New computer
There are always people who want to buy a new computer, but are not up-to-date with the currently available technology. I just bought a new one and did some research about the best, but still affordable components before that. I had a look at tech specs, magazine reviews and customer opinions. In my opinion it’s now finally the time to get a SSD as primary hard-drive for the operating system and applications since these bring significant performance improvements, especially regarding the starting time of programs. Adobe Photoshop is now ready to use almost immediately after clicking on its symbol. My new PC, which replaces a 7 year old methuselah, is also very quiet, so I’m very happy with it overall. So if your budget is around 1000€ ($1300) to get a really fast and reliable machine with a projected lifetime of six years, you should check out the following components:
- Processor: Intel Core i5-2500K Box, LGA1155 178,33 €
- Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-P67A-UD3-B3, Intel P67, ATX 115,19 €
- Graphics card: MSI N460GTX-MD1GD5/OC, 1024MB, GDDR5, PCI-Express 152,08 € (a very similar card is available at Amazon)
- RAM: Corsair XMS3 DDR3-1333 CL9 8GB-Kit 70,80 €
- Hard-drive: Crucial RealSSD C300 128GB 199,28 €
- External hard-drive: Western Digital My Book Essential 2TB, USB 3.0 103,82 €
- Case: Thermaltake V4 Black Edition 37,32 €
- Power supply: be quiet! Pure Power 530 Watt / BQT L7 57,41 € (not available at Amazon)
- DVD burner: LG GH22NS black SATA 22,89 €
- Operating system: Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64-Bit (SB-Version) 79,68 €
Congrats!
Graphics designer (and avid gamer) myself, upgraded a year ago or so – old motherboard, had to replace almost everything – and I can safely say you can build a great rig fit for everything for under 600$, since that’s what I did, and what I’m still using.
Well, provided you don’t have to a buy a new copy of windows. @&$%#%@.
@ Draco_2k: Oh yeah, about SSDs: these are COSTLY, but if you work with graphics, extremely helpful or even essential.
I’d recommend having a 40Gb-something SSD in addition to 1Tb+ HDD: you can move thing like windows, photoshop and project temp folders to the SSD and enjoy a speed boost while maintaining that fresh HDD smell.
In theory.
I agree with everything but the external drive. Speaking from experience, Western Digital’s line of Caviar Green drives (which are now the only thing used in the MyBook enclosures) have a high failure rate, and it gets worse with higher-capacity drives. Seagate has 2TB external units for about the same price.
You went with only a 530 watt PSU?!?
I know it says ‘be quiet’ but your computer will eat all of that and be a bit hungry under full load.
Also, Intel. Yuck.
AMD is cheaper and faster.
I mean, my machine was $1000 USD.
Phenom II x4 955 BE
750 Watt Corsair PSU
8 GB DDR3
1×1 TB HDD, 1×500 GB HDD
ATI Radeon HD 6870
M4A79XTD – EVO
Win 7 x64 Pro
And it runs beautifully. Metro 2033 at top spec with 78 FPS.
They… are… making… Eight… Gigabyte… Rams?
I just barely made the jump from 256 K to 2 GB last year!
Also, Operating Systems become obsolete in five years, so a six-year-lifespan is… I don’t know
AMD’s are not faster, they are comparable with Intels product line.
Though I would tend to agree that the power supply seems lacking. I would suggest a 700 to 800 watt supply to be safe, otherwise you’re just running your hardware into the ground early on.
Also, WD Caviar Green drives have gotten less than glowing reviews, but Caviar Black drives are some of the best out there at the moment.
SSDs have a limited life cycle, especially in write-intensive uses.
@ Frank:
That’d be two 4-Gig strips. Notice it says “kit”.
I just built a new machine – well, i jacked up the PSU and drives and drove a new mobo, RAM and case under them.
Gigabyte 880GN-D2H
AMD Athlon II X3 450 (3-core)
1 4Gig Corsair (going to get a second when my next Social Security check comes)
Came to about $130.
Also, when my next SS check comes, i plan to pick up a few piece-parts and use the mobo and Intel dual-core processor i replaced to build a new computer for my wife, so we’re not always sharing this one. (I still have the OEM Windows 7 that was installed on rhis one before i upgraded to the 64-bit retail Home Premium, and i can re-install it on the “new” machine…)
Interesting …. what can you suggest in the 12-inch laptop range for a budget of about €550 (£500) sometime in early 2012?
…what? May as well ask. I used to be the go-to guy for such things but my knowledge is badly rusty. I just know Intel and AMD have got some seriously impressive new CPU+GPU (“APU”?) chips and chipsets coming out soon. May be time to move on from the trusty Pentium-M.
Oh and go solid state. Spinning rust system drives are really starting to get on my nerves. Doesn’t matter so much about RW cycle numbers if the thing that’s going to put most wear on it is going into and coming out of hibernation once or twice each every 24 hours, right? Probably restarted the system outright about 10 times in the last year, and it was a pain every time.
40 years ago I was a performance analyst for mainframe computers. The key to performance back then is the still the same as for PCs now. Your performance is always limited by your slowest component and that has always been the long term storage media (aka hard disk drive). Till now they have always operated at speeds several orders of magnitude slower than absolutely everything else. The introduction of SSDs is the single greatest performance improvement anyone will ever make to their PC.
If your budget can stretch a little further get a second, very large, SSD and load all your most frequently used programs onto it. Save as much of your current SSD for operating system files, including paging and temp files. Only use your USB drive as a backup/archive source and for storing large static files (eg pictures) or you will waste the best advantage you have.
