Building a gaming PC

[Pete10141748]

Hey, not sure if this should be here or in the gaming section, but it is a "how do i?..." type question!

 

I am looking into building my first gaming rig, and frankly there are so many different makes & model numbers of hardware out there that it's making my head hurt a bit!

 

So I wondered if any veterens here would look over my spec here and see if a) I've made any obvious mistakes, b) anything that could be improved for a reasonable cost, and c) if this will cope well enough with titles due to be released now/near future ie Diablo III, Modern Warfare/Battlefield etc or am I going to be needing to upgrade something very soon?

 

Much thanks!

 

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PC Components

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Case & Power/ Fans: Galaxy III Black/blue with 750W (or 850W?) power supply, extra fans etc. Approx. £30

 

CPU: Intel i7 2600k (8M, 3.4) £190

 

Motherboard: Asus P8Z77-M £69

 

RAM: 8Gb (4x2Gb) £33

 

Graphics: nVIDIA GTX560 £115

 

 

Extra 'standard' bits like HDD, media drive, wireless/ethernet etc. I am OK with.

 

Any thoughts or opinions appreciated!

 

Cheers.

[LosOjos]

General advice from me - don't buy that case a PSU; buy the best case and PSU you can afford - the PSU is vital, you really don't want to skimp on that, and a good case will make assembly and future upgrades easier, as well as have good air flow.

 

Spend as much as you can afford to on the graphics card (obviously back this up with reviews, slightly cheaper doesn't necessarily mean worse, £50+ cheaper probably does), it'll have a much larger impact £ for £ than the processor in a gaming rig

[Valentine]

I would always recommend buying a PSU from a well known manufacturor, badly made ones can be a real problem further down the line.

No need to get an I7 for gaming, there is virtually nothing that will use the extra cores so stick with an I5. You can also get Ivy Bridge CPUs now (3xxx rather than 2xxx), at first look i think the motherboard you linked supports them.

RAM - Get 2x4gb rather than 4x2gb, leaves room for expansion.

Graphics is fine, thats just where to chuck the extra money to reach your budget so if you can afford a better one then do it. It will run the games listed perfectly well.

 

Assuming I am allowed to post links to other forums have a look at OcUK Full Systems & Bundles - Overclockers UK Forums as every day there will be a "i have £xxx money to spend, make me a good PC" post

[sonofsanta]

Firstly, i7 is probably overkill. The i5 3570K is all the processor you would ever need, and in all honesty you could probably get away with an i3 for most games. It's also the newer Ivy Bridge processor, where the i7-2600K is last gen, so the newer processor uses less power. Saying that, it's a good price on that i7...

 

The 560 is a decent card, but the 560Ti is better. If you're not desperate to build this, nVidia are in the middle of replacing their line up with the 600 series so there'll either be a 600 coming out, or the prices on the 500-series will drop.

 

Motherboard is good (Asus are brilliant), 8gb of RAM is plenty (and Patriot are decent, AFAIK).

 

The only thing I would say is - I wouldn't trust that PSU to run my kettle, let alone my PC. You cannot, cannot, cannot cheap out on your PSU. If that goes bang, everything could get fried, and cheap power supplies are cheap for a reason. Corsair and Antec are, generally speaking, the better PSUs at a reasonable price (others vary by model). If you can find a review of a PSU on jonnyguru.com, that's about the best opinion around. You want something around 550W going by the numbers spat out @ eXtreme Outer Vision - eXtreme tools for computer enthusiasts (with full capcacitor aging on so you can run it for a good long while) - just make sure it has 2 x 6pin PCI-E power connecters for the 560/560ti. This unit was the first decent one sorting by price at eBuyer.

 

Case is personal preference and you can spend loads on them, but this is damn good for £25 if you're not too fussy.

 

You might also want to consider an SSD, 128gb Crucial m4's are down to £90 on eBuyer, well worth the investment - so long as you have a secondary hard drive for games you don't play frequently.

 

 

In summary: spec is plenty good enough, consider a slight bump up to the 560ti if you can, but for the love of God get a better PSU. No point in risking hundreds of pounds worth of components for the sake of a few quid saved on a crappy power supply. Seriously. Don't do it.

