Gaming Build & HD Video Editing

TheTacticsGuy

This build will be used for mainly hardcore gaming and HD video editing.

1. What is your budget?
Can't stretch beyond €800

2. What will be the main purpose of the computer?
Gaming e.g. Skyrim, Witcher 2, BF3, Diablo 3 & some MMO's. Adobe Photoshop, Sony Vegas and lots of web surfing + basis for a HTPC. Definitely want to be able to play games on high settings and decent FPS (40+).

3. Do you need a copy of Windows?
No

4. Can you use any parts from an old computer?
No

5. Do you need a monitor?
No. I have an LED LG 32" Full HD TV that I will use.

6. Do you need any of these peripherals?
A wireless card for now. Will need to update speakers at some stage but not now.

7. Are you willing to try overclocking?
Will probably try it.

8. How can you pay?
Flexible.

9. When are you purchasing?
ASAP

10. If you need help building it, where are you based?
N/A

Markd250

Ok, stretching things a little here, but there's a sweet GPU in this build!

Item|Price
Intel Core i5-2500K Box, LGA1155|€187.99
ASRock Z68 Pro3 Gen3, Sockel 1155, ATX|€81.59
Super-Flower Amazon 80Plus 550W|€56.47
Samsung SH-D163C SATA schwarz|€12.42
LogiLink Wireless LAN 300 Mbps PCI Karte 802.11n 2T2R|€16.42
Sapphire HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5 PCI-Express|€308.28
BitFenix Merc Beta|€31.61
Samsung SpinPoint F3 1000GB, SATA II (HD103SJ)|€104.87


The guts of this build are pretty strong, I think - the 2500K is the most recommended current CPU for gaming, and that 7870 is a beast of a card that will see you right for a good while.

The CPU comes with a stock cooler. If you want to overclock (and you should with that chip), it's worth spending €25 on an aftermarket cooler. You probably don't need it now, and you can always install one in a few months time.

I couldn't squeeze an SSD into that budget with a storage drive, I'm afraid. If you have any hard drives at home that you could use, I'd put a Crucial M4 128gb in - it costs about the same as that 1tb samsung drive.

Enjoy!

Craig B

Markd250 wrote: »

Ok, stretching things a little here, but there's a sweet GPU in this build!

Item|Price
Intel Core i5-2500K Box, LGA1155|€187.99
ASRock Z68 Pro3 Gen3, Sockel 1155, ATX|€81.59
Super-Flower Amazon 80Plus 550W|€56.47
Samsung SH-D163C SATA schwarz|€12.42
LogiLink Wireless LAN 300 Mbps PCI Karte 802.11n 2T2R|€16.42
Sapphire HD 7870 OC 2GB GDDR5 PCI-Express|€308.28
BitFenix Merc Beta|€31.61
Samsung SpinPoint F3 1000GB, SATA II (HD103SJ)|€104.87


The guts of this build are pretty strong, I think - the 2500K is the most recommended current CPU for gaming, and that 7870 is a beast of a card that will see you right for a good while.

The CPU comes with a stock cooler. If you want to overclock (and you should with that chip), it's worth spending €25 on an aftermarket cooler. You probably don't need it now, and you can always install one in a few months time.

I couldn't squeeze an SSD into that budget with a storage drive, I'm afraid. If you have any hard drives at home that you could use, I'd put a Crucial M4 128gb in - it costs about the same as that 1tb samsung drive.

Enjoy!

Would you not be better off cutting back on the GPU as RPG's are more CPU intensive and then getting an i7 2600k as that will be better for RPG's and HD Video Editing because of the hyperthreading tech


EDIT
And it looks like you forgot RAM, I suggest this but you can upgrade to 16GB in the future..

Skylinehead

Craig B wrote: »

Would you not be better off cutting back on the GPU as RPG's are more CPU intensive and then getting an i7 2600k as that will be better for RPG's and HD Video Editing because of the hyperthreading tech


EDIT
And it looks like you forgot RAM, I suggest this but you can upgrade to 16GB in the future..

He didn't specifically mention RPGs, he also quoted BF3, which does benefit from a good GPU.

Craig B

Skylinehead wrote: »

He didn't specifically mention RPGs, he also quoted BF3, which does benefit from a good GPU.

Yeah but that is a bit overkill, would you not be better off downgrading?

And I thought it said RPG as I was just browsing other threads :P

Markd250

Re: RAM, whoops!!

