Gaming / General use, £1200 - £1500 inc monitor.

[jester58th]

Hi All
I've been lurking round the forum for a while reading all the posts and checking the advice and have decided on a spec that I'm kinda happy with. So I thought I'd post it here for a little feedback and ask a few questions.

Basically, I need a rig for mainly gaming - Been out of the loop since my last machine died 4 years ago and can't wait to play Skyrim, BF3/4 etc, but also for day-to-day web browsing/multimedia etc. I'm hoping this spec offers decent bang-for-buck and it seems to offer decent upgrade potential (SLI and/or dual monitor)

Case
CM STORM ENFORCER <--Not the case I want, waiting for the CM690 II to be back in stock or maybe the Corsair Vengeance C70. Any thoughts?
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™i5 Quad Core Processor i5-4670 (3.4GHz) 6MB Cache
Motherboard
ASUS® Z87-A: ATX, USB2.0, USB3.0, SATA6GB/S, SLi, XFIRE
Memory (RAM)
8GB KINGSTON HYPER-X GENESIS DUAL-DDR3 1600MHz, X.M.P (2 x 4GB KIT)
Graphics Card
4GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 770 - 2 DVI, HDMI, DP - 3D Vision Ready <-- Only going to be using 1 monitor for now, but may use 2 later hence the 4gb.
Memory - 1st Hard Disk
120GB KINGSTON HYPERX 3K SSD, SATA 6 Gb/s (upto 555MB/sR | 510MB/sW)
2nd Hard Disk
1TB WD CAVIAR BLACK WD1002FAEX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE (7200rpm)
3rd Hard Disk
2TB WD CAVIAR GREEN WD20EZRX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64MB CACHE
1st DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM
Memory Card Reader
INTERNAL 52 IN 1 CARD READER (XD, MS, CF, SD, etc) + 1 x USB 2.0 PORT
Power Supply
CORSAIR 850W ENTHUSIAST SERIES™ MODULAR TXM-850 V2-80 PLUS® <-- See Below (1)
Processor Cooling
Super Quiet 22dBA Triple Copper Heatpipe Intel CPU Cooler <-- See Below (2)
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Wireless/Wired Networking
WIRELESS 802.11N 300Mbps PCI-E CARD <--*EDIT* Deceided on Homeplugs
Operating System
Genuine Windows 8 64 Bit - inc DVD & Licence
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Miscellaneous
FREE BATMAN: ARKHAM ORIGINS GAME with GTX 660 & 7 Series GPUs!
Quantity
1

£1,293.00

(£1,531.00 inc BENQ XL2411T)

Questions

(1) PSU - The config says it only needs a 650w (610w actually) for this setup but I might think about SLIing in the future and the config suggests 1050w for 2 x GTX770 (910w actually) but that's with 20% allowance and it is allocating 300w per GTX770 (which seems too much). In the real world would an 850w be enough?
Even if I don't SLI, I thought I read that it's more efficient to run a psu at 50%-80% max capacity to reduce heat and aid longevity, or did I just dream this up?
(It's only £20 to go from 650w to 850w, but it's another £60 to go to 1050w)

(2) Cooling - I know that for non-overclocked systems the advice is the Triple Copper Heatpipe, but would upgrading to liquid cooling offer any significant longterm advantage?

Probably should add that this machine could be running for 8+ hours a day most days so stability/longevity is very important.

I also need a decent monitor and am thinking about the BENQ XL2411T, if anyone has any thoughts on it.

That's it for now, no doubt I'll think of a few other things but any help or feedback would be appreciated, cheers.

Jester.

 

[keynes]

1) that is what I though as well, a few weeks ago when I spec a similar build 850w PSU was fine. To be safe if you are going to sli I would go with the recommended PSU.
2) no.
You won't notice a difference in performance between PCI and PCI-e but if you plannin to sli to with the latter.

 

[bigben]

I also need a decent monitor and am thinking about the BENQ XL2411T, if anyone has any thoughts on it.

I have 2 and am really happy with them. The colours need a bit of tweaking when you first get them but that's not the end of the world (if you do get one message me and I will give you my settings)

Apart from that looks decent, I would consider homeplugs over wireless though.

 

[jester58th]

@ Keynes
Thanks for the reply and the info (+1 rep).

All things considered, I think I'm gonna drop the SLI idea for now - don't want to spend an extra £60-£80 on something I might not use when can put it towards a better single card later on.

@bigben
Thanks for the reply and the info (+1 rep).

Yeah, I completely forgot about homeplugs because I need the pass-through type that PCS don't do - so I probably will get some instead of wireless, and if I go for the BENQ I'll drop you a line, cheers.


I'd still welcome any info/advice regarding the PSU (ie will I get less heat and more longevity running an 850w psu on a system that only needs a 650w) and any opinions on my case choice.
I rang PCS about 6 weeks ago and they said they were expecting new stock of the CM690 II at the start of the month (October) but no sign of them yet. Is it worth holding out or should I just choose something else?

 

[bigben]

@bigben
Thanks for the reply and the info (+1 rep).

Not sure about the PSU.
Both cases are very good. I really like the look of my CM690 II (I changed the led fan to red though), whether is is worth holding out is entirely up to you though! However, seeing as you have managed to wait 6 weeks already I would say yes it is worth waiting if that is the case you really want, maybe worth ringing PCS for an update?

 

[jester58th]

Gave PCS a ring and they said that the delivery of Coolermaster CM690's is due November 1st, so I think I'm just gonna wait till then.