Final checks on £2400 gaming PC

[DaveyP16]

Sorry for starting a new thread for this, but think i'm almost set on final specs and am looking to order today/tomorrow.



Case
SILVERSTONE RAVEN RV03 - GAMING ENTHUSIAST TOWER CASE
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™i7-2600 Quad Core (3.40GHz, 8MB Cache) + HD Graphics
Motherboard
ASUS® P8Z68-V PRO: USB 3.0, SATA 6GB/s, NVIDIA®SLI™, ATI®CrossFireX™
Memory (RAM)
8GB KINGSTON HYPER-X GENESIS DUAL-DDR3 1600MHz, X.M.P (2 x 4GB KIT)
Graphics Card
3GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 580 - 2 DVI, HDMI, DP - 3D Vision Ready
Free Item
FREE Batman Arkham City with any Nvidia® GeForce GTX560 or above!
2nd Graphics Card
3GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 580 - 2 DVI, HDMI, DP - 3D Vision Ready
Free Item
FREE Batman Arkham City with any Nvidia® GeForce GTX560 or above!
Memory - 1st Hard Disk
450GB VELOCIRAPTOR WD4500HLHX, SATA 6-Gb/s, 32MB CACHE (10,000rpm)
2nd Hard Disk
2TB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD2002FAEX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE (7200rpm)
SSD CACHE DRIVE
20GB INTEL® SSD 311 SERIES - CACHE DRIVE FOR SYSTEM / 1st HDD
1st DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
12x BLU-RAY ROM DRIVE, 16x DVD ±R/±RW (£45)
2nd DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM
Power Supply
CORSAIR 1050W PRO SERIES™ HX1050-80 PLUS® SILVER MODULAR (£162)
Processor Cooling
TITAN FENRIR EVO EXTREME HEATPIPE CPU COOLER (£39)
Sound Card
Sound Blaster® X-Fi™ Titanium (£59)
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
DVI-D & HDMI Monitor Cables
2 x 2 METRE DVI-D CABLE (£9)
Speakers
LOGITECH S120 2.0 BLACK SPEAKER SYSTEM (£9)
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 10 to 12 working days
Quantity
1

Price: £2,345.00 including VAT and delivery.


after a bit of tinkering I have gone for this. (maxing out budget with monitors)

Keyboard and mouse I am still researching, looking at razer naga epic and dont know about keyboard yet as everything gets mixed reviews.

any recommendations welcome.


Now for the system questions

1. I'm going for 2 of these http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showpr...source=froogle , It says they have 1 x Dual Link DVI-D input. Does this mean i just need the cables supplied by PCS or should I be looking for 'high quality gold plated....' ones? Is it one cable per monitor from each graphics card both to get 2560*1440 res?

Is hdmi not better than dvi-d? should I be looking for hdmi monitor? The Hazro D model is 10 bit and has hdmi etc, should I look to that one?

2. I have put the sound card in for simple music creation (plugging guitar and mic in) either directly to PC or via my toneport. Is this sound card needed/good enough? Will the onboard still have done?

I also had to sacrifice the wireless n pci-e card to free up the slot, is this worth doing?

3. Is the cooling still sufficient or will I need more with extra sound card/wireless n card in?

4. I notice the difference between the 3tb and 2tb green and black drives is £3. Does this mean green drive is reduced in performance? I will only be using this drive to store all movies photos and music etc.

5. Lastly, this system is mainly for gaming and if honest focused at BF3, is it worth delaying the build till closer to the release for drop in price? Or wont prices change much in that short a period?


Thanks again in advance for any help, I really want to get this right.

 

[Frenchy]

1. Standard DVI cable will do, no need for the better quality ones. HDMI and DVI are technically identical, except for oen thing, HDMI carries sound. The image itself is exactly the same since it is encoded in exactly the same way.

2. Dont bother with the soudn card, just use onboard.

3. Ciooler is fine, im running this cooler on an overclocked 2600k with two 3GB GTX 580's and it copes fine.

4. If you have a choice between green and black as a primary drive go for the black. If its a secondary drive then go for green. Even with an SSD i would still count HDD's seperatley in termsd of primary and secondary. For example I have a primary SSD 120GB, but then I have a cavier black as my primary HDD, this is because most of your programs, data will eb stored on the cavier black. Needs to still be good response times.

