Majestic, dazzling electronic goodies

[Dr. Pannenkoek]

Hello there, young tech savvy people!

I shall be getting a new computer soon, and I've currently got a quote from a custom building pc site for £1046.55

Here are the specs:

CPU: 2066 - Intel Core i5 2500K

CPU Cooler: 3011 - Thermaltake Frio

Operating System: 11001 - No Operating System - I will install my own

Motherboard: 4095b3 - Asus P8P67 LE (Rev. 3)

Memory: 5039 - 8GB DDR3 1333mhz (2x 4GB)

Hard Drives: 6006 - 1TB S-ATAII 3.0Gb/s

Second hard drive: 6029 - NEW! 2TB S-ATAIII 6.0Gb/s

Optical Drive: 7003 - 22x DVD±RW DL S-ATA

Graphics card: 9035 - ATI Radeon HD 6950 2GB

Sound card: 10001 - Onboard 7.1 Audio

Keyboard and mouse: 14019 - Razer Arctosa Gaming Keyboard

Keyboard and mouse: 14021 - Razer Abyssus Gaming Mouse

Keyboard and mouse: 14020 - Razer Goliathus Speed Mouse Pad

Speakers: 2001 - Creative Inspire T10

Monitors: 15014 - LG 22' E2240S-PN LED

Case: 17038 - NEW! NZXT Phantom White

PSU: 18034 - 700W Xigmatek

Warranty: 1000 - 3 Year Bronze Warranty

But what I was wondering was, do I need to make any improvements? I think this will satisfy my needs for a while and I (my brother) could easily upgrade components when need be..

I believe the case will be big enough as the site would let me choose another case because it said that it wasn't big enough (which is a huge help on these types of sites)

It's easier if I want a custom pc to get it though these sites as even though I will be paying for it....my parents really don't want me to buy the parts and assemble it myself (again I'm talking about my brother doing this)

Preese discuss :3

[bAsTiNaToR]

I put all your parts together and get an amount of ~1050€, but only if you buy them in the cheapest shops. So I'd say that the price is ok, same shop + assembly (The price you got is ~1200€). I took some HDDs I thought that would fit, since they're no info about them (Ram and optical drive too), same for the graphics cards, because an ATi Radeon HD 6950 doesn't exist(its AMD now).

But there're some things I criticise: The PSU is way too oversized. If you plan a dual-GPU configuration, then it'd be okay, but a good 500/550 Watt PSU from Corsair, Cougar, Enermax, Seasonic etc. should be enough for this configuration.

You should ask if they can give you specific information about the HDDs, Ram and the graphics card, like brand and stuff. I don't know the CPU cooler, but I'd recommend you a Scythe Mugen 2/3 or a Thermalright HR-02 Macho, excellent cooling performance for a fair price.

The razer stuff is a matter of taste, but the mousepad has a lenght of nearly 1 meter ...

The case is very good, heard only good things about it. Good airflow + plenty of space.

Speakers, meh, keep them away from audiophile CyriusG

Edited August 9, 2011 by bAsTiNaToR

[Dr. Pannenkoek]

Yeah the speakers were the most basic one on the screen, I might use any spare money getting a decent pair of speakers...

But as for the ram and graphics cards I've sent them an email and I just think they haven't updated the ATi names to AMD, and as for the ram I said again in the email about what brand they are, I'll probably bump the post when I get any word from them, it just seemed a bit fishy that their last testimonial was 5 months ago...but they are having a summer sale which may at least seem ok at best....and they are approved by some site..

oh and as for the PSU there's a 500W xigmatek version...or do you think it's worth just getting a completely different brand?

Edited August 9, 2011 by Dr. Pannenkoek

[Rinkana]

Hello there, young tech savvy people!

I shall be getting a new computer soon, and I've currently got a quote from a custom building pc site for £1046.55

Here are the specs:

CPU: 2066 - Intel Core i5 2500K Get a better one (i7 with hypertreathing for example)

CPU Cooler: 3011 - Thermaltake Frio

Operating System: 11001 - No Operating System - I will install my own

Motherboard: 4095b3 - Asus P8P67 LE (Rev. 3)

Memory: 5039 - 8GB DDR3 1333mhz (2x 4GB)

Hard Drives: 6006 - 1TB S-ATAII 3.0Gb/s Make it a 6.0GB/s Drive (and if possible put them in Raid 0) (Or even better, get an SSD)

