Other Building a PC?

[Flying_Heckfish]

Is that because you want to be playing on the highest graphics possible all the time? Aslong as it can run everything well, I don't mind taking a hit on some games.

For £600-700 you will be looking at High on most games @ 1080p at the moment.

My assessment it based on wanting to keep those same settings and framerate, if you wanted you could drop settings as you go. It'll still look better than a console if that's what you're worried about.

 

[Redlambs]

Get the cpu, motherboard and memory right first. If your budget is running low, even a £80 R7 260x graphics card will beat the consoles. You can easily upgrade that later. And with the memory don't be confused about all the different speeds, amount is still king. It's another thing you can adjust in the future.

Pcpartpicker.com is a very helpful site for compatability. I used aria for my latest cpu/motherboard as they have solid overclock options (not that I've needed to use oc yet) and usually have offers on. Finally a mid-high end i5 is more than enough and will be to outlast this generation easily, so don't bother with an i7 unless it's a decent deal.

 

[b82REZ]

Cheers for all the replies. You're bringing me round to the idea. How much would I likely save by building myself?

My concern is that I'd do a messy job more than not be able to do it, and cause problems lately. I need to make sure all the components and what not are compatible too don't I, I have no clue where to start with that shit.

I don't want to have to keep opening it up, tinkering with it or adding new stuff though. Preferably, I'd like 4 years or so without needing to do shit to it. How much have I gotta spend for that? I'm thinking about £600-£700 on the PC itself as I still need to get a monitor, new desk etc.

Price will depend if you go the AMD or Intel route. I use AMD processor and Hd Raedon GPU and I can run anything I want on top settings, with a few exceptions.

Personally I'd go AMD as you'll save yourself a few hundred. Mine ended up costing about 500 not including a monitor, at the time I was shopping around it would have been a couple hundred more to go with Intel.

But you'll get some people telling you to go Intel, your best bet it to watch a few videos and shop around. Don't rush into buying anything unless you can get a good deal in a sale.

 

[Redlambs]

AMD is indeed a good, cheaper option. But the prices for a high end cpu of theirs and an overclocked i5 is nothing major at the moment so I'd always try to build the system using Intel.

However to save on the budget an R7 or R9 is the way to go. Graphically there's not going to be anything this gen that those cards won't pump out far better than the consoles and its the easiest part to upgrade down the line.

 

[Alock1]

Spoiler

• Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO (120mm)by Cooler Master
• In stock
• Eligible for FREE Delivery
• This will be a gift Learn more

£25.50

• Samsung 24x Retail SATA DVD Writerby Samsung
• Only 9 left in stock.
• Sold by ADMI Limited UK
• Gift options not available. Learn more

£14.25

You save:
£2.74 (16%)

• Crucial CT256MX100SSD1 256GB MX100 SATA 2.5 Inch 7mm SSD Includes 9.5mm Spacerby Crucial
• In stock
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£79.98

• Sapphire AMD R9 290 TRI-X OC Graphics Card (4GB, HDMI, PCI-E)by SAPPHIRE
• In stock
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£239.99

• MSI Z97 PC Mate Intel LGA1150 Z97 ATX Motherboard (4x DDR3, 4x USB3.0, 8x USB2.0, GBE, LAN, HDMI, VGA, DVI)by MSI
• In stock
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£64.99

• Intel Core i5 i5-4690K CPU (Quad Core 3.5GHz Processor, 6MB Cache, Intel HD 4600 Graphics, Socket H3 LGA-1150)by Intel
• In stock on February 23, 2015
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£181.00

• Corsair Builder Series CXM 600W Modular 80 PLUS Bronze Certified ATX/EPS PSUby Corsair
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£56.99

• Corsair CMZ8GX3M2A1600C9 Vengeance 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 1600 Mhz CL9 XMP Performance Desktop Memory Kit Blackby Corsair
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£53.99

• Corsair CC-9011041-WW Carbide Series 200R Windowed Compact ATX Performance Computer Case - Blackby Corsair
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£49.99

Subtotal (9 items): £766.68

done, now suck my dick.

