New computer

[kenneth18278]

Just had a bit of a windfall, so I decided to treat myself, and saw this bundle on eBuyer:

Item: Silverstone 12cm transparent Red Led Case Fan
Qty: 1 Cost:
£14.12

Item: CM Storm Enforcer Case with Coolermaster 650W GX PSU
Qty:
1 Cost: £93.31

Item: Corsair 8GB (2X4GB) DDR3 1866Mhz Red Vengeance
Memory Kit CL9 1.5V
Qty: 1 Cost: £32.37

Item: AMD FX-6 6100 Black
Edition 6 Core 3.3Ghz Socket AM3+ 8MB L3 Cache Retail Boxed Processor
Qty: 1
Cost: £69.49

Item: Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3 990FX Socket AM3+ 8 Channel
Audio ATX Motherboard
Qty: 1 Cost: £88.33

Item: Sony AD-7280S 24x
DVD±RW with DL & RAM SATA Optical Drive - OEM Black
Qty: 1 Cost:
£11.65

Item: WD 1TB Blue Desktop Drive 3.5" SATA-III 7200RPM 64MB
Qty:
1 Cost: £49.99

Item: Microsoft Windows 7 Professional w/SP1
Qty: 1
Cost: £95.82

Shipping method: Next Working Day at £13.22

Sub Total: 468.30

VAT Total: 93.69

Total: £561.99

Now, I'm not too well up on current retail prices (my current setup was bought pre-owned), but this looks to be a good deal to me. Anyway, as I say, being able to get this is a rare treat and I'm quite looking forward to putting it all together, and enjoying a faster up-to-date toy (sorry, essential modern technology!).

Of course, I may be a mug and this is not worth the cost. Would be interested in any informed views if anyone would care to share.

Regards to all

Ken

 

[RRSignal]

What kind of video card? That'll make a big difference!

Avoid Coolermaster PSUs like the plague.

Be certain sure that Windows is 64-bit. I recommend buying a Retail version versus OEM, since OEM is (usually) a one-shot affair.

Otherwise, it's a good system. One other topic to think about: The FX-4170 is about the same price as that FX-6100 and runs up to 4.2GHz out of the box. That'll probably help more in games like Trainz which wouldn't normally take advantage of the extra cores of FX-6100. I believe Trainz only uses 2 cores in Driver. Unless the next version can utilize more than 4, there is no benefit to having a six-core beast (and that's assuming you plan to buy it! .) Of course, you could, down the road, overclock the FX-6100 (I generally am not a fan of overclocking, just throwing it out there) then that can even things out a bit and take advantage of that memory's speed which otherwise would be of little benefit to the FX-6100.

There are folks here with more experience than I have with AMD; perhaps they can weigh in as well.

 

[kenneth18278]

Ah, no, silly me - forgot the graphics! How about:-

Zotac GT 640 2GB DDR3 Dual DVI Mini HDMI £66.78

Regarding Windows 7, it is 64 bit but OEM is cheaper, so I'll probably settle for that. As to the CPU, I've been runnuing Trainz quite happily (2009 anyway) on a bog standard 2.2Ghz Phenom 4-core, and a 3.3Ghz has to be an improvement on that, as will 6Gbs S-ATA drives, so even the minimal stuttering I've been getting should be improved. Hopefully, will run TS2010 and TS12 adequately as well.

I'm intrigued by your disapproval of Coolermaster PSUs, but that can be swapped out for something similar, I dare say. Do you have any recommendations on that? And why is Coolermaster bad? I'd be interested, especially, as I say, as I'm far from being an expert.

Anyway, most of it is good, then, so perhaps I'm not a total dummy. Thanks for replying and I do appreciate the advice.

Regards

Ken

 

[RRSignal]

You're welcome. Take a look at a GTS 550Ti or a GTX260 video cards. Those should run about the same price (not including VAT) and are better video cards. Over there they're about the same price on sale.

I've had enough Coolermasters go bad on me that I won't do business with them again. I recommend using this list, which will tell you about Coolermaster and other brands:

http://www.eggxpert.com/forums/thread/323050.aspx

FYI, with Tier I supplies, you can probably get away with at 550w (with the 550Ti or lower card) or 600w with the GTX 260 and have a reasonable margin of safety and the ability to add . With the Tier 2, add at least 50w. With any of the lower Tiers, add at least 150w. I generally recommend at least 750w these days with what video cards consume now no matter what brand, but the above rules should help you save a few pounds.

One thing: The 6Gbps link probably won't help THAT much with stuttering, though it will open the door for you to get an SSD either now or later one, which will.

I would have to know a lot more about your current system to make a judgment call as to whether or not it's worth upgrading, but raw CPU speed tends to help a lot with Trainz.

 

[clam1952]

Coolermaster Power supply? I posted a year or so ago on here about the one I had that literally blew up with a loud flash and a bang after 2 weeks use, Ebuyer replaced it with a more expensive 700 watt Antec at no charge, which has been rock solid, I bought a second one for one of my other builds.

Both PC's I have in use here at the moment are motherboard processor ram bundles from Ebuyer no problems in the 18 months I've been using them.

The 6 core Phenom 1090T I have here depending on who's benchmark of course, out performs the the FX-6 6100 in several areas.
Of course depending on the motherboard you can turn off extra cores and run a 6 core as a 4 leastwise on the Phenom you can. Odd though that the 1090T seems to be somewhat of a rarity, I notice neither Dabs, Ebuyer or Scan have any listed now.

 

[kenneth18278]

The Coolermaster is included with the case, and I do like the case. For the graphics, I was looking to get 2Gb of memory - I'll have another look at that and see what I can find.

Yes, I do have an ambition to get a SSD, probably 512GB or thereabouts, but the price will have to drop a fair bit first, and when it does I'll probably go with Crucial, as they make it easy to migrate your operating system and whatever else you want (according to the video on their site, anyway).

Malc, couldn't find 1090T on eBuyer, but am looking at the FX4170 when I get a minute - 4.2Ghz out of the box seems good to me, but I do play other games, such as Skyrim, so I don't know whether 6 cores could help there, plays fine on 4 as it is so probably not. Yes, maybe 6 cores is just being greedy, although I was thinking "future proofing". Never know how long it might be before I can afford to do this again - I must be running out of relatives to inherit from!

Anyway, food for thought - I'd never even heard of the Tier classification for PSUs until you chaps put me wise. Live and learn, eh?

So, I'll give all this a good chewing over and once again, much thanks for your help.

Regards

Ken

 

[LNERlover5]

For trainz, the higher clock speed of the FX-41xx series will help. However, in everything else (By which I mean any application optimized properly for modern hardware) the FX-61xx - FX8xxx series of processors will be better. I would recommend the GTX 550 Ti, seeing as I chose it for a friends build and it performed brilliantly in modern games. Don't rule out the AMD Radeon 7xxx series though, they are very competitive price to performance wise.