Second hard drive: 6029 - NEW! 2TB S-ATAIII 6.0Gb/s

Optical Drive: 7003 - 22x DVD±RW DL S-ATA

Graphics card: 9035 - ATI Radeon HD 6950 2GB Better GFX card

Sound card: 10001 - Onboard 7.1 Audio

Keyboard and mouse: 14019 - Razer Arctosa Gaming Keyboard

Keyboard and mouse: 14021 - Razer Abyssus Gaming Mouse

Keyboard and mouse: 14020 - Razer Goliathus Speed Mouse Pad

Speakers: 2001 - Creative Inspire T10 Get a 5.1 / 7.1 speakerset (It gives you more the feeling to be in the game

Monitors: 15014 - LG 22' E2240S-PN LED

Case: 17038 - NEW! NZXT Phantom White Nice Case!

PSU: 18034 - 700W Xigmatek

Warranty: 1000 - 3 Year Bronze Warranty

Edited August 9, 2011 by Rinkana

[Botervloot]

Throw an SSD in there

Why the hell would you need 3 TB, Use the big 2 TB one and get a like a 60/80 GB SSD

Edited August 9, 2011 by Botervloot

[CarPileUp]

Hello there, young tech savvy people!

I shall be getting a new computer soon, and I've currently got a quote from a custom building pc site for £1046.55

Here are the specs:

CPU: 2066 - Intel Core i5 2500K Get a better one (i7 with hypertreathing for example)

CPU Cooler: 3011 - Thermaltake Frio

Operating System: 11001 - No Operating System - I will install my own

Motherboard: 4095b3 - Asus P8P67 LE (Rev. 3)

Memory: 5039 - 8GB DDR3 1333mhz (2x 4GB)

Hard Drives: 6006 - 1TB S-ATAII 3.0Gb/s Make it a 6.0GB/s Drive (and if possible put them in Raid 0) (Or even better, get an SSD)

Second hard drive: 6029 - NEW! 2TB S-ATAIII 6.0Gb/s

Optical Drive: 7003 - 22x DVD±RW DL S-ATA

Graphics card: 9035 - ATI Radeon HD 6950 2GB Better GFX card

Sound card: 10001 - Onboard 7.1 Audio

Keyboard and mouse: 14019 - Razer Arctosa Gaming Keyboard

Keyboard and mouse: 14021 - Razer Abyssus Gaming Mouse

Keyboard and mouse: 14020 - Razer Goliathus Speed Mouse Pad

Speakers: 2001 - Creative Inspire T10 Get a 5.1 / 7.1 speakerset (It gives you more the feeling to be in the game

Monitors: 15014 - LG 22' E2240S-PN LED

Case: 17038 - NEW! NZXT Phantom White Nice Case!

PSU: 18034 - 700W Xigmatek

Warranty: 1000 - 3 Year Bronze Warranty

Raid is stupid and unnecessary. (High risk of data loss) Instead of doing RAID 0 he should get a SSD. A i5-2500k is completely enough when he only wants to play games. A I7-2600K makes sense when he's going to do hardcore HD-Videorendering and such. You are suggesting him expensive things like his parents are uber rich and he also has much money.

700 Watt for what? A 500 - 600 Watt brand PSU is enough. Get a 2TB HDD and a 80 GB SSD and put your OS on the SSD. You don't need 3TB.

Edited August 9, 2011 by CarPileUp

[Botervloot]

Also a good headset gives a much more lifelike experience speakers could never offer

[bAsTiNaToR]

Also a good crappy gaming headset headphone gives a much more lifelike experience speakers could never offer

Edited August 9, 2011 by bAsTiNaToR

[oDi_W]

Raid is stupid and unnecessary. (High risk of data loss) Instead of doing RAID 0 he should get a SSD.

700 Watt for what? For the GPU ofc.

I disagree with your opinion of RAID0. it isn't stupid and you don't have a abnormally high risk of data loss.

its the same risk. not even twice the risk. since it acts like one single HDD.

Example:

Singe HDD - When crashed, you lose all data on that drive.

RAID0 2 or more drives acting like one - When crashed, you lose all data on those drives.

PLus 6GB/s for a HDD? most budget SSD's wont even make that.*

3 GB/s is more than enough. most HDD's wont even use 60% of the total 3GB/s bandwith*

*after looking at some reviews of some recent HDD's

[Sacrevy]

Aw. I gotta buy an new computer with my 700 euro laptop from 5 years ago well yeah. Does anyone can show me a good fast computer with good accesoires under 600 euros (i would love if it whas under 500 or 400)

[bAsTiNaToR]

Raid is stupid and unnecessary. (High risk of data loss) Instead of doing RAID 0 he should get a SSD.

