Sub-£1k quiet PC build, looking for guidance on my choices

[timread]

I'm planning on replacing my ageing AMD PC (see left) with a self-build. I need a quiet system that still has good performance and can handle TF2 and other newer FPS games. The only things I'll keep from my old system are the 2x Samsung 250GB drives for a RAID 1 'Data' drive, two LCDs (a new Dell U2311h and an old 2005FPW), and my MX518 mouse and SideWinder X6 keyboard. I'll be primarily gaming on the U2311h at 1920x1080.

This is my current list. It comes to £987 inc VAT at Scan. Can it be improved upon?

Asus Xonar DX/XD 7.1 PCI-E Soundcard
Scythe Mugen 2 Rev.B Quiet CPU Cooler
Fractal Design Define R3, Black Pearl, Mid Tower Case w/o PSU
620W Antec HCG-620 High Current Gamer
8GB (2x4GB) Corsair DDR3 Vengeance Jet Black, PC3-12800
Intel Core i5 2500K
1GB MSI GTX 560 Ti Twin Frozr II/OC
MSI P67A-GD53 (B3)
Samsung SH-B123L/BSBP 12x BD-ROM & DVDRW Combo Drive
128GB Crucial RealSSD M4, 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s SSD

I already have a spare retail copy of Win 7 Ultimate.

My main questions are: Could I drop down to a 500W/520W PSU (I don't plan to run SLI/Crossfire) to save a little money (or, get a more efficient 80PLUS Gold PSU)?

Next, is there a better or quieter air cooler I should be considering in the sub £50 range? I'm not considering water cooling, but I will be overclocking the 2500K. I will be buying a second fan to run the Mugen in a push-pull config.

Finally, many reviews of the Fractal Design Define R3 case advise using a GPU that exhausts air out of the back of the case (rather than one that blows down onto the GPU). I've got no major preference between 560Ti and AMD 6950, but went with the 560Ti mainly due to cost. Are there any better cards than the 560Ti Twin Frozr? The 2GB 6950 Twin Frozr III is a bit too pricey for me. Could I drop to the MSI Hawk 6870 Twin Frozr III and get acceptable gaming performance in the next 2 years on current/future FPS games?

Anything else I've missed/forgotten? As you can see from my current system specs, it's been a while since I built myself a PC

[biertonco]

Lose the sound card get a Z68 board perhaps? There are people here who know what they're talking about a lot more than me but I reckon that may be a suggestion that pops up. Otherwise i'd say that looks like a nice machine!!

[CooperXS]

Loose sound card, get a much cheaper generic 2x4GB DDR3 1333MHz and opt for a SATA2 SSD and you'll be able to safe for a GTX570 or HD6950.

[Pob255]

With the stock Fractal Design Define R3 what you want to do is get a additional fan for the front and a couple of 140mm fans for the top

The Bitfenix fans are very good value for money and quiet http://www.scan.co.uk/products/140mm...fdb%29-1000rpm
The new antec true quiet http://www.scan.co.uk/products/140mm...witch-case-fan are decent too and have nice built in rubber grommits.

for cpu cooler the Antec Kuhler is worth a look http://www.scan.co.uk/products/antec...plus-am3-3plus the all in one water cooler are easy to use and as good as most of the top end cpu coolers.

You could probably keep your current psu without an issue, the antec HCG 620w is the newer seasonic S12II bronze 600w
And yes you should be able to drop down to the 520w version without issue.

As to p67 vs z68 there's not much difference really as the ondie gpu is turned off when you plug a card in and that's the only major difference.
I'd probably pay the extra £14 for the MSI P67A-GD65 (B3) or Gigabyte GA-P67A-UD3P-B3



personally I'd stick with onboard sound but I'm no audiophile.

[timread]

Great suggestions folks, thank you.

I've thought more than once about keeping my Seasonic S12-600 in the new build. Only reason I didn't was because it's now 5yrs old, and 1) I thought it only had one 6-pin PCIe connector but apparently (after checking online) it has 2; and 2) I know even the best PSUs don't last forever. Guess I better open up my case and double-check! If I can keep it for now, then that saves me at least £60 to spend elsewhere.

I will definitely be looking at optimal cooling for the Fractal Design case, and adding fans if necessary. Just need to see a few more reviews and check out SPCR, QuietPC.co.uk and Scan for what's decent and available in the UK. Scythe and Noctua fans seem to do well.

I do like the look of the MSI GD-65 and that would save me having to get a 3rd party soundcard. I am a bit of an audiophile but the onboard sound on this board looks pretty decent. Getting THX certification is not that easy, AFAIK.

I did check out the Antec Kuhler H620 but after checking out the very comprehensive SPCR review of the 620 and 920 I thought it made more sense to stick with air cooling at the price level I'm looking at.

