New PC Build: €1,200 - €1,500

16shells

Howdy,
Set up a new account for this. I've had an account on Boards for years, but forgot the username after not logging in for a while... Anyway, your help would be appreciated:

1. What is your budget? [€1,200 - €1,500]

2. What will be the main purpose of the computer? Gaming (Assassin's Creed, Borderlands, Fallout Series, Skyrim and lots more..) HTPC - don't really know what this entails. I like to watch MKVs etc. Internet - don't fully understand this question - obviously I want to go on the net.

3. Do you need a copy of Windows? Yes - I've heard HardwareVersand will put on English Windows 8? I'd like that.

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

5. Do you need a monitor? No. I will use my Philips 42" LCD TV (42PFL3403D/12)

5b. If no, what resolution is your current monitor and do you plan to upgrade in the near future? Sorry haven't got a scooby Doo of resolution. No upgrade.

6. Do you need any of these peripherals? Keyboard - something jazzy might be nice. Wireless Card. Speakers - I want to use the TV as a speaker.

7. Are you willing to try overclocking? Don't know enough to answer. If build is in this price range is it necessary/advisable?

8. How can you pay? Credit Card. Number is.. just kidding.

9. When are you purchasing? In 10 days.

10. If you need help building it, where are you based? I think I would like to get HardwareVersand to assemble it.

From reading through the threads here, I see most people favour i5 over i7 - anybody disagree with that? I see that the builds generally include smaller Solid State Drives, which I assume they run games from. I've not used this yet, does it improve the experience? My friend, who actually knows something about computers, told me to ask what's the deal with VAT? Do you get 23% lumped on after?? Before browsing these threads I had planned to go with Nvidia, but now I mostly see Radeon here - especially HD7970 - are there any Nvidia proponents?
Anyway, I know that all replies are a gift here, so I will thank anyone who wants to chip in in advance. This is a great resource, so cheers to all.

marco_polo

HWVS tend to leave it VAT at 19% (included in prices) but I don't think it is guaranteed. Stuck in a pretty large 256 GB SSD do plenty of room for a good few games as well as regular programs and windows, definitely worth it on this budget because there really is few other places you could spend money to make this any better for gaming on a single HDTV, except on maybe a silent waterblock cooler for the CPU.

No reason not to overclock it is pretty easy on the i5-3570K and very safe if you are not messing with CPU voltages, which you should't do until you get more comfortable with the concept, so starting out a reasonably cheap air cooler should do the job for a reasonable overclock.

The i5 is the best choice for a purely gaming PC, there are no gaming benchmarks where the i7 bests it, unless you are doing other stuff like 3D graphics rendering or video editing.

Item|Price
MS Windows 8 64bit (SB-Version) Englisch|€85.31
FRACTAL DESIGN Define R4 Black Pearl|€97.00
Super-Flower SF550P14XE Golden Green Pro 80plus gold|€75.61
ASRock Z77 Extreme4, Sockel 1155, ATX|€123.89
8GB-Kit Corsair XMS3 PC3-12800U CL9|€40.40
Intel Core i5-3570K Box|€204.96
Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO - Intel/AMD|€29.36
Club 3D Radeon HD 7950 royalKing, 3GB GDDR5, AMD Radeon HD 7950, PCI- Express|€285.73
Crucial M4 256GB SSD 6,4cm (2,5")|€175.34
Toshiba DT01ACA Series 3TB, SATA 6Gb/s|€120.73
Samsung SH-224BB bare schwarz|€17.14
Shipping|€18.99
Total|€1.255.47

16shells

Thanks - If I move up to a 7970, will it make a difference? Also,which waterblock cooler would you recommend? Cheers.

marco_polo

16shells wrote: »

Thanks - If I move up to a 7970, will it make a difference? Also,which waterblock cooler would you recommend? Cheers.

Not a huge amount TBH the even at stock the HD7950 is already a overkill for 1080p, but it should last quite a long time:).

On top of that the Club3D is a decent overclocker as well, and has a very good cooler on it (At least one poster in the overclocking forum has got it to 1200MHz on the core no bother) which is in line with some excellent review results.

16shells

Hi!
Bought this; albeit with the 7970 and a different case, as the one mentioned was out of stock. Received it about 5 or six weeks ago. Things were going swimmingly, until it died. Was playing new Assassin's Creed - screen suddenly turns red and comp freezes. Had to force restart and after that it would try to boot for 4 seconds and die... continually. For fear of voiding warranty I could do nothing but look through the see-through plastic and at the back. After a week of nonsense, UPS collected it (lengthened by the HVS staffer telling me she had booked a collection, when she hadn't). Another week in transit to HVS. No word for 4 days after they received it. I rang (thankfully they didn't cut me off when I asked if they spoke English, as has already happened twice) - the staffer said the techs take two weeks to check the returns. I AM NOT HAPPY. I have a computer costing €1,500 for less than a month, then it takes at least a month to go through the nonsense of getting it looked at and (hopefully) returned. To ad to that my save game is stuck on it (how could I remove a save game from a dead comp without voiding the warranty?) This is not the way to do business. I have to say I am a little less thankful for the help I received on here now... Just kidding, but if I had just gone to Dell.....:rolleyes:

SpannerMonkey

feck dell they are only good for laptops
you should have built it yourself dude its seriously easy and youd probably be back up running again . i know everyone on here are fans of hardwareverand and they have good prices but twice ive bought from them and twice i have had problems , in fairness they did sort them out eventually but i stick to the UK now when buying stuff . haveing said that sometimes **** just happens , could have happened just as easily with a dell

