Here's my review, including pics.
The Rig
I was in the market for a high end desktop build and having used PCS for my prior build they were my first choice for doing so again.
After discussing the chosen specs (https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?25014-It-s-That-Time-Again) I made a few amendments and ended up with this:
Case
CORSAIR CARBIDE SERIES™ 300R COMPACT GAMING CASE
Overclocked CPU
Overclocked Intel® Core™i7-3770k Quad Core (3.50GHz @ max 4.60GHz)
Motherboard
ASUS® SABERTOOTH Z77: USB 3.0, SATA 6.0GB/s, THERMAL ARMOR
Memory (RAM)
8GB KINGSTON HYPERX BEAST DUAL-DDR3 2400MHz X.M.P (2 x 4GB KIT)
Graphics Card
2GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 670 - 2 DVI, HDMI, DP - 3D Vision Ready
Memory - 1st Hard Disk
120GB KINGSTON HYPERX 3K SSD, SATA 6 Gb/s (upto 555MB/sR | 510MB/sW)
Power Supply
CORSAIR 750W PRO SERIES™ HX750-80 PLUS® GOLD MODULAR (£119)
Processor Cooling
Corsair H60 Hydro Series High Performance CPU Cooler (£59)
Extra Case Fans
2 x 12CM Black Case Fan (configured to extract from rear/roof) (£9)
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND (£9)
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Facilities
10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT - AS STANDARD ON ALL PCs
USB Options
MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 4 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS
Operating System
NO OPERATING SYSTEM REQUIRED
Office Software
NO OFFICE SOFTWARE
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour) (£5)
Delivery
PCS EXTRA-CARE DIAMOND DELIVERY - MON-FRI, PRE-NOON (£9)
Build Time
FAST TRACK 3 WORKING DAY DISPATCH (£69)
Miscellaneous
FREE METRO: LAST LIGHT GAME with GTX 660 & UPWARDS GPUs!
Quantity
1
Price: £1,315.00 including VAT and delivery.
I also called PCS to check everything was in stock and ask few questions about what brands they currently had available. As per usual I got through pretty quickly and they were very informative.
Unboxing
The PC was built and arrived on time within the three working days and before 12pm via DPD.
Most of you will have seen this all before but for anyone who hasn't and wants to know how PCS package everything up:
You get a very large, sturdy and well protected box.
Inside on the top you will find your welcome pack.
The welcome pack contains all of the unused accessories from your build, so in this case the unused connectors for the modular PSU, power cables, driver disc(s) and a welcome pack. When I ordered there was a promotion on for a free copy of Metro: Last Night so in the event of this you will find a product key as well. If you order Windows a disc is also provided, not a backup disc, the installation disc.
Underneath is padding galore, though as you can see nothing is always courier proof and DPD did a bit of a number on it on the way down.
Note the polystyrene encasing the PC itself is not rigid but flexible, the general consensus seems to be that this stuff does a better job than the rigid variety most of the time.
Unfortunately the rear stand snapped off the case during transit (probably mishandled or dropped en route) but the protection seems to have taken the brunt of it and the internals were undamaged. I arranged for an RMA on the rear stand via Email.
On my previous desktop order PCS included a protective airbag inside the case and so it was a shame not to see that here too (in fairness if they still use these it might not have fit)!
Still plenty of room for another 670 though...
The cable management was generally fine but I'm not too happy with the amount of pressure on this cable, it's routed tight and won't stretch any further. Though they are pretty durable so I'm not in any way concerned, but will probably redo a bit of the cable management at some point, maybe when I add a disc and hard drive.
Also it would of been nice if the additional case fan added had been a Corsair branded fan like the others and not a Cooler Master one, but I'm being VERY pedantic there as they're a perfectly good brand as well.
So here it is under the desk. This desk is too small but it's all I can fit in the space I have, stupidly I forgot to check the measurements. It didn't fit underneath but I moved the wooden panel below the bar instead of above it and it now fits in okay.
And the entire setup. That monitor on the left is 12 years old and it still has better viewing angles and colour reproduction than my brand new one. I brought the peripherals separately and not through PCS this time round.
Review:
What can I say really, it runs like an absolute dream and has surpassed the expectations that I had. The overclocked 3770K tears through anything I throw at it and the GTX 670 is a good performer.
The overclock had reset itself but as PCS provide the settings used it was easy enough to restore, albeit they should probably update some of the old BIOS names to more closely match the UEFI menus, but they were similar enough as to be able to work out.
The H60 is noisier than I expected on idle, but not that loud on full load, which I find a little bizarre. It was making a strange sound that had a very variable pitch when idling that was getting on my nerves. I actually turned up the fan so it's slightly louder on idle but of a more consistent tone as not to be annoying. Considering the voltage which is on the high side at 1.375 the temperatures are acceptable, no higher than the low 90s after an extended period at 100% load. By the time the thing burns out I'll probably have moved on anyway.
The case is nice, unassuming and subtle (some would say boring) but that's how I like my cases. The build quality isn't up to that of say the CM690 II from Cooler Master, or Corsair's own high end cases, but it's very good for the money and has a nice finish plus most of the enthusiast features to be expected at this price point.
I think the rig looks the part and I'm going to try and import the side panel with a window from the states.
All in all once again I'm a very satisfied customer! Cheers PCS.