 

EDIT: as others have said, get 2 x 4gb, not 4 x 2gb. No difference in price.

Edited May 14, 2012 by sonofsanta

[Pete10141748]

Thanks for the speedy responses! I will take them on board for sure.

 

I didnt have my heart set in anything so changes for the better are fine with me, I'd seen the 560Ti around so will look more into that, and thanks for the link to the PSU that looks great to me

[gshaw]

Thanks for the speedy responses! I will take them on board for sure.

 

I didnt have my heart set in anything so changes for the better are fine with me, I'd seen the 560Ti around so will look more into that, and thanks for the link to the PSU that looks great to me

 

 

- quality case with good cable routing and airflow

- quality branded PSU... can't go wrong with Corsair

- branded memory Corsair etc

- 560Ti or newer, preferably a factory overclocked edition

- i5 2500k with aftermarket cooler

- Intel or Crucial M4 SSD

- Samsung HDD

- any motherboard except ASUS

 

I like the MSI I have in mine, solid and good value. Get a copy of Custom PC mag as their hot lists are pretty much on the money imo.

[Arthur]

@sonofsanta is spot on with his recommendations. Just to add to what he said...

 

RAM: For third-gen Intel Core processors (Ivy Bridge) you should get 1.35v/1.5v 1,600MHz DDR3 RAM. Avoid 1,333MHz (or > 1,600MHz) RAM and DIMMs with ridiculously tall heatspreaders - they just get in the way of larger CPU heatsinks and are purely for looks.

Motherboard: Z77 or Z68 chipset, 20-pin USB 3.0 header, plenty of PCI Express slots. Asus have the best UEFI BIOS, fan control options and their Z77 motherboards have a very unique feature no other manufacturer has (T-Top).

PSU: Choose a power supply somewhere in the ~400-600 watt range from a reliable make such as Seasonic or Corsair. PSUs are generally most efficient at around half their rated load so don't go OTT and buy a 700-1000 watt power supply, because a modern PC won't use anywhere near that amount of power. Modular PSUs will reduce the number of cables inside the case since you only need to connect the ones you require.

Case: As already mentioned, good airflow and cable routing are essential. Front or top mounted USB 3.0 ports are very useful too.

 

Here are a few suggestions...

 

Processor - K models are overclockable, but require a Z68/P77 motherboard

Intel Core i5-3550 (£159.80)

Intel Core i5-3570K (£172.98)

 

Motherboard - Gigabyte and MSI motherboards aren't as good as Asus

Asus P8Z77-M (£88.52)

Asus P8Z77-M Pro (£114.92)

Asus Maximus V Gene (£150.92)

 

RAM

8GB (2x4GB) Corsair XMS3 1.5v 1,600MHz DDR3 (£34.89)

8GB (2x4GB) Corsair Vengeance LP 1.5v 1,600MHz DDR3 (£39.36)

8GB (2x4GB) Corsair Vengeance LP 1.35v 1,600MHz DDR3 Arctic White (£41.98)

8GB (2x4GB) Samsung Green 1,600MHz DDR3 (£55.99) - Overclockable to 2,400MHz!!!

 

Heatsink/Fan (for CPU)

Cooler Master Hyper 212 Evo (£25.18)

Corsair A50 (£26.99)

Thermalright Ultra 120 eXtreme (£34.74)

Thermalright HR-02 Macho inc. 140mm fan (£39.22)

 

Additional Fans (if required)

Scythe Kaze Jyuni (£9.18)

Thermalright TY-140 (£9.44)

DeepCool UF-120 (£9.72) or DeepCool UF-140 (£12.78)

Scythe Gentle Typhoon (£11.98)

 

Graphics

nVidia GeForce 560 Ti (448 Cores) e.g. MSI Twin Frozr III/OC (£179.47)

 

PSU - Avoid Coolermaster and OCZ. Too noisy!

