Computer Build. Your Thoughts?

[gnomey]

Helping a friend with a new rig as his is rather out of date. This was just a cursory browse this afternoon any advice you can give before ordering it?

Budget: ~£1000
Resolution: 1920x1080
Games / Settings Desired: New games close to max specs. Project Shield looks interesting so 6 Series GPU needed.
Any other intensive software or special things you do: Fraps / Video capture. No interest in overclocking.
Country: UK

build I've put together all from amazon just for convenience:

CPU: Intel Core i7 (3770) 3.4GHz Quad Core Processor 8MB L3 Cache 5GT/s Bus Speed (Boxed)
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Intel-3-4GHz...8195121&sr=8-6
£222.69
Motherboard: AsRock Z77 Extreme4 Motherboard
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Z77-Extreme4...8195480&sr=1-1
£101.98
Graphics: Asus GeForce GTX660 TI-DC2-2GD5 Nvidia Graphics Card
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Asus-GTX660-...8195375&sr=1-1
£217.28
RAM: Corsair CMZ16GX3M2A1600C10 Vengenace 16GB 1600MHz
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Corsair-CMZ1...8196491&sr=1-1
£67.97
PSU: Corsair TX650M Enthusiast Series TX 650W ATX/EPS Modular 80 PLUS Bronze PSU
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Corsair-TX65...8195566&sr=1-5
£73.02
CPU Cooler: Enermax ETS-T40-TA
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Coolergiant-...8195664&sr=1-3
£33.47
Case: NZXT Phantom 410 Midi Tower Chassis - White
http://www.amazon.co.uk/NZXT-Phantom...8195759&sr=1-1
£82.98
Hard Drive: Western Digital 1TB Hard Drive - Caviar Blue
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Western-Digi...8195912&sr=1-1
£55.45
SSD: Samsung SSD 830 2.5inch SATA III 6GBps 128GB
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Samsung-2-5i...8195837&sr=1-1
£107.40
Optical Drive: Asus Blu-Ray Internal Combo Drive
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Asus-Blu-Ray...1&sr=1-1-fkmr0
£60.52

Total: £1022.76

Things im not too sure on:-

Intel i5 3570 vs Intel i7 3770 and the K verities - He seems insistent on an i7. His plan like all idiots, is to start recording for youtube and doesn't want to touch overclocking.

Aftermarket CPU cooler. is it needed without overclocking or is sticking with the stock cooler fine? especially as there's no plan to overclock.

And got Vista Retail. Is it better to upgrade to windows 7/8, buy a fresh copy or stick with vista?

[jholdaway]

If he isn't going to overclock ever then there is really no need for the K verities. Not entirely sure about the CPU cooler but I think the stock cooler should work just fine. Upgrade to a minimum of Win 7. Vista is crap in my book. Currently using an old laptop (since all the pieces of my new computer haven't made it in yet) that had vista on it but switched to Win xp.

[Berserker Cronus]

Is there any real point to the BD drive? Optical media is dying out, so you'll probably never really see software or games on blurays. The movies take software capable of working with the ever-evolving DRM they use, so he'll most likely have to pay for software to do that.

With that board it's extremely easy to take an unlocked i5 or i7 to 4.2 Ghz just by changing one setting, so that's something he should really consider. A modest overclock like that can add a good year or two before needing to consider a new CPU. $10 is a small price to pay for that added longevity, even if he doesn't plan on trying it immediately.

[Idrinkwhiterussians]

Here is a revised build that I threw together for you:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Core i5-3570K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor (£165.59 @ Aria PC)
CPU Cooler: Corsair H80 92.0 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler (£69.98 @ Overclockers.co.uk)
Motherboard: ASRock Z77 Extreme4 ATX LGA1155 Motherboard (£101.98 @ Dabs)
Memory: Mushkin Blackline 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (£35.30 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Crucial M4 128GB 2.5" Solid State Disk (£78.96 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£51.36 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 670 2GB Video Card (£309.20 @ Amazon UK)
Case: Fractal Design Define R4 (Black Pearl) ATX Mid Tower Case (£89.22 @ Aria PC)
Power Supply: SeaSonic G 550W 80 PLUS Gold Certified ATX12V / EPS12V Power Supply (£79.41 @ Amazon UK)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 (OEM) (64-bit) (£66.66 @ CCL Computers)
Total: £1047.66
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2013-01-15 18:29 GMT+0000)

Mind you, this does include W7, a better GPU and the 3570k, along with a good closed loop cooler for the 3570k.

[Deleted]

He isn't interested in overclocking, so I'd lose the H80 cooler, buy the i7 3770, drop the motherboard to a decent H77 or even a B75 board and buy yourself a DVD/BD optical drive. Dabs are also doing a mean deal on 16GB of Corsair Vengeance RAM. £55 at the time of writing. If you only purchase this item however there is a shipping charge of £4.

Also partpicker fails to include the shipping cost from Aria, unless there is some way to get free shipping from Aria if you sign up to their forums? But shipping costs is an extra £6-£7 ontop (which makes the CPU a little more expensive than stated)

All in all though, for around £1040 if you purchase mainly from Dabs/Ebuyer and maybe sacrifice the NZXT case for a Fractal R3 case from Ebuyer (a brilliant case), you could grab a system that will include a i7 3770, a GTX 670, 16GB of RAM, a 128GB SSD, Win7 OS, an Antec 450 ea platinum and DVD drive to boot.