Building a PC

staggerlee

Hi all, trying a pc build instead of a shop purchase, below is what i have so far, anyone have any suggestions for it? or see anything total wrong! starting with 4gb of ram then i will throw more into it later when i get some more cash going to 8, i mainly want it for gaming and setting up some virtual servers to mess around on. going with Win7ent OS.

Also random note, will i need to get any extra cables to set it up?

Thanks for any input

Sapphire HD 5770 1GB GDDR5 Dual DVI HDMI DisplayPort HDCP PCI-E Graphics Card £123.05

AMD Phenom II X2 555 Black Edition 3.2GHz Socket AM3 6MB Cache Retail Box Processor

Kingston 2gb Ddr3 1600mhz Hyperx Memory Cl9(9-9-9-27)

LG GH22LS50 22x DVD±RW DL & RAM with LightScribe SATA - Retail Box Black With Software

Akasa AK 860SF (Socket 754, 940, 939, AM2) aluminium Processor Cooler

Intel 80GB X25-Mainstream SSD 2.5" SATA-II Read 250MB/s Write 170MB/s

Antec 300 Three Hundred Case

Dynamode 10/100/1000 Mbps 32 Bit Gigabit PCI Network Adapter RJ45

ASUS M4A78LT-M LE AMD 760G Socket AM3 DVI VGA Out 8 CHannel Audio MATX

KeithC

I noticed that you are lacking a power supply. Also you do not need the additional NIC card since their is one on board that is the same speed unless you already thought of that. The motherboard it looks like according to the pictures at Newegg.com only come with 1 sata cable so may need another depending if the DVD comes with one. I think only having 2 memory slots will cost you more money when upgrading down the road.

The case only comes with a top and a back fan and the front and side fans are not included. Typically I would just buy better replacement fans that are a tad decent while trying to take into effect noise and air movement.

Good Luck and have fun

exampasser

For the ati 5770 card I would go with this one instead as it looks like it will blow most of the exhaust out of the case:
Newegg.com - XFX HD-577A-ZNFC Radeon HD 5770 (Juniper XT) 1GB 128-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFireX Support Video Card

For a cpu I'd personally go with the phenom II x6 (either normal version or the black edition.)

Devilsbane

80GB likely won't be enough HDD space for you, especially if you are looking into VM's. Definitely consider a secondary drive for storage if nothing else. My laptop is set up to boot off of a 60GB SSD, and then I just have all my files (including VMs because they can be so large) on a 640GB 5400 WD Scorpio.

Devilsbane

KeithC wrote: »

I think only having 2 memory slots will cost you more money when upgrading down the road.

4GB sticks are quite expensive.

arwes

Any particular reason why you chose that motherboard? It's been my experience with MATX boards that they have to skimp on things to conform to the MATX size specification. If you go with an ATX board you'll likely have more RAM slots and more expansion slots. When I moved to Win 7 64 bit, I maxed out my RAM at 8 GB.

KeithC

Devilsbane wrote: »

4GB sticks are quite expensive.

Yes memory is expensive now but say 2 years down the road they could be cheap enough to justify going from 4G to 8G.

I would have to agree with arwes about questioning the OP's choice of motherboard my last build I used the evga e758 with 6 slots for ram. While the price difference is by a lot I had the choice to start out low in memory on the cheap. I still installed 12G in the system it was overkill but that's 1 less thing to have to think about.

I also point out usually OEM parts will be cheaper then retail at least in the U.S. for at least the DVD burner while it may be the same item you may get shortened on documentation and cables and possible on the warranty.

brad-

I'll just say I disagree with most of your selections, but to each his own.

The glaring needs I see are the 80GB HD - no reason to go that small. Power Supply. If it is for gaming, get a decent soundcard - and possibly some 5.1 speakers and/or a nice headset with microphone.

Look at newegg.com. See what items are popular in the category you're looking for. If you're going to spend a little more, look for the best rated - and back it off a bit or two to fit your budget.