Corsair CX-430 v2 (£36.52) or Corsair CX500 v2 (£44.87)

Antec High Current Gamer 520w (£58.24)

Corsair AX-650 (£108.78)

Seasonic X-560KM 90% efficient (£107.47)

Seasonic X-460FL 90% efficient fanless (£116.95)

 

Case

Fractal Design Core 3000 (£49.49)

Fractal Design Arc Mini (£58.78)

Fractal Define Mini (£71.18)

Silverstone TJ08B-E (£82.80)

Antec Solo II (£89.92)

Corsair Obsidian 550D (£109.86)

Corsair Obsidian 650D (£136.38)

Corsair Graphite 600T White (£137.98)

 

SSD - Avoid OCZ SSDs!

Crucial M4 (£88.94 for 128GB, £177.90 for 256GB)

Samsung 830 (£97.34 for 128GB, £199.50 for 256GB)

Intel 330 Series (£104.54 for 120GB, £167.02 for 180GB)

Intel 320 Series (£147.74 for 120GB, £172 for 160GB) - 5 year warranty

Plextor M3 Pro (£140.54 for 128GB, £263.10 for 256GB) - 5 year warranty

 

HDD

2TB Seagate Barracuda 7200.14 / ST2000DM001 7,200rpm (£84.65)

2TB Hitachi Deskstar 7K3000 7,200rpm (£111.84)

Edited May 14, 2012 by Arthur

[gshaw]

For heatsink also consider the Be Quiet Dark Rock Advanced or Xigmatek Aegir. Personally I'd go for the Xigmatek, really impressed with mine and installation was a doddle, some of the aftermarket coolers have nightmare fiddly clip mechanisms when installing!

[sonofsanta]

Started ordering componants for my new gaming PC.

Nothing to do with work, but still cool nonetheless!

 

Go on then, which bits did you pick in the end?

 

/component voyeur

[Pete10141748]

So far I've ordered;

 

8GB (2x4GB) Corsair XMS3 1.5v 1,600MHz DDR3 RAM

Corsair TX650W PSU

Standard Sony 24x DVD RW optical drive (no need for anything fancy)

Standard b/g/n wireless PCI card

This case (May not be amazing but it'll do for now)

Thrown in some extra fans for good measure

 

 

Later today when I have time to shop around some more for the best deal I'll be looking to order the more expensive parts;

Intel i5-3550 Quad-core 3.3Ghz 6Mb cache

nVIDIA GeForce GTX560 Ti 1Gb (2 DVI, 1 HDMI, 1 VGA)

Asus P8Z77-M motherboard

 

Think I'll also pick up one of the Corsair A50 heatsinks too.

 

My budget will be all but gone once I order that little lot so for now I may just use my existing PC's 500Gb HDD to get things up & running and then treat myself to a 1Tb (possibly 2Tb) HDD next payday.

[sonofsanta]

Looking good, good choice on the PSU, thankfully

 

Regarding the processor - the i5-3570K (i.e. the easy to overclock one) is about £7 more than the 3550, you may as well get it. The overclocking process goes something along the lines of

1) Increase multiplier

2) Run Super Pi to test stability

3) Repeat until you've hit your limit (or start increasing voltage if you can be bothered)

so it's straightforward enough for a 12 year old to do. And if you have a decent heatsink on it, you may as well - no point in the aftermarket heatsink if you're not going to push the processor, after all.

 

 

Also: stuff the HDD in a month, get an SSD and just shuffle your game installs around as necessary to make the most of the space.

[mrbios]

Regarding graphics cards: **B Grade** Gigabyte GeForce GTX 560Ti SUPER OC 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card []

 

Bargain. EDIT: just to reassure, B grade just means someone may have had it, opened it and returned it under DSR, but they're still tested as fully working. and as others have said, get an SSD at least for windows, it makes a terrific different, something like a crucial M4 drive would do you tell, even if it's jsut a 64gb one.

 

On another note, took delivery of a Gigabyte Windforce 3X GTX670 an hour

Edited May 16, 2012 by mrbios

[Mako]

Also: stuff the HDD in a month, get an SSD and just shuffle your game installs around as necessary to make the most of the space.

 

Or do what I did and buy a small SSD and a duplicate of the original. Install your OS on the SSD, and the OS alone. Stick the other two drives in a RAID-0 and iInstall -all- applications to the RAID. Leave as little junk on the OS drive as possible and watch your machine boot in 25-or-less seconds, and watch your games load with breakneck speeds.