Nice one Cina. Do you fancy building it for me too?? I totally could but you've gone to all that effort. I had put one together on overclockers not knowing whether it was everything I needed or any good so this helps a lot.

 

[Alock1]

For £600-700 you will be looking at High on most games @ 1080p at the moment.

My assessment it based on wanting to keep those same settings and framerate, if you wanted you could drop settings as you go. It'll still look better than a console if that's what you're worried about.

I'm not really bothered about it looking better than consoles. And to be honest, there's a good chance I'll get a lot of games on Xbox that I could get on PC anyway for playing online and things, plus I'm useless at mouse + keyboard. Aslong as everything is playable then I'm not too fussed.

 

[Flying_Heckfish]

You should be absolutely fine at that budget then.

Edit - Are you a member of the OcUK forum btw? Very useful resource

 

[Redlambs]

I'm not really bothered about it looking better than consoles. And to be honest, there's a good chance I'll get a lot of games on Xbox that I could get on PC anyway for playing online and things, plus I'm useless at mouse + keyboard. Aslong as everything is playable then I'm not too fussed.

You'll find using a controller on PC games is still a lot better than on the consoles, purely because you can tweak the framerate. Plus you aren't limited to one controller type for all games. Online is generally better too, though obviously if all your mates are on xbox then that point is moot.

 

[Redlambs]

Oh and take a look at http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/parts/partlist/ Alock, it's very helpful and finds decent deals for every part.

Like I said above though, I recommend Aria for cpu/motherboard pre-built bundles as you can always get deals on them and that's the only real potentially tricky part of system building. Plus they barely cost anything more than buying individual parts, in fact on sale they can be cheaper.

 

[Alock1]

You'll find using a controller on PC games is still a lot better than on the consoles, purely because you can tweak the framerate. Plus you aren't limited to one controller type for all games. Online is generally better too, though obviously if all your mates are on xbox then that point is moot.

Yeah in general I more meant for like Fifa and stuff that I'd prefer the online of Xbox. And even though the controller probably is better I wouldn't want to go up against mouse + keyboard for shooters. Cina posted a ton of parts for me if you look at my last quote. I might look and see if I can get them from Overclockers, it's not far from me and I could pick it all up rather than paying for delivery. Though I have Amazon prime anyway so I guess it makes little difference.

 

[Flying_Heckfish]

I buy most of my stuff from OC these days as they have got much better in CS and on price the last couple of years. Forum users get free delivery too, though if you are nearby then makes sense to pop in.

Previously I used Scan (free delivery via AVForums), their prices are sometimes cheaper and they have the Today Only deals.

I've used Aria before too, but I did not have free delivery for them so can't really say how they compare as I don't check religiously.

 

[Redlambs]

Yeah in general I more meant for like Fifa and stuff that I'd prefer the online of Xbox. And even though the controller probably is better I wouldn't want to go up against mouse + keyboard for shooters. Cina posted a ton of parts for me if you look at my last quote. I might look and see if I can get them from Overclockers, it's not far from me and I could pick it all up rather than paying for delivery. Though I have Amazon prime anyway so I guess it makes little difference.

Mouse and keyboard is very fluent once you nail it

And if you are anything like the rest of us, you'll agonise over parts for ages, then once you've built your machine still question yourself

Use pcpartpickers not just for the prices (you can look around and get even better, or indeed use overclockers as a comparison as they might even have better bundles), but for the compatibility and ideas of what you can change in and out to tweak your budget to suit.

But in general an i5 with 16gb ram and you are good to go for a long time into the future. Good luck!

 

[Alock1]

I know mouse and keyboard is better I just don't think I could take the hit and go from good to shite and just plow on for a few months whilst getting killed constantly.

Cheers. It's probably going to be 6 weeks before I order the stuff so I have plenty of time.. but I can't help but get obsessed over this stuff and fixate on it needlessly.

 

[Redlambs]

I know mouse and keyboard is better I just don't think I could take the hit and go from good to shite and just plow on for a few months whilst getting killed constantly.

