Fresh/First Build

[Deleted]

I've been hovering around for a while now and finally decided to put a basket together on Scan with some of the information I've read and some of the more common components I've read about. I may have been a little liberal on the spending for what I need it for but I want something that will last a few years and still be able to keep up with future releases instead of bobbing along on pretty low settings like I currently am.

Budget - I'm looking at a maximum of around £1000
Resolution - Monitor in the build is 1920x1080p, but I haven't really looked into it all that much.
Games/Setting - General MMO's WoW, Rift/SWTOR occasionally, and anything else ranging from Skyrim, Borderlands, Mass Effect, Black Ops etc. I'd hope . to run them on anything around mid-high comfortably.
Other activities - None that would demand anything significant.
Country - UK
Parts - Just mouse and keyboard.
OS - Not needed
Peripherals - Monitor is needed and maybe speakers if anyone can recommend something.


Case - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/corsa...usb-30-w-o-psu
Board - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/msi-z...dvi-d-hdmi-atx
CPU - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/29-4i...art-cache-34x-
Memory - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/12gb-...-9-24-xmp-150v
GPU - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/2gb-e...4-2x-dl-dvi-dp
HDD - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/2tb-w...wer-64mb-cache
SSD - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/128gb...5mb-s-35000-io
PSU - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/600w-...et-fan-atx-psu

Monitor - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/23-as...80m1-5ms-black

Like I said it maybe overkill for what I need it for but I want it to last, dropping the SSD wouldn't bother me if the money could be better spent elsewhere, I was also looking into a 670 instead of the 660ti if that's anything to consider, I also wasn't too sure on the monitor either if there's any input there.

Anyway, long post, thanks if you read it and thanks in advance if you have any advice or comments regarding the build.

[Skarsguard]

You want dual channel for your memory either 2 sticks or 4 sticks I wouldn't go 3 sticks if you want to go 16gigs (Ram is cheap why not) get the Corsair vengeance LP http://www.scan.co.uk/products/16gb-...9-9-24-xmp-15v

On the GPU a 660TI is fine it's going to run most games on ultra or high to ultra with no problems but I would get a different brand something like this http://www.scan.co.uk/products/2gb-a...344-2x-dl-dvi-

On the PSU corsair is good but the builder series is not good I would get something like the XFX 450W pro http://www.scan.co.uk/products/450w-...n-atx-v231-psu.

The HDD you selected I'm not to familiar with it but somebody else might help you with that.
everything else looks fine.
EDIT: The monitor is a really good monitor you probably not going to get much better for the price.

[Rafax]

So to start off get rid of that psu, the builder series arent as good as most of corsair's stuff, grab a seasonic m12 620 w, or a xfx pro 650w you will be happier.

Apart from that you dont realy need 12Gb of memory and i dont think you should go with triple channel for this motherboard either 2 2x4 GB or 4 x4 GB.

I also think you should get a good cpu cooler, you have the power to overclock that system and you will regrett not getting the cooler atm, if you want a cheap option just get something like the xigmatek loki or the cooler master hyper evo 212, you can also go with something more expensive like the silver arow, xigmater darknight or ever the noctua dh14.

About the hardrive, personally I'd get a 2TB caviar blue and not the green.
Apart from that the build seems fine to me and I wouldnt change up alot of stuff.

[Danno]

What others said about the RAM. Get 2x4GB RAM since 8GB is plenty for gaming.

I used a CX430 on a $450 gaming build, but its reliability may not be optimal in the long run as I got it for $20. I would go with a Seasonic, Antec, or a higher quality Corsair with Seasonic as the OEM.

660 Ti will be great for playing games at 1080p.

You really should have a WD Blue instead of green if you plan on putting games on it. I think of green mainly for media storage and blue for games. Black is only needed if you're skipping a SSD and putting the OS on it in all honesty. Blue is the way to go.

[chazus]

1) Despite what others have said, the Green drive is fine for STORAGE. This means movies, pictures, music, and other large, rarely used files.
2) You should not be installing games or programs on the HDD, just the SSD.
3) Your system probably doesn't break 330w power, so anything over 500w is a waste of money
4) Anything over 8gb is a waste of money. People say "ram is cheap, may as well"... A dollar is a dollar. Forty bucks is forty bucks. Not only that, no matter how cheap ram is, 16gb is literally useless for most people... So even if it's $1... It's still $1 wasted.
5) You have an OC CPU and Board. If you plan to OC, get lower profile ram, and a good cooler.
6) If you DONT plan on OC'ing... get a B75 board and a 3350P cpu

[Killora]

1) Despite what others have said, the Green drive is fine for STORAGE. This means movies, pictures, music, and other large, rarely used files.
2) You should not be installing games or programs on the HDD, just the SSD.
3) Your system probably doesn't break 330w power, so anything over 500w is a waste of money
4) Anything over 8gb is a waste of money. People say "ram is cheap, may as well"... A dollar is a dollar. Forty bucks is forty bucks. Not only that, no matter how cheap ram is, 16gb is literally useless for most people... So even if it's $1... It's still $1 wasted.
5) You have an OC CPU and Board. If you plan to OC, get lower profile ram, and a good cooler.
6) If you DONT plan on OC'ing... get a B75 board and a 3350P cpu

Pretty much this. 240gb ssd should store all your games fine aslong as you don't expand much/manage storage well (like deleting the hibernate file and page files.)

