The PC Building Thread

Jamezinho said:
Looks like a great build. Only thing you may want to consider is an aftermarket CPU cooler. These are essential if you plan to overclock the CPU, and recommended even if you don't. Also an optical drive of some sort but they are not strictly necessary these days.

As for PSUs, I use a 650W Corsair hybrid modular unit. Good PSU manufacturers are the likes of Seasonic, Corsair, Enermax, XFX, OCZ or Antec. There are probably others I've forgotten.

Basically, modular PSUs are the most expensive, non-modular the cheapest and hybrid modular somewhere in between.
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Any links James? I genuinely don't want to order something I have no knowledge of.

PC building back a few years was fine but things seem to have progressed now.
 
Depends how much you want to spend and do you want a modular PSU?

Fully modular will give a tidier build as there are no cables hard-wired into the unit - you just plug in the ones you need. Non-modular will have the whole nest of cables hard-wired to the power supply so you have loads of cables left over that you won't use and need to hide. Hybrid ones have the important cables hard-wired and then you plug in the extra ones you need.

Maybe something like the Corsair CX600M or the CX750M if you want a bit more juice. They are hybrid modular, not too expensive and will serve you well.
 
kevano22 said:
Thanks to bsmaff I picked this up for £455 and am hoping my kind friend will pick it up and save me £20 delivery.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/170873861...orefresh=true&autorefresh=true#ht_1507wt_1270
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Remember when I bought this?

As of last night its started to boot for about 3 seconds then shut down. Then it tries again. Then fails. Tries again. Etc.

Have to unplug.

Have tried resetting bios. Removing battery from mobo. Reseated ram and gfx.

Anyone ever seen this before or know what it could be?
 
Fuck it, I think I'm gonna shell out the extra £100 for the 780, it seems to offer a fairly substantial performance improvement and the 3GB of VRAM will put at ease my paranoia about 2GB not being enough to mod the crap out of Skyrim.
 
kevano22 said:
Remember when I bought this?

As of last night its started to boot for about 3 seconds then shut down. Then it tries again. Then fails. Tries again. Etc.

Have to unplug.

Have tried resetting bios. Removing battery from mobo. Reseated ram and gfx.

Anyone ever seen this before or know what it could be?
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Sometimes dodgy ram or an unstable overclock will do this. I've had it happen with my system.
 
CPU: Intel Core i5-4670K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor (£173.82 @ Aria PC)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler (£23.90 @ Ebuyer)
Motherboard: MSI Z87-G45 Gaming ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£107.84 @ Scan.co.uk)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (£65.18 @ Amazon UK)
HDD: Toshiba 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£56.45 @ Amazon UK)
SSD: Samsung 840 EVO 120GB 2.5" Solid State Disk (£69.95 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 780 3GB Video Card (£389.74 @ Scan.co.uk)
Case: Fractal Design Core 3000 USB 3.0 (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case (£58.78 @ Scan.co.uk)
Power Supply: XFX 650W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply (£69.50 @ Ebuyer)
Total: £1015.16

I feel I'm nearing the ideal setup with this build, thoughts?
 
bsmaff said:
Nothing wrong at all, just amazing how quickly £800 turns into £1000.
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Isn't it just! A bit naughty - I tried to tell myself to keep to £1000, but it's going to be nearer £1200 with the monitor added and postage & packing, thermal paste etc :P.

I'm confident it will be well worth it though once it's up and running!
 
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I swapped the RAM for these;
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B004JKNIZQ

Heard reports that the heat spreaders on the Vengeance are unnecessary and can get in the way of the CPU cooler.

I have all of the components in my basket on the respective sites now, just waiting until tomorrow/Thursday to order because I'm away from my house until Friday, just to make sure I'm in when the stuff gets delivered.

Do you recommend getting any thermal paste or extra case fans? The case I've selected already has 3 fans so I'm thinking I could maybe do without the fans, but the consensus seems to be that the provided thermal paste is crap.
 
Try the Vengeance low profile ram.

3 fans will be fine to start with. You may not need any additional ones.

I used the thermal paste supplied with my cooler - no issues.
 
Took your advice and gone for this RAM now;
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/8gb-...k-pc3-12800-(1600mhz)-non-ecc-unbuffered-cas-

I'll go with the provided paste and fans initially, should be fine - I'm not planning to overclock immediately unless it will provide a noticeable difference anyway.

Unless some drastic sale or something happens in the next 24 hours, this build is sorted now finally.

Sorry for the fretting and countless questions, but surely it's understandable when dropping so much money on something :P.
 
I'm also going with Amazon for the majority of the components, as a few of your links don't have stock for quite some time.
 
Nice! :D.

Yeah I just used PCPartPicker really to sort out which components to buy - I have sorted out where I'm getting stuff from. It's all Amazon and Scan for the PC and Pixmania for the monitor...

There seems to be some stories of bad experiences involving Pixmania but the monitor is considerably cheaper than elsewhere so I'm taking the gamble... I have a small TV I can use in the meantime if they screw it up.
 
Ordered all my bits now, aside from OS, keyboard/mouse etc.

