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Critique my potential gaming/media setup

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  • 27-07-2012 5:49pm
    #1
    Gary The Gamer
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 179 ✭✭


    Hi all, what are your thoughts on the following. First up are my requirements. The pc will be used for media duties connected to my plasma screen with another hdmi lead out connected to a high quality office monitor when I want to sit down. Might be used for a bit of photo/video editing. Gaming and simulations are also on the list.

    1. Silence : This is golden. If I hear fans spooling up it just kills my desire to use the pc. I intend to leave the computer on all the time and I just want a small, consistent hum like my office pc.
    1a. Silence usually means low power and efficiency so I'd be more into small nm chips that produce less heat

    2. Must be able to run games as good as possible for the price. Trying to hit some sort of sweet spot so I'm not really into the top end cards.

    3. Future proof. I will be looking at a 5 year shelf life

    4. The case should be as inoffensive and discreet as possible. Smaller is better. No crazy alienware type crap.

    So I was thinking about a build but then I'm fairly sure that a well specced XPS 8500 can sort me out. I want your collective expertise to confirm this or to convince me otherwise.


    This is the model I will probably get. To be honest I'd rather scale down a few parts on it for the price but Dell only have certain builds and this is the closest I can get.

    http://www.dell.com/ie/business/p/xps-8500/pd?oc=d00x8515&model_id=xps-8500

    In summary

    3rd gen Intel® Core™ i7-3770
    • 256GB mSATA SSD + 2TB (7,200rpm) SATA Hard Drive (would rather a 128gb to save money.
    • AMD Radeon™ HD 7870 2GB DDR5 Graphics Car would rather the 7850 to save 80 quid
      • 12GB4 Dual Channel DDR3 SDRAM at 1600MHz
      • 8x Blu-Ray ROM Combo (Blu-ray read only, DVD, CD read & write) Would be happy enough with a dvd drive

    One important point when it comes to pricing.....I get a discount in Dell more or less to the prices shown in that page. I won't if I self build.


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    #2
    Procrastastudy
    Closed Accounts Posts: 6,224 ✭✭✭Procrastastudy


    12GB in dual channel why do Dell do this very odd thing?

    Do you really mean a mSATA SSD those things are for tablets and are mad money.

    7200RPM HDD will be louder than a 5400 (generally) Seagate pipeline series is probably ideal in terms of noise (5900 RPM)


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    #3
    Skylinehead
    Registered Users Posts: 11,690 ✭✭✭✭Skylinehead


    Item|Price
    Intel Core i5-2500K Box, LGA1155|€200.96
    ASRock Z68 Pro3 Gen3, Sockel 1155, ATX|€85.67
    MSI R7850 TwinFrozr 2GD5/OC, 2048MB DDR5, PCI-Express|€224.43
    Super-Flower Amazon 80Plus 550W|€52.06
    Samsung SSD 830 128GB SATA 6GB's Paper Box|€102.55
    Seagate Barracuda 7200 2000GB, SATA 6Gb/s|€100.00
    FRACTAL DESIGN Gehäuse DEFINE R3 Black Pearl|€94.85
    Thermalright True Spirit 120|€23.67
    8GB-Kit G.Skill PC3-10667U CL9|€36.44
    LiteOn iHAS124-19 schwarz SATA|€18.78
    Shipping|€18.99
    Total|€958.40

    - CPU is 2500k, went with that as the newer gen 3570 runs hotter. There's space in your budget to go to a 3570k + Z77 combo though.
    - Case is pretty big, but silent. Can go smaller if you really need it.


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    #4
    Procrastastudy
    Closed Accounts Posts: 6,224 ✭✭✭Procrastastudy


    Tray CPU saves you €18 on the 2500K rather than the boxed version included. Otherwise nice build.


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    #5
    Skylinehead
    Registered Users Posts: 11,690 ✭✭✭✭Skylinehead


    GCDLawstudent wrote: »
    Tray CPU saves you €18 on the 2500K rather than the boxed version included. Otherwise nice build.

    I'd rather spend the 18 quid and have a 3 year warranty tbh, and you always have a backup cooler for a HTPC or something down the line.


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    #6
    Procrastastudy
    Closed Accounts Posts: 6,224 ✭✭✭Procrastastudy


    Skylinehead wrote: »
    GCDLawstudent wrote: »
    Tray CPU saves you €18 on the 2500K rather than the boxed version included. Otherwise nice build.

    I'd rather spend the 18 quid and have a 3 year warranty tbh, and you always have a backup cooler for a HTPC or something down the line.

    You've still recourse though the seller if things go wrong. Which I've never heard of with a CPU. I've two of those stupid intel fans kicking around now.


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    #7
    ScumLord
    Registered Users Posts: 28,789 ✭✭✭✭ScumLord


    Gary The Gamer wrote: »
    3. Future proof. I will be looking at a 5 year shelf life
    I wouldn't see 5 years as future proof, I fully expect to get 10 years out of my current PC with the odd graphics card change. That's what I got out of my last PC and it's still a decent enough PC.

    Silence is going to be a bit of a problem with Dells, everyone I've used is pretty loud. The graphics card is often the loudest part, I had a silent graphics card in my last PC, it had no fan but when under heavy use it did need to have some air put over it which I did with a controllable fan.

    The SSDs are silent but you will need a standard hard drive for storage. But they stay silent until in use.

    If you want something silent I don't think you'll get it off dell.


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    #8
    Gary The Gamer
    Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 179 ✭✭Gary The Gamer


    Cheers lads, some food for thought.


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