Wanting to build a new pc but i'm not as technically savy as some of you guys and I want to make sure i'm getting the best for the money have.

I got a budget of £600-800 (thats about $937.02- $1 249.36 dollars)

Heres what i've been looking into

Intel Core i7-2700K 3.50GHz

16gb ddr3 ram (32 if I can afford) i'm not sure what speed it best.

an SSD just for the OS.Heard speed is really good.

1tb regular hdd


also a geforce 460 EVGA. graphics card.

does that sound good for starters?

I hear the i7-3930K is good but its beyond my budget.

QUESTIONS

Is the CPU i'm going for the best for my money,or is there a better one out there that is around the same price? (but still intel)

Same question about the geforce 460 graphics card,is there a more recent version I should look into?

what are the best ram speeds? is that dependent on the motherboard?

I would really appreciate your help guys,been waiting a while to build this.

If you can afford it, I would really try to get 32GB, especially if you're into simulations.

yes I want to do sims,so thanks i'll trying get some extra for 32gb

The newer i7 3770K is also a good choice. It will save you a few watts, though it doesn't overclock quite as well as the 2700K (if you're into that). I'm also partial to the CoolerMaster Hyper212 CPU heatsink as it's cheap and does an excellent job of cooling. It is big, and can block the first DIMM slot on some motherboards, so make sure it's not a microATX board.

As for memory, DDR1600 will give you good performance without costing a premium (higher DDR speeds quickly get more expensive). Many benchmark sites have shown a measurable difference between DDR1333 and 1600, but beyond that, the improvement drops off substantially. If you're buying 4GB sticks, timings of 9-9-9-27 are good. For 8GB sticks, the latencies are usually a bit more, such as 10-9-10-30. Finally, if you're going for 32GB make sure the motherboard you choose supports this (some older or cheaper boards only support 16GB), and if you're going to use Windows7, you'll need at least the Pro version, as Home Premium only supports 16GB.

As for the 460, other options in that price range include the 550ti and the 560se. Most have 1GB of VRAM, which is adequate for the viewport but will not run very large OpenCL sims. You'll need at least 2GB of VRAM to do reasonably detailed volume sims.

An SSD is definitely a nice luxury, as a boot drive it makes rebooting almost painless. It's a little pricy, but the most difficult component to replace later on. I've heard good things about the Intel 300 series and the Samsung 830.


(Note these are my own personal recommendations, not Side Effects)

thanks twod,i was talking to my father about the i7 3930

he said to sit and work out the price difference between all the supplies needed for an i7 2700 machine and a i7 3930 because i'll need a more expensive motherboard for the latter.

the price difference was only about £300.

even though its tad more expensive,am i better off going for the 17 3930 in the long run? so far the motherboards i've looked that support the 3930 can only take 1600 ram which you have recommended.

or should I settle for 2700,is the 3930 worth the extra buck?

also how do i determine how powerful the power supply should be?

thanks for the graphics card advice!

For rendering and CPU simulation, the i7 3930 is definitely a better CPU, no question. However, I don't know how much 300 is worth to you, but here are the advantages:

• there are some socket 2011 motherboards (3930) that support 64GB of memory; socket 1155 (2700) boards generally top out at 32.
  
• socket 2011 uses quad memory channels vs. dual on the 1155, so you get more memory bandwidth which can be useful in some cases.
  
• The extra 2 cores do make a difference in rendering, especially PBR and raytracing. They should run about 50% faster than a 2700K.
  
• I briefly had my 3930 clocked at 4GHz (base) for a few weeks with no stability issues with the Hyper 212, so it can make up the clockspeed difference between the 2700 (3.5) and the 3930 (3.2) easily. I only turned it back down because I couldn't monitor the CPU temperature on Linux, and didn't feel like frying a $500 CPU.
  
  The only advantages that the 2700K has are its price, and an integrated GPU with Quick Sync. However, it can be tricky to get Quick Sync to work when you have a discrete GPU, and the iGPU on intel CPUs is inadequate for OpenGL. So in the end, it may not be much of an advantage to you.
  
  For the power supply, do a search on “power supply calculators”. You'll get a bunch of links like this one [extreme.outervision.com], and that'll give you a good starting point. I would choose a 80plus certification supply with silver rating or higher (gold, platinum) - it'll save you some money in the long run in power bills, though you do need to watch the price increase over a bronze supply. Just don't skimp on the power supply – a fried motherboard, CPU or graphics card costs a lot.

you've convinced me about the 3930,and yeh i noticed the motherboards for that take 64gb ram even though i could still only afford 32gb,I could add more in later.

I am a bit concerned in regards to the temperature monitoring you mentioned,thats something I should think about too.I will be able to monitor that on a pc (win7) right? some kind of software or hardware? is can the motherboard do that automatically?

perhaps some extra fans.

Thanks nobody has been this helpful anywhere else.Great advice on the power supply.

The motherboard -usually- comes with an install disc which includes a monitoring utility for CPU frequency, voltages, temperatures and fan speeds. If you're using W7, it'll definitely be supported. It's good practice to test your setup with a long CPU intensive render (or other task) once you've set up the system to see if the heatsink is properly seated on the CPU (with a thin layer of thermal compound). If it's not, CPU frequencies will be lower than expected (thermal throttling) or temperatures will be high (for this CPU, >50C at 3.2GHz and standard voltage). I've used ASUS, MSI and Gigabyte motherboards in the past and they've all included such a utility. However, you only really need to worry about temperatures beyond the initial CPU/heatsink testing if you're overclocking the CPU.

A case supporting a front fan plus a rear fan (preferably 120-140mm) should provide enough ventilation. The larger the fan, the lower the noise for the same airflow. 80mm fans should be avoided if you would like near-silent operation.

I should also mention that the i7 3930 does not come with a CPU heatsink - you need to buy one separately. The 2700K comes with one, though it's pretty average.

Glad to help, and good luck!

:shock: feedback galore.

manythanks again.Heatsink added to budget