First time builder - Some tips

Gumbi

OK guys, here's the story: I intend to build myself a PC with some money I've earned. I know only the basics of computers, so this is a relatively big undertaking.

The desktop (I don't have a monitor either) will be used for some gaming and other general usage. (Internet etc.) I expect I'll need 4GB ddr3 and Win7 64 bit. Can you guys help out a bit in terms of the CPU and graphics card I need to be looking at? Motherboard too? (I know nothing about motherboards). Should I consider overclocking? (ie how easy is it?).

My budget is €850, by the way. What's the best I can get for that? Thanks a lot in advance, all advice and help is appreciated.

distraction

i think you should look into buy some kind of cpu mobo bundle and a good guide book to buildin [mind all u really need is a screwdrive and some patience], what exactly do you want to use it for ?why have u pikd the ram or do u already have it?

Icyseanfitz

dont bother getting a book to tell you how to build it you will learn enough through the web guides, im also putting my first build together in a couple of weeks and its pretty straight forward everything fits someplace on the motherboard kinda like lego,
This ( build2.jpg )is what id buy if i where you but remember to add in an os which is around an extra 100, it comes in around 150 over your budget of 850 but you could cut 50 - 100 on the gpu if you wanted, the reason i went with ati over say a nvidia gtx 460 is that the mobo i pointed out to you will support crossfire (2 GPU's) so you would be able to add another 5850 down the road if you wanted to. The Gpu all depends on how much gaming you want to do the hd 5850 is a good card for gaming but you could cut costs and buy a hd 5830.

Chuck Finlay

Overclocking is quite easy and can be looked into. It needs some double-and triple checking which can be a bit annoying for a novice, but once set up it can give you a bit more boost for the games where you might need it.

Operating system and monitor are going to cut a fairly sized chunk out of your budget.
What size of a screen do you prefer / are you looking for? Do you have specific games in mind? Do you want to be able to play all the newest upcoming games? Do you need highest levels of detail and AA/AF?

Gumbi

Icyseanfitz wrote: »

dont bother getting a book to tell you how to build it you will learn enough through the web guides, im also putting my first build together in a couple of weeks and its pretty straight forward everything fits someplace on the motherboard kinda like lego,
This ( build2.jpg )is what id buy if i where you but remember to add in an os which is around an extra 100, it comes in around 150 over your budget of 850 but you could cut 50 - 100 on the gpu if you wanted, the reason i went with ati over say a nvidia gtx 460 is that the mobo i pointed out to you will support crossfire (2 GPU's) so you would be able to add another 5850 down the road if you wanted to. The Gpu all depends on how much gaming you want to do the hd 5850 is a good card for gaming but you could cut costs and buy a hd 5830.

That's great but a little over budget. I can stretch to €900 but without an operating system it's still to0 expensive. Maybe I could go for a 5770 (http://www.pixmania.ie/ie/uk/4129647/art/pixmania/radeon-hd-5770-1-gb-gddr5.html), or 5830 if possible. What are your opinions on this processor:AMD Athlon II X4 635 (2.9GHz) (http://www.pixmania.ie/ie/uk/4788841/art/amd/athlon-ii-x4-635-quad-cor.html)

Will my mobo change with these changes? Would a 500W psu do for these changes? By dropping to a 5830 and switching to that cpu I can save over €140. Would this cpu do as well for gaming.

In terms of monitors, the one you suggested is fine, but I am prepared to go as cheap as possible, as I know they're pretty future-proof. By the way what am I looking at in terms of shipping from this site.

Thanks a lot, I really appreciate you taking your time to do this for me.

Edit: I put this together on the site (which is great by the way): Radeon 5830 (170 I think it's just €20 shipping for it all, which is great. Please inform me if changes to the motherboard are necessary. Also should I stick with the 700W power Supply suggested or not? Have I gone too low with the cpu?

http://s991.photobucket.com/albums/af34/tommymooore/?action=view&current=Capture.jpg

Again, thank you very, very much to all of you.

VenomIreland

Gumbi wrote: »

That's great but a little over budget. I can stretch to €900 but without an operating system it's still to0 expensive. Maybe I could go for a 5770 (http://www.pixmania.ie/ie/uk/4129647/art/pixmania/radeon-hd-5770-1-gb-gddr5.html), or 5830 if possible. What are your opinions on this processor:AMD Athlon II X4 635 (2.9GHz) (http://www.pixmania.ie/ie/uk/4788841/art/amd/athlon-ii-x4-635-quad-cor.html)

Will my mobo change with these changes? Would a 500W psu do for these changes? By dropping to a 5830 and switching to that cpu I can save over €140. Would this cpu do as well for gaming.

