Buying a new PC (UK)

[myles]

Hi all,

I'm looking into purchasing a new PC. My budget will reach to around £800 (inc VAT) and I'm looking to use it for gaming and video editing.

I'm a cameraman by trade so any of my freelance work I will need to edit using a high-end PC.

I am also an avid gamer, and would like to play games such as Skyrim, Battlefield 3, Guild Wars 2, and other such recent games with ease on a budget.

I'm not looking to purchase any accessories such as keyboard/mouse/screen/speakers. However, I am looking for an entire base unit including operating system, graphics card, and SSD.

I am from the UK and as I mentioned above, my limit would be around £800 including VAT. If anyone could suggest any good places where I can look to purchase a PC to meet my needs then I would appreciate the expert help as I have been stung in the past by poor manufacturers selling me expensive garbage.

Many thanks.

 

[myles]

Bump:

I've found a website (Computer Hardware - Scan.co.uk) that seems to have a good selection of builds for my budget. However, I'm currently unsure on which build to go for:

BUILD 1 - 3XS - Configure your Custom Gaming PC with AMD FX 6100 and AMD ATI HD7770

..(doesn't tell me what MOBO it is using)
..AMD FX 6100 BE, 3.3GHz Hex Core, 12MB Total Cache (AMD FX professionally overclocked by our 3XS engineers to 4Ghz! )
..Arctic Cooling Freezer 13 CPU Cooler - Quiet Cooler
..8Gb (2x4Gb) Corsair Vengeance LP, DDR3, 1600Mhz
..2GB XFX Radeon HD 7850, 860MHz GPU, 1024 Cores, 4800MHz GDDR5
..600W Corsair Gamer Series PSU, (Any Single Graphics Card)
..120GB Corsair Force 3, Read 550MB/sec, Write 510MB/sec - SF-2281
..1TB Seagate Barracuda, SATA 6Gb/s, 7200rpm, 64Mb Cache
..Pioneer DVR-S19LBK DVD Writer
..Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit

=== BUILD 1 @ £784.50 ===

BUILD 2 - 3XS - Configure your Custom Gaming PC with Intel Core i5 2500K and NVIDIA GTX 550

..Gigabyte GA-Z77-D3H, Intel Z77 Chipset MOBO
..Intel Core i5 3570K, Ivy Bridge, 3.4GHz, Quad Core, 6MB Cache (Extreme Overclock - 4.5Ghz - Tuned to absolute safe maximum - Performance prioritised over acoustics.)
..Arctic Cooling Freezer 13 Performance CPU Cooler
..4GB (2x2GB) Corsair Vengeance LP, DDR3, 1600Mhz
..1GB EVGA GTX 650 Ti, 1071MHz GPU, 768 Cores, 5400MHz GDDR5
..600W Corsair Gamer Series PSU, (Any Single Graphics Card)
..120GB Corsair Force 3, Read 550MB/sec, Write 510MB/sec - SF-2281
..1TB Seagate Barracuda, SATA 6Gb/s, 7200rpm, 64Mb Cache
..Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64bit

=== BUILD 2 @ £852.20 ===

I am really unsure on which system is better for the budget? My budget was £800 which build 1 is good for, but is the extra £50 worth spending for build 2?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

[PP Mguire]

How did I miss this thread 4 days ago?

Ok first build, no. Just no.

Second build is good, but the problem is change that Gigabyte to an ASRock Pro4 Z77 which should be cheaper and more reliable. For a video/photo editor I recommend 16GB of RAM but due to cost you can easily get away with 8GB no problem. Second build only has 4.

You should change the PSU to the 650w Corsair TX instead. OEM is different, therefor quality is drastically different. Next up to shed a few bucks is drop the aftermarket cooler unless you plan to overclock. Even still, you would want a better one anyways. Also, if you don't need 1TB of extra storage you can drop the drive or make it smaller to fit within your budget.

The next thing I should urge you to do is read my article here:
http://www.techist.com/forums/f76/your-cpu-modern-games-guide-those-building-261626/

And then decide what is more important. Gaming, or quicker renders/encodes? You can shed a few bucks by going with an i3 3320 instead which will give you identical gaming performance as the quad so you can get a 660 which is faster, or you can stick with the 3570k/650ti setup for a faster production speed. Both will be quick, but the extra 2 cores will give a noticeable advantage when doing CPU intensive tasks like video editing.

 

[myles]

Hi Mguire,

Thanks for your advice. Unfortunately on Scan.co.uk I don't think there is a way to customise it further other than the available options provided?

However, I have had a look in PCSPECIALIST who have provided what I think to be a really decent build, but I'd like to check it with you first to see if its worth the money as it is about £150 over my budget.

PCSPECIALIST - Vortex 1000 Gaming PC, Configure Your Own PC, Configure PC, Design Your Own PC

£943.00 inc VAT

It's a tough one because I think I'll need 1TB of HDD space for video editing, and I'm worried that if I lower my CPU and GPUs then they will get outdated prematurely?

 

[PP Mguire]

Yea looks good to me.
Just a hint, everybody gets out dated every 6 months. Nothing really to worry about as gaming wont take major strides for another 3-4 years. Worry mainly about your main computer usage. GPU for games, CPU for editing.

 

[myles]

Frustratingly the price has gone up a bit from £942 to £984 for the same build. If I were to change the cooler from a 'coolit Eco 2 liquid cooler' (£49) to a 'spire gem thermal hdt twin fan cooler' (£39) instead, would that have a big detrimental impact on my system or would it be negligible?

 

[PP Mguire]

Just go with stock.

 

[myles]

Thanks for all of your help with this Mguire, I'm extremely grateful for your advice.

I'm hoping to get this build ordered over the weekend so just want to double-check it with you once more to make sure I haven't overlooked something:

Intel Core i5 Quad Core Processor i5-3570k (3.4Ghz) 6MB Cache
ASUS P8Z77-V LX: USB 3.0, SATA 6GBs, ATI CrossfireX
8GB KINGSTON HYPER-X GENESIS DUAL DDR3 1600MHz (2x4GB)
2GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 660Ti
120GB KINGSTON HYPERX 3k SSD, SATA 6GB/s
1TB 3.5" SATA-III 6GB/s HDD 7200RPM 32MB CACHE
24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER
CORSAIR 650W ENTHUSIAST SERIES TX650
SUPER QUIET 22dBA TRIPLE COPPER HEATPIPE INTEL CPU COOLER
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1 SURROUND) SOUND as standard
LAN PORT as standard
6x USB 2.0 PORTS
WINDOWS 7 HOME PREMIUM 64 Bit

£942 inc VAT

http://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/view/Vortex-1000-gaming-pc/

 

[PP Mguire]

Sounds good. Enjoy.