700 Watt for what? For the GPU ofc.

I disagree with your opinion of RAID0. it isn't stupid and you don't have a abnormally high risk of data loss.

its the same risk. not even twice the risk. since it acts like one single HDD.

Example:

Singe HDD - When crashed, you lose all data on that drive.

RAID0 2 or more drives acting like one - When crashed, you lose all data on those drives.

PLus 6GB/s for a HDD? most budget SSD's wont even make that.*

3 GB/s is more than enough. most HDD's wont even use 60% of the total 3GB/s bandwith*

*after looking at some reviews of some recent HDD's

Since we don't know what Dr.Pfannkuchen intends to do with his PC (I guess he'd use it for something abstract like gaming), we cannot say these things for sure, but I agree with CarePileUp. As long as you just use your PC for gaming you're well served with a good HDD. Even a SSD would be questionable since it "just" reduces the loading times of maps (the only benefit for games) and boost the windwosboot and programs open faster due the better access times.

Btw, this 6 gb/s (= Sata III) nonsense is just marketing stuff. If it comes to speed, your HDD has no chance against a SSD, which can trully benefit from the larger bandwidth of your 6 gb/s.

@ Rinkana

Your post is just useless. Why should he get an i7 for a gamimg rig? Many games barely profit from a quad-core, so why should he spend more money on a CPU with Hyperthreading, which won't increase his FPS? 6gb/s crap ... .Why didn't you give any arguments for buying a gtx card? If you say PhysX, I'll take it, shove it up all your ass and guts til it comes out of your throat and helps to compute a realistic model of your sparkling puke. (If he'd said that he uses en/decoding programs which support CUDA, then it might be an argument, but he didn't ...)

A good 5.1 / 7.1 set of speakers costs a shitload of money, cheap sets might have good bass, but the sound is dull, because they're lacking mids & highs.

Sry for being a bit rude, but if it comes to PCs, I'm dead serious and don't want the guys to buy stuff they won't need and/or which are just a waste of money !

Edit: @ Dr.Pfannkuchen

If you can give us the exact model name or the specefications of the PSU, I could tell you if it's good or not

Edited August 10, 2011 by bAsTiNaToR

[Dr. Pannenkoek]

To make it easy for you I just want a decent kinda top of the line computer that I'll upgrade eventually for a price of up to £1100

To make it even easier i want to play Skyrim on high settings :>

[Darkstar]

Basically it's for gaming and to last a few years before having to think about upgrading major parts.

[Rinkana]

@ Rinkana

Your post is just useless. Why should he get an i7 for a gamimg rig? Many games barely profit from a quad-core, so why should he spend more money on a CPU with Hyperthreading, which won't increase his FPSAn I7 WILL increase his FPS? 6gb/s crap What 6GB/s is crap the more the better.... .Why didn't you give any arguments for buying a gtx card? If you say PhysX, I'll take it, shove it up all your ass and guts til it comes out of your throat and helps to compute a realistic model of your sparkling puke. (If he'd said that he uses en/decoding programs which support CUDA, then it might be an argument, but he didn't ...) There are better GFX cards avalible since he wants a good gaming computer

A good 5.1 / 7.1 set of speakers costs a shitload of money, cheap sets might have good bass, but the sound is dull, because they're lacking mids & highs.That is sooooo untrue.

Sry for being a bit rude, but if it comes to PCs, I'm dead serious and don't want the guys to buy stuff they won't need and/or which are just a waste of money !

Edit: @ Dr.Pfannkuchen

If you can give us the exact model name or the specefications of the PSU, I could tell you if it's good or not

[bAsTiNaToR]

It was clear from the beginning that the PC will be abused for excessive gaming . Its hard to say how long this configuration will handle new games, because nobody can predict the system requirements just by seeing some pictures or pre-alpha gameplay or w/e. But I see no problem til the next generation of consoles, PS4 and Xbox 720, will be released. Nowadays its much cheaper to program & optimise a game for consoles and afterwards you just port it on the PC, get some dissapointing graphics and often a horrbile control. So the system requirements of most of the current games are pretty adequate and don't require a high-end PC with atleast 2 graphics cards. Well, and the same thing happens to Skyrim, but I'm optimistic and hope that the developers will do a good job. (If the graphics won't satisfy me, I'll wait for the mod community )

As I said before, the full name of the PSU wouldn't be bad and yeah, 3 TB space is a bit overkill. I have a 120gb SSD and a 500gb HDD and no problems thus far . But its your decision .

