Case + PSU Compatibility

[Joppsta]

Trust me... Oil industry isn't a garentee... I'm a Metullurgist in the Oil capital of Canada... Last year was pretty rough. Jobs dried up pretty bad in the oil sands. But its back up so I'm buisy.

I'm not a RAM Guy, so i can't help you out there. Yes that board only has 2 ram spots, but running 4 sticks saddens your computer. 8gigs is plenty in a 4x2.. I think that ram for 230 is its original price in the 50's or something...

From what I know your first choice is a bit better at 9-9-9-24 vs 9-9-9-27

Having an onboard is nice for trouble shooting, and for a media server in a 2nd life. Now don't get me wrong those boards you posted are VERY nice, but a bit overkill...

If all else fails I'll become a hippy and build wind turbines.

So ... snap up the expensive ones or the cheap? I've priced everything I intend to buy and it's sitting around £300. With the OS I am getting a 1TB HDD too which is sweet. I'll have those 4 sticks of RAM spare so I could sell those on or hold onto them for a future project.

I tore apart (literally) my Dad's old desktop and I have a 256mb stick of RAM... so maybe I'll keep the gigs for lulz?

Anyway I'll summarise my intentions in this post I guess. You green light and I'll go ahead with the debit card.

Processor: i3-550 @ 3.2GHz Dual Core (already owned in current machine
--
RAM: Corsair CMZ8GX3M2A1600C9 8GB 1600MHz CL9 DDR3 Vengeance Memory Two Module Kit: Amazon.co.uk: Computers & Accessories (1GBx4 sticks in current machine spare, sell?)
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GPU: EVGA GTX 460, on the way already Link
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PSU: Corsair AX 650W Link
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OS: Win7 64 bit with 1TB Seagate (bundle) Link
--
HDD: Seagate 1TB above + 1TB Western Digital onboard current computer (any maintenance on this required before reinstallation? I saw a recovery partition when I was messing around with disk management today)
--
Case: BitFenixy Thing Link
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Cooling: I could use the stock one in the Dell, but would this be more appropriate... link ?

Total for required parts/software = £295-£300 including delivery


If only I had done this at the start of the year before buying this Dell, although I wonder if I would have saved money or not ^^

All in all this "upgrade" is costing more than the PC was worth in the first place... I guess it's a build now you could say teh irony? I think so.


My only question would be what to do with the Dell PSU/Casing and such? The stuff I don't need... I don't think it'll be easy to pawn this stuff off. Should I keep it for a future build or something to that effect?


Oh and if wind turbines fail me, I'll design fancy tin cans... a backup of a backup? BACKUPCEPTION?

PS: Sorry for the tl;dr nature of this post but I like to be over 9000% before throwing £300 around ^^


EDIT: Will the dual slot card fit on the mobo btw?

Had a sudden side-thought. Instead of buying a new OS, could I borrow someone's Win 7, install and use the trial version for the trial period and then upgrade after that? It would be easier on my budget to do that, since i get paid in 3 weeks and I'm sure there's a trial for 30 days ... no?

Also another mobo to consider for £65 used: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Gigabyte-GA...1_2?s=computers&ie=UTF8&qid=1315934582&sr=1-2

 

[patonb]

They're "used" but would really be a good board. I like my Gigibyte board, so I'd consider it, plus it has 2 pci-e and 4 rams.

no idea on the win 7 thing. But as you have 1Gig x 4 you really shouldn't need more ram right now, you can get 7 and run the old ram.

But again, me and ram ain't freinds.

 

[Joppsta]

They're "used" but would really be a good board. I like my Gigibyte board, so I'd consider it, plus it has 2 pci-e and 4 rams.

no idea on the win 7 thing. But as you have 1Gig x 4 you really shouldn't need more ram right now, you can get 7 and run the old ram.

But again, me and ram ain't freinds.

I'm really not one that's too fond of buying used parts for anything... but I had a look around and this board seems more to what i want, £30 extra but I'd say the £100+ I'm saving by not buying the OS cancels out the negatives of that.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0031KUFGK/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?ie=UTF8&m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE

I intend to buy the OS, if i have to, after the trial period for it runs out or whatever. All else fails I'll use something free for a while.

 

[patonb]

The gigibyte board may just be a refurb/open boxed item.. So it's not from a person but a store.

Asrock is division of Asus, but i've heard neither good or bad.

IT"LL do the job just fine, though i don't knows much about ASROCK..All companies are hit n miss in electronics

 

[Joppsta]

I'm just going to cut my losses and stop ... messing around, as it were?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B0032ZGKJ0/ref=ox_sc_act_title_2?ie=UTF8&m=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE#

I've went and ordered that. I'm saving around £100 by not ordering an OS right now anyway and overall this comes out £100 under budget. I'll get the cooler + OS when payday comes later in the month... should be a good one since I get a bonus (which I should have got last month, le sigh).

The only obvious thing is "lol it doesn't support SLI" but currently I don't think I'm in a position to care much about that anyway, that's for a future build in a couple years I think.

Cheers for the support and I guess I'll keep you up to speed on how the build goes.... and by that I mean I'll post in this thread whining most likely about how expensive lego breaks too easily

 

[patonb]

You'll be happy.

 

[Joppsta]

You'll be happy.

I just realised something somewhat problematic.

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/71dRRqRZhfL._AA1500_.jpg

She has no onboard graphics... how does one install and boot up one of these? Do I just shove in a graphics card and it defaults to using that first time, yes?

 

[patonb]

Yup. Every card pretty much can run with the bios and default windows drivers.

Youre starting to over think things now

 

[Joppsta]

Yup. Every card pretty much can run with the bios and default windows drivers.

Youre starting to over think things now

I am a perfectionist when I want to be... you think this is bad? You should see how long I tinkered with windows for sound settings for my microphone for my YouTube channel ! xD

Literally hours.

OCD is a terrible thing. Lucky for me everything is coming tomorrow, bad thing is I'll have to use the HD5450 for a while because as my friend pointed out... the output from the card is DVI-I and all i have in my possession is VGA! So I've already got a DVI-I to VGA adadapter ordered from Amazon (for a bankbreaking £1.08..).

Using the RAM as we speak, it's pretty sweet. Would there be any reason to use the extra 2GB RAM i could shove into my computer.. isn't Win7's max 8GB in the first place? I was considering passing 2 sticks onto a friend since I don't think I'll be using them in the near future (they were Kingston by the way).



tl;dr Organisation is the key to success and I got bad OCD/Insomnia/toomuchtimetothink.

 

[Joppsta]

Still awaiting my case! I got the motherboard and co literally sitting in my house waiting for OC to pull their finger out of their... well you know.. and get that thing moving to me. Charging me £10 for delivery and it's still sitting in their warehouse apparently when the delivery states "DPD next day delivery"

"Order Date: 13 Sep, 11, 11:35 pm"

Probably ordered it too late in the day for them to get it trunked up for the 14th obviously but seriously, 2 days later and it's still sitting in their warehouse according to their system worries me >_>

If it doesn't come today I am going to be sorely annoyed. Paying that much for delivery that doesn't do what it says on the tin is irritating.

EDIT: Found what the problem was, they are out of stock.

So you know what? I'm going to can my order with them (if i can.. it's not exactly been shipped yet has it?)

And go for one of these bad boys

Coolermaster Elite 430 Black Mid Tower Computer Case

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/cool...-side-window-120mm-front-led-blue-fan-w-o-psu

That should do the same job whilst being significantly more stylish all for a fiver extra.