New M-ATX Build

jozi

Friend has asked me to build him a pc. Got started with specing up last night and picking parts. Turns out he wants a smaller case than his current midi tower.

I'm not to familiar with m-atx mobo's so just picked on of reasonable value.

Main use will be gaming, he has a monitor already so no need for it, here's what we've come up with:

*Antec NSK3480-EC Micro ATX Tower, 92mm fans, 380W PSU
*Club3D Radeon HD 4870 1GB Which good 3rd party cooler would you recommend, keeping silence in mind
*Corsair Powersupply 650W Black Little bit over kill i think, i like the corsair psu's and they are pretty silent, would the 450watt model be enough? this ones cheaper than the 520watt model
*Crucial DDR2 PC6400 4096MB CL6, Kit w/two matched DDR2 PC6400 2GB CL6
*Intel Core™ 2 Duo E8200 2.66GHz Seemed like a good one, any point getting the quadcore? something else even? Will be looking for a good cooler as well for this.
*Logitech G15 Gaming Keyboard, Refresh, LCD, USB, US Layout
*Logitech G5 Laser Mouse 2007, USB
*MSI P7NGM Digital, GeForce 9300, m-ATX Socket-775 Not sure on this one, just stuck it in the list to have it
*OCZ Solid State Disk Core V2 , 30GB He wants a ssd for his windows partition, where are they cheaper?
*Samsung SpinPoint F1 1TB SATA2 32MB 7200RPM
*Sony NEC Optiarc DVD±RW burner AD-7200A, 20x, IDE, Black, bulk

All this comes in at 1133 (komplett), any cheaper is better off course and this is pretty much his budget. Where is cheapest to buy parts these days?

Could do with some direction as to what is a good mobo, cpu, ram combo and maybe the gfx althou from quickly checking a few reviews the ati is nearly as good as the latest nvidia.

Jozi

EDIT:
Upto date list:

*Antec NSK3480-EC Micro ATX Tower, 92mm fans, 380W PSU
*Asus P5E-VM SE SKT-775 MATX
*Intel Core 2 Duo E8200 Wolfdale Skt1775 1333FSB : BX80570E8200
*Thermalright Ultra-120 Extreme CPU-Cooler, Socket 775/AM2/939/940 Might change this depending on what the shop I order from has
*Corsair HX520W 520w Modular PSU
*GeIL 4gb Black Dragon DDR2 PC2-6400 (5-5-5-15) Dual Channel kit (2x2GB) - GB24GB6400C5DC
*Palit 1GB Radeon HD 4870 Sonic PCI-E 2.0
*Samsung Spin Point F1 1tb SATA2 7200rpm 32mb cache HD103UJ
*Samsung 32gb Sata2 SLC 2.5" Solid State Drive
*Sony NEC Optiarc AD-7200S DVD±RW/DL 20x6x20x8 S-ATA - Black OEM
*Nexus PWM Series 92x92x25mm Quiet Case Fan
*Nexus PWM Series 120x120x25 Quiet Case Fan
*Logitech G15 Keyboard
*Logitech G5 Laser Mouse
Total 945.00 GBP = 1,177.56 EUR excluding case and cpu cooler which is about the most he wants to pay, cooler is +/-50Euro, case 75Euro.

jozi

Changing the OCZ SSD to a Mtron one, much more expensive but after reading chosens review they seem to be the bees knee's!

TerrorFirmer

That case comes with a 380w psu, get the case by itself it's only 38 euro. 450w is not really enough but a 550w corsair would be OK. I'd get a gigabyte board instead of an msi one. They have good m-atx boards. 4870 is a solid choice, bit slower then the GTX280 at a way lower price. Here's what I went for, also built an matx machine:

http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.aspx?sku=341864

http://www.komplett.ie/k/ki.aspx?sku=341107

Sqaull20

I went with an Asus G31 board with mine, it overclocks great ( have e2180 running @ 3.0ghz on stock fan ) and cost me about €40.I also went for the very cool Aerocool M-40 case and paired them with a 8800gs and 4 gigs of cheap ddr2.

http://www.dabs.ie/productview.aspx?Quicklinx=57T6

http://www.dabs.ie/productview.aspx?Quicklinx=55XD

I wouldnt buy a quad or fancy dual myself, you can get a 2.5ghz E5200 for €64 and it will overclock well past 3.0ghz on the above board, you dont need anything more than at the moment and with Nehalem coming in a few weeks it would be foolish to spend big on a cpu imo.

I tried my mates ssd drive for a few evenings and they are only worth it unless you have money to burn and really really want that snappier feel.

Memory c have good deals for them.

http://www.memoryc.com/storage/solidstatedisk/30gboczcoreseriesv2ssdsataii.html

This is what I would get.

jozi

Thanks for the replys.

There's a few changes being made since the 1st post.

I think we're sticking with the antec case. I may suggest the gigabyte case to my mate. Couldn't find much on reviews about it, did find someone saying it's not a nice case to work on due to some panels not being removable. Those SFF cases are nice but they don't leave much room for anything inside, looks very very tight inside. Again i'll put it to my mate and see what he says.

I got recommended a Asus P5E-VM SE SKT-775 MATX motherboard paired with the above cpu as it won't break a sweat being clocked to a higher speed with stock cooler.

Also changing the gfx for different one, same spec just with different cooler and little cheaper.

The SSD has been changed to a Samsung one which was also recommended. I read the OCZ SSD's have problems with them hanging.

Changing the PSU to a 520watt modular model.

Think thats all, just have to find a place which is cheap and some good silent case fans.

EDIT:
Upto date list:

*Antec NSK3480-EC Micro ATX Tower, 92mm fans, 380W PSU
*Asus P5E-VM SE SKT-775 MATX
*Intel Core 2 Duo E8200 Wolfdale Skt1775 1333FSB : BX80570E8200
*Thermalright Ultra-120 Extreme CPU-Cooler, Socket 775/AM2/939/940 Might change this depending on what the shop I order from has
*Corsair HX520W 520w Modular PSU
*GeIL 4gb Black Dragon DDR2 PC2-6400 (5-5-5-15) Dual Channel kit (2x2GB) - GB24GB6400C5DC
*Palit 1GB Radeon HD 4870 Sonic PCI-E 2.0
*Samsung Spin Point F1 1tb SATA2 7200rpm 32mb cache HD103UJ
*Samsung 32gb Sata2 SLC 2.5" Solid State Drive
*Sony NEC Optiarc AD-7200S DVD±RW/DL 20x6x20x8 S-ATA - Black OEM
*Nexus PWM Series 92x92x25mm Quiet Case Fan
*Nexus PWM Series 120x120x25 Quiet Case Fan
*Logitech G15 Keyboard
*Logitech G5 Laser Mouse
Total 945.00 GBP = 1,177.56 EUR excluding case and cpu cooler which is about the most he wants to pay, cooler is +/-50Euro, case 75Euro.