BloodBath

16shells wrote: »

Hi!
Bought this; albeit with the 7970 and a different case, as the one mentioned was out of stock. Received it about 5 or six weeks ago. Things were going swimmingly, until it died. Was playing new Assassin's Creed - screen suddenly turns red and comp freezes. Had to force restart and after that it would try to boot for 4 seconds and die... continually. For fear of voiding warranty I could do nothing but look through the see-through plastic and at the back. After a week of nonsense, UPS collected it (lengthened by the HVS staffer telling me she had booked a collection, when she hadn't). Another week in transit to HVS. No word for 4 days after they received it. I rang (thankfully they didn't cut me off when I asked if they spoke English, as has already happened twice) - the staffer said the techs take two weeks to check the returns. I AM NOT HAPPY. I have a computer costing €1,500 for less than a month, then it takes at least a month to go through the nonsense of getting it looked at and (hopefully) returned. To ad to that my save game is stuck on it (how could I remove a save game from a dead comp without voiding the warranty?) This is not the way to do business. I have to say I am a little less thankful for the help I received on here now... Just kidding, but if I had just gone to Dell.....:rolleyes:

If you took the time to build it yourself and learn a little bit about what you are doing then you most likely wouldn't have ran into this problem in the first place. If you want a no frills trouble free gaming platform buy a console.

16shells

BloodBath wrote: »

If you took the time to build it yourself and learn a little bit about what you are doing then you most likely wouldn't have ran into this problem in the first place. If you want a no frills trouble free gaming platform buy a console.

Can't be arsed to build - when I learn new things it pushes out the old stuff - like the time I forgot how to drive after taking that wine-tasting course. My point was not to whinge, but to give a heads up to the many people who would be attracted by the cheap assembly option HVS provide. It sounds good, but as I found out, when your expensive rig dies after less than a month, you have no option but to send it on a holiday to Deutschland for another month. Boards comp building section often looks like an off-shoot of the HVS site and I have to say that after having followed the advice on here, I am not fully satisfied. But as the previous poster said **** happens. His advice was, at least a bit constructive - telling me to learn to build is kind of like someone asking for advice and being told 'this would never have happened if you were a better person'.

BloodBath

Can't be arsed to build - when I learn new things it pushes out the old stuff - like the time I forgot how to drive after taking that wine-tasting course

Haha ok then

Well that's the risk with ordering stuff from Germany but I always recommend people to take the time to build it themselves. It helps to learn and troubleshoot for problems like this and it means you only have to send 1 part back if it is a faulty part instead of the whole machine. It could even have been a very simple problem like a loose card.

Your post came off as ungrateful and whiney. It is as far as I'm concerned your fault for not taking the time to learn a bit more about what you are doing. People took the time from their day to share their knowledge with you and help you get a good deal. You would have spent €1000 more for a similar build from alienware.

16shells

Okay I agree. I hope people will see this though and realise what can happen as regards warranty if you order prebuilt. Computers going back and forward to Germany is way too slow. If I could open it without voiding, then the problem would probably be simply fixed. Just to put it straight, I am definitely grateful for replies on here and was mostly being whiney about UPS and HVS (being cut off and told of imaginary UPS pickups does that - along with four week turn-arounds..).

BloodBath

I understand your frustration but hwvs aren't trying to compete with Dell or their customer service. They just sell hardware and offer a basic build service.

It sucks but hopefully they sort it out fast for you and you don't run into any more problems.

16shells

Howdy!
Update here (in case anyone is interested)...
Got the whole kit and kaboodle back on Wednesday. Plugged her in and away we go - except not. Wouldn't communicate with screens through DVI or HDMI. Gave it to a friend and he found that it worked when the RADEON graphics card was removed, by using the other card on the motherboard. Got a different card and put it in RADEON's former slot and that too worked. So card must be faulty - dunno how it arrived that way... Anyway, sending it back (only graphics card this time). When it went first my big mistake was not finding the individual component and only sending that back. I was wrong in my assumption that I would void the warranty upon opening. You live and you learn.. I think it's a bad idea posting fully assembled computers though - either that or the HVS repairmen are a bunch of ******s.

BloodBath

Unlucky dude. The long ass delays must be killing you.

A bit unusual to receive a totally dead card but theses things happen I guess.

Shipping built machines with couriers is the main issue. One good bang could easily damage anything.

Did hwvs say they found any problems the first time? It's unusual that it's still not working. They must have tested it.

16shells

They didn't contact me at all - I eventually rang and they said it was on its way back to me. I asked for a tracking number and they didn't have one - bit random if you ask me. When the machine came back it wasn't doing the same thing as before though, so I know they didn't just send it straight back or anything - they didn't email me or leave a note as to what repairs were made. Originally it was continuously restarting, whereas this time it ran, but wouldn't show up on the screen.

The Splat

16shells wrote: »

They didn't contact me at all - I eventually rang and they said it was on its way back to me. I asked for a tracking number and they didn't have one - bit random if you ask me. When the machine came back it wasn't doing the same thing as before though, so I know they didn't just send it straight back or anything - they didn't email me or leave a note as to what repairs were made. Originally it was continuously restarting, whereas this time it ran, but wouldn't show up on the screen.

The card probably fried.