In terms of monitors, the one you suggested is fine, but I am prepared to go as cheap as possible, as I know they're pretty future-proof. By the way what am I looking at in terms of shipping from this site.

Thanks a lot, I really appreciate you taking your time to do this for me.

Edit: I put this together on the site (which is great by the way): Radeon 5830 (170 I think it's just €20 shipping for it all, which is great. Please inform me if changes to the motherboard are necessary. Also should I stick with the 700W power Supply suggested or not? Have I gone too low with the cpu?

http://s991.photobucket.com/albums/af34/tommymooore/?action=view&current=Capture.jpg

Again, thank you very, very much to all of you.

I'd say get a Phenom II instead of the one you have picked.
I'd also recommend getting a 5770 instead of a 5830, you are using a small monitor and as such don't need so much power, also, the 5830 I myself have, needs to be downclocked to prevent driver crashing in some old games.

Icyseanfitz

Gumbi wrote: »

That's great but a little over budget. I can stretch to €900 but without an operating system it's still to0 expensive. Maybe I could go for a 5770 (http://www.pixmania.ie/ie/uk/4129647/art/pixmania/radeon-hd-5770-1-gb-gddr5.html), or 5830 if possible. What are your opinions on this processor:AMD Athlon II X4 635 (2.9GHz) (http://www.pixmania.ie/ie/uk/4788841/art/amd/athlon-ii-x4-635-quad-cor.html)

Will my mobo change with these changes? Would a 500W psu do for these changes? By dropping to a 5830 and switching to that cpu I can save over €140. Would this cpu do as well for gaming.

In terms of monitors, the one you suggested is fine, but I am prepared to go as cheap as possible, as I know they're pretty future-proof. By the way what am I looking at in terms of shipping from this site.

Thanks a lot, I really appreciate you taking your time to do this for me.

Edit: I put this together on the site (which is great by the way): Radeon 5830 (170 I think it's just €20 shipping for it all, which is great. Please inform me if changes to the motherboard are necessary. Also should I stick with the 700W power Supply suggested or not?

http://s991.photobucket.com/albums/af34/tommymooore/?action=view&current=Capture.jpg

ya that cpu is am AM3 socket CPU so it will fit in that motherboard (as to whether its good for gaming id presume it wouldnt be bad as it is a modern quad core but someone else will be able to tell you as im not really up to date with CPU's compared to GPU's).

What are your plans for gaming? do you intend to run more than one screen and are you looking to max games like crysis? Well there isnt a whole lot of difference between a 5830 and a 5770 and if i was on a tight budget i would go with the 5770 and then after a while buy another one to crossfire but if were you id save up for a while until you could afford to get something like a 5850 (much better gaming card and the rule of thumb when it comes to GPU's is always buy the best single GPU that you can instead of thinking about crossfire).

As for monitors and PSU's this is my own opinion but you should never skimp on a PSU for two reasons one is that it is a component that you can carry over to a few builds if it is a good one second is that if it goes bang it can destroy your whole pc, also if your planing on overclocking at any point its nice to have a PSU with high wattage as you know you have plenty room to overclock. If i where you id be getting a monitor with a 1920 x 1080 resolution maybe around 20-23 inches the one i pointed out is very good.

Gumbi

Hmmm... What kind of old games necessitate downclocking in the 5830? I intend to play games like Rome Total War (old now I know) medieval 2 and I'll be pushing into Starcraft II with this system and other newer games. Reviews online suggest that the 5830 can manage close to 30FPS even on 2560x1600 and I won't be playing anywhere near that res so I should be fine for a few years with that car if I play @ 1600x1050 or less, right?

Upgrading the cpu adds another €45+, surely the 2.8GHz 635 will do? I also think I'm looking at a 22" LG monitor now, as originally suggested, as it has a 2 Year Warranty included as well. (Although by law it should be 5 I believe...).

Many thanks again.

VenomIreland

RTW was actually one of the games I had to downclock for, although after a recent driver update I haven't tested it, infact, at stock clocks I have only gotten one driver crash overall.

