need some advice on this spec please

[felamb]

Hey, need some advice on this spec please.

My budget is ~£1200 ex Case. primarily for running Adobe Creative Suite and occasional Gaming at 1920x1080+. I wanted something very upgradeable and fast, and this is what I came up with:

Case
Choose Your Own Case - PC-A77F

I'm not 100% sure about this case - there are 4 USB 3.0 ports on it and I don't really need 3.0 but really like the case, will the motherboard be able to support them or use them as 2.0? or would it be better to go for the PC-A70F?

Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™i7 Quad Core Processor i7-950 (3.06GHz) 4.8GTs/8MB Cache

Motherboard
ASUS® P6X58D-E: DDR3, USB 3.0, SATA 6.0GB/s, 3-Way SLI

Memory (RAM)
12GB KINGSTON HYPER-X TRI-DDR3 1600MHz, X.M.P (6 x 2GB KIT)

Graphics Card
1280MB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX470 GDDR5 PCI EXPRESS - DirectX® 11

Memory - 1st Hard Disk
60GB OCZ VERTEX 2 SATA II 2.5" SSD (upto 285MB/sR | 275MB/sW)

1st DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM

Power Supply & Case Cooling
600W Quiet 80 PLUS Quad Rail PSU + 120mm Case Fan (£59)

Processor Cooling
INTEL SOCKET LGA1366 STANDARD CPU COOLER

Will this be sufficient?

Sound Card
ONBOARD 8 CHANNEL (7.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)

Network Facilities
ONBOARD 10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT

USB Options
6 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL (MIN 2 FRONT PORTS) AS STANDARD

Firewire & Video Editing
1 x IEEE 1394a FIREWIRE PORT ONBOARD

Operating System
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64 Bit - inc DVD & Licence (£79)

Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour) (£5)

£989.79 ex VAT.
£1163 inc VAT and Delivery

Thanks.

[Sleinous]

Good choice of warranty, welcome to my little gtx 470 club. Yes the cpu cooler is fine if u dont plan on oc'ing. That (and all current mobos that have 3.0) only has 2x usb 3.0 on back panel and only usb 2.0 internal headers for frontal usb ports on cases

[Meds]

Hey,

- As Sleinous points out, motherboards do not yet have the USB 3.0 headers in order to connect the front USB ports. They will be connected to USB 2.0 headers should you opt for that case.

- PSU is underpowerd for that specification in my opinion. I'd bump it up to a TX650, TX750, or even the standard 800W Quad Rail if you can fit this into your budget. Buying a better PSU now will also help when you want to upgrade/add components in the future.

- The "Standard CPU Cooler" is the one provided by Intel so will be sufficient should you not plan to OC the CPU.

- HDDs; You have only selected a single SSD? Do you plan to add your own HDD for storage & extra programmes? If not then 60GB will get filled very quickly.

- Others may also point out that you probably don't need the 1600MHz RAM either, you'll be fine with the more stable Samsung 1333MHz.

Hope this helps!

[felamb]

Thanks for the replies. I will stick with that case then, at least I'm future proof for USB 3.0. It is still within budget if I get the TX750 and 1333MHz RAM so thats no problem - thanks for that. As for the HDD - I have externals yeah, but I did a little digging and I don't think the case ships with a 2.5" converter anyway so I better get one of these 64MB CACHE drives and sort out an SSD later?

Revised:

Case
Choose Your Own Case - Lian Li PC-A77F

Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™i7 Quad Core Processor i7-950 (3.06GHz) 4.8GTs/8MB Cache

Motherboard
ASUS® P6X58D-E: DDR3, USB 3.0, SATA 6.0GB/s, 3-Way SLI

Memory (RAM)
12GB SAMSUNG DDR3 TRI-DDR3 1333MHz (3 x 4GB)

Graphics Card
1280MB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX470 GDDR5 PCI EXPRESS - DirectX® 11

Memory - 1st Hard Disk
640GB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD6402AAEX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE (7200rpm)

2nd Hard Disk
640GB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD6402AAEX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE (7200rpm)

RAID
RAID 0 (STRIPED VOLUME - 2 x same size & model HDD / SSD) (£9)

1st DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM

Power Supply & Case Cooling
CORSAIR 750W PSU (TX750) 80+ ULTRA QUIET (£88)

Processor Cooling
INTEL SOCKET LGA1366 STANDARD CPU COOLER

Sound Card
ONBOARD 8 CHANNEL (7.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)

Network Facilities
ONBOARD 10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT

USB Options
6 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL (MIN 2 FRONT PORTS) AS STANDARD

Firewire & Video Editing
1 x IEEE 1394a FIREWIRE PORT ONBOARD

Operating System
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64 Bit - inc DVD & Licence (£79)

Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour) (£5)

£997.45 ex VAT.
£1172 inc VAT and Delivery.

[Sleinous]

Do bear in mind, although you get a performance increase from Raid 0, if you corrupt a drive, you corrupt both.

Consider 6GB of RAM as that will be more than enough to get you started (and can be added to with a further 6GB pack of 3x2GB from Kingston in the future when they decrease further in price).

With the money you save, consider upgrading to an HX1000W PSU if you would be interested in adding a second GTX 470 in SLI later on

[felamb]

I was aware of the risk with RAID 0 but on second thought it will only be temporary until I get an SSD for installing OS and programs on, then they will just be for storage so I'll remove it.

Will 6GB be enough for using Adobe CS programs? I tend to use Photoshop, InDesign, Illustrator etc. all at the same time.

I was planning on adding a second GTX470 yeah, when/if I needed it but that may be a while, thanks again.

[Sleinous]

Problem with the current PSU is itw ont be enough to run 2 470s, and taking a PSU out and replacing is a royal pain, not to mention, costly as, you will be having to buy a completely new one instead of buying what you need now rather than later.

yes, 6GB should be plenty, even for those 3 running at the same time