Mainly Gaming

[Tony1951]

Case
COOLERMASTER HAF 932 FULL TOWER GAMING CASE
Overclocked CPU
OVERCLOCKED AMD PHENOM II X6 1090T (3.20GHz @ MAX 3.80GHz)
Motherboard
ASUS® M4A89TD PRO/USB3 : DDR3, USB 3.0, SATA 6.0Gb/s, CrossFireX
Memory (RAM)
4GB KINGSTON HYPER-X GENESIS DUAL-DDR3 1600MHz (2 x 2GB KIT)
Graphics Card
2GB AMD RADEON™ HD6970 - 2 DVI,HDMI,2 mDP - DX® 11, Eyefinity 4 Capable
Free Item
FREE Total War Shogun™ 2 with any AMD® Radeon™ Graphics card!
Memory - 1st Hard Disk
450GB VELOCIRAPTOR WD4500HLHX, SATA 6-Gb/s, 32MB CACHE (10,000rpm)
2nd Hard Disk
640GB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD6402AAEX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE (7200rpm)
1st DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM
Memory Card Reader
INTERNAL 52 IN 1 CARD READER (XD, MS, CF, SD, etc) + 1 x USB 2.0 PORT
Power Supply
CORSAIR 650W TX SERIES (TX650) 80+ ULTRA QUIET PSU (£72)
Processor Cooling
TITAN FENRIR EVO EXTREME HEATPIPE CPU COOLER (£39)
Thermal Paste
STANDARD OVERCLOCK THERMAL PASTE
Sound Card
ONBOARD 8 CHANNEL (7.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Facilities
ONBOARD 10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT - AS STANDARD ON ALL PCs
USB Options
6 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL (MIN 2 FRONT PORTS) AS STANDARD
Operating System
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64 Bit - inc DVD & Licence (£79)
Office Software
FREE Microsoft® Office Starter 2010 (Limited functionality Word & Excel)
Anti-Virus
BULLGUARD INTERNET SECURITY - FREE 90 DAY TRIAL
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour) (£5)
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 11 to 13 working days
Quantity
1

Price: £1,191.00 including VAT and delivery.

Have been reading other posts and have thought about going down the overclocked route for the first time.
Will mainly use for gaming although also storing pictures and videos.
My thinking is that a SSD wont make a lot of difference as my budget is around £1200.
Any ideas on how to improve on this.

 

[FacetiousPizza]

Case
COOLERMASTER CM STORM ENFORCER - GAMING ENTHUSIAST CASE
Overclocked CPU
Overclocked Intel® Core™i7-2600k Quad Core (3.40GHz @ max 4.80GHz)
Motherboard
ASUS® P8P67 PRO (NEW REV 3.0): USB 3.0/SATA 6Gb/s, CrossFireX™ & SLI
Memory (RAM)
4GB KINGSTON HYPER-X SPECIAL EDITION GREY - DDR3 1600MHz (2 x 2GB KIT)
Graphics Card
1.25GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 570 - 2 DVI, HDMI, DP - DX® 11, 3D Vision Ready
Memory - 1st Hard Disk
1TB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD1002FAEX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE (7200rpm)
1st DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM
Power Supply
CORSAIR 850W TX SERIES (TX850) 80+ ULTRA QUIET PSU (£99)
Processor Cooling
COOLIT ECO A.L.C (ADVANCED LIQUID COOLER) (£49)
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC COOLING MX-3 HIGH THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND (£9)
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Facilities
ONBOARD GIGABIT LAN & WIRELESS 802.11N 300Mbps PCI CARD (£16)
USB Options
6 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL (MIN 2 FRONT PORTS) AS STANDARD
Operating System
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64 Bit - inc DVD & Licence (£79)
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
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 11 to 13 working days
Quantity
1

Price: £1,173.00 including VAT and delivery.

Configure Here: http://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/computers/intel-1155-overclocked/

This will be better for gaming. The CPU is far superior to the AMD 6 core, and there is a bit of a debate about the GTX570 vs AMD6970 but I prefer NVIDIA...
Also, I'm not too fond of the price of the Velociraptors, in my opinion you are better off waiting for SSD prices to fall.
The 850W PSU allows you to add another GTX570 in SLI in the future, should you feel the need to do this.

 

[Tony1951]

Thanks for that I do see were you are coming from. It is just that i have always gone down the AMD/Radeon route. i tried crossfire with 2 radeon 3850 about four years ago thought it was rubbish replaced them with a 4870 which i am still using.Not sure i will do sli/crossfire again, so may consider the 580 instead.As you say could fit ssd drive at a later date.

 

[Teaz]

You can't really go wrong with either Nvidia or AMD. You dont have to go for SLI or CrossFire as a single powerful gpu is plenty for the years to come and if ever needed, you can always op for a second if felt required. Going for a single powerful is pretty much better than multi gpu setups in my view as not many games today still fully utilise multi gpu setups plus it doesnt consume as much power or give off as much heat as a multi setup. Go for a single powerhouse like the 580 or 590 in my view.