5. Prices might drop a bit, they may also go up, depends on stock levels as well as supply worldwide of certain components i guess. Also tghe annoying thing is that even if you wait a month ro so youll then see the differenc ein price and think, hmm well ill wait longer then, in the end you end up waiting for ever because your either waiting for a price drop or some new component.

 

[Blakey0]

Sorry for starting a new thread for this, but think i'm almost set on final specs and am looking to order today/tomorrow.



Case
SILVERSTONE RAVEN RV03 - GAMING ENTHUSIAST TOWER CASE
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™i7-2600 Quad Core (3.40GHz, 8MB Cache) + HD Graphics
Motherboard
ASUS® P8Z68-V PRO: USB 3.0, SATA 6GB/s, NVIDIA®SLI™, ATI®CrossFireX™
Memory (RAM)
8GB KINGSTON HYPER-X GENESIS DUAL-DDR3 1600MHz, X.M.P (2 x 4GB KIT)
Graphics Card
3GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 580 - 2 DVI, HDMI, DP - 3D Vision Ready
Free Item
FREE Batman Arkham City with any Nvidia® GeForce GTX560 or above!
2nd Graphics Card
3GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 580 - 2 DVI, HDMI, DP - 3D Vision Ready
Free Item
FREE Batman Arkham City with any Nvidia® GeForce GTX560 or above!
Memory - 1st Hard Disk
450GB VELOCIRAPTOR WD4500HLHX, SATA 6-Gb/s, 32MB CACHE (10,000rpm)
2nd Hard Disk
2TB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD2002FAEX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE (7200rpm)
SSD CACHE DRIVE
20GB INTEL® SSD 311 SERIES - CACHE DRIVE FOR SYSTEM / 1st HDD
1st DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
12x BLU-RAY ROM DRIVE, 16x DVD ±R/±RW (£45)
2nd DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM
Power Supply
CORSAIR 1050W PRO SERIES™ HX1050-80 PLUS® SILVER MODULAR (£162)
Processor Cooling
TITAN FENRIR EVO EXTREME HEATPIPE CPU COOLER (£39)
Sound Card
Sound Blaster® X-Fi™ Titanium (£59)
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
DVI-D & HDMI Monitor Cables
2 x 2 METRE DVI-D CABLE (£9)
Speakers
LOGITECH S120 2.0 BLACK SPEAKER SYSTEM (£9)
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 10 to 12 working days
Quantity
1

Price: £2,345.00 including VAT and delivery.


after a bit of tinkering I have gone for this. (maxing out budget with monitors)

Keyboard and mouse I am still researching, looking at razer naga epic and dont know about keyboard yet as everything gets mixed reviews.

any recommendations welcome.


Now for the system questions

1. I'm going for 2 of these http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showpr...source=froogle , It says they have 1 x Dual Link DVI-D input. Does this mean i just need the cables supplied by PCS or should I be looking for 'high quality gold plated....' ones? Is it one cable per monitor from each graphics card both to get 2560*1440 res?

Is hdmi not better than dvi-d? should I be looking for hdmi monitor? The Hazro D model is 10 bit and has hdmi etc, should I look to that one?

2. I have put the sound card in for simple music creation (plugging guitar and mic in) either directly to PC or via my toneport. Is this sound card needed/good enough? Will the onboard still have done?

I also had to sacrifice the wireless n pci-e card to free up the slot, is this worth doing?

3. Is the cooling still sufficient or will I need more with extra sound card/wireless n card in?

4. I notice the difference between the 3tb and 2tb green and black drives is £3. Does this mean green drive is reduced in performance? I will only be using this drive to store all movies photos and music etc.

5. Lastly, this system is mainly for gaming and if honest focused at BF3, is it worth delaying the build till closer to the release for drop in price? Or wont prices change much in that short a period?


Thanks again in advance for any help, I really want to get this right.

I can't comment on the spec, but I just had to reply to say massive kudos for spending over £2300 to play BF3 in the best possible way (although I'm sure the PC will be used for more than that).

 

[DaveyP16]

OK great thanks for the reply so quick.

1, Thats good to know, I still might go for the D model of the monitors has I will be able to plug PS3 into it also.

2. Onboard it is.

3.will stick with that cooling. Is it worth paying extra £23 to upgrade to the K version of processor just incase needed in future for overclocking? Will I ever get the beneift of overclocking for anything I will be going, Gaming,phots,music,movies etc.

4. By losing the sound card I may go for a third hard drive as you can never have enough storage space i find. So will opt for the 450 velociraptor, 2tb black and 2tb gree.

5. Agreed, will order tonight.

Thanks for all your help.


