Building a PC

[MethylatedSpirit]

Decided to build myself a PC for the sheer fun of it (and because I can't find a pc with the exact spec I want)


So far I have ordered:

Motherboard:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/A88XM-PLUS-Motherboard-Soc...

Processor:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/AMD-AD785KXBJABOX-Edition-...



That's all Ive bought. Need suggestions for a small form factor case, ssd and ram and monitor

[sandys]

What do you expect it to do, where do you want it to live.

I have the same mobo in a Silverstone LC19 that was initially living in the front room as a HTPC but is now my daughters, good little case but PSU may not be strong enough for that chip.

[MethylatedSpirit]

Its either going to be on the floor under my desk or on top of my desk.


It's mainly a computer for uni work, autocad and various other CAD packages. I also play the odd game.

[cornet]

RAM: I've always just bought Crucial direct from their site and never had any problems with it. Don't bother with the high frequency stuff - it won't make any real world difference. Always get more RAM over supposedly higher spec stuff - I'd probably be going for 16GB if you're running stuff like AutoCAD.

SSD: Again get crucial. The only consumer SSD with power loss protection (meaning there is much less chance of corrupting files if/when the power gets pulled). There are SSDs with that are faster in benchmarks but again it makes next to no real world difference.

CPU Cooler: Stock AMD ones suck. With a stock cooler I've never been able to max out the CPU for more than a few minutes without the temperature getting dangerously high or the PC shutting down (and that is with case fans as well). You don't need to spend £100s, £30/40 should be enough.

Monitor: Mostly down to personal preference. I use a 27" dell ultasharp which I bought because I wanted the Adobe RGB support for photo editing.

Case: Not a clue - I'm using the same case I bought 10 years ago


Also

External Backup Disk: Get one now, do not say "I'll get one later" because "later" nearly always turns out to be "too late"

[Dave^]

I've got two of these...

http://eu.coolermaster.com/uk/case/mini-itx/elite-...

Loads of fans, so nice and quiet.

Bit of a squeeze if you want a big cooler/graphics card though, so be careful before going all out on buying bits...

[TotalControl]

Wasn't there a supplier that dealt with making screens out of the Dell and iMac seconds? I recall people on here being very happy with the 27" versions that were had for almost a third of the cost.

I can't for the life of me remember the site though.

[Mr_Yogi]

Dave^ said:

I've got two of these...

http://eu.coolermaster.com/uk/case/mini-itx/elite-...

Loads of fans, so nice and quiet.

Bit of a squeeze if you want a big cooler/graphics card though, so be careful before going all out on buying bits...

OP's motherboard is Micro ATX, not Mini ITX.

[sandys]

If it is mainly CAD you may want to do a bit of research I know for my work stuff, Intels CPUs are stronger and CUDA support plus solid OpenGL from Nvidia Quadro chips prove to be quite handy, some software will support AMD GPU Compute, again it all depends on what you will use.

[mikef]

Case: Bitfenix Prodigy?

[Who me ?]

cornet said:

External Backup Disk: Get one now, do not say "I'll get one later" because "later" nearly always turns out to be "too late"

I always find there's plenty of "clean pull " HDD on Ebay. Even better if you can support an IDE drive, as these are now cheap. Format them and check them with one of the makers disk test programs. I've got an 80GB Maxtor which passes all Powermax tests ( cost ~£8), which I use as a out of PC backup store. But there's always a low capacity flash drive for possibly a lot less. Or at a push, burn it to a DVD ( APPROX 4GB).

[Dave^]

Mr_Yogi said:

OP's motherboard is Micro ATX, not Mini ITX.

D'oh!

[Melman Giraffe]

Did the OP get the job done?

[MethylatedSpirit]

I'll update soon with loads of build pictures. Mega busy right now with uni!

[MethylatedSpirit]

Progress so far:




I was going to go for the bitfinex prilogy (spelling?) but the corsair case beside it was cheaper, oozed qualilty and had a side window. Its only slightly taller.

My ram and cd drive comes tomorrow. ( 8gb 2400mhz). I read that the gpu performance on my processor is increased with high bandwidth memory.

[Melman Giraffe]

If you need anything take a look at my profile