The 635 will do, but the lack of L3 cache seems to affect performance going by a benchmark I once saw, if I find that benchmark I'll link it here.

Solitaire

Stretching you to the very limits of your budget, but for an OC-friendly system with L3 cache and beats the socks off a Athlon X4+HD5770 build...

€905 including shipping:

VenomIreland

Ok, I can't fidn the benchmark comparison, can anyone help me find it? It had a list of most CPU's and you could selec which ones to compare, I remember it was blue and green in most places.

Gumbi

Looks like a similar system there, but the card is different. The cpu is better though. According to a quick check, it seems that card is better than the 5830. Am I correct?

Solitaire

Are you thinking of the Toms one?

All I know is that I've seen several benches with the Athlons (X4 in particular) taking a performance hit in encoding/decoding/crypto/games presumably from the lack of L3. They're best-in-class but they can't really box above their weight so if you have the money to spare get a Phenom for a gaming build.

EDIT - Yeah, GPU's a little better, a little less thirsty and a lot better for OCing And the Phenom has enough cache to keep games happy

VenomIreland

Nah it's not the Tom's one, I've seen one where you can remove some CPU's from the list to compare whatever CPU's you want.

Gumbi

Solitaire wrote: »

Are you thinking of the Toms one?

All I know is that I've seen several benches with the Athlons (X4 in particular) taking a performance hit in encoding/decoding/crypto/games presumably from the lack of L3. They're best-in-class but they can't really box above their weight so if you have the money to spare get a Phenom for a gaming build.

EDIT - Yeah, GPU's a little better, a little less thirsty and a lot better for OCing And the Phenom has enough cache to keep games happy

I'm talking about the 5830 vs the GTX460. It seems the 460 beats the 5830, I think, according to a quick check, although I'm not sure. Over-clocking seems to be a definite option to look into once the build is complete. Would I need to replace the stock fan though then?

I could around €30 if I go for a cheaper monitor though, which would make this system very tempting indeed. Thanks much.

Solitaire

Gumbi wrote: »

I'm talking about the 5830 vs the GTX460. It seems the 460 beats the 5830, I think, according to a quick check, although I'm not sure.

That's what I said at the bottom of that post

Over-clocking seems to be a definite option to look into once the build is complete. Would I need to replace the stock fan though then?

CPU? Yes, if you pushed it hard. That's why I included the Hyper 212 Plus in the build GPU? Nope, should be able to handle a decent OC on the included cooling setup. As I said the GTX460 is much better for quick-n-easy OCing than the highly-stressed HD5830

I could around €30 if I go for a cheaper monitor though, which would make this system very tempting indeed.

You could, although the reason I went with that monitor was because its a good, branded gaming monitor with very high refresh (2ms) and DVI. If you had to drop something then maybe it would be better to drop the CPU cooler or downgrade from a 1TB to 500GB Samsung F3 instead.

VenomIreland

Gumbi wrote: »

I could around €30 if I go for a cheaper monitor though, which would make this system very tempting indeed. Thanks much.

Don't drop the monitor, I have the P2270 (or P2370, I can't remember, I'll check now) and it's an awesome monitor.

EDIT: It's the P2370.

Gumbi

Solitaire wrote: »

That's what I said at the bottom of that post



CPU? Yes, if you pushed it hard. That's why I included the Hyper 212 Plus in the build GPU? Nope, should be able to handle a decent OC on the included cooling setup. As I said the GTX460 is much better for quick-n-easy OCing than the highly-stressed HD5830



You could, although the reason I went with that monitor was because its a good, branded gaming monitor with very high refresh (2ms) and DVI. If you had to drop something then maybe it would be better to drop the CPU cooler or downgrade from a 1TB to 500GB Samsung F3 instead.

Saving money on the HDD is viable, but I'd really only save, what, a tenner? A little more? I've no prob with that though, 220GB is keeping me going at the moment without much hassle.

I see the fan now. I guess I have to overclock now:D Combined with that monitor, that system has some real potential @ only €900! I could even slice a bit off on the monitor, HDD and fan if I really, really had to, but I don't, which is great.

That site has some very cheap components indeed; it was also highly recommended to me by my cousin for that very reason.

Thanks, I may end up going for this system after all.

Edit: Will the GTX460 trump the 5850 with ocing by a more than neglible margin??