Devilsbane

brad- wrote: »

I'll just say I disagree with most of your selections, but to each his own.

I would go with one of the new i7's. I have one in my laptop and I'm quite pleased.

earweed

arwes wrote: »

Any particular reason why you chose that motherboard? It's been my experience with MATX boards that they have to skimp on things to conform to the MATX size specification. If you go with an ATX board you'll likely have more RAM slots and more expansion slots. When I moved to Win 7 64 bit, I maxed out my RAM at 8 GB.

I'd definitely change to a different MOBO. You want expansion capabilities especially for RAM. You'll want to expand your RAM and it's better, and cheaper. to just add more RAM into empty slots than to replace the sticks you have.

tiersten

brad- wrote: »

The glaring needs I see are the 80GB HD - no reason to go that small.

Its a SSD. Thats why it is small.

As this is a desktop, add a regular HD for storage and use the SSD as the boot/app drive if you still want the SSD.

brad- wrote: »

If it is for gaming, get a decent soundcard

Unless your games support OpenAL or another sound API for sound then a 3rd party hardware accelerated sound card is useless. DirectX no longer supports hardware accelerated sound so you need games that use a different API.

arwes

Looking back through this post, I have to ask. Have you ever built a PC from scratch? If not, I highly suggest you get someone who has a few successful builds under their belt to give you a helping hand with your first one. There's quite a few things that can go wrong if you're not careful, like my friend who built his first one (and wouldn't wait on me to come over to help) and unknowingly left a stray stand-off in his motherboard tray. I hear the blue electrical arc across the board looked neat, but yeah it fried pretty much everything. They'll probably be like me, more than happy to help, especially if you provide the steak or pizza.

tiersten

As others have pointed out the motherboard you've listed only has 2 DIMM slots and you're using 2GB DIMMs for a total of 4GB so if you ever want to upgrade in the future then you'll have to throw them away.

The motherboard is intended for small budget systems. It already has mediocre integrated video and you're adding in a video card as well. If the integrated video isn't necessary then I'd find another motherboard.

Ditto again for Ethernet and you're adding an Ethernet card as well. The Ethernet card is a not particularly good Realtek chip and it is PCI. If you really need more Ethernet ports then get a better card and get a PCI Express one since your board supports that anyway.

Your case is capable of taking a regular ATX motherboard so I'd say go find another motherboard instead of the one you've listed. Make sure it has 4 DIMM slots.

Any particular reason why you want W7 Enterprise? I assume that you're getting it via MSDN, Technet or work.

phoeneous

The first time I built a pc ('93) I forgot the spacers between the mobo and case. As soon as I hit the power, poof!

Nobylspoon

phoeneous wrote: »

The first time I built a pc ('93) I forgot the spacers between the mobo and case. As soon as I hit the power, poof!

Atleast on the brightside, it is probably not going to be a mistake you will ever make again

tiersten

phoeneous wrote: »

The first time I built a pc ('93) I forgot the spacers between the mobo and case. As soon as I hit the power, poof!

You put the motherboard right up against the motherboard tray? The bang from that should have been impressive.

aordal

you need hexacore CPUs !!

earweed

phoeneous wrote: »

The first time I built a pc ('93) I forgot the spacers between the mobo and case. As soon as I hit the power, poof!

Expensive lesson. I was ultra careful with everything on my first build (about 2 years ago) I had just gotten my A+ and rewatched the Mike Meyers video while doing my build. It took a long time to do it but happily it was bang free.

GAngel

That processor will get spanked by any of the i5/i7 processors. It's basically equivalent to a mid/high end i3 processor. If you're going to spend the money may as well do it right once.

phoeneous

tiersten wrote: »

You put the motherboard right up against the motherboard tray? The bang from that should have been impressive.

It didnt even have a tray, it was screwed directly onto the case! Awesomeness it was. There was a loud bang, then some smoke, then everything was dead. All components flatlined.