The rest of your system looks sweet and I am jealous. Congrats.
@ DJ Promethium and Boygenius32
The 530 Watt power supply is more then enough for that System
Most Systems, even with high performance grafic cards, don’t need more then this. It’s just that a lot of people think “bigger is better”, when in fact it is not. A bigger power supply would mean more power lost for nothing, because the system will never reach the “good spot” for best perfomance of the power supply.
I’m running a Phenom II 955 with 12 GB DDR3 RAM and two HD5850 in Crossfire, in a case with multiple hard disks including an SSD, a bluray burner, half a dozen LED fans and a few other things, on a 625 Watt Enermax power supply. System is running for over a year now without any problems. Top Power consumed so far 526 Watt on Furmark and prime95 together. No game or other programm ever gotten me beyond 450.
@Novil
Nice rig you build yourself there. If I where to build me new one right now, I’d probably go for a new generation I5 or I7 as well. I’m pretty sure it will support you for a few years, like I hope mine will do for me. 🙂
there are currently 4 components id need to get my pc back uptodate.
1st off XD this is a 8year old pc and overtime has been upgraded on several parts.
the parts i currently need would be
motherboard,
processor,
ddr card (dont know what they are called)
powersuply unit (mine makes noice that wakes up the neighbours) T_T
unfortunatly all my money will go to animecon this may (netherlands) X3
@ zentju:
8 years old? here in the states you can get a pc at the very least equal, if not a bit better than yours for about $300.
of course, any anime convention would be worth postponing the purchase, imho.;)
I’ve spend a whole lot on my new PC about a week ago so I’m still into this ^^
First of all: Don’t save too much money on the case. It’s what you might regret the most since it’s the hardest part to change (2nd one is mainboard). I took “Sharkoon T9 Value black edition” which is 55€ and already got 3 fans. (didn’t find it on amazone.)
I would recommend you take just the i5 2500 (without the K) except you want to make some overclocking since the K only means you can add a multiplyer for overclocking as you see fit.
I took an i7 2600 (no K) for my own PC.
The boxed cooler is normally enough, but they are a bit louder, which is ok if you don’t mind 10 or 12 decibel more.
RAM: In case you want to save some money, look for Mushkin. They are normally a bit cheaper but have the same quality. Else I’d stick with the ones you got there.
Harddrive… well, I’ve no experience with SSD’s at all so I won’t judge them but I think that they are quite expensive for that low capacity.
The external one is the one I wanted to take first… oh If I just had… The Verbatim I have now is nuts… I think I’ll send it back… Western Digital has a good reputation but I don’t have one myself.
concerning @ Darkbunny: I’ve heard the exact same thing about Seagate.
I’ve read a ton of stuff… everyone is saying something else!
(I’d write more about that but I have to go to college now XD’ )
Gigabyte make good mainboards too but I’d take a MSI board since you already got a MSI graphics card.
Oh, and one word about the Operating system:
Are you really sure you want “Home Premium”? I’d really recommend to take “Professional” instead.
Last but not least:
Since you live in germany as I do you might find this helpfull:
http://www.alternate.de/html/pcbuilder/circleView.html?cn=1&tn=BUILDERS
The builder is automatically checking if the parts are actually fitting together.
I build and bought my PC there. For 80€ more they even build it together and run some tests on it.
@ Frank:
Operating systems will never become obsolete unless Google talks enough people into believing their crap… no offense.
Chrome is spyware, not a browser!
I meant 256 M, not K. Though it looks like you people got it anyway.
@ Someone: I meant any particular operationg System. Windows 3.0 (1990) was made obsolete by Windows 95, which was, in turn made obsolete by Windows 2000, which was “finally” made obsolete by Windows Vista (2005).
The classic Mac OS (1985) was made obsolete by System 7 (1990), this by System 8 (1997, but that’s because Jobs wasn’t there in 1995), this, in turn by OS 9 (2000)
The pattern is also present in video game consoles.
@ Frank:
Oh, I see ^^
Well, if you put it that way it’s making sense.
Except that Vista was crap and Win2000 was only usefull for networks/Servers 😛
I used XP until Win7 was out.
Also I keep my old consoles 😉 although I no longer have a TV I could plug it to XD’
hmm
A month ago I built a friends PC from scratch, for some 1.1-1.2k €.
IMO one could do as well with a MSI P67-GD65 (cheaper) and one GTX 560 Ti (Gigabyte if I rememmber correctly)
An SSD of 128GB…. if one really needs it. IMO 64 GB OCZ Vertex 2 is pretty much ok, most of the people do not use excessive quantity of programs so the active HDD does not have to be big (it’s the datagrave which has to be tremendous)
A good PS is always in order, with more power preferrable, as one might actually want to upgrade the system w/o buying new PS. (650W is a max I’d recommend any normal user[i.e. no 3xSLI, Corei7 max CPU)])
I’ve got a nice case for that PC too, CoolerMaster CM 690 II and was reasonably pleased.
The “summer-endurance-test” is still to be done though 😉
BTW. notice the problems with sandy-bridge before buying. Though I still haven’t got any complaints from my friend, they are not impossible.
@ Someone: When Windows XP came out, people said about it all the same things that people later said about Vista. I always found it particularly funny that those people changed to XP because of Vista. The end result was the same: the 5-year-old O.S. going out.