Prices are all in AUS Dollar Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-M720-US3 ~ $83 Ram: OCZ PC2-6400 Platinum 2x1GB ~ $65 Processor: AMD Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition ~ $125 GPU: Gigabyte Radeon HD4850 ~ $129.48 PSU: CoolerMaster 650W Extreme Plus ~ $96 Total ~ $498.48 So what do ya's think? *Note* Im not planning on overclocking although i am considering on attempting to unlock the extra cores on the processor.
you probably wont be able to unlock the extra cores as bios updates have been released that disable that ability. For the PSU I personally recommend the Silverstone Olympia OP750 if you can get it.
the 12V rails are rather low, only 36A combined. This would significantly limit your ability to upgrade further at a later date. The one I recommended has a single 60A 12V rail.
is OCZ StealthXStream 500W SLI any better? I could of gone for a better one but the price is starting to get a little high.
that one is no different. You really don't want to skimp on the PSU, remember it is powering all your other expensive hardware. The first one you found would do the job, but if you were to upgrade at a later date (specifically the graphics card) you would also need to replace the PSU.
Im not planning on upgrading further any time soon so I'll stick with the CoolerMaster for now. Should any problems arise or i decide to upgrade further then i would invest in a heavy duty PSU but that should suffice for now. Thanks for the help Loony Post Merge: [time]1257816963[/time] Problem Solved. The Gigabyte GA-M720-US3 has some dual bios thing that still allows you to unlock the cores ^^
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139005 I have this PSU, it's excellent. And cheap. Don't unlock your cpu.
His build looks good, no real complaints, and Loony basically said what I would've said. The x2 series cores were not designed with unlocking the other cores in mind.
Did you contact Corsair? They would've given you a replacement for free, most likely. Mines running great at ~8 months of usage.
Yeah I did, they wanted me to ship it abroad at my own expense. I returned it to the place I bought it.
before making a commitment into making these purchases, do research on what is the feasibility of overclocking the amd quad core processors. if i remember from the previous phenom, they weren't that good in overclocking on both the black and regular editions. so it wouldn't be that great to spend the extra money on a premium version if it won't do much overclocking. so this means just buy the regular edition. additionally, if you do intend to buy the premium edition, make sure it is on the intent that you do plan to overclock the processor, which in this case you have no intention of overclocking and it's therefore useless to buy it. if you intend to get a quad core from this, it'll probably blow in your face. "if it's too good to be true then it probably is." btw, that 5050e processor looks really good. 45watts on a dual core. my god. what makes this processor great is the ability to use them on a small form factor case, such as those with flex atx power supplies that usually have a wattage of less than 300watts. if you have no intention of overclocking, why not look for a "regular" motherboard? the board you're looking at is very overclocking friendly. i own a gigabyte intel board myself and they are really good at overclocking. by looking at a more general motherboard, you'll likely to reduce your cost for the motherboard in return putting more spending money for other parts like the processor or the video card.
SFF cases are utter crap, they cant regulate heat properly, and there is nothing 'non regular' about that motherboard. Gigabyte happen to be a good brand. I have had no end of trouble from so-called 'value' brands so I stay the hell away from them and so do most of the people I know.
i was referring maybe he look into micro atx as you can get a modest board for about $50. i'm really starting to like micro atx. micro atx feels like the typical board for most people as it has a single slot pci express 16x for graphics [and a single pci express slot is typically enough for most people] and enough sata 2 ports [4-6] along with modest audio quality sound. when i look at a full atx board, it should be equiped with at least 2 or more pci express 16x slot and more pci express 4x and 1x. pci on a full atx is okay, but most of the time people using full atx boards don't really use pci. i feel that micro atx has become the more then typical board for most people while full atx is semi-server/workstation like boards. is there a problem between the two, no but i feel that sometimes people spend the extra money for nothing. but this is all just an opinion of one person. btw, i've been using a small form factor computer for awhile [over two years] and i haven't had any problems. i'm using an amd 4200+[65watt] with an ecs geforce 6100 micro atx board and a case from here [http://www.apextechusa.com/products.asp?pID=4] with a 275 power supply and using a single hard drive and dvd burner. i've had recently added an ati radeon 4650 and have had no problems. the only complaint is that the motherboard is pretty old as it's on an am2 socket and only has 2 sata 2 ports. other then that it's a pretty good small form factor build. now you know why i said that 45watt dual core processor is hot.
I dislike microATX because they're much more annoying to work with (everything gets in the way). I much prefer full and extended ATX boards.
