Building a multi-purpose Desktop

J

Hi,

As my first post/thread on this forum, I'd like some help with selecting components for a new desktop. Please be gentle if I break forum rules in the process!

1. What is the purpose of the computer? What all applications and games are you going to run? (Stupid answers like 'gaming' or 'office work' will not work. Be exact. Which games? Which applications? Avoid the word 'et cetera.')

Ans: Programming, movies and games. I'd like to play Crysis 2 and Far Cry 2 on high resolution; for that matter, anything released in the past year with eye-candy turned up. I also intend to be doing a fair amount of programming, mostly Java, so a hog like Eclipse should not break a sweat. I'll also be running a Virtual Machine or two on top of my primary OS with a good bit of disk intensive stuff. And finally, movies in all their glory, preferably HD.

2. What is your overall budget? If you can extend a bit for a more balanced configuration, then mention this too.

Ans: 50K is my ideal price point, stretchable.

3. Planning to overclock?
Ans: I would like to, but stability is paramount for me. I don't like rebooting my machines more than once in a few days.

4. Which Operating System are you planning to use?
Ans: Windows 7 , Ubuntu.

5. How much hard drive space is needed?
Ans: 1TB. Plus, I'd like expansion slots so I can add another disk in a few months.

6. Do you want to buy a monitor? If yes, please mention which screen size and resolution do you want. If you already have a monitor and want to reuse it, again mention the size and resolution of monitor you have.
Ans: Yes. 20-23 inches, 1080p.

7. Which components you DON'T want to buy or which components you already have and plan on reusing?
Ans: I have to buy everything.

8. When are you planning to buy the system?
Ans: In the next 2 weeks.

9. Have you ever built a desktop before or will this be done by an assembler?
Ans: My first time building it.

10. Where do you live? Are you buying locally? Are you open to buying stuff from online shops if you don't get locally?
Ans: Bangalore. Ready to buy locally as well as online.

11. Anything else which you would like to say?
Ans: I've thought of a base setup, but I'm quite uncertain:
Processor - AMD FX-8150
RAM - Corsair Vengeance 8GB*2
M/B - ASUS M5A97
PSU - Corsair 500CXV2UK or Seasonic S12II-520
Graphics Card - Sapphire AMD/ATI Radeon HD 6750 1 GB DDR3
HDD - Seagate Barracuda 1TB
Cabinet, Speakers,Monitor - ?

T.I.A!

This might be a kicka$$ Config atm.

Most of the items are available at SP. Road, Bangalore. No need of online purchases.

J

Thanks d3p. However this config will not really suit my usage. It
will perform superbly wrt gaming, but that is not my only/primary need. Since I will be running Virtual machine(s), these will need a nice slice of RAM of their own while I continue to use the host OS. That is why I think I need 16GB of RAM. As for the CPU - how is the Phenom's performance in a parallel/multi-threaded workload? I shortlisted the FX 8150 since it is supposed to do well with such workloads though at the cost of single-threaded performance.

d3p said:
This might be a kicka$$ Config atm.

Component | Make | Price Processor |AMD Phenom X4 960T|7000
Motherboard |Gigabyte GA-970A-UD3|6600
RAM |G-skill Ripjaws X F3-12800CL9S-4GBXL|1500
Graphic Card |SAPPHIRE HD7850 Dual X Active|15300
HDD |WDC 250GB Blue WD2500AAKX|3600
DVD Writer |LG 24x Super DVD R/W|900
PSU |Seasonic S12II-520W|3700
Case |CM Elite 310|1600
Monitor |Benq G2222HDL LED Monitor|7500
Keyboard & Mouse |Logitech MK200|700
UPS |APC 600va|1800
Speakers |Logitech Z313|1500
| Total |51500

Most of the items are available at SP. Road, Bangalore. No need of online purchases.

JovianStorm said:
I'll also be running a Virtual Machine or two on top of my primary OS with a good bit of disk intensive stuff

JovianStorm said:
50K is my ideal price point, stretchable.

d3p, IMO phenom x6 1090T would be far better than x4 970. VMs would gain much from the extra cores.

