Help I want to build a PC for £500/$1000

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chiptouz, what is the point in spending $40 for a CPU cooler for a CPU that only costs 70 (or $59 for the oem, which you may as well buy if you're buying a separate cooler) Why not just buy a more expensive cpu, and OC it a little bit less? better yet why not just buy a stock 3600 and oc it as far as it will go with the stock cooler?
 
The point in my opinion is that you should be able to overclock a lot more with an aftermarket solution than a stock. I will be honest with that I am unsure how much you can overclock the 3600 on the stock cooler, but with my 3800+ 10% was pushing it a lot. I also like the reusablility of an aftermarket cooler. If he decides to go with a core 2 duo later he can reuse the cooler, plus I like they way they look better than the stock. The artic cooler freezer 7 pro is like $35 US and does a great job.
 
right guys massive change now hope zenmaster gets to see this and can offer advice!!

thinking of changing from the E4300 to the E6320 mainly for the 4MB cache which i read shows a great improvement.

reason i mention zenmaster is you offered great advice on the E4300 combined with the 667 ram as easily overclocked.

would it be still worth getting 667 ram and adding the E6320? would this be easily overclocked or would i need better ram 800 and extra cost?

sorry about going over old ground its just this is so new to me my heads spinning with all the new info and advice.

also just seen the antec 900 which costs alot more than my other case but i really like the look anyone any opinions on that?

once again a huge thanks to all of you can't express all the fun i'm getting out of this, looking forward to finally placing my order 😀
 
Two Reason stand out. One a stock cool will not OC as well has even a cheap $10 heatsink/Fan as I use. Two noise, the stock fan is designed as cheap as possible for the given CPU. Three the transfer grease of a stock cooler is crap and will get much worst with age. Note I only said two as you can replace the grease of a stock cooler.
 
I agree and my X2 3600 can max the mobo out at 300FSB @ 59c max. Thats 2.85GHz but due to fan noise I like it at 2.51GHz and a safe 53c max. This is on a 10~$15 cheap after market cooler which I choice due to a tight budget.
 
I've been looking over the new price guide and the E6320 is gone. The new CPU is an E6540~E6550 for $163 and the E4300 is gone for the E4400 is the lowest at $113.
http://www.hkepc.com/bbs/itnews.php?tid=789466

I have no ideal about OC of the E6540 and E6550 however I would suggest the DDR2 800 as some work at a lower cas lantency at 533/667.

Now if you really want to go cheap looks like intel has a 1MB CPU price cut planed for July.
http://www.vr-zone.com/index.php?i=4976
OC'ed it looks like it can beat the X6800 which is great for a $84 CPU.
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/pentium-e2160_14.html
At stock it only seems a match for the X2 3600 and 3.4GHz is to much to ask for on air cooling for the average OC'er. A reasonable 3-3.2GHz should beat a E6700 which is great.
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/pentium-e2160_13.html
I think the pentium name is replacing celron's.
 
Hi guys.

I'm following this thread with some interest, as i'm looking to build a new pc for £500 or buy one from a store for more and split payment over six months (speaking of which, are mesh computers any good?).

Please could you post a summary of the components once you've decided?

Good forum, this.
 
Just wanted to say: solid advice from both Elbert and zenmaster :trophy:

Living outside the US can be so frustrating though when it comes to prices :roll:

I have to buy some of my components from the UK, and there can be a significant price difference (and not to our benefit :cry: )
 
Hi Tony, yeah these guys are wicked. In terms of the parts i'm going for they keep changing all the time but heres so far -

Gigabyte GA P35-S3, iP35 Express, S 775, PCI-E (x16), DDR2 1066/800/667/533, SATA II, SATA RAID, ATX £59.59 £70.02

Intel Core 2 Duo E4300, Socket 775, 1.80 GHz, 800MHz FSB, Allendale Core, 2MB Cache, Retail £61.89 £72.72

2Gb (2X1GB) Corsair TwinX XMS2, DDR2 PC5400 (667), 240 Pin, Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 4-4-4-12 £39.54 £46.46

Samsung SH-S182M/BEBN 18x DVD±R, 8x DVD±DL, DVD+RW x8/-RW x6, DVD-RAM x12, IDE, Black, OEM, LS £15.99 £18.79

Logitech White Wireless Desktop PRO Keyboard & Mouse £7.99 £9.39

250 Gb Samsung SP2504C SpinPoint P120, SATA300, 7200 rpm, 8MB Cache, 9.0 ms, NCQ £31.98 £37.58

530W Hiper HPU-4M530 SLi Ready Black ATX2.2/BTX SATAx2 PCI-Ex2 £36.89 £43.35

Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro - P4 up to 4.4GHz - S775 Dual Core / Core2Duo Ready £10.35 £12.16