Cheers. It's probably going to be 6 weeks before I order the stuff so I have plenty of time.. but I can't help but get obsessed over this stuff and fixate on it needlessly.

That's the only way to do it!

But you'll have fun building it, it's fairly easy. And I'm sure between us on here we've come across all the problems you can encounter so you'll have no shortage of help.

 

[Alock1]

Yeah, I appreciate that. Plenty of helpful folk on here, only a few who aren't (@Olly)

 

[Flying_Heckfish]

but I can't help but get obsessed over this stuff and fixate on it needlessly.

This is just the start

 

[Redlambs]

This is just the start

 

[b82REZ]

It really sounds like your building one for the sake of building one. If you are going to prioritise triple As on console id build a cheap 300 rig that will handle PC exclusives and indies. Youll be wasting money buying a top end one.

 

[Alock1]

It's the MMOs, mobas, RTS and early access games that I wouldn't play on console though which I'd still want something decent for. Plus I'm going to be doing a fair bit of video/sound editing over the next few years.

You're right though, for right now I could spend less but like I said I don't want to have to be fiddling and upgrading. I'd rather spend the extra now and not have to think about it for 4 years or whatever.

 

[Redlambs]

It's the MMOs, mobas, RTS and early access games that I wouldn't play on console though which I'd still want something decent for. Plus I'm going to be doing a fair bit of video/sound editing over the next few years.

You're right though, for right now I could spend less but like I said I don't want to have to be fiddling and upgrading. I'd rather spend the extra now and not have to think about it for 4 years or whatever.

If you are doing video editing too, definitely go i5 or i7. I got my i7 on sale for the same price as an i5, and it's overclocked, so the deals are out there.

 

[b82REZ]

It's the MMOs, mobas, RTS and early access games that I wouldn't play on console though which I'd still want something decent for. Plus I'm going to be doing a fair bit of video/sound editing over the next few years.

You're right though, for right now I could spend less but like I said I don't want to have to be fiddling and upgrading. I'd rather spend the extra now and not have to think about it for 4 years or whatever.

The early access and indies arent particularly resource heavy so should run on an entry level system. I've used my PC for video editing and had no issues but I know very little about it so don't really know what you'd need for that.

No matter how much you spend eventually you'll need to upgrade or replace parts. I tried to future proof my rig but I blew one PSU that I had to replace and I've added more RAM as well as removing things to neaten things up inside. It's only a matter of time before you'll be in a similar situation. On that point make sure you get a Corsair PSU.

 

[Flying_Heckfish]

Corsair PSUs are a minefield at the moment unfortunately. They are all pretty good, don't get me wrong, but they are using different OEMs all over the place. Quite confusing! Check this out for a comparison.

It's difficult to specify a PSU until we know the GPU you are going for, but Seasonic is a preferable OEM.

 

[NinjaZombie]

I can't help but get obsessed over this stuff and fixate on it needlessly.

This is just the start

This is so true.

I've just got my build done but I've been researching and mulling over parts for my brother because he made an offhand remark on how he should build one at a certain budget after seeing me play Battlefield at home instead of at the LAN shop like how he does it. Also been thinking up of builds for my sister who does light graphic work and my father in law, whose AMD build just died on him recently.

 

[Alock1]

Spoiler

Intel Core i5-4690K 3.50GHz (Devil's Canyon) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail

£191.99

(£159.99)

Inno3D GeForce GTX 960 OC 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (N960-1DDV-E5CNX)

£155.99

(£129.99)

Asus Z97 Pro Gamer Intel Z97 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ATX Motherboard

£107.99

(£89.99)

OCZ Arc 100 Series 240GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Drive (ARC100-25SAT3-240G)

£82.73

(£68.94)

Phanteks Enthoo Pro Mid Tower Enthusiast Case without Window

£79.99

(£66.66)

BenQ GW2255 22" Widescreen LED Monitor - Black

£79.99

(£66.66)

Corsair Vengeance 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CMZ8GX3M2A1600C9)

£53.99

(£44.99)