The Rig
I was in the market for a high end desktop build and having used PCS for my prior build they were my first choice for doing so again.
After discussing the chosen specs (https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?25014-It-s-That-Time-Again) I made a few amendments and ended up with this:
Case
CORSAIR CARBIDE SERIES™ 300R COMPACT GAMING CASE
Overclocked CPU
Overclocked Intel® Core™i7-3770k Quad Core (3.50GHz @ max 4.60GHz)
Motherboard
ASUS® SABERTOOTH Z77: USB 3.0, SATA 6.0GB/s, THERMAL ARMOR
Memory (RAM)
8GB KINGSTON HYPERX BEAST DUAL-DDR3 2400MHz X.M.P (2 x 4GB KIT)
Graphics Card
2GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 670 - 2 DVI, HDMI, DP - 3D Vision Ready
Memory - 1st Hard Disk
120GB KINGSTON HYPERX 3K SSD, SATA 6 Gb/s (upto 555MB/sR | 510MB/sW)
Power Supply
CORSAIR 750W PRO SERIES™ HX750-80 PLUS® GOLD MODULAR (£119)
Processor Cooling
Corsair H60 Hydro Series High Performance CPU Cooler (£59)
Extra Case Fans
2 x 12CM Black Case Fan (configured to extract from rear/roof) (£9)
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND (£9)
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Facilities
10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT - AS STANDARD ON ALL PCs
USB Options
MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 4 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS
Operating System
NO OPERATING SYSTEM REQUIRED
Office Software
NO OFFICE SOFTWARE
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour) (£5)
Delivery
PCS EXTRA-CARE DIAMOND DELIVERY - MON-FRI, PRE-NOON (£9)
Build Time
FAST TRACK 3 WORKING DAY DISPATCH (£69)
Miscellaneous
FREE METRO: LAST LIGHT GAME with GTX 660 & UPWARDS GPUs!
Quantity
1
Price: £1,315.00 including VAT and delivery.
I also called PCS to check everything was in stock and ask few questions about what brands they currently had available. As per usual I got through pretty quickly and they were very informative.
Unboxing
The PC was built and arrived on time within the three working days and before 12pm via DPD.
Most of you will have seen this all before but for anyone who hasn't and wants to know how PCS package everything up:
You get a very large, sturdy and well protected box.
Inside on the top you will find your welcome pack.
The welcome pack contains all of the unused accessories from your build, so in this case the unused connectors for the modular PSU, power cables, driver disc(s) and a welcome pack. When I ordered there was a promotion on for a free copy of Metro: Last Night so in the event of this you will find a product key as well. If you order Windows a disc is also provided, not a backup disc, the installation disc.
Underneath is padding galore, though as you can see nothing is always courier proof and DPD did a bit of a number on it on the way down.
Note the polystyrene encasing the PC itself is not rigid but flexible, the general consensus seems to be that this stuff does a better job than the rigid variety most of the time.
Unfortunately the rear stand snapped off the case during transit (probably mishandled or dropped en route) but the protection seems to have taken the brunt of it and the internals were undamaged. I arranged for an RMA on the rear stand via Email.
On my previous desktop order PCS included a protective airbag inside the case and so it was a shame not to see that here too (in fairness if they still use these it might not have fit)!
Still plenty of room for another 670 though...
The cable management was generally fine but I'm not too happy with the amount of pressure on this cable, it's routed tight and won't stretch any further. Though they are pretty durable so I'm not in any way concerned, but will probably redo a bit of the cable management at some point, maybe when I add a disc and hard drive.
Also it would of been nice if the additional case fan added had been a Corsair branded fan like the others and not a Cooler Master one, but I'm being VERY pedantic there as they're a perfectly good brand as well.
So here it is under the desk. This desk is too small but it's all I can fit in the space I have, stupidly I forgot to check the measurements. It didn't fit underneath but I moved the wooden panel below the bar instead of above it and it now fits in okay.
And the entire setup. That monitor on the left is 12 years old and it still has better viewing angles and colour reproduction than my brand new one. I brought the peripherals separately and not through PCS this time round.
Review:
What can I say really, it runs like an absolute dream and has surpassed the expectations that I had. The overclocked 3770K tears through anything I throw at it and the GTX 670 is a good performer.
The overclock had reset itself but as PCS provide the settings used it was easy enough to restore, albeit they should probably update some of the old BIOS names to more closely match the UEFI menus, but they were similar enough as to be able to work out.
The H60 is noisier than I expected on idle, but not that loud on full load, which I find a little bizarre. It was making a strange sound that had a very variable pitch when idling that was getting on my nerves. I actually turned up the fan so it's slightly louder on idle but of a more consistent tone as not to be annoying. Considering the voltage which is on the high side at 1.375 the temperatures are acceptable, no higher than the low 90s after an extended period at 100% load. By the time the thing burns out I'll probably have moved on anyway.
The case is nice, unassuming and subtle (some would say boring) but that's how I like my cases. The build quality isn't up to that of say the CM690 II from Cooler Master, or Corsair's own high end cases, but it's very good for the money and has a nice finish plus most of the enthusiast features to be expected at this price point.
I think the rig looks the part and I'm going to try and import the side panel with a window from the states.
All in all once again I'm a very satisfied customer! Cheers PCS.