As for the CPU - the difference between the i5 and i7 is hyperthreading, which allows 2 virtual cores to run from each physical core. Makes no odds in gaming performance, actually the i5 performs better in some benchmarks.

And the GPU - yes you could pay less for a card with less grunt, but that is a great card for the money and will last a couple of years at least.

I'll edit the build above to put the RAM in.

Markd250

Actually OP you specify HD video editing as one of the purposes of the machine. If you're doing a lot of that the i7-2600K is a bit better. It's a hundred quid more expensive though!

There's always something to push the price up...

Craig B

Markd250 wrote: »

Actually OP you specify HD video editing as one of the purposes of the machine. If you're doing a lot of that the i7-2600K is a bit better. It's a hundred quid more expensive though!

There's always something to push the price up...

Thats why I asaid cut back on the GPU

Markd250

Heh - point taken! :P

Ok, here's an alternative:

Item|Price
ASRock Z68 Pro3 Gen3, Sockel 1155, ATX|€81.59
Super-Flower Amazon 80Plus 550W|€56.47
Samsung SH-D163C SATA schwarz|€12.42
LogiLink Wireless LAN 300 Mbps PCI Karte 802.11n 2T2R|€16.42
BitFenix Merc Beta|€31.61
Samsung SpinPoint F3 1000GB, SATA II (HD103SJ)|€104.87
Intel Core i7-2600K Box, LGA1155|€261.99
Club 3D Radeon HD 7850, 2048MB GDDR5, AMD Radeon HD 7850, PCI- Express|€218.20
8GB-Kit G.Skill PC3-10667U CL9|€32.50


This time with RAM! Bear in mind, there's €19 delivery on top of that.

That processor will help with well threaded applications, such as video editing software. As I said above though, makes very little difference in gaming terms.

The 7850 is definitely a lesser card, but should still allow you to play new games at close to max settings at 1080p (BF3 being the only real exception).

There's no real difference between the RAM I chose and the sticks Craig chose - though his do look nicer.

Thoughts?

Craig B

Markd250 wrote: »

Heh - point taken! :P

Ok, here's an alternative:

Item|Price
ASRock Z68 Pro3 Gen3, Sockel 1155, ATX|€81.59
Super-Flower Amazon 80Plus 550W|€56.47
Samsung SH-D163C SATA schwarz|€12.42
LogiLink Wireless LAN 300 Mbps PCI Karte 802.11n 2T2R|€16.42
BitFenix Merc Beta|€31.61
Samsung SpinPoint F3 1000GB, SATA II (HD103SJ)|€104.87
Intel Core i7-2600K Box, LGA1155|€261.99
Club 3D Radeon HD 7850, 2048MB GDDR5, AMD Radeon HD 7850, PCI- Express|€218.20
8GB-Kit G.Skill PC3-10667U CL9|€32.50


This time with RAM! Bear in mind, there's €19 delivery on top of that.

That processor will help with well threaded applications, such as video editing software. As I said above though, makes very little difference in gaming terms.

The 7850 is definitely a lesser card, but should still allow you to play new games at close to max settings at 1080p (BF3 being the only real exception).

There's no real difference between the RAM I chose and the sticks Craig chose - though his do look nicer.

Thoughts?

Pretty solid rig, the reason I picked that RAM is that I'm getting it in my gaming build but your RAM is better as the fiver will impact the shipping,

TheTacticsGuy

Thanks for the replies guys. My current PC is an intel core 2 vPRo. To generate a 10 minute HD gaming video takes roughly between 35-40 mins and if I even thought about opening another instance of Vegas it would completely crash.

The build I'm looking for is mainly gaming but I will be generating/editing HD videos with hope of reducing the time to around 10 mins and working away on some other video while the HD content is being created. So again its mainly a gaming rig.

Markd250

I haven't much experience in video editing, so perhaps someone else might advise you further on that, but I'd expect that the i5 should pull its weight there too.

If it were me, if be going for the i5 build, but that would be for gaming performance!

Craig B

If the editing isnt main go with the i5 build,
If editing is a MUST and I mean you NEED to be doing it QUICKLY then go for the i7.

i5 will pull its weight for editing but the i7 is designed for it.
I'll link some bench-marks if I remember to
And aswell for editing later on you might want to double the RAM as it helps in editing but not in gaming

EDIT
Benchmarks here

Markd250

Your move OP!

TheTacticsGuy

The video editing isn't as high a priority as gaming with high settings and great FPS. So it looks like the i5.