If you are going to run Virtual Machine then get Phenom II X6 1075T @ 7.5K. Since it is a 6 core processor, it will help better in running VM. However, AMD FX-8120 @ 9.4K is another great option due to its support for both Vt-D and Vt-X.

J

dashing.sujay, yes. That was why I was looking at AMD since it seems to give more bang for the buck in terms of multicores.

Cilus, both the 8120 and 8150 seem like attractive options. However, is the extra 2-3K for the 8150 worth it over the 8120?

T.I.A everyone.

1

Cilus said:
If you are going to run Virtual Machine then get Phenom II X6 1075T @ 7.5K. Since it is a 6 core processor, it will help better in running VM. However, AMD FX-8120 @ 9.4K is another great option due to its support for both Vt-D and Vt-X.

Where did you find 8 cores FX-8120 at such a low price? When I was shopping earlier it was like 11-12 K?

JovianStorm said:
Cilus, both the 8120 and 8150 seem like attractive options. However, is the extra 2-3K for the 8150 worth it over the 8120?

Extra 2-3K for FX-8150 is not worth it. Go for FX-8120.

J

1manshow said:
Where did you find 8 cores FX-8120 at such a low price? When I was shopping earlier it was like 11-12 K?

I'm confused as well. Flipkart and a couple of SP road dealers stated a price that's around 2k more than the price on smcinternational.in - which one is right?

ico said:
Extra 2-3K for FX-8150 is not worth it. Go for FX-8120.

The 8120 was my initial selection, but then I got greedy :lol:

Maybe I can use the money saved to get a slightly better graphics card.

fx 8120 and fx8150 prices are bound to fall cheapest in india smc international and chennai shops delta and may be challenger

J

Had to postpone my purchase due to cash crunch. I've now almost finalized on the build
and will be buying it in a couple of days from SP road. Prices are from flipkart.

Does the build seem balanced?

Ready to spend around 58k? Look into this one

Component Make Price
CPU AMD FX 8120 9400
Motherboard Gigabyte MGA-970A-UD3 6600
RAM G.Skill Ripjaws 8GB DDR3 3100
GPU Gigabyte HD 7850 OC 15300
HDD WD Caviar Blue 500 GB 4100
Optical Drive Asus DRW-24B3ST 1130
Case NZXT Source 210 Elite 2400
PSU Seasonic S12 II 520 3850
Monitor Benq G2222HDL 7500
KB + Mouse Logitech MK200 700
UPS Numeric 1KVA 4100
Total 58180

>Including UPS that can give decent backup.
>Skipped the speakers.

T

The graphic card you've chosen is a bad one. Go for HD 7750 @ 6.5k - 7k or HD 6850 @ 8.5K . And for monitor, go for Benq G2222HDL @ 7.8k. Change mobo to Gigabyte GA-970A-UD3 if you are planning to OC. Rest is fine.

J

The Benq G2222HDL doesn't seem to have a HDMI input, only VGA. How about the Benq GL2250HM though?

The Radeon HD 6850 is out of my budget - the prices are in the 10K range for the 1GB cards. The HD 7750 seems viable though, and thanks for the motherboard advice wrt OC. Will do some more research.

the_conqueror said:
The graphic card you've chosen is a bad one. Go for HD 7750 @ 6.5k - 7k or HD 6850 @ 8.5K . And for monitor, go for Benq G2222HDL @ 7.8k. Change mobo to Gigabyte GA-970A-UD3 if you are planning to OC. Rest is fine.

V

@JovianStorm

Change the motherboard to Gigabyte MGA-970A-UD3 as suggested by the_conqueror.
For graphics pick up hd6770 or hd 7750 .hd6770 is slightly better than hd7750 in gaming.hd 7750 consumes much lesser power though.
hd6770 is available for around 6.3k and hd7750 is around 6.8k.

