New Build: Figuring out the pieces

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Bishop98

n00b
Joined
Feb 2, 2011
Messages
25
1) What will you be doing with this PC? Gaming? Photoshop? Web browsing? etc
Gaming/Movies, SAS programming/Excel data mining, Video editting and web browsing.
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2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?
$1000 (Excluding Tax and Shipping)
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3) Which country do you live in? If the U.S, please tell us the state and city if possible.
Toronto, Canada but I can acquire things from the States (Michigan) too.
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4) What exact parts do you need for that budget? CPU, RAM, case, etc. The word "Everything" is not a valid answer. Please list out all the parts you'll need.

CPU, CPU fan, Mobo, Ram, and SSD.

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5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model.
2 SATA hard drives,
Seasonic X750 (2 years old),
Asus Xonar DX (Not sure if there is a point to this considering that the new mobo has a good built in Sound so I would appreciate your thoughts on shelving this),
AV40 + BIC F12,
Corsair Graphite 600T,
Dell U2410
Sapphire 5770 (I need to save up for a new graphics card so I will upgrade that component in a month or 2, I might go with 7950 but I haven't decided yet. I'll cross that bridge when I get to it)

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6) Will you be overclocking?
Mild overclocking (4.3-4.5 depending on my luck :) ) since sticking with Air Cooling with Ivy Bridge.
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7) 7) What is the max resolution of your monitor? What size is it?
Single 24 inch monitor at 1920 X 1200.
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8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC?
In a week.
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9) What features do you need in a motherboard? RAID? Firewire? Crossfire or SLI support? USB 3.0? SATA 6Gb/s? eSATA? Onboard video (as a backup or main GPU)? UEFI? etc.
z77 is the only thing that comes to mind just to get the most out of the latest i7.
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10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license? If so, what OS? Is it 32bit or 64bit?
I currently have XP Pro but getting either Window 7 Home Premium (64bit) or Win 7 Pro (64bit).
The cost of the OS will be separate from the budget.
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Hi, I am posting this build that I am considering and I was hoping that the folks here would give me their feedback and or suggestion on alternatives. I am trying to avoid things that would be noisy since I work from home a lot.

Thank you in advance for the help.

These are the parts that I was thinking about it.
Gigabyte Z77x UD5H =$190
i7 3770K =$290
Noctua NH-U9B SE2 =$50
256GB Samsung 830: MZ-7PC256N/AM =$310
For Ram I was considering one of the below. The Ares model is being considered because the heat spreaders on the Ripjaws might not fit with the HSF (based on some forum readings).
$115=
G.Skill Ripjaws X 16GB - 1600 (2 x 8GB): F3-12800CL10D-16GBXL
or
G.Skill Ares 16GB - 1600 (2 X 8GB): F3-1600C10D-16GAO

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On a side note I've looked for the Samsung PM830 and the Crucial C400 (mSata) but I haven't had any luck finding them in the retail channels. Are they not available yet and what size mSATA drive is considered to be optimal ?
 
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The CPU and mobo are solid choices.

Ditch the Noctua: Unless you have a case that's really tight on space, no reason to get that Noctua when this Coolermaster Hyper 212+ cools significantly better and is signficantly cheaper:
http://ncix.com/products/?sku=41337&vpn=RR-B10-212P-G1&manufacture=COOLERMASTER

As for the RAM, if you're planning on going for 32GB, get Windows 7 Pro as Windows 7 HP is artificially limited to 16GB of RAM support. Both RAM are fairly solid and will perform virtually the same. So go for the one with the lower heatsinks.

As for the SSD, why mSATA?
 
Thanks Danny Bui, I will switch out the Noctua HSF with the coolermaster and I appreciate your input on the OS & Ram.

I am planning to have the Samsung 830 as my main SSD drive for my OS, core programs and a hand full of games while my old Sata drives will be the storage drives for media and material.

The Gigabyte z77x ud5 has an onboard msata slot that allows for a msata drive to be installed. With it you can use the 'Intel Smart response' to cache the more frequently used programs for quicker run (At least that is what I've read). I was comparing the onboard msata option against having a main SSD but I don't quite know if there is any benefit to it over an SSD drive. Just a little confused about the whole thing :)

One other thing is the premium that is attached to the Samsung 830 SSD worth it when compared to the Crucial m4 ?
 
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Perfect , so I will stick with the SSD and HDD combo instead of using the msata.

I've picked up the UD5 mobo and the 212+ HSF, 2 down 3 more components to go :).

I've given it some thought and I don't think I will go beyond the 16GB for the ram. Everything that I've read says that the 32GB is over kill but I was curious is their any benefit for having dual channel kit (2 x 8GB) versus a quad channel kit (4 x 4GB) ?
 
Bishop98 said:
Everything that I've read says that the 32GB is over kill but I was curious is their any benefit for having dual channel kit (2 x 8GB) versus a quad channel kit (4 x 4GB) ?
Click to expand...

Slightly better chance of a higher OC with a 2 x8GB set. But that higher OC is probably like an extra 200Mhz at best or so. Also, that's not quad-channel: Quad-channel is only supported by socket 2011. On a socket LGA 1155 mobo, that 4x4GB is still a dual channel set.
 
My bad on the wrong use of the terminology and thanks for clearing that up. I went ahead with the dual kit since newegg had a 15% off promo for them :) . I've ordered the ram and SSD but I've scaled back the SSD to 128GB.

Thanks Danny for all your help figuring out the components. Last thing I've decided to get a new HDD since the 2 I have are long in the tooth (5+ years). There are so many different versions from each manufacturer can you please suggest a make and model from ncix. I am looking for something that is about 2 TB that has a good balance of value, performance and noise level.
 
Thanks for your help Danny, I finally finished putting together my rig. I got hung up on a defective hard drive and a quirk with the mobo but all is good :).

Final Rig
Corsair 600T White
Seasonic x750
Gigabyte Z77x UD5H
i7 3770K
Hyper 212 plus SE2 + Noctua P12 - PWM (Push & pull setup)
128GB Samsung 830
WD Caviar Green 2TB
G.Skill Ares 16GB - 1600 (2 X 8GB)
Xonar DX

A video card upgrade is the next upgrade mid summer since the Sapphire 5770 vaporx is outdated compared to everything else but for now I will play with the OC and see what I can reasonably get out of it :D

So far Excel and D3 are running beautifully ... I will be enjoying this rig for some time now.
 
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