Frenchy, To add one more thing, i keep reading about space bar issues on the black widow. You had any problems with this?

 

[DaveyP16]

I know, the wife says I'm mad. But your right it will be used for more than that. My current PC and laptop are quite outdated now so been after a new one for a while so thought i'd try and get best I can.

 

[Frenchy]

I had a friend who had to RMA his black widow due to a problem with sapce bar, however I have not had a single issue with mine. Not sure really.

Also no point with the k version for gaming tbh, If you were 3D modelling, doing math intense calculations, creating formulas to figure out how to get into another universe, then yeah deffinately, but for gaming, no point really.

 

[DanteWilhelm]

No DO NOT USE ONBOARD SOUND


because of one thing, latency.


Have you SEEN the latency on asio4all? or any drivers which aren't dedicated drivers for that matter?


I know you are knowledgeable Frenchy but I have to step in here.

I cannot provide screenshots as my sound card broke but



asio4all drivers latency was horrendous, my m audio 1010 sound card had 8ms of latency.


dude if you are going to record music get a dedicated sound card or you will hear everything like it's through a delay pedal.


if you play a note and use onboard sound and Asio4All drivers you won't hear the note until a long time after you play it.


I did a course in music technology for 2 years and have been producing music on some level for the last 5 years.

 

[DanteWilhelm]

well I have just looked at some pictures and nobody seems to have the horrendous latency I had on asio4all!


another reason why my pc is going in the bin as soon as i get my new one


regardless asio direct duplex driver is horrible.


and it depends what kind of device you are connecting to your sound card.


it depends how good you want your music to sound and how serious you are about it, as time goes on chances are you will want to improve


i started off using crap equipment and getting a pci recording interface with my delta 1010 sound card made a huge difference, hardly any latency.

 

[Frenchy]

as far as his post goes though, he is using computer for gaming mainly, and some recording using guitar etc, hes not doing full music production or anythign like that.

I totally agree if he was doing music production to get a proper soundcard, but from what he described the onboard is totally fine, especially on newer boards.

 

[DaveyP16]

Case SILVERSTONE RAVEN RV03 - GAMING ENTHUSIAST TOWER CASE
Processor (CPU) Intel® Core™i7-2600 Quad Core (3.40GHz, 8MB Cache) + HD Graphics
Motherboard ASUS® P8Z68-V PRO: USB 3.0, SATA 6GB/s, NVIDIA®SLI™, ATI®CrossFireX™
Memory (RAM) 8GB KINGSTON HYPER-X GENESIS DUAL-DDR3 1600MHz, X.M.P (2 x 4GB KIT)
Graphics Card 3GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 580 - 2 DVI, HDMI, DP - 3D Vision Ready
2nd Graphics Card 3GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 580 - 2 DVI, HDMI, DP - 3D Vision Ready
3rd Graphics Card NONE
Memory - 1st Hard Disk 600GB VELOCIRAPTOR WD6000HLHX, SATA 6-Gb/s, 32MB CACHE (10,000rpm)
2nd Hard Disk 2TB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD2002FAEX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE (7200rpm)
3rd Hard Disk 2TB WD CAVIAR GREEN WD20EARS, SATA 3 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE
4th Hard Disk NONE
RAID NONE
SSD CACHE DRIVE 20GB INTEL® SSD 311 SERIES - CACHE DRIVE FOR SYSTEM / 1st HDD
1st DVD/BLU-RAY Drive 12x BLU-RAY ROM DRIVE, 16x DVD ±R/±RW (£45)
2nd DVD/BLU-RAY Drive 24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM
Memory Card Reader NONE
Power Supply CORSAIR 1050W PRO SERIES™ HX1050-80 PLUS® SILVER MODULAR (£162)
Processor Cooling TITAN FENRIR EVO EXTREME HEATPIPE CPU COOLER (£39)
Sound Card ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Facilities ONBOARD GIGABIT LAN & WIRELESS 802.11N 300Mbps PCI-E CARD (£19)
USB Options 6 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL (MIN 2 FRONT PORTS) AS STANDARD
Modem NONE, I WILL BE USING BROADBAND
Floppy Disk Drive NONE
Firewire & Video Editing NONE
TV Card NONE
Operating System Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64 Bit - inc DVD & Licence (£79)
Office Software NO OFFICE SOFTWARE
Anti-Virus NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Monitor NONE
2nd Monitor NONE
3rd Monitor NONE
4th Monitor NONE
DVI-D & HDMI Monitor Cables 2 x 2 METRE DVI-D CABLE (£9)
Eyefinity / GeForce 3D Vision NONE
Keyboard & Mouse NONE
Mouse NONE
Speakers LOGITECH S120 2.0 BLACK SPEAKER SYSTEM (£9)
Webcam NONE
Headsets (VOIP) NONE
Surge Protection NONE
Printer NONE
External Hard Drive NONE
Warranty 3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour) (£5)
Home Installation NONE
Data Recovery NONE
Delivery STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time Standard Build - Approximately 10 to 12 working days
Miscellaneous FREE Batman Arkham City with any Nvidia® GeForce GTX560 or above!





