New Gaming PC [€750]

ZeitgeistGlee

1. What is your budget? €750 (Can stretch to €800 if there'd be a reasonable improvement).

2. What will be the main purpose of the computer? Gaming. Skyrim, Rome II, Civ 5, etc.

3. Do you need a copy of Windows? No.

4. Can you use any parts from an old computer? 2TB Seagate hard-drive.

5. Do you need a monitor? No. (Bought a Dell UltraSharp U2312HM a few months back.)

6. Do you need any of these peripherals? Wireless Card, keyboard & mouse (preferably a silent keyboard).

7. Are you willing to try overclocking? Haven't done it before but yes.

8. How can you pay? Laser/Credit Card/Bank Transfer

9. When are you purchasing? Within the next two weeks.

10. If you need help building it, where are you based? Clonmel, Tipperary.

Xenoronin

Item|Price
WD Caviar Blue 1TB 6Gb's|€56.69
Intel Core i5-3570K Box, LGA1155|€200.84
be quiet! PURE POWER L8 500W|€56.72
BitFenix Shinobi Midi-Tower USB 3.0 black, ohne Netzteil|€54.07
ASUS GTX660 Ti-DC2O-2GD5, GeForce GTX 660 Ti, 2048MB DDR5|€209.00
ASRock Z77 Pro3, Sockel 1155, ATX|€81.89
8GB-Kit Kingston HyperX blu.XMP PC3-12800U CL9-9-9-27|€60.52
ASUS PCE-N15|€14.90
Sharkoon Drakonia Gaming Laser Mouse|€24.71
Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO - Intel/AMD|€28.66
Shipping|€18.99
Total|€806.99

Good base to work off anyway. If you want to get the price down use this site.
http://geizhals.de/
It is a price comparison website. Clear your basket on hardwareversand, type the name of the item you want to compare e.g. AsRock Z77 Pro3. Check the list for hardwareversand. Click it. Add to basket. Rinse and repeat for all items you want to buy. Only do this just before ordering.

Alternatives to consider: Get the graphics card from overclockers.co.uk when they are doing a deal. Should work out cheaper and you can get a better card such as a GTX 760.
Get wall power plugs to set up a LAN using the powerlines in your house rather than wireless.
Don't buy a keyboard from germany. They use a different keyboard layout. If you want a silent keyboard, avoid a mechanical keyboard (though some are silent rather than clicky depending on the switch used). Maybe look at a low profile keyboard such as the Lycosa or Deathstalker.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Razer-Deathstalker-Expert-Gaming-Keyboard/dp/B00AU2SFCS/ref=sr_1_13?ie=UTF8&qid=1377366137&sr=8-13&keywords=deathadder
Can cheap out a little on the processor by downgrading to a 8350 or 6300 AMD processor. Very good bang for your buck but at the cost of performance compared to the intel offering. Still good processors if you do go that route though.

ZeitgeistGlee

Cheers for the build Xeno, forgot to say I'll be transferring my storage drive from my current computer (2TB Seagate) so I'd like to use an SSD for the OS drive.

Also would there be any benefit to going higher than 8GB of RAM?

Xenoronin

Not unless you do video editing in your spare time.
http://www.hardwareversand.de/Solid-State-Disk/85975/Samsung+SSD+840+EVO+Basic+120GB+SATA+6Gb+s.article
http://www.hardwareversand.de/Solid-State-Disk/67795/Samsung+SSD+840+120GB+SATA+6Gb+s.article

These are two options. There are other options but I prefer the samsung models over anything else out there. The EVO is a newer model and that's reflected in the price.

RossieMan

Is HWV not taken down from geizhals?

Xenoronin

http://geizhals.de/asrock-z77-pro3-90-mxgm00-aouayz-a756265.html

Proof it's still there anyway. Used it last month.

RossieMan

Xenoronin wrote: »

http://geizhals.de/asrock-z77-pro3-90-mxgm00-aouayz-a756265.html

Proof it's still there anyway. Used it last month.

oh, must use it next time i'm ordering.

was sure it was taken down last month, obviously back up again.

Roy Rogers

Just wanted to say thanks for the Geizhals link... ordering a new build this week and this'll save me €20-30!

Lu Tze

Roy Rogers wrote: »

Just wanted to say thanks for the Geizhals link... ordering a new build this week and this'll save me €20-30!

No it wont, you will just end up spending €20-30 more on the case/gpu/motherboard/fans/speakers/peripherals (delete as appropriate!)!

Roy Rogers

I'm sure I don't know what you mean

ZeitgeistGlee

How much of a downgrade would I be looking at if I decreased my budget to 700? Might have to curtail my budget somewhat.

BloodBath

Not much. Go with an fx 6300 processor and an Asrock 970 Extreme 3 board and you will get identical performance in 95% of games.

Keep the 212 evo.