If gaming is a top priority then consider RiGOD's rig.To make it even stronger add 2.5k and get fx8150.

Dell st2220l has HDMI port and many people in the forum are using it.
Wait for members to comment on Benq GL2250HM.

d3p said:
This might be a kicka$$ Config atm.

Component | Make | Price Processor |AMD Phenom x6 1090T|8500
Motherboard |Gigabyte GA-970A-UD3|6600
RAM |G-skill Ripjaws X F3-12800CL9S-4GBXL|1500
Graphic Card |SAPPHIRE HD7850 Dual X Active|15300
HDD |WDC 250GB Blue WD2500AAKX|3600
DVD Writer |LG 24x Super DVD R/W|900
PSU |Seasonic S12II-520W|3700
Case |CM Elite 310|1600
Monitor |Benq G2222HDL LED Monitor|7500
Keyboard & Mouse |Logitech MK200|700
UPS |APC 600va|1800
Speakers |Logitech Z313|1500
| Total |53000

Most of the items are available at SP. Road, Bangalore. No need of online purchases.

but not to forgot

I'll also be running a Virtual Machine or two on top of my primary OS with a good bit of disk intensive stuff. And finally, movies in all their glory, preferably HD.
How much hard drive space is needed?
Ans: 1TB.

so 6 core cpu maybe enough for 2-3 vms, and 1tb hdd for vms and HD movies, and lots of ram :mrgreen:

Anything else which you would like to say?
Ans: I've thought of a base setup, but I'm quite uncertain:
Processor - AMD FX-8150
RAM - Corsair Vengeance 8GB*2
M/B - ASUS M5A97
PSU - Corsair 500CXV2UK or Seasonic S12II-520
Graphics Card - Sapphire AMD/ATI Radeon HD 6750 1 GB DDR3
HDD - Seagate Barracuda 1TB
Cabinet, Speakers,Monitor - ?

since you want max settings at games thus 6750 is not enough

J

Great advice all around - thanks everyone. RiGOD 's spec sheet is more gaming oriented than I'd want/need. And I'm definitely changing the graphics card.Would a HD6770 1GB GDDR5 be fine?

And I'd also like some advice on the case since there's considerable price difference between the NZXT 210 and the Corsair 400R. What am I missing here?

V

@JovianStorm
If you are sticking to your own config then no need to replace the carbide 400r.
Carbide 400r has better airflow,2 front usb3.0(NZXT 210 elite has 1),better fans,huge back-plate space,more drive bays.Probably you wont need to change the cabby afterwards.This cabinet should be good enough for all kind of future upgrades that you are going to bring to the system
NZXT source 210 elite cabinet is good enough cabinet for its budget.Probably it has the best specs for its price.

For gpu hd6770 is good enough to play some old titles in high settings.It will struggle at high settings and high resolutions for new games and some games like crysis would struggle on it.
If you can spend a bit more then pick up the nvidia gtx560 for 10k.
The card in the RiGOD'd config(hd7850) is pretty powerful.

Or else you can cut down on cabinet(by opting for nzxt source 210 elite) and get a card like hd6850 or gtx560.

Go with the NZXT Source Elite 210 and get a good Graphics Card .

U

Check this one out.
1.Processor: AMD Phenom II 960T: 7.5k
2.Mobo: ASUS M5A88-M: 5k
3.RAM: 1GB: 1k
4.HDD: 1TB: 5k
5.GPU: HIS Radeon HD 6870: 12k
6.Monitor: BenQ G2222HD: 7k
7.Cabinet: Cooler Master Elite 311: 2k
8.DVD writer: 0.9k
9.PSU: Corsair GS 600: 4k
10.Mouse+Keyboard: Razer Cyclosa bundle: 2.1k
11.Speakers: Altec Lansing BXR1221: 2k
12.UPS: Intex 600VA: 1.5K
TOTAL: 50k

Utkarsh Sharma, OP specifically mentioned about Virtual machine and that's why people are suggesting him FX series CPUs as they've better support for Virtual machine.