I should mention - I get a corporate account discount on Crucial kit (and Amazon 5% discount on top until end of August), so I can pick up the Crucial M4 128GB SSD for £135 inc VAT. Can't pass up such a good drive at that price ;-). For the same reason I can pick up a Crucial Ballistix Sport 8GB Kit (4GBx2) DDR3 PC3-12800 10-10-10-28 DDR3-1600 1.5V Part #: BL2KIT51264BA160A for £33.96 inc VAT. Price is very tempting but those timings aren't as good as the Corsair kit, and the Ballistix Sport cooling is not as good as Corsair's.

[Pob255]

Cooling shouldn't matter, that was one of the big selling points of ddr3, running at only 1.5v it shouldn't need big heatsinks like ddr2 did as it could go up to 2.3v

[CooperXS]

Today you can get a iPhone speaker set with THX label on it. So I'm not sure how decent that thing even is anymore.

[Vimeous]

Suggestions...

A modular PSU would give an easier build and better airflow, handy as you plan to OC. I go with the 650W Antec Truepower. The 650W isn't necessary but it's the lowest wattage in their modular range it seems. Besides you'll probably be closer to 50% load (PSU peak efficiency) when OC'ing.

Be Quiet air coolers are currently well regarded for performance vs noise. Saves on buying extra fans too.

Gfx. Funnily enough I am considering the same cards. If you plan to fold the 560Ti is a no brainer. If you plan to increase to 3 monitors a AMD card - in particular Sapphires Flex range (if you can source them) makes most sense.
If you do have an internally venting card you'll just need extra care when cabling etc to ensure the airflow is optimised.

Motherboard wise I'm an ASUS nut so I'd change that immediately. However with Sandybridge boards there is some actual logic here. It seems not all SATA3 and USB3 controllers/implimentations are equal and ASUS's boards appear to be much faster than their rivals. Check the relevant reviews and see how your chosen board compares.
Also what USB3 facilities does your chosen board have? It will become the defacto standard through familiarity/compatibility so it's worth being ready.

Are you going to clock your RAM or run very FSB dependant apps? If not XMS3 or similar should be fine - and the smaller heatsinks give you more space to work with.

Oh and as for sound - you can always add the Xonar later so a THX-cert board is worth a shot. Pop-in some headphones and listen to the background electrical noise. If there's nothing there stick with it.

[ik9000]

a z68 board would offer more flexibility.

+1 on the suggestion to go modular with the PSU it makes a huge difference.

Re what power to go for check out this thread: http://forums.hexus.net/hexus-hardwa...n-numbers.html

For non-SLI and sandy bridge, a 500W PSU is prob all you need. The NZXT ones are really quiet + give over 90% efficiency irrespective of powerdraw, but I think they only go modular at 650W and above. Coolermaster do some good modular drives too - make sure you get a gold efficiency model though.

You might be able to save money spent on drives by getting a sata III SSD of 60GB paired with a decent HDD. See instructions here: http://www.maximumpc.com/article/how...ia_storage_ssd

Other things to watch out for: How many fans does your mobo support? Will you need Y-splitter cables to run all your case fans? I did and had to go running to maplins which isn't the cheapest way to get them. The other thing that made a noticeable difference was buying isolation washers for the optical drive and HDD, and silicon pegs for the case fans rather than the bundled screws with the BitFenix fan.

[timread]

I'd love to get a modular PSU... shame they still command such a price premium over non-modular. I really like the look of the Seasonic X-560 (560W) Modular 80 PLUS Gold but it's £100. The Antec TP 650W would also be good (and it's made by Seasonic after all).

I expect I'll be overclocking using the CPU/Turbo multiplier only. Maybe more tweaking once I learn the ins and outs of the UEFI BIOS.

I can't see myself ever going to triple-head monitors, but I would (truth be told) prefer to go AMD this time... but when you compare the 6950s and 560Ti's they each come with a set of pros and cons that make a final choice more tricky...e.g. price (560Ti wins), power consumption (6950 wins), noise (560Ti generally wins), availability (560Ti wins), performance (depends on the game engine!). The 560Ti edges a win if power consumption is not an important deciding factor.

Re: P67 vs Z68 - now that I've done some more research, the GPU power savings that Virtu/QuickSync potentially offer on the Z68 (assuming it has been implemented) are interesting, but would those power consumption savings make up for the higher initial outlay vs a P67 board? I can't see myself using SRT since I'll already have an SSD OS boot disk. Am I missing some other great benefit Z68 would bring?

What Asus P67 board would folks here recommend? The P8P67 Rev3, or the Pro? Or something else?

I guess the P8Z68-V is not all that much more than a P67 board, and supports Virtu!

[Vimeous]

Turns out Scan have the 550W version of the Antec for £63.

With the gfx I'd only go Nvidia if folding is important - the power consumption and multi-monitor support are more important to me so I'm currently leaning towards AMD. It's even closer for you but essentially your right either will do.
It's great to have a choice!

For Asus boards have a look here: http://uk.asus.com/Motherboards/
Go to the Comparison tool on the left menu and have a look.
Essentially I choose on what's on the rear panel, number of fan headers etc.
I was planning on a P8P67-M as I want an matx board and prefered the i/o outputs. However I now fancy the Maximus IV Genie-Z for its out-of-the-box performance and extra USB3 header.
Then again the Deluxe does have that snazzy 3.5" USB3 box .....

