Anything for £500-£575?

[WinkingPig]

Evening,

Does anyone reckon you could get a half decent machine for £500 - £575, now i'll list the parts i already have below;

Optical Drive (DVD+/- RW)
Floppy Drive
Hard Disk Drive (80GB SATA150)
1GB DDR400 (Will eBay It For Some £)
TFT (17" LG)

Now i'm looking at £500 - £575 as my maximum budget for a machine, nothing for gaming, for general power and crunching, that will be very quiet, and cool. If anyone can recommend some parts, motherboard, processor, ram etc... i'd be really grateful, birthday next week and i'm looking at throwing this mATX thing out the window and just going Dual Core if at all possible, but i don't require lots of storage as i have a storage server for that task, just needs to be fast enough to multi-task, graphic design etc...

Oh, nearly forgot, must all be from eBuyer.

Chris

 

[Anon_F]

Oh, nearly forgot, must all be from eBuyer.Chris

Hi Chris, OK so Novatech is out!
Will have a think & get back to you

 

[WinkingPig]

Thanks, just i'm putting the whole system on credit over @ eBuyer as i have an account, just saves me blowing my entire current account at once. But i only say £500 - £575 as thats what i have saved up so far, would rather get stuff on credit for what i already have in my account than go over the top.

 

[floppybootstomp]

E-Buyer only offer 4 Socket 775 boards, 3 Asrocks and a low budget AGP slot Asus.

The top priced Asrock looks ok, it has onboard graphics but I guess you could disable them.

For £575 and the parts you have you should easily be able to build a good machine to suit your needs. Not sure if you need Mouse, Keyboard & Speakers as well.

But I cannot, honestly, hand on heart make recommendations if everything has to come from E-buyer, the choice of products there is absymal.

 

[Anon_F]

Here it is then:
ASUS P5W DH Deluxe SKT 775 dual-core Core2Duo Conroe ready Crossfire 8channel audio ATX
quickfind code: 113951 @ £130.92 inculiding VAT
Intel Core 2 Duo E6400 (2.13ghz) Socket 775 FSB1066 2MB Cache Retail Boxed Processor
quickfind code: 112708 138.60 inc VAT
Connect 3D X1950XT 256MB GDDR3 DVIx2 VIVO PCI-E
quickfind code: 119729 154.94 inc VAT

But then i have not bought new parts in 2 years
I just salvage old parts or scrounge off friends

 

[WinkingPig]

Well i think eBuyer are fairly OK to be honest.

The components i'm looking for are;

Processor
Motherboard
Memory
Graphics Card

That's basically it, and if a quote could include 2GB RAM then that'd be excellent. And feckit, the graphics is a bit over the top, i don't need anything at all like that, maybe half that price for the graphics front.

Now i'm not the best at compatibility or specifications thus why i posted on here, as i generally build machines that fall to bits after a few months...

Chris

 

[WinkingPig]

How about this for starters;

PRODUCT: Gigabyte Intel SKT775 965P/ICH8R PRICE: £95.55 QUICK FIND: 113819
PRODUCT: Intel Core 2 Duo E6400 (2.13ghz) PRICE: £138.60 QUICK FIND: 112708
PRODUCT: Kingston Valueram 2Gb 667MHz DDR2 PRICE: £117.06 QUICK FIND: 91124
PRODUCT: Sapphire ATI Radeon X1650 Pro 256MB PRICE: £69.73 QUICK FIND: 116150

TOTAL: £422.94 Inc VAT & Delivery

And that leaves me with some spare cash for a decent case.

 

[V_R]

That dont seem too bad Chris.

 

[WinkingPig]

Anything you would swap out and replace V_R?

Not sure about the motherboard, anyone know whether its any good?