I'd go with a Cooltek Antiphon over the Shinobi case as well.

ZeitgeistGlee

BloodBath wrote: »

I'd go with a Cooltek Antiphon over the Shinobi case as well.

How come if you don't mind explaining?

Also could you explain the difference between this processor and this processor. It looks like the former can be overclocked and the latter cannot?

BloodBath

It's a better case for the money. It has rubber lined door panels to reduce noise and comes with 3 stock fans compared to the 1 in the shinobi. The only downside is only 2 front usbs to the 4 on the shinobi. If you prefer the Shinobi just grab a couple of extra fans.

One comes with a stock cooler and the other does not. I'd get the one with the cooler. It's handy if you want to sell it on but keep the 212.

ZeitgeistGlee

BloodBath wrote: »

It's a better case for the money. It has rubber lined door panels to reduce noise and comes with 3 stock fans compared to the 1 in the shinobi. The only downside is only 2 front usbs to the 4 on the shinobi. If you prefer the Shinobi just grab a couple of extra fans.

Not really that fussed about the front USBs, only thing I use them for is my headset and the occasional flash drive. Silver one looks rather nice but it doesn't have an available date.

BloodBath wrote: »

One comes with a stock cooler and the other does not. I'd get the one with the cooler. It's handy if you want to sell it on but keep the 212.

Heh which one has the cooler?

Done up a build based on the cheaper budget, would appreciate any feedback you could provide.

Item|Price
Samsung SSD 840 EVO Basic 250GB SATA 6Gb/s|€152.81
AMD FX-6300 Prozessor, Tray, Sockel AM3+|€94.61
be quiet! PURE POWER L8 500W|€56.81
Cooltek Antiphon Silver, ohne Netzteil|€65.00
ASRock 970 Extreme4, AM3+, ATX|€78.34
8GB-Kit Kingston HyperX blu.XMP PC3-12800U CL9-9-9-27|€59.63
Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO - Intel/AMD|€30.47
Total|€537.67

Haven't included shipping or a graphics card yet. What would the AMD equivalent to the GTX660 Ti or is there any advantage to moving to an AMD card on an AMD mobo? Also took out the mouse and wireless card, can reuse my old stuff and the wireless adapter for the time being

[Edit] Saw this SAPPHIRE 7950 in the bargains thread, would it be an improvement over the 660 TI?

BloodBath

The boxed one comes with the cooler.

The 7950 is a better card for sure. That's a great deal as well and the Sapphire dual-x cooler is pretty good so it should overclock a fair bit.

I'd stick in a couple of extra 120mm fans to improve case airflow for overclocking. The one downside of the antiphon is poor enough stock cooling performance but most cases suffer from this. You can add another intake to the bottom and exhaust in the top.

ZeitgeistGlee

Cool, I'll probably order the lot in the morning then (pay day tomorrow ). What are HWS like for building? Noticed they'd reduced the price down to a €5 and figured it might be worth saving hassle if I just have to install the graphics card. Would it have any effect on potential issues/damage in transit?

Is there a particular fan/exhaust you'd recommend? Or would it be worth maybe spending a bit more and getting a case more suited to overclocked hardware?

ZeitgeistGlee

Just put the order through, the Cooltek was out of stock so I decided to go with the Nanoxia Deep Silence 2 after a bit of research (like minimalistic looking cases). Figured it getting it built was worth a €5, not really sure about the TrustedShops Guarantee but for €3 it seemed worth a punt too.



Stuck in a bit of a quandary regarding the graphics card though, would this be worth the extra €20 over this? So far as I can see there's only the "Vapor-X" in the difference, they've both got the Boost.

Thanks for all the help though guys.

BloodBath

It's a slightly better cooler. Not worth €20 more imo.

ZeitgeistGlee

Just realised I forgot to add a DVD drive. :facepalm Is there a way to edit the order and add it?

BloodBath wrote: »

It's a slightly better cooler. Not worth €20 more imo.

OK, cheers mate.

BloodBath

You might as well just grab one on Amazon or somewhere else like dabs.ie.

ZeitgeistGlee

Sent them an email asking for the order to be amended to include this DVD drive, haven't put through the money order yet so if worst comes to worst I can always just cancel the order and put it through again with it this time.

Heh feel like a right gowl to have poxed this up this close to the finish line. ^_^;

ZeitgeistGlee

Got my email this morning confirming payment and shipping, haven't been this excited for a delivery since my last PC.

Slight downer though, my order from Pixmania seems to be stuck at pending. Payment went through fine and it was validated when I checked Monday morning but since then it's just sat there. Is this normal?

rob_itb

check if the part you ordered is in stock?

ZeitgeistGlee

The difference an hour can make, just came back from lunch and it's been dispatched. Should have everything by Friday then fingers crossed.

ZeitgeistGlee

Unfortunate update.