Arctic Silver 5 Thermal Compound for CPU and Chipset Coolers £3.79 £4.45

Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium 32Bit 1Pk OEM (DVD) £54.89 £64.50

Antec Nine Hundred Ultimate Gamer Case w/o PSU £57.99 £68.14

320MB EVGA 8800GTS, PCI-E (x16), Mem 1600MHz, GPU 500MHz, 96 Streams, 2x Dual Link DVI-I/HDTV

These parts are all from Scan.co.uk in terms of cost this has risen above £500 but the case and the graphics are a bit of a luxury could cut cost there. Also i'm holding off buying until july as apparentcy CPU's are going to drop in price.
the cooler and paste are only needed if you plan to overclock otherwise the stock cooler will be fine.
Also if you're not going for a 8800 GTS then I think a cheaper PSU could be bought although it seems important not to scrimp too much on a PSU.

if you're buying now, that processor ram and motherboard are a good place to start good value and easily OCed Im told.
 
If you can live without bragging rights over who has the 'bestest' computer on the block. Look around for a discounted 'barebones' kit or even an open box discount at a retailer.

Example: A friend picked up a an AMD 4000 x2 based Acer with 19" widescreen 5ms LCD and printer for a less than $586 including tax at Best Buy. It came with a $75 in discounts and she took back the printer ($50). Net $461. Upgraded to 2gb DDR 800 for $85, 500w PSU for $40, and EVGA 7900GS KO for $125. Total $711. (<$540 less monitor for a budget rig that will handle games with decent graphics settings) Not too bad!

So look around. For gaming the GPU makes the machine and there are deals to be had if you take the time to look.
 
For just over £500 your doing well to squeeze a GTS in there as well as the Antec 900 case :)

If I were you though i would ditch the artic silver paste. Unneccesary as both the Retail E4400 fan and FP7 come with paste and taking the pre-applied paste and reapplying it is kind of a waste of time for the 1 or 2 degrees your going to shave. It may even be worth considering dropping the FP7 too although at £12 its not going to break the bank. Its up to you but you should know that the retail fan is very much capable of taking an E4400 to 3GHz. I myself only run my E6300 at 2.4GHz (from 1.8GHz) to avoid having to increase the voltage (my own motherboards limit, differs from board to board).

Overclocking is great, very simple to nudge the FSB from 266 to 333 (my 1.8 -> 2.4 increase) without changing anything else. You dont have to push the limits of overclocking to reap the benefits.

In my experience of owning a FP7 its quite noisy at full speed so you might want to experiment with PWM fan control on your motherboard or using a program such as Speedfan.

Otherwise, spot on mate.
 
sheepish this hasn't stayed at £500 unfortunately. prob looking at spending around £700 now 🙁

but more i read more I seem to need.

This has changed again and prob will on 22nd but heres what I have so far -

Asus P5N-E SLI
(2x1GB) CorsairTwinX XMS2, DDR2 PC2-6400 (800) at 4-4-4-12
530W Hiper HPU-4M530
320MB EVGA 8800GTS
250 Gb Seagate 16MB cache
CoolerMaster Centurion 5
Vista Home Premium 64Bit
Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro
Core 2 Duo E6320
Optiarc (Sony/NEC) DVD

and a cable all comes in at £690 at scan.co.uk

What do people think?
 
Did you switch to the Asus for SLI because the P35 board would be faster and have more of a CPU upgrade path? (If it's for SLI, then go for it.)

The Intel 965Chipset tends to be very slightly faster than the 650i boards with identical settings while the P35 tends to be faster than the 965 which would create a definite difference between the P35 and 650i boards.

I'm also not a fan of the 63xx CPUs.
Their Base speed is too low for the high default FSB.

I think you are better off with an E4300 or E6420.

Both of these would allow for OCing with less concern about FSB speeds or
FSB cooling. There are also less concerns with RAM OCs. If you were to run your E63xx with 1:1 speeds with your RAM, it would only be running at 2.8ghz. You need to push your ram well beyond DDR2800 speeds to get a really good CPU speed.