Latest quote is;

PRODUCT: Gigabyte Intel SKT775 965P/ICH8R PRICE: £95.55 QUICK FIND: 113819
PRODUCT: Intel Core 2 Duo E6400 (2.13ghz) PRICE: £138.60 QUICK FIND: 112708
PRODUCT: Kingston Valueram 2Gb 667MHz DDR2 PRICE: £117.06 QUICK FIND: 91124
PRODUCT: Sapphire ATI Radeon X1650 Pro 256MB PRICE: £69.73 QUICK FIND: 116150
PRODUCT: Antec Solo Quiet Mini Tower Case PRICE: £50.78 QUICK FIND: 112659
PRODUCT: Seasonic S12 Series 430W ATX2.0 PRICE: £46.17 QUICK FIND: 104478

TOTAL: £519.89 Inc VAT & Delivery

 

[WinkingPig]

Obviously it'll drop below the above price a month after i've built it, as i'll be eBaying the current machine i have, and i'm sure that'll fetch £100-£150 or maybe more, who knows!

 

[Adywebb]

Not bad at all Chris - but can I suggest the Asus P5B-E Plus mobo: Asus P5b-e Plus/intel P965/lga775 Ich8r £107.60 Quick Find 123839 - I'm using that for my Quad and another rig, its a little cracker and less quirky to set up than the Gigabyte which I have also used

 

[floppybootstomp]

That looks like an excellent choice Chris.

When you choose a case, don't skimp on the PSU, if possible find a case without PSU and choose your own.

I'm confused now, I went to e-buyer, clicked on motherboards, then socket 775 and all I got was the 4 boards I mentioned above.

As for purchasing from e-buyer, it would appear they've got better but thrice bitten, twice shy, is my experience.

 

[WinkingPig]

God dammit, everything is going out of stock and ruining my quote

 

[Adywebb]

I'm confused now, I went to e-buyer, clicked on motherboards, then socket 775 and all I got was the 4 boards I mentioned above.

The site is a bit weird Flops - I think it just gives you a few selected examples, then to see them all you have to either click on 'Click here to view all search results' or on one of the manufacturers above.

 

[Adywebb]

God dammit, everything is going out of stock and ruining my quote

I can't believe it either Chris, only a couple of minutes ago it had 9 of the Asus boards - now its out of stock

Edit: Jeeze the Gigabyte is now out of stock too - that site is weird

 

[WinkingPig]

So Ady, the Asus P5B-E swapped into my spec should do me alright for this new computer then?

You reckon that PSU will hold up, i don't trust Hiper anymore, and i'd rather have something efficient like that SeaSonic 430w.

 

[ChristopherP]

As for purchasing from e-buyer, it would appear they've got better but thrice bitten, twice shy, is my experience.

2 working day turnaround for RMA's - good customer support over the phone

They have improved no end

 

[ChristopherP]

So Ady, the Asus P5B-E swapped into my spec should do me alright for this new computer then?

You reckon that PSU will hold up, i don't trust Hiper anymore, and i'd rather have something efficient like that SeaSonic 430w.

The Corsair HX series are *highly* reccomended over at the OCUK forums - they are re-branded seasonics for less cash. I got my ATX 2.2 620w one for less than a hundred quid.

get the E6600 if you can? its ace

 

[Adywebb]

So Ady, the Asus P5B-E swapped into my spec should do me alright for this new computer then?

You reckon that PSU will hold up, i don't trust Hiper anymore, and i'd rather have something efficient like that SeaSonic 430w.

Having used both, the Asus is def better and easier to set up

I have a Seasonic S12 500W and its fine....

Yep, the E6600 is nice, but its £50 more, but you can OC the E6400 really well with the Asus board if you need to

 

[V_R]

Good choice of board that ASUS. If i were in your shoes Chris that would be one on my shortlist for sure.
Should have spotted that really....

I have also dealt more with Ebuyer lately, most recently, my new Viewsonic monitor, gotta say they do seem to have got better.

Yep, the E6600 is nice, but its £50 more, but you can OC the E6400 really well with the Asus board if you need to

I've read on some OC forums that pro clockers prefer the E6400 rather than the E6600 due to it havin a smaller L2 cache = More OCing and less heat.

Not sure about the rest of you guys but...

Kingston Valueram 2Gb 667MHz DDR2 PRICE: £117.06 QUICK FIND: 91124

Just me or is that a little out of place with the rest of the system?