Edit:

Dear Rinkana,

May you be so kind and type some full sentences instead of using others posts with some editing.

As long as Dr.Pfannkuchen plays in Full HD with maximum graphics settings, he doesn't have to fear that his CPU will be the bottleneck, because the GPU will be the limiting factor. And for the graphics cards, here a little list:

AMD Radeon HD 6990 - fastest dual-GPU card but also crap

Nvidia GTX 590 - crappy dual-GPU

Nvidia GTX 580 - Your better gtx card with ~20-30% more performance than the HD 6950 Price 360€ and more

AMD Radeon HD 6970 - Price: 280-300€

Nvidia GTX 570 - Your better gtx card with ~ 10% more performance Price ~ 250-280€

AMD Radeon 6950 - The card he plans to buy Avg. price ~200-240€

Nvidia GTX 560 Ti Price: 190-230€ - ~5-10% slower that the HD 6950

With a HD 6950 he gets enough power for current and new games like Skyrim for a pretty fair price. (Besides of that, nvidia cards need more energy for the equal / lower performance...)

Well, take your 6gb/s HDDs and live with them. Its fact that current 3gb/s hardly hit the bandwith limit of Sata II, so why should they get faster with more bandwidth? Pls, tell me that.

Edited August 10, 2011 by bAsTiNaToR

[Dr. Pannenkoek]

Although it's nice having a discussion here about various parts... but what is nicer is having parts which people think I'll actually need like exact makes of parts without saying stuff to me about your techy abbreviations which I won't understand (just imagine you're talking to a simpleton :3)

[Rinkana]

Edit:

Dear Rinkana,

May you be so kind and type some full sentences instead of using others posts with some editing.

As long as Dr.Pfannkuchen plays in Full HD with maximum graphics settings, he doesn't have to fear that his CPU will be the bottleneck, because the GPU will be the limiting factor. And for the graphics cards, here a little list:

AMD Radeon HD 6990 - fastest dual-GPU card but also crap

Nvidia GTX 590 - crappy dual-GPU

Nvidia GTX 580 - Your better gtx card with ~20-30% more performance than the HD 6950 Price 360€ and more

AMD Radeon HD 6970 - Price: 280-300€

Nvidia GTX 570 - Your better gtx card with ~ 10% more performance Price ~ 250-280€

AMD Radeon 6950 - The card he plans to buy Avg. price ~200-240€

Nvidia GTX 560 Ti Price: 190-230€ - ~5-10% slower that the HD 6950

With a HD 6950 he gets enough power for current and new games like Skyrim for a pretty fair price. (Besides of that, nvidia cards need more energy for the equal / lower performance...)

Well, take your 6gb/s HDDs and live with them. Its fact that current 3gb/s hardly hit the bandwith limit of Sata II, so why should they get faster with more bandwidth? Pls, tell me that.

Show me sources to proove that you're right.

And about the 6GB/s part

1.The more speed the faster.

2.More bandwith == speed.

3.Nowday's we have sATA-300

4.The faster the better

5.It does not cost (much) extra money.

[CarPileUp]

Although it's nice having a discussion here about various parts... but what is nicer is having parts which people think I'll actually need like exact makes of parts without saying stuff to me about your techy abbreviations which I won't understand (just imagine you're talking to a simpleton :3)

- Get a 2TB HDD and a small SSD for your OS (64GB or 80GB) (Crucial for example)

- Smaller PSU (500 - 550 Watt brand PSU is more than enough)

- If you don't want to overclock, you can also get a I5-2400. But it's your choice.

- The rest is fine.

No need to follow the "RAID discussion". It's stupid, unnecessary and uninteresting for you because you don't fucking need it. It's just something for enthusiasts who have lots of money and upgrading their PC every day.

Edited August 11, 2011 by CarPileUp

[Dr. Pannenkoek]

Although it's nice having a discussion here about various parts... but what is nicer is having parts which people think I'll actually need like exact makes of parts without saying stuff to me about your techy abbreviations which I won't understand (just imagine you're talking to a simpleton :3)

- Get a 2TB HDD and a small SSD for your OS (64GB or 80GB) (Crucial for example)

- Smaller PSU (500 - 550 Watt brand PSU is more than enough)

- If you don't want to overclock, you can also get a I5-2400. But it's your choice.

- The rest is fine.

No need to follow the "RAID discussion". It's stupid, unnecessary and uninteresting for you because you don't fucking need it. It's just something for enthusiasts who have lots of money and upgrading their PC every day.