16gb is only ever useful if you're multi-boxing games or doing large format/high quality 3d rendering. it'd be a complete waste for games.

[Deleted]

You should consider shopping elsewhere for your parts, unless you're completely set on Scan and have used them before. Scan do offer a free delivery service if you sign up to up to one of their partnership websites (I think it might be hexus and it requires a non spam post count too)

Other places to consider

Ebuyer
Scan
and Amazon

I bought the Corsair 300r for around £60 free delivery.

If you drop the SSD and CPU cooler, you could get yourself a really nice system with a Dell 24 inch monitor for just over £1000. Just be wary that the monitor will take around 2-5 weeks to ship from Amazon, but given the price, it might be worth it.

[Lapetos]

You should consider shopping elsewhere for your parts, unless you're completely set on Scan and have used them before. Scan do offer a free delivery service if you sign up to up to one of their partnership websites (I think it might be hexus and it requires a non spam post count too)

Other places to consider

Ebuyer
Scan
and Amazon

I bought the Corsair 300r for around £60 free delivery.

If you drop the SSD and CPU cooler, you could get yourself a really nice system with a Dell 24 inch monitor for just over £1000. Just be wary that the monitor will take around 2-5 weeks to ship from Amazon, but given the price, it might be worth it.

Also recommend dabs.com, fast deliver and cheap prices at times.

[Deleted]

Yes I agree. Although some items can take a while though. It all depends on what you buy. Their RMA service was fantastic.

[Deleted]

Thanks for the replies and advice

Hows this looking? Some parts aren't in stock yet but it only gives me more time to get it ironed out.

Case - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/corsa...usb-30-w-o-psu
Board - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/msi-z...dvi-d-hdmi-atx
CPU - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/29-4i...art-cache-34x-
Memory - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/8gb-(...9-9-24-xmp-15v
GPU - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/2gb-g...hz-cores-1344-
HDD - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/500gb...16mb-cache-8ms
SSD - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/250gb...s-write-250mb-
PSU - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/450w-...n-atx-v231-psu
Cooler - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/coole...55-1156-1366-a

Monitor - http://www.scan.co.uk/products/23-as...80m1-5ms-black

Decided to drop to a smaller HDD as I also have an external sat here if anymore space is needed for storage and put the money into a larger SSD. Is there also any noticeable difference between the different branding of the 660Ti?

[Skarsguard]

I think it's a great setup I actually like all the part's for the price what do you think about this Asus instead of the Gigabyte GPU I don't think you can go wrong with either but the gigabyte is a bit more louder I could be wrong I might be thinking of the 3 fan setup http://www.scan.co.uk/products/2gb-a...2x-dl-dvi-dp-h I think this one is a few more bucks

[Rafax]

Seems like thats as good as it gets for this budget, so run with it I guess

[Halabash]

My only advice is to confirm that your ram/mb combo will work, check the mb mfg specs for a list of approved ram modules and swap that case out for this
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/72ant...op-fan-w-o-psu

If your building a box to last years, then your constant will always be your case and possibly your power supply, the rest of the components will come and go. I use this box because I skimped out on a box and literally cooked my v.card. I had too much power and not enough air flow to exhaust all the heat. Also this box is very builder friendly, lots of space and if you want max cable management you won't find a better box, and its easy to keep clean and dust free. Its a gem.

[n0cturnal]

I think it's a great setup I actually like all the part's for the price what do you think about this Asus instead of the Gigabyte GPU I don't think you can go wrong with either but the gigabyte is a bit more louder I could be wrong I might be thinking of the 3 fan setup http://www.scan.co.uk/products/2gb-a...2x-dl-dvi-dp-h I think this one is a few more bucks

Gigabytes 3 fan cooler is much better than the 2 fan cooler. The 2 fan cooler is kind of meh.

[Rafax]

The carbide 300r has plenty of cooling options, and even space for a top mounted radiator plus 2 front fans ,2 side fans, and 1 back exhaust fan, theres no problem there.
The only thing id actualy consider changing would be the psu to a xfx 550w version for future proofing and overclocking.

