Low power, work PC build

[sniglet]

1) What will you be doing with this PC? Gaming? Photoshop? Web browsing? etc

Mainly work - graphic design, so Photoshop, Illustrator, InDesign and some very, very light video, animation and 3D work. I'd also like to be able to play games to some degree - if the rig can play new(ish) games on medium settings without AA or AF that's fine (my monitor resolution is 1920 x 1080 and if the rig can do some gaming at native res, that would be a bonus).

2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?

~ £500-600

3) Where do you live?

Belfast, Northern Ireland

4) What exact parts do you need for that budget? CPU, RAM, case, etc. "Everything" is not a valid answer. Please list out all the parts you'll need.

CPU
RAM
Mobo
GPU
HD x 1
Case
PSU
Wifi Card (preferably -N)
DVD-RW
OS

5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model.

Migrating from laptop, so not much ...
Keyboard
Mouse

6) Will you be overclocking?

If possible on stock components.

7) What size monitor do you have and/or plan to have?

NEC Multisync EA231wmi - 23" 1920x1080 VGA DVI DisplayPort)

8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC?

Within the next couple of months.

9) What features do you need in a motherboard? RAID? Firewire? Crossfire or SLI support? USB 3.0? SATA 6Gb/s? etc.[/I]

USB 3.0 might be nice if that becomes standard, other than that I don't see me being too adventurous with components.

10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license? If yes, what OS? 32bit or 64bit?

No. I'd prefer 64-bit, unless you folks know of any reason why I shouldn't with Adobe Creative Suite 3? MS Windows 7 would seem logical to me.

Other points - I'd like a low power system. Yes, I'm a bearded environmentalist. I have several external drives so storage is not an issue. Oh, and I'd like some feedback on the components below; use this as a starting point for your feedback if you like. I found all these parts on Ebuyer.com (I've used them a lot in the past and shipping isn't bad to Northern Ireland):

intel Core i3 530 2.93GHz Socket 1156 4MB L3 Retail Box Processor
Corsair 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 1333MHz Dominator Memory Kit CL9 (9-9-9-24) 1.5V
Gigabyte GA-H55M-UD2H H55
XFX HD 5770 1GB XXX Edition
Samsung SpinPoint F3 500GB Hard Drive SATAII 7200rpm 16MB Cache
Antec 300 Three Hundred Case
Antec 430W EarthWatts Green PSU
Linksys by Cisco Wireless-N Dual-Band PCI Adapter
+ Cheap DVD-RW
+ Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit OEM

£581.07 + free 5 day shipping.

Many thanks in advance,
Nick

 

[Dangman]

Swap out the PSU for this slighlt larger and therefore sligthtly better efficiency PSU instead:
£60 - Antec EarthWatts Green 500W PSU

Besides that, looks decent to me. Though I'd spend the extra cash for this setup because a quad-core is gonna help out with the apps you mentioned and the better bang for the buck value:
£108 - AMD Phenom II X4 955 CPU
£56 - Gigabyte GA-MA770T-UD3 AMD 770 Motherboard
----
Total: £164

Only £18 more but you get significantly more performance for the money.

 

[sniglet]

Thanks for the advice Danny, a couple of questions:

Swap out the PSU for this slighlt larger and therefore sligthtly better efficiency PSU instead:
£60 - Antec EarthWatts Green 500W PSU

That's great, I'll do that. Is the reasoning with this is that 430W will be constantly stressed by the load and use more power than a 500W? Or is it just stability with the components I've chosen?

Besides that, looks decent to me. Though I'd spend the extra cash for this setup because a quad-core is gonna help out with the apps you mentioned and the better bang for the buck value:
£108 - AMD Phenom II X4 955 CPU
£56 - Gigabyte GA-MA770T-UD3 AMD 770 Motherboard
----
Total: £164

Only £18 more but you get significantly more performance for the money.

Does the AMD draw a lot more power? I want this PC to be as efficient as possible energy-wise. Bearing this in mind, is there a better choice for GPU than the AMD 5770?

Thanks again for the help.

Nick

 

[Dangman]

That's great, I'll do that. Is the reasoning with this is that 430W will be constantly stressed by the load and use more power than a 500W? Or is it just stability with the components I've chosen?

A little bit of both. The lesser the load on a PSU, the greater the chances for higher stability. But the main reasoning is because the Earthwatts 500W is the better deal since it's not that much more. In addition, the Earthwatts 500W will offer more room for upgrades as well.

Does the AMD draw a lot more power? I want this PC to be as efficient as possible energy-wise. Bearing this in mind, is there a better choice for GPU than the AMD 5770?

TBH, yes the AMD Phenom II 955 route would draw significantly more power.

For your res, yes there are significantly faster video cards. However your budget effectively eliminates all those faster video cards as viable choices

 

[sniglet]

I think I'll order this thing fairly soon and I'll go with the i3 but upgrade to the 500W PSU for future proofing. Never know if you will need more storage at a later date! In fact, I may just add a 1TB 5400rpm hard drive for some more backup options.

Thanks for all the help Danny. If anyone else has any thoughts, please let me know asap.

Nick