Went with:
* Intel Core i5 4670K Quad Core Retail CPU (Socket 1150, 3.40GHz, 6MB, Haswell, 84W)
* Asus Z87-PRO USB 3.0 Motherboard (4x DDR3, ATX, 2x PCI Express 3.0/2.0, Intel, Wi-Fi)
* Toshiba DT01ACA200 2TB SATA 6Gb/s 7200rpm 3.5 Inch Internal Hard Drive
* Samsung 840 EVO 120GB 2.5 inch Basic SATA Solid State Drive
* EVGA Nvidia GeForce GTX780 Superclocked ACX Cooler 3GB GDDR5 Graphics Card (PCI Express 3.0, HDMI, DVI-I, DVI-D, Display Port, 384-Bit, 2560x1600, Nvi
* 8GB (2x4GB) Corsair DDR3 Vengeance Jet Black Low Profile, PC3-12800 (1600), Non-ECC, CAS 9-9-9-24, XMP, 1.5V
* Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler.
* Fractal Design Define R4 Arctic White Midi Tower Soundproof Case
* 750W Corsair RM Series 80PLUS Gold Modular Power Supply

Forgot about a DVD player/writer too.

So much for the £800 budget FFS.
 
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Scutch said:
Nigh on £1200 mate. Got severe buyers guilt straight after placing the orders from several different outlets.

I realised I needed a DVD player/writer to install Windows so went with this http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00CC6YN6M/ref=oh_details_o00_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Speaking of which, Windows 7 or 8?
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Ooooooff! :))

Windows 7 or 8? I prefer the usability of 7 as the new Metro UI on Windows 8 is a train wreck, but Windows 8 performs a little better, can be made to look and feel like Win7 with very little effort, and should have a longer lifespan being the newer product.

I'd go with 8 and try and live with it. Some people like Metro but to me it's not suitable for desktops. Fucking awful.

(edit - I had 7 and upgraded to 8)
 
If your buying a new OS, it is Windows 8 all the way for me.
Used both and I would never go back to Windows 7 now, Windows 8 runs a lot less shit in the background to Windows 7 and is a lot smoother and faster.

Once you get used to the fact you don't need to use the metro system and you just press the 'Windows Key' and half type in what you want to open you realise why the fuck are people still using a bollocks start menu for.
Things change and once your passed the initial this is weird stage it is a 'Superior' OS.

HAPPY NEW YEAR GUYS
 
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I still say the functionality of Windows 7 is much better, but each to their own. Windows 8 Metro is a tablet OS in my opinion.

Aside from the UI, I agree that Windows 8 is superior.
 
Ordered all my stuff as well now, came to £1130 - managed to include some speakers and a 20m ethernet cable in that too. Hope the delivery of everything goes smoothly and I have it up and running before too long, can't wait! :)
 
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Scutch said:
Ordered all my bits now, aside from OS, keyboard/mouse etc.

Went with:
* Intel Core i5 4670K Quad Core Retail CPU (Socket 1150, 3.40GHz, 6MB, Haswell, 84W)
* Asus Z87-PRO USB 3.0 Motherboard (4x DDR3, ATX, 2x PCI Express 3.0/2.0, Intel, Wi-Fi)
* Toshiba DT01ACA200 2TB SATA 6Gb/s 7200rpm 3.5 Inch Internal Hard Drive
* Samsung 840 EVO 120GB 2.5 inch Basic SATA Solid State Drive
* EVGA Nvidia GeForce GTX780 Superclocked ACX Cooler 3GB GDDR5 Graphics Card (PCI Express 3.0, HDMI, DVI-I, DVI-D, Display Port, 384-Bit, 2560x1600, Nvi
* 8GB (2x4GB) Corsair DDR3 Vengeance Jet Black Low Profile, PC3-12800 (1600), Non-ECC, CAS 9-9-9-24, XMP, 1.5V
* Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler.
* Fractal Design Define R4 Arctic White Midi Tower Soundproof Case
* 750W Corsair RM Series 80PLUS Gold Modular Power Supply

Forgot about a DVD player/writer too.

So much for the £800 budget FFS.
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Guys, what cables will I need to go with this, if any? Just the HDMI lead from GPU to TV?
 
Just don't use a pad when playing online, you will get well and truly owned.

I am surprised though Jamez, even though I have a 360 pad I rarely use them except for FIFA and a couple of racing games.
Even games like Batman Arkham I still find it so much easier to use a keyboard compared to a controller.
 
I genuinely cannot get into my head how a keyboard and mouse is easier than a controller. Simply cannot fathom.

All seems massively confusing to me.

I can appreciate how many think it's a night and day experience over a controller, but as I say, using WASD for movement and the mouse as well is crazy, not to mention all the other keys all over the shop.
 
My pc is in the living room so I'm predominantly a sofa based gamer. A controller is so much more comfortable and practical. Most pc games work with the 360 out of the box so it's plug and play.

I've stayed away from online shooters because I know I can't compete using a pad.

Keyboard and mouse may be more precise but I find it a step backwards compared to a pad. I know that's sacrilege in pc circles but coming from a console background it's what I prefer.
 
The speed, precision, and variation in sensitivity of a mouse far exceeds what you can do with the analog stick of a controller, you will get well and truly battered if you try to play a twitch shooter such as Counter Strike online with a controller.

It seems awkward at first and takes a lot of practice, especially training your fingers to hit the right keys, committing common combinations to muscle memory etc. but you get far, far more control than with a gamepad.

The majority of console shooters have aim-assist, even online, to compensate for the lack of precision you find with a mouse.

This video is pretty funny, a guy using K&M plays COD MW2 on the 360;

YouTube - XIM3: Mouse and Keyboard on Xbox 360 | MW2 Demo #1

:LOL:

Certain games are obviously better on a controller than a keyboard though, e.g. sports games, racing games.
 
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