[Deleted]

CPU - http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B...A3P5ROKL5A1OLE
GPU - http://www.ebuyer.com/product/432444
Mobo - http://www.dabs.com/products/asrock-...-atx-80XR.html
SSD - http://www.dabs.com/products/samsung...rive-8BNX.html
HDD - http://www.ebuyer.com/product/264274
Case - http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B...A3P5ROKL5A1OLE
Memory - http://www.ebuyer.com/product/408617
PSU - http://www.dabs.com/products/corsair...ries-7CHB.html
Monitor - http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B...=AN4O4IKO17KHR

Total comes to £970.69

You can add an aftermarket cooler such as the one you've chosen and still be under budget.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Cooler-Maste...0999051&sr=8-1

Or you can drop the Corsiar 300r and purchase the Fractal R4
http://www.ebuyer.com/391898-fractal...d-ca-def-r4-bl and still be under budget. This will hopefully negate some of the noise the Powercolor Myst card creates under load.

Or if you prefer Nvidia, then you can opt for Asus 660ti

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/393522, which is on sale at the moment. If you drop the Coolermaster Hyper 212 and purchase this instead of the Powercolor AMD card you'll be £15 over budget. This card is on sale though, at £217 the price is okay when compared to other GTX 660ti's. However it's also £45 more expensive than the Powercolor card and given their comparative performance, it's hard to justify spending that extra money.

If you kept the Powercolor Myst 7870, you could upgrade to the Fractal R4 and purchase the Coolermaster Hyper 212 Evo cooler and it will only cost you £5 more compared to purchasing the Asus 660ti.

All items I've chosen have the option of Free Delivery.

Thoughts on my build.

The Powercolor GPU is loud. Don't get me wrong though, this card performs as well the GTX 660ti in most modern games and at £171.99, it's just too good a deal to miss out on. However I've recently built a system with the very similar VTX3D version of that card in the Corsair 300r and trust me it can get quite loud, especially if your tower is placed on the top of the desk and you're sitting right next to it. To compensate this noise however, I've linked the Fractal R4 case which will cost you £25 more.

The monitor is an excellent monitor. At £170 it's a great budget IPS monitor which is very strong for games and it has a very expensive feel to it. I own the older version, the Dell 2311h and trust me its a gorgeous monitor with great ergonomic features. The Dell 2312HM is arguably a better monitor than the one I own.

The build also has a Western Digital 2TB drive. The 500gb drive you originally opted for might save you £25 now, but it will save you nothing if you're having to buy a new HDD later down the line.

The Extreme 4 motherboard is very popular amongst users in this forum and for good reason. It's a great motherboard that will support a decent overclock.

The RAM i've chosen has lifetime warranty. Crucial have an excellent reputation and it's low profile ram. If you plan on an aftermarket air cooler, this RAM will certainly help with compatibility.

The PSU has extra long cable lengths, which is stated on the Corsair website. This will definitely help when routing the cables around the back of the Corsair 300r and thus tidying your build. It's also important to note (given I accidentally deleted my previous post) that the XFX 450W P1-450S-X2B9 has comparatively short cable lengths, which is horrible when trying to build a system with the Corsair 300r. This is from personal experience btw. I've also researched the XFX PSU and that particular model only has 1 PCIe connector (6+2 pin). For a build with high end components you'll want a PSU that will support powerful modern graphics card out of the box.

I hope this helps.

[Skarsguard]

Gigabytes 3 fan cooler is much better than the 2 fan cooler. The 2 fan cooler is kind of meh.

I was talking about the noise I'm not sure about the quality on either I had an older card 3850 and it lasted for 2 1/2 years with no problems.

[n0cturnal]

I was talking about the noise I'm not sure about the quality on either I had an older card 3850 and it lasted for 2 1/2 years with no problems.

Yes so am I, the 2 fan cooler makes more noise and does worse when it comes to cooling.

[Skarsguard]

Yes so am I, the 2 fan cooler makes more noise and does worse when it comes to cooling.

Ah good to know I would get the Asus that I linked in the earlier post. http://www.scan.co.uk/products/2gb-a...2x-dl-dvi-dp-h.

BTW Nocturnal how is that Force GT SSD working out for you I'm looking for a Corsair SSD to complete my next build.

[n0cturnal]

Ah good to know I would get the Asus that I linked in the earlier post. http://www.scan.co.uk/products/2gb-a...2x-dl-dvi-dp-h.

BTW Nocturnal how is that Force GT SSD working out for you I'm looking for a Corsair SSD to complete my next build.

It is decent, haven't had any issues with it but it is still just another Sandforce drive. I am going to upgrade to a ~250GB drive and it will most likely be a Samsung 840 pro. If I were to go with another Corsair drive I would pick a Neutron GTX.