VenomIreland

I wish to whomever the common people believe in nowadays that I knew of how cheap hardwareversand was when I was ordering the parts to my PC

Would've saved my parents like €100 or gotten myself a 5850

Solitaire

HD5850?? An OCd GTX460 1GB could take a stock HD5850, a GTX460 768MB can't unless OCd to a ludicrous level. Then again, a 1GB GTX460 is quite a bit more expensive than the regular version, and the HD5850 more expensive still. The latter is just a wee bit outside your price range though...

VenomIreland

Pah, I'm stuck with the 5830 anyway

At least in the future I can pick up a cheap one and CrossfireX them instead of binning/selling them.

Gumbi

Solitaire wrote: »

HD5850?? An OCd GTX460 1GB could take a stock HD5850, a GTX460 768MB can't unless OCd to a ludicrous level. Then again, a 1GB GTX460 is quite a bit more expensive than the regular version, and the HD5850 more expensive still. The latter is just a wee bit outside your price range though...

I actually meant the 5830 so it's al good :cool: I hope the ocing isn't too frustrating (I know a bit about computers but the building is a first time for me). Thank a lot for your help, if all goes well I could be ordering tonight.:D

Solitaire

GTX460 is much easier to OC than HD5830 - the latter sometimes has no OC headroom at all, and is stuck at 800MHz, while the GTX460 can approach those speeds and is a helluva lot more powerful per clock cycle!

OCing the GPU and RAM timings is done in software nowadays anyway. You'll have to do the CPU and RAM speed in the BIOS though, but its not too hard if you're not looking for la-la-land figures

VenomIreland

Solitaire wrote: »

HD5830 - the latter sometimes has no OC headroom at all

You're taking that from my experiences aren't you

It still crashes sometimes, I'm beginning to think the 5830's just suck Shoulda got a 5770.

Solitaire

If it fails to hold stable under stock clocks its legally Not Fit For Purpose and can be RMA'd.

VenomIreland

Might return it then for a refund. Would get back €100 or so after buying a 5770 that could be put toward a second 5770 or a Bulldozer CPU (when it comes out)

VenomIreland

Yeah I think I'll return it for a refund, get a 5770, then put the €100 into savings for a Bulldozer CPU.

Gumbi

Just ordered that system, Solitaire. Without the HDD though, as someone I know has a spare 500GB SATA lying around that he said he'd give me. (Only annoying thing is that I can't find the ETA of delivery for me on the site ...oh well)...

Thanks very much to all who contributed.

Monotype

VenomIreland wrote: »

Ok, I can't fidn the benchmark comparison, can anyone help me find it? It had a list of most CPU's and you could selec which ones to compare, I remember it was blue and green in most places.

VenomIreland wrote: »

Nah it's not the Tom's one, I've seen one where you can remove some CPU's from the list to compare whatever CPU's you want.

Anandtech

VenomIreland wrote: »

I wish to whomever the common people believe in nowadays that I knew of how cheap hardwareversand was when I was ordering the parts to my PC

Dude, you have to leave it go. If you keep thinking about the PC you could have had, your PC will go obsolete before you have the chance to enjoy the one that you do have. Komplett provide a good service and at least you can sleep knowing that you're helping employ those guys that work there and that the VAT goes into the Irish economy.
You learn a bit every time. I've haven't used hwv because they have never been cheaper when I've needed to use them. It's not like you went with a scamming company or got a 'coolwatts' PSU that messed up your system. It may not be perfect, but it rarely is and you just need to take it on board next time.

VenomIreland

Monotype wrote: »

Anandtech



Dude, you have to leave it go. If you keep thinking about the PC you could have had, your PC will go obsolete before you have the chance to enjoy the one that you do have. Komplett provide a good service and at least you can sleep knowing that you're helping employ those guys that work there and that the VAT goes into the Irish economy.
You learn a bit every time. I've haven't used hwv because they have never been cheaper when I've needed to use them. It's not like you went with a scamming company or got a 'coolwatts' PSU that messed up your system. It may not be perfect, but it rarely is and you just need to take it on board next time.

Thanks, and thanks for the comparison I was looking for

Icyseanfitz

whats the rest of your build like venom? the great thing about using a pc for gaming or anything really is that you can upgrade parts whenever you want so save up til Xmas and buy a new hd 6 series card i take it the hd 5830 didnt cost you too much right? im bloody looking at a hd 5970 and if that thing under-performs for me il go into cardiac arrest