JovianStorm, stick with FX-8150 over FX-8120. The performance difference in certain areas are not marginal.

J

@Cilus, yes, I'm decided on the processor and RAM. Fx8150 and 16GB G.skills or Corsair vengeance. Have also fixed on the power supply.

Cilus said:
Utkarsh Sharma, OP specifically mentioned about Virtual machine and that's why people are suggesting him FX series CPUs as they've better support for Virtual machine.

JovianStorm, stick with FX-8150 over FX-8120. The performance difference in certain areas are not marginal.

What PSU you are gonna buy.

J

Seasonic S12II-520W

I believe it should be enough for all the series 67** and 68** series Radeon's I am considering.

Sainatarajan said:
What PSU you are gonna buy.

It Should be Enough . It is a good PSU.

J

Hi Jovian,

RAM : Corsair XMS3 DDR3 4 GB (2 x 4 GB) PC RAM (CMX4GX3M1A1600C9) Rs. 3250
Processor : AMD 3.3 GHz AM3+ FX6100 Processor Rs. 8374
Motherboard : ASUS M5A88-M Motherboard Rs. 5592
Psu : Seasonic S12II-620 620 Watts PSU Rs. 5463
Internal Optical Drive : Asus DRW-24B3ST Internal Optical Drive (Black) Rs. 1135
Cabinet : Cooler Master Elite 310 Cabinet (Red) Rs. 1950
Internal Hard Drive : WD Caviar Green 2 TB HDD Internal Hard Drive (WD20EARX) Rs. 7151
Mouse+Keyboard : Microsoft Wireless Desktop 800 Rs 1200
UPS :- Intex 720VA Rs:1433 (Ebay)
GPU :- Gigabyte AMD GV-R7850OC-2GD 2 GB Rs.16830

Total :- Rs.52438/-

Following are the specs of My Rig for Virtualization (Hyper-V & VMware) and Gaming use.

If you are going for hosting side then go for FX 8120 otherwise if you need this for study or R&D purpose go for this Spec. Dont bother about cores

Still searching for GPU, for now thinking about Asus 7850 2GB

Jackell said:
Hi Jovian,

RAM : Corsair XMS3 DDR3 4 GB (2 x 4 GB) PC RAM (CMX4GX3M1A1600C9) Rs. 3250 (4GB vengeance 1600c9@1.5V is for ~1.5k)
Processor : AMD 3.3 GHz AM3+ FX6100 Processor Rs. 8374
Motherboard : ASUS M5A88-M Motherboard Rs. 5592
Psu : Seasonic S12II-620 620 Watts PSU Rs. 5463
Internal Optical Drive : Asus DRW-24B3ST Internal Optical Drive (Black) Rs. 1135
Cabinet : Cooler Master Elite 310 Cabinet (Red) Rs. 1950
Internal Hard Drive : WD Caviar Green 2 TB HDD Internal Hard Drive (WD20EARX) Rs. 7151
Mouse+Keyboard : Microsoft Wireless Desktop 800 Rs 1200
UPS :- Intex 720VA Rs:1433 (Ebay)
GPU :- Gigabyte AMD GV-R7850OC-2GD 2 GB Rs.16830

Total :- Rs.52438/-

Following are the specs of My Rig for Virtualization (Hyper-V & VMware) and Gaming use.

If you are going for hosting side then go for FX 8120 otherwise if you need this for study or R&D purpose go for this Spec. Dont bother about cores

~~Still searching for GPU, for now thinking about Asus 7850 2GB~~

J

truegenius said:

vengeance was not available at the time of ordering..

Thanks for GPU

J

Done. So I went quite over budget, and finally got the machine.

T

You should have spent Rs 200 more and got GA-970A-UD3 instead of M5A97. It would've been better for OCing.

Exactly .

It's okay if he doesn't overclock.

For an average user, I'd say Asus M5A97 is better because of proper UEFI. You could use GPT partitions with that instead of MBR.

Post some pics buddy

Building a multi-purpose Desktop - 50K