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Budget home PC, cast your expert eyes over my ideas...


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Hey all,

 

I'm looking at building a home PC capable of running the usual software (Max, Photoshop, After Effects, etc), but don't have much in the way of a budget. Ideally I want to keep below £500.

I want a stable, relativly fast, easy build, that will last a couple of years.

 

So far my wish list is....

 

AMD Black Edition - Processor - 1 x AMD Phenom II X4 970 / 3.5 GHz

Asus AM3 M4A87TD/USB3 5200MT/S Includes Sound and Lan

Sapphire HD5570 1GB DDR3 HDMI Graphics Card

Seagate OEM 500GB Barracuda 3.5 inch 7200

Corsair DDR3 1333MHz 8GB

CiT 750W Power Supply Unit with PSU and Dual 12V Rails - Black Edition

Elite 330 Mid Tower Chassis

LG GH22NS50.AUAA 22x SATA DVDRW Drive

Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium

Nisis 3 port PCI Firewire Card

Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro Rev.2 CPU Cooler

Arctic Silver 5 3.5g Thermal Paste

 

The list can be seen on Amazon here http://t.co/rh2m4dS

 

So what do you guys think? It's just below my budget. I know the graphics card is a big compromise, but I would rather have a faster CPU, and lower spec GFX as I can streamline scenes and work-flow to compensate, but I can't increase render times as easily.

 

Also I have a couple of other quick "newbie" questions...

 

What is the main difference between a "Desktop" and a "Workstation"?

 

How can you compare processors? Ie how can you compare a dual core 4ghz to a quad core 3ghz?

 

Finally, is hyperthreading more favourable over none hyperthreading processors? The reason I ask is my understanding is that hyperthreading allows for better multitasking, but if you are single tasking, such as rendering, is there any difference?

 

 

Thanks, Deano!

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Thanks for you reply, I don't really know why I overlooked the X6. It also looks like it's quite well suited to overclocking, so might be able to squeeze out some extra power there too.

 

Thanks for the link to Anatech, very useful to see actual comparisons in real work situations.

 

Thanks, Dean

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Overclock the 1055T ? It's interesting guy . the 1055T@3.6ghz with that mobo is really a decent system . :D

 

- It is great if you know how to overclock , the 1055T really more suitable . And the AMD X4 970BE have not much headroom for overclocking .

 

PS : I did some realworld tests with 1055T in this thread in a vietnammes forum . If you wanna see it , you can login with the acc : Mozilla Firefox , pass : Firefox .

Edited by Superkames
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From another forum I have been advised to....

 

Asus AM3 M4A87TD motherboard change to MSI A75MA-G55 AMD Hudson D3 (Socket FM1) motherboard

 

AMD Phenom II X6 1055T change to AMD A8-3850 processor

 

Apparently the AM3 socket is old now, and the FM1 socket is the future, even though at the moment the processors are currently slower. What do you guys think?

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OK here is my revised spec. The main changes are for a faster and more reliable harddrive, change motherboard for OCing, different case with more fans and better cooling, and better powersupply. It's still slightly over budget, but I think I will be getting quite a lot for my money, with the options of larger harddrives, better graphics card, etc in the future.

 

Complete list can be seen here http://amzn.to/oPBqjB

 

AMD Phenom II X6 1055T 2.80 GHz 125W £122.48

 

Gigabyte SKT-AM3 GA-MA770T-UD3 Motherboard by Gigabyte £58.03

 

Seagate ST3500413AS 3.5 inch Barracuda 500 GB 7200rpm SATA Drive £27.19

 

Sapphire HD5570 1GB DDR3 HDMI Graphics Card Offered by NORDPC by SAPPHIRE £55.00

 

Coolermaster Silent Pro 700W Modular PSU by Coolermaster £83.93

 

Zalman Z7-PLUS Mid-Tower ATX Gaming Computer Chassis by Zalman £46.40

 

LG GH22NS50.AUAA 22x SATA DVDRW Drive - Bare Black by LG £12.29

 

Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium £70.99

 

Corsair DDR3 1333MHz 8GB (2x240) DIMM Unbuffered, Dual Channel by Corsair £53.32

 

eSecure - High Speed All-in-1 USB Card Reader for all Digital Memory Cards - White

 

Nisis 3 port PCI Firewire Card Offered by Star e-shop by Nisis £7.89

 

 

Let me know if you have any advice!

 

Cheers, Deano

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