PC now ordered!!!! Hope this soundcard holds up after reading that! oh dear first bit of doubt after order confirmation.

 

[DaveyP16]

to add to this, i'm in no way a music production professional wannabe, its just a hobby. I have been connecting guitar through my toneport which is a s/pdif digital out direct to current soundcard (x-fi)

 

[M3aaaq]

Good luck with the pc.. hope nothing breaks with delivery! im getting mine 2 days from now so fingers crossed..

 

[vanthus]

High background noise level is caused by using onboard sound card when recording guitar,
I have the same sound card you were thinking of getting & there is simply no comparison to on board, far as guitars go.
the creative smart recorder you get with the bonus software is very good,
also with the creative console,you can have hours of fun just playing through the creative sound card using the graphic equalizer & the EAX Effects alone.
I just do it as a hobby myself,but the onboard sound card is simply no use for guitar work of any description,however it's up to yourself.

 

[UndeadJack]

Awesome setup man

 

[PringlesInside]

hi Davey,

In my view ..you can save alot of money.

How many monitors are wishing to game on? and at what resolution (im guessing 1080p)?

One GTX 580 would be enough for the time being ...and 1.5GB. << if you are gaming at 1080p on a single monitor.

You can always add another GTX 580 when you it cant handle on the single 580 anymore......... and by that time you will also probally have a price drop in the 580's (thus saving futher money).

 

[Frenchy]

hi Davey,

In my view ..you can save alot of money.

How many monitors are wishing to game on? and at what resolution (im guessing 1080p)?

One GTX 580 would be enough for the time being ...and 1.5GB. << if you are gaming at 1080p on a single monitor.

You can always add another GTX 580 when you it cant handle on the single 580 anymore......... and by that time you will also probally have a price drop in the 580's (thus saving futher money).

One thing to add though, if your ever thinking of going to 3 screens, then go for the 3GB version, you will need the extra vram. I know ive seen several people say on other forums that the 1.5GB will still be fine if you have two 1.5GB cards, however this is simply not the case. I have seen my vram go as high as 2.4GB on certain programs / games which if you had 2 x 1.5GB cards, would mean vram starts swapping, this is bad because tyour fps will drop off drastically. Swapping just means its swapping the contents fo the vram with the harddrive, because it needs more storage. The 3GB version allows it to store more information and therefore swapping does not occur.

 

[DaveyP16]

High background noise level is caused by using onboard sound card when recording guitar,
I have the same sound card you were thinking of getting & there is simply no comparison to on board, far as guitars go.
the creative smart recorder you get with the bonus software is very good,
also with the creative console,you can have hours of fun just playing through the creative sound card using the graphic equalizer & the EAX Effects alone.
I just do it as a hobby myself,but the onboard sound card is simply no use for guitar work of any description,however it's up to yourself.

After this info I think I am going to ammend order and swap the wireless n pci-e card to a pci to free up space for the x-fi titanium.

Am i running risk of those graphics cards getting too hot by cramming more things inside or will i still be fine?


http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MO-016-HO&utm_source=froogle I have ordered two of these and hope to run each moniotor at 2560*1440, hence the 3gb cards?

 

[DaveyP16]

I also stream large 1080p video files to my living room tv, will there be much difference between pci & pci e? Will pci still manage without stuttering etc?

 

[PringlesInside]

ok then sli 580 3gb , sweeeeet

um not sure about the wireless card and that interface and stuff .

Just a question i would like to ask for my own interest, does streaming from your pc to your living room tv use your internet connection (i.e download/upload usage//bandwich or w.e)?

 

[DaveyP16]

Im not sure how the bandwidth thing works to be honest mate, dont think ive ever had anytging else going whilst streaming.

Anyone else have advice on sacrificing my pci-e network card to fit the sound card in?