to rebuild? AMD's new bulldozer architecture should be released some time over the summer (although it could be up to three months away) and even if it doesn't knock intel off the number one spot in performance terms, there's every chance it will have an impact on pricing. if you can put up with what you've got for another three months it could be well worth waiting, since this is a completely new architecture rather than a tweak to the existing one.

Think of it as being like the change from Pentium 4/D to Core 2, and remember what happened then...

EDIT: I'm intrigued... how have you managed to fit a Phenom II in a socket 775 motherboard...? Or do you just need to update your system specs?

Ah yes I forgot to update my mobo, done now though.

I will look further into the bulldozer suggestion, though I really do have my doubts. I have looked a little into the speculations but I could not find any trustworthy benchmarks (are there even any?). If I waited a few more months though I would have about trippled my spending potential though which could be good even if Bulldozer is a let down.

[scaryjim]

There aren't any reliable bulldozer benchmarks yet because the only chips in the wild are engineering samples, and they're very rarely reliable! But given you're running a Phenom II X4 with 4GB RAM and a 5870 I doubt you actually need to upgrade yet, so I'd definitely wait until bulldozer is released: either it'll be brilliant and you'll want to buy one, or it'll make everything else that bit cheaper and you can pick up as good a computer for less money. And if waiting means you'll be able to save up more money towards the new buildm, then even better!

And with that said, I now need to persuade myself that I don't want to buy a low profile GTS250 I've just spotted on Microdirect...

[neonplanet40]

i thought microdirect were in administration? :S

[scaryjim]

I've not heard anything to that effect yet...

Their website is still open and they are still, to the best of my knowledge, trading from their Upper Brook Street store. One of their management team spoke to Hexus to confirm that they were having some cashflow issues, but that's a long way from being bankrupt or going into adminstration. Their stock levels are unusually low for a lot of items though (hardly any AMD motherboards, for example), which may be to do with a downsizing of their operation after the closure of the Stockport Road branch / warehouse...

if everyone goes and buys a low profile GTS250 off them for £50 it might help

EDIT: A quick google suggests that the only place that reported this "news" was hexus itself. If it turns out that they're not able to turn the cashflow issues around it would be a shame, as they were a very convenient and reasonably priced component retailer close to Manchester city centre: it'd basically leave me with Maplin as the only place I could walk into and buy a motherboard or graphics card. Not a pleasant thought...