Originally Posted by Orlix Would be interesting for somebody to justify EUR300 for a case out there that does not do WC or SLI with 8800GTX. (they have the money to throw away)...
People spend EUR300 because those cases often look gorgeous in comparison to something that's EUR50. Not everything is about functionality otherwise we'd still have green/yellow motherboards and ugly heatsinks.
what a great article, i wish bit tech would do more of this kind of thing.
I have the same mobo but a slightly higher spec: E4500 @ 3ghz and 8800GT @ 700/1000.
i have always found mid range hardware to be the best bet for me, i run a 19" monitor and due to that i can turn all the eye candy up on anything i throw at it with no problems. a little bit of overclocking and performance easily matches that of a system £100 - £200 more expensive.
to me the percentage of extra perfomance you get from a high end rig just isnