Hello everyone, I'm in the process of speccing my first homebuilt system, and wanted to ask for any advice or suggestions on what I had in mind. First : Approximate Purchase Date: This month, I hope. Budget Range: 600 - 900 GBP System Usage from Most to Least Important: Work ( high-performance computating under Linux, either using CUDA or OpenMP depending on application ), and Gaming ( Windows ). Parts Not Required: Keyboard, mouse, monitor ( 22-inch LCD, 1680x1050 ) Preferred Website(s) for Parts: www.ebuyer.com Country of Origin: UK Parts Preferences: NVIDIA GPU for using CUDA. Otherwise, tend to lean towards Intel CPUs, but if there's a good argument for AMD, I'll take ! Overclocking: Maybe - depends on whether you think it's worth any associated risks, and if I can get enough cooling. This is my first homebuilt system, so I'm reluctant to try anything too crazy. SLI or Crossfire: Current build only has one graphics card - but perhaps in the future, SLI might be cool. Monitor Resolution: 1680x1050. Additional Comments: I need something robust. I don't care for LEDs or case-bling. Quiet would be a plus. My current idea : Case : Casecom 6788 Black Mid Tower Case with Full Black Interior/Exterior 120mm Blue LED Front Fan - No PSU I'm not sure what to look for in a case. It either holds the contents, or it's too small. I'm worried about temperature - is this case going to be cool enough ? Case Fan ( Top and / or Rear ) : Antec TrueQuiet 120 - Case fan - 120 mm CPU : Core i5 2500 3.3GHz Socket 1155 6MB Cache Retail Boxed Processor I'd like a fast CPU rather than many cores. If I can parallelise something well, then it'll go on the GPU. If it isn't parallelisable, I'd rather it chewed through one processor quickly ! There's also the K-version of this CPU available for not much more in terms of cost, allowing overclocking, if you would suggest I do that. Also to keep in mind - this processor doesn't offer hyperthreading - would you recommend that ? CPU Fan : Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro rev 2 Socket 775, 1156, 1155, 1366, AM2, AM3 Heatpipe CPU Cooler RAM : 4 x Corsair 2GB DDR3 1333MHz Memory Module Unbuffered Should I go for something a little faster ? Graphics Card : Gigabyte GTX 560 OC 1GB GDDR5 Dual DVI Mini HDMI Out PCI-E Graphics Card It comes with some good reviews ( both the NVIDIA spec and the Gigabyte build in particular ), and this one is slightly overclocked by the manufacturer. HDD : Seagate ST31000528AS 1TB Hard Drive SATAII 7200rpm 32MB Cache - OEM Also debating a small SSD, mainly for the OSs, but these are still very expensive. Optical Drive : Sony Optiarc AD-5260S 24x DVD±RW & DL SATA Optical Drive - OEM Black PSU : Antec TruePower New 650W Modular PSU Is this powerful enough ? Too powerful ? Wireless Adapter : Cisco Linksys Wireless-N PCI Adapter No wired access in my place... Motherboard : I have no idea what to look for. Ideally, I don't want to put too much money into a mobo. If it supports SLI, that's an advantage. As long as it has at least four USB ports ( six+ better ), then great. I don't need 8-channel sound. My monitor is VGA, though HDMI or DVI would be great for the future. Where I'd mostly like to ask for help, is selecting a mobo that will fit in the case, have the characteristics just mentioned, and more importantly, can successfully power and work the rest of the spec - I'm not 100% sure what to look for. All mobos I see have SATA 2 support at least, a lot have SLI, but the rest, I don't really know what it means. Do I want a P67 ? Anything you'd like to suggest, or anything you think I should be after, please let me know ! Thank you very much for any comments, suggestions and advice on this build ! I appreciate your help. Quentin