Many thanks! I'll probably roll out the final specifications soon, but not very soon....but it should be compliant with the stuff you said :>

[bAsTiNaToR]

Dr.Pfannkuchen, could you post the website of the shop? I'd like to compare prices between Austria, Germany and UK. And sry for my posts which directed Rankana instead of you. I was a bit upset, but now I realised that I'm talking against a wall and that I should ignore his posts.

CPU's recommendation is very good, but you could swap your P67 board with a H67 board, because the Pxx series is made for overclocking and if you doesn't intend to do that, you can safe some money with a H67 board

Edited August 11, 2011 by bAsTiNaToR

[Dr. Pannenkoek]

Well, to be honest I only googled custom pc's and it was one of the first ones up....but anyway it's http://www.dinopc.com/default.asp, I have no idea if it's good or not

+it has dinosaurs.....NO WONDER I LIKED IT SO MUCH!

Edited August 11, 2011 by Dr. Pannenkoek

[bAsTiNaToR]

Well, a configuration with CarePileUp's stuff, a Z68 board (no H67 available), a Xigmatek Asgard as case (forgot to mention it) a 1 TB HDD and a 64gb Crucial SSD costs ~768 pounds (PC only). So you'd have enough money for a monitor, mouse etc. or a better CPU / GPU left. (I'd recommend to upgrade your GPU in ~2 years, because new graphics cards generations will become more powerfull and need less power for the equal performance you'd get right now)

Edit:

I'd also recommend you to take a look on other sites as well, because they can vary in their prices. (Buying all the components and put it together by yourself/your brother is the cheapest way and also ensures that you only buy quality components and not some cheap OEM stuff. (But it might take more time, because of the searching for prices and brands)

Edited August 11, 2011 by bAsTiNaToR

[Dr. Pannenkoek]

Okey, also on a side note, they responded to my email and it turns out that they are jsut used to calling it ATi and in regard to the ram they say they use Kingston or corsair if thats any consolation

[Darkstar]

Mkay, I have a list of the parts I'm going to be getting for Pannenkoek's PC, and I thought it'd be best to run it through here first to get opinions, bear in mind with the CPU he will not be OC'ing it so thats why I didnt go for the 2500K.

And also would a 3rd party cooler be needed, or just stick with the stock one?

https://docs.google....uthkey=CJ-KqtkN

[CarPileUp]

Mkay, I have a list of the parts I'm going to be getting for Pannenkoek's PC, and I thought it'd be best to run it through here first to get opinions, bear in mind with the CPU he will not be OC'ing it so thats why I didnt go for the 2500K.

And also would a 3rd party cooler be needed, or just stick with the stock one?

https://docs.google....uthkey=CJ-KqtkN

Pretty decent. But if he's not going to OC then he can also get the i5-2400 because it's cheaper and the performance is just about 2-3% lower. You won't see a difference.

http://www.computerbase.de/artikel/prozessoren/2011/test-intel-sandy-bridge/46/

Instead of a OCZ Vertex 2 you should get a Samsung SSD 470 64GB or a Crucial M4 64 GB. The vertex 2 has some issues.

650 Watt is also a bit high. Like I said 1000 times before, a decent 500 Watt PSU for this system is more than enough.

PSU: http://www.scan.co.uk/products/480w-psu-be-quiet-straight-power-e8-cm-bn161-modular-91eff-80-plus-silver-sli-crossfire-eps-12v-quie

SSD: http://www.scan.co.uk/products/64gb-crucial-realssd-m4-25-sata-6gb-s-ssd-mlc-flash-read-415mb-s-write-95mb-s

CPU: http://www.scan.co.uk/products/intel-core-i5-2400-s1155-sandy-bridge-quad-core-31ghz-gpu-850-mhz-6mb-cache-95w-retail

Mainboard: http://www.scan.co.uk/products/gigabyte-ga-ph67a-ud3-b3-intel-h67-s-1155-ddr3-sata-iii-6gb-s-raid-sata-pcie-20-%28x16%29-atx (Only get this mainboard if you don't want to overclock. Incase you want to get the i5-2500K you should get a mainboard with P67 or Z67 chip.)

Edit: You can also think about getting a HD6950. I mean you want to pay pretty much for your PC. So a HD6950 !2GB! (not 1GB version) would make more "sense" than a HD6870.

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/2gb-sapphire-hd-6950-dirt3-edition-pci-e-21-%28x16%29-5000mhz-gddr5-gpu-800mhz-1408-cores-dl-dvi-hdmi-dp

Edited August 30, 2011 by CarPileUp