SuperFlower Golden Green HX 550W "80 Plus Gold" Power Supply - Black

£49.99

(£41.66)

LG 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM GH24NSC0.AUAA10B

£13.99

(£11.66)

Zalman ZM-K200M Multimedia/Gaming Keyboard

£8.99

(£7.49)

Total

£825.64

Spoiler

Budget Option

Intel Core i5-4460 3.20GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail

£154.99

(£129.16)

KFA2 GeForce GTX 960 Mini OC 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card - Retail (96NPH8DND8VZ)

£149.99

(£124.99)

BenQ GW2255 22" Widescreen LED Monitor - Black

£79.99

(£66.66)

SuperFlower Golden Green HX 550W "80 Plus Gold" Power Supply - Black

£49.99

(£41.66)

GeIL Black Dragon 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (GD38GB1600C11DC)

£43.99

(£36.66)

Gigabyte H81M-S2PV Intel H81 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard

£43.99

(£36.66)

Seagate Barracuda 500GB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s 16MB Cache - OEM (ST500DM002) HDD

£34.99

(£29.16)

BitFenix Neos ATX Tower Black/Black

£29.99

(£24.99)

LG 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM GH24NSC0.AUAA10B

£13.99

(£11.66)

Zalman ZM-K200M Multimedia/Gaming Keyboard

£8.99

(£7.49)

Total

£610.01

What do you guys think of these 2 builds? Obviously the 2nd is a fair bit cheaper.

 

[pauldyson1uk]

my choice would be 1st one.

 

[Stobzilla]

What do you guys think of these 2 builds? Obviously the 2nd is a fair bit cheaper.

I would try and save a bit on the case in the first build and get yourself a Western Digital 1TB drive for storage. Install your OS on the SSD though.

 

[Alock1]

Well i plan to get an external hdd for my xbox soon anyway so thought i could save some money by just using that?

 

[Olly Gunnar Solskjær]

That's what I do, so obviously it's the coolest possible thing to do.

 

[Fortitude]

Hoping this is the right thread for this, but here goes:

I'm building an x99 socket rig and have decided on pretty much everything except the RAM. Have any of you built an x99, and if so, what RAM did you opt for?

I've seen these: http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00N1OXS...&ascsubtag=63ea6f2904e0da101437c54d6033079d_S

& these:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-100-GS&groupid=701&catid=8&subcat=2557

And was wondering what the opinion of them is. Should I go for 16gb at 3000mhz with lower latency, or stick with he 32gb at 2400mhz?

Try as I might, I can't find any reviews about them, so I do feel like this is the part of the build I'm going into blind. Any advice?

Cheers.

 

[Attila]

My gaming rig is still running a dual core E6600 or something like that. The processor really isn't that important in the scheme of things. If I didn't already have a graphics card, I wouldn't even be bothering to look at i7's, I'd go for a mid i5 or top i3 and put the money in the gpu.

Let's face it, with the new gen it's only modders who will once again push the top systems slightly.

That's the same CPU I have right now in my PC (Core 2 Duo E6600) but my graphics card is very bad (7300 GS, think it was like a £50 budget card in 2007). I used to have a 7800 GS but that died last year.

I want to go back and play some games that I missed like Morrowind and The Witcher series. Also wouldn't mind replaying Oblvion, Skyrim, Fallout, Dragon Age, Mass Effect with mods and less load times/improved graphics. I like Civilization and Football Manager which are only on PC of course.

I think I might just go ahead and build a new PC in a couple of months but it's hard to decide whether I should wait for the new CPU's and graphic cards to come out. Hard to know whether it is worth waiting for Skylake/R9 300 series.

I have this monitor right now and does anyone know if it will be good for gaming? Would rather not buy a new one.

http://www.eizo-apac.com/products/coloredge/cg243w/index.html
http://flatpanelshd.com/review.php?subaction=showfull&id=1281424353

 

[Attila]

GTX 980 Ti. Basically the same as a Titan X. Costs £550

Spoiler: Benchmarks

 

[Tommy]

GTX 980 Ti. Basically the same as a Titan X. Costs £550

Spoiler: Benchmarks

2x SLI here I come. Ready for Valve/HTC Vive later this year.