While this is often possible, I would rather save a few dollars and get the E4300 or E4400 which would be over 3.6Ghz with the RAM at rated speeds. Mind you that these chips would really likely not run much more than 3.2 Ghz without serious cooling.
 
ok once again put on the right track by zenmaster my new list is -

CPU - E4300
GPU - 320MB EVGA 8800 GTS
MOBO - Gigabyte GA P35-S3
RAM - 2Gb Corsair TwinX (667) 4-4-4-12
CASE - Cooler Master Centurion 5
HDD - 250 Gb Seagate Barracuda
PSU - 530W Hiper
DVD - Optiarc (Sony/NEC)
OS - XP Home Edition SP2b (Release 2)
Cooler- Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro

All comes in at £605 inc VAT and Shipping

Any good?
 
id go with this:

gigabyte ga-p35-ds3r $130

wintec ampo ddr2 800 2gb (2x1gb) $83 good for 504mhz at 2.1v

e2160 core 2 duo $91

evga 8800gts 320, $280

logisys ps575xbk psu $25

rosewill 604-p $35

x-fi xtreme audio 7.1 $65

total $716

-$20 mail in rebate

this would be plenty fast for most purposes, very upgradable in the future, and overclockable. you can get a thermalright ultra 120 extreme cpu heatsink here for 65 dollars shipped, it is the best air cooler money can buy.

so for about 800 bucks if you buy some 120mm fans as well.

you could save some money buying a cheaper videocard and just use the onboard sound if you want. i would recommend a 7600gt for 100 bucks, and upgrade to a dx10 card when nvidia releases its next revision later this year, early next year. by that time you should be able to upgrade the processor to intels 45nm penryn. or you can use the money saved to buy a 6320 that someone mentioned above, which has the 4mb of cache, the e2160, has only 1mb which hurts performance, running at 3.5ghz its performance is about equal to a stock e6800 running at 2.93, so its up you, but game performance would be better with a cheap processor and an 8800gts than it would with a cheap gfx card and a more expensive processor.
 
hey I cannot get the parts you recommended, I am in the uk and the website dosen't ship here.

Does anyone know a us store that ships here and is still worth while?
 
My new favourite for OCing is the E2160, it'll hit 3ghz on air cooling and outperform a stock E6700

cache memory on these things seems to make zero difference in real world (gaming) applications

for the UK, ebuyer.co.uk or misco.co.uk are my usual faves
 
hey in regards to that psu you recommended are you sure? its just all the advice seems to point in the direction of making sure a decent amount is spent on the psu wouldn't a $25 psu be putting all my other components at risk?
 
Hey right almost my final post on this build, want to know if with this build its worth waiting for july 22nd or should I just order now?

system is -

Corsair (2x1GB) DDR2 675MHz/5400 (4-4-4-12)

Point Of View 8800GTS 320MB DVI HDCP PCI-E

Antec Nine Hundred - Gaming Case with 200mm Top Fan

Extra Value Silver Wireless Keyboard with USB Rechargable Optical Mouse

2m Newlink HDMI v1.1 Male to DVI Male Cable (HDDV-002) £4.99 £5.86

Optiarc/NEC DVD

Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro

250 Gb Seagate Barracuda

Gigabyte GA P35-S3, iP35 Express, S 775, PCI-E (x16), DDR2
1066/533/667/800, SATA II, SATA RAID, ATX

530W Hiper HPU-4M530 SLi Ready Black ATX2.2/BTX SATAx2 PCI-Ex2

Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition SP2b (Release 2) OEM - Single Pack

Intel Core 2 Duo E4300, Socket 775, 1.80 GHz, 800MHz FSB, Allendale Core, 2MB Cache

will it change radically when the price drops come?
 


with all due respect Rob - Eclipse seem to have a terrible reputation for product reliability and customer service.
for the most part the feedback on numerous boards is frighteningly negative.
though the mags give them rave reviews !!!

a quick google ...

"The Trading Standards say this is illegal and they will act against the company if enough people complain - so DO IT TODAY! "
http://www.smallworldmedia.co.uk/weblog/2005/04/on_eclipse_comp_1.html

and
"Eclipse computers are COWBOYS and extremely useless."
http://www.dooyoo.co.uk/electronic-stores/eclipse-computers-coventry/reviews/

and
"I would NEVER EVER order from them again, biggest bunch of cowboys under the sun imo.
Took over two weeks to send my order and there was a whole load of things wrong."

http://forums.hexus.net/shopping-retail-therapy/101995-should-i-worrying-eclipse-computers-3.html#post1324630

and
"IF I DIDNT STOP MYSELF FROM PURCHASING FROM THESE MUPPETS, I WOULD HAVE PROBABLY LANDED ONE ON THE MANAGERS! "
http://www.ciao.co.uk/Reviews/eclipse_computers_com_Eclipse_Computers_Coventry__5262036

and
"DO NOT USE ECLIPSE. THEY ARE ROTTEN TO THE CORE"
http://forums.hexus.net/hexus-hardware/52432-anybody-used-http-www-eclipsecomputers-com.html

and
"Do not be tempted to use this company - they are cheap but their after sales service stinks"
http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=16173

sure maybe only disatisfied customers complain but google Chillblast or Zoostorm or Dell and you don't find pages of angry feedback ! but you do with Eclipse !! and its not that they are a large company
an informed assessment of the wisdom of an Eclipse purchase should take this into account
 
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