 

My games are backed up to a third drive I found lying around, so if the RAID fails I can just reinstall Steam games from there. I'll never look back after having an SSD.

 

See my sig for my components.

[Pete10141748]

@sonofsanta Cheers for the heads-up about the 3570k, for the sake of £7 I shall get that one instead!

@mrbios Thanks a lot for the link to the discounted card, that'll help me a lot - have purchased it now along with the Asus motherboard too

 

 

I'll take a look at the SSD options again, if it's really worth doing. Maybe just a small one for the OS and then a RAID arrangement as Mako suggest.

 

 

Thanks for all the advice guys, you rock

[sonofsanta]

@sonofsanta Cheers for the heads-up about the 3570k, for the sake of £7 I shall get that one instead!

@mrbios Thanks a lot for the link to the discounted card, that'll help me a lot - have purchased it now along with the Asus motherboard too

 

 

I'll take a look at the SSD options again, if it's really worth doing. Maybe just a small one for the OS and then a RAID arrangement as Mako suggest.

 

 

Thanks for all the advice guys, you rock

 

Really really really worth doing. SSDs are amazing. Once you have one, you too will be indoctrinated into the cult and be recommending them to everyone you can.

 

Short and entertaining summary of the state of the SSD market: Hard choices: SSDs | Rock, Paper, Shotgun

Your best bet regards value will probably be the Crucial m4, the 128Gb models are down at £90 now which is superb value. Worth noting that a 128gb SSD will outperform a 64gb SSD as well as it has more memory chips to access in parallel - so you don't just get more capacity, but more performance as well.

[SHimmer45]

had an OCZ Oynx 64GB boot drive for a while now and havent noticed any issues with it

[LosOjos]

Don't think you're going to beat this SSD in terms of value for money right now: Kingston 120GB V+200 SSD - £69.99 @ eBuyer

[Pete10141748]

Payday is here!

 

Treated myself to a Corsair 120Gb SSD (on offer for £30 cheaper this week) and the Intel i5-3570k (£6 off, lol).

Bought both from Overclockers, they were slightly cheaper elsewhere but their service has been so good I'm happy to give them my business.

 

Still waiting on the RAM & PSU to arrive, then I can get building!

[Pete10141748]

Finished building this now, and wow, I can't believe how much difference it makes having an SSD drive.

Everything at work seems really slow now

 

Big thanks to everyone how contributed to this thread, you guys helped me out a lot!

[sonofsanta]

S'alright, I'm only living vicariously through your disposable cash anyway.

 

Let us know how it goes when you load your first game up... I'm almost tempted to ask you to use a webcam to record a reaction video first time you run something like The Witcher 2 or Battlefield 3, but that'd be creepy on every count

[Pete10141748]

lol I've ordered Skyrim as my first game, should come in the mail tomorrow (was going to get it via Steam but it was much cheaper from Gamestation, and comes with the free guide too, which I dont need as I've already had it for Xbox but it's a nice thing to have anyway!).

 

I haven't got a *really* good screen yet though, that'll be next month. For now I'm using a 19" tv via HDMI, but really at 1080p level it's quite crappy to look at (text almost unreadable) so sticking with 720p for now. Still looks nice though.

[Mako]

lol I've ordered Skyrim as my first game

 

I hope you have fulfilled what you wished to during your life, for now there is no return.

 

My thoughts and prayers are with your family at this time.

[chazzy2501]

can't wait for Skyrim 2

 

 

 

[Pete10141748]

I hope you have fulfilled what you wished to during your life, for now there is no return.

 

My thoughts and prayers are with your family at this time.

 

I've already put abot 150 hours into the Xbox360 version, so my OH is already well-perpared. Plus she's engrossed in her own PS Vita games anyway, the benifit of being a couple who are both gamers, we know what to expect from each other! LOL!

 

 

can't wait for Skyrim 2

 

 

 

 

The Elder Scrolls Online (MMO) is what I'm looking forward to. Being able to visit all of the lands from the previous games, that'll be something!

Edited May 29, 2012 by Pete10141748