 

[JinnerJamie]

GTX 980 Ti. Basically the same as a Titan X. Costs £550

Spoiler: Benchmarks

Just placed my order...

 

[Badunk]

I'm looking for a new pc for Fallout 4 next month. I'd be happy with either a bundle, a bare bones system or even putting it all together myself. The only thing is, I get bamboozled by all the numbers on the different components. I'm looking to spend about £6-700 on the pc and about £150 on a new monitor. I've looked at Aria, Chillblast, Reddit, etc, but I'm suffering from paralysis by analysis and have only succeeded in confusing myself even more. Any advice would be much appreciated.

 

[Tommy]

I'm looking for a new pc for Fallout 4 next month. I'd be happy with either a bundle, a bare bones system or even putting it all together myself. The only thing is, I get bamboozled by all the numbers on the different components. I'm looking to spend about £6-700 on the pc and about £150 on a new monitor. I've looked at Aria, Chillblast, Reddit, etc, but I'm suffering from paralysis by analysis and have only succeeded in confusing myself even more. Any advice would be much appreciated.

If you're willing to put it together yourself, then hey, lets see...

(Overclockers is my default store. Might find cheaper individual parts elsewhere).

Asus Z97-K & i5 4690k - £260
Asus GTX 970 - £275
16GB (2x8GB) Corsair Vengeance Pro - £80
Seagate SSHD 1TB - £50
Superflower Golden Green 80+ Gold PSU - £60

725 without a case (which should come with enough fans) or the cables, which would bring it up to £800 or so. You could drop the GPU down a tier or two and still get great performance in Fallout 4. I'd definitely not swap the Mobo/CPU combo out, as that's enough there to last you for years to come.

Can get a 960 for £159, which would bring the total to just over £600 with budget left for case & cables.

 

[JTW95]

I'm looking for a new pc for Fallout 4 next month. I'd be happy with either a bundle, a bare bones system or even putting it all together myself. The only thing is, I get bamboozled by all the numbers on the different components. I'm looking to spend about £6-700 on the pc and about £150 on a new monitor. I've looked at Aria, Chillblast, Reddit, etc, but I'm suffering from paralysis by analysis and have only succeeded in confusing myself even more. Any advice would be much appreciated.

I remember when I was first looking in too building one. I was confused as hell. The more research you do the more it makes sense.

It is not difficult to build a PC and it feels extremely satisfying when you complete it.

 

[Badunk]

I don't think the actual building of it will be too difficult. I've tinkered with PCs and laptops over the years, taking them apart, cleaning them, checking for problems, adding ram, etc. It's just that I don't know if an i5 4460 @ 4.0GHz is better than a 4570 @ 3.8GHz. And don't get me started on graphics cards.

I don't know if those actually exist, btw. I'm just plucking numbers out of the air to illustrate.

 

[Badunk]

If you're willing to put it together yourself, then hey, lets see...

(Overclockers is my default store. Might find cheaper individual parts elsewhere).

Asus Z97-K & i5 4690k - £260
Asus GTX 970 - £275
16GB (2x8GB) Corsair Vengeance Pro - £80
Seagate SSHD 1TB - £50
Superflower Golden Green 80+ Gold PSU - £60

725 without a case (which should come with enough fans) or the cables, which would bring it up to £800 or so. You could drop the GPU down a tier or two and still get great performance in Fallout 4. I'd definitely not swap the Mobo/CPU combo out, as that's enough there to last you for years to come.

Can get a 960 for £159, which would bring the total to just over £600 with budget left for case & cables.

Nice one @Tommy

Cheers

 

[Vitro]

Any advice on how to go about building my PC (for the first time) regarding actually putting it all together as I already have all the parts?

Planning on starting tomorrow and haven't had much time to scour through youtube for build videos.

 

[botond]

Nice one @Tommy

Cheers

you do not need Z board and K Cpu if you are not planning to overclock