Overclocking is fine but not much on offer or any new experience to gaming. Going for an overclocked machine just for gaming by sacrificing some of the cpu's lifespan isnt really worthit in my view as its stock Ghz is still really fast.

 

[Tony1951]

Cheers Teaz am not able too buy now maybe in 2 months time. So will way up the alternatives, no overclocking and a single card 580/590/6970. Still cannot decide on hard drives though.

 

[Tony1951]

Oh by the way +1 rep to both of you for taking the time to post appreciated.

 

[Teaz]

570/6970/580/590 will do you well for the years to come by 2months is plenty of time to think, no need to rush yourself

As for the drives, ssd are good but you should keep them in shape to get the best out of them from what i see since they dont last as long as mechanical drives and are limited by their Read/Write lives. The Velo drive is not a bad replacement in Mech form although their price don't exactly justify them.
ssd are good for fast things like boot ups and load times etc. they are based on speed, you could kinda say its an "overclocked mech" drive.
Mechanical drives shouldnt be a problem for you as they have conisderable fast speeds which are copable. There is always a chance to add one in the future if you do decide.

 

[Tony1951]

Case
COOLERMASTER HAF 912 PLUS MID TOWER GAMING CASE
Processor (CPU)
AMD PHENOM II X4 970 (3.50GHz/8MB CACHE/AM3) - BLACK EDITION
Motherboard
ASUS® M4A87TD/USB3: DUAL DDR3,SATA 6.0GB/s, USB 3.0
Memory (RAM)
4GB SAMSUNG DDR3 DUAL-DDR3 1333MHz (2 X 2GB)
Graphics Card
2GB AMD RADEON™ HD6970 - 2 DVI,HDMI,2 mDP - DX® 11, Eyefinity 4 Capable
Free Item
FREE Total War Shogun™ 2 with any AMD® Radeon™ Graphics card!
Memory - 1st Hard Disk
1TB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD1002FAEX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE (7200rpm)
1st DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM
Memory Card Reader
INTERNAL 52 IN 1 CARD READER (XD, MS, CF, SD, etc) + 1 x USB 2.0 PORT
Power Supply
CORSAIR 650W TX SERIES (TX650) 80+ ULTRA QUIET PSU (£72)
Processor Cooling
STANDARD AMD CPU COOLER
Sound Card
ONBOARD 8 CHANNEL (7.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Facilities
ONBOARD 10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT - AS STANDARD ON ALL PCs
USB Options
6 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL (MIN 2 FRONT PORTS) AS STANDARD
Operating System
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64 Bit - inc DVD & Licence (£79)
Office Software
FREE Microsoft® Office Starter 2010 (Limited functionality Word & Excel)
Anti-Virus
BULLGUARD INTERNET SECURITY - FREE 90 DAY TRIAL
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour) (£5)
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 11 to 13 working days
Quantity
1

Price: £848.00 including VAT and delivery.

After reading yours and other answers would this spec then do the necessary. It is also a lot cheaper than my original budget

 

[Teaz]

Looks good. I would go for a 750psu for the extra breathing room and space as 650 is pretty much on its peak. If you will spend some long hours on it aswel as gaming i would op for a tripple copper cooler.

This spec might be off budget for you but its a real good spec for ideas:

Case
COOLERMASTER HAF 912 PLUS MID TOWER GAMING CASE

Processor (CPU)
AMD PHENOM II X6 1100T (3.30GHz/9MB CACHE) - BLACK EDITION

Motherboard
ASUS® M4A87TD/USB3: DUAL DDR3,SATA 6.0GB/s, USB 3.0

Memory (RAM)
4GB SAMSUNG DDR3 DUAL-DDR3 1333MHz (2 X 2GB)

Graphics Card
2GB AMD RADEON™ HD6970 - 2 DVI,HDMI,2 mDP - DX® 11, Eyefinity 4 Capable

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

2nd Hard Disk
1TB WD CAVIAR GREEN WD10EARS, SATA 3 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE

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

Memory Card Reader
INTERNAL 52 IN 1 CARD READER (XD, MS, CF, SD, etc) + 1 x USB 2.0 PORT

Power Supply
CORSAIR 750W TX SERIES (TX750) 80+ ULTRA QUIET PSU (£86)

Processor Cooling
SUPER QUIET 22dBA TRIPLE COPPER HEATPIPE CPU COOLER (£19)

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

Network Facilities
ONBOARD 10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT - AS STANDARD ON ALL PCs

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

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)

Total: 951

 

[Tony1951]

That looks good my original budget was £1200 so anything under £1000 is a bonus. I also like the idea of 2 large hard drives for backup.

 

[Teaz]

Well the 1st drive is used for general stuff like your programs along with software and anything else while the caviar green drive is used as your storage for all your video, photos, music, docs etc etc You can up the TB to how flexible you need it, if its comfortable in your budget.

 

[Tony1951]

Just checked my current usage on my 2 hard drives only 200gig. So there is plenty there. thanks for your input will now work on the missus to let me get it.

 

[Teaz]

lol hope it goes all well