[shbris]

http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=31326

silent 500W for £100

[ik9000]

I'd love to get a modular PSU... shame they still command such a price premium over non-modular. I really like the look of the Seasonic X-560 (560W) Modular 80 PLUS Gold but it's £100. The Antec TP 650W would also be good (and it's made by Seasonic after all).

This http://www.scan.co.uk/products/650w-...-12v-140mm-fan is £90, modular and seriously quiet. I use the 750w version, it's fine. If you're not doing SLI/Crossfire then this will be ample. Wait for the Scan today-only offers to come up this afternoon and you'll prob find it even cheaper.

I expect I'll be overclocking using the CPU/Turbo multiplier only. Maybe more tweaking once I learn the ins and outs of the UEFI BIOS.

Good cos that's the only way you can really clock the sandy bridge chips. On the upside it means less worries about what RAM you use. Stick with a k-variant chip or you'll find the multiplier locked.

I can't see myself ever going to triple-head monitors, but I would (truth be told) prefer to go AMD this time... but when you compare the 6950s and 560Ti's they each come with a set of pros and cons that make a final choice more tricky...e.g. price (560Ti wins), power consumption (6950 wins), noise (560Ti generally wins), availability (560Ti wins), performance (depends on the game engine!). The 560Ti edges a win if power consumption is not an important deciding factor.

Check out some of the custom cooled cards eg the Gigabyte SuperOverClocked series. Premium components and cooling + factory clocked for good performance without a noise penalty.

Re: P67 vs Z68 - now that I've done some more research, the GPU power savings that Virtu/QuickSync potentially offer on the Z68 (assuming it has been implemented) are interesting, but would those power consumption savings make up for the higher initial outlay vs a P67 board? I can't see myself using SRT since I'll already have an SSD OS boot disk. Am I missing some other great benefit Z68 would bring?

It's not just power savings with quicksync, it's ability to crunch data quicker and get the full benefits of SandyBridge. I wouldn't look at anything other than a Z68 board and the price difference isn't too bad.

What Asus P67 board would folks here recommend? The P8P67 Rev3, or the Pro? Or something else?

Any board you buy irrespective of type needs to be rev3 - otherwise you risk SATA performance degrading with time.

If you don't want SLI then just the standard P8P67 would be fine. If you want SLI then you need to get at least the Pro version. Crossfire will work on the standard P8P67, but only because it can handle the two GPUs running at different PCIe bandwidths. If you want two 8x PCIe Lanes then you need to get the Pro version or better.

I guess the P8Z68-V is not all that much more than a P67 board, and supports Virtu!

Correct. Get Z68, but the comments above about PCIe slots still applies to the Z68 range. You need at least the Pro model to get two 8x PCIe slots.

[timread]

Thanks for the great comments. I'll have to check out some reviews of the Gigabyte 6950 OC cards, they do look interesting.

Looks like I could go Z68 and AMD 6950 2GB, and still stay under £1k (just!).

Scythe Mugen 2 Rev.B Quiet CPU Cooler £38.24
650W Antec TruePower New, Modular, 80Plus Bronze £67.98
Fractal Design Define R3, Black Pearl, w/o PSU £74.94
Intel Core i5 2500K Unlocked, £160.98
Samsung SH-B123L/BSBP 12x BD-ROM & DVDRW £41.98
Asus P8Z68-V £128.02
2GB MSI HD 6950 Twin Frozr III Power Edition/OC £219.89
128GB Crucial RealSSD M4, 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s SSD £142.38
8GB Kit (4GBx2) Crucial Ballistix DDR3 DDR3-1600 £34.02

(all kit prices from Scan apart from the 2 Crucial items) - total £908.43, which leaves some over for additional case fans/cables etc

[Pob255]

The Seasonic X-560 (560W) Modular 80 PLUS Gold is expensive, that's becasue it so goddamn good
One of the best and most stable PSU's around http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php...Story&reid=169

I'm not saying the 650W Antec TruePower New, Modular is bad, because it's not, it is very good, just the Xseries is flat out amazing (with a price tag to match)

One down side to the Antec TruePower New, Modular series is that they are only half modular, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NvuhTl5MHmo
It has the following hard wired cables
20+4pin cable
4pin cable
8pin cable (yes two separate cables not a single 4+4pin cable)
pci-e cable with a 6pin and a 6+2pin on the one cable
3 molex + 1 floppy on one cable
3 sata on one cable

then come with a big bunch of modular cables, more than you can actually plug in, to give you multiple setup options.

[ik9000]

Other PSUs you could have a look at

http://www.scan.co.uk/product.aspx?ProductId=38625 £85 gold efficiency

http://www.scan.co.uk/product.aspx?ProductId=25479 £60 looks like bronze efficiency

(prices as Scan Today Only)

The beauty of the NZXT PSU I recommended before is it is quiet up to 100% load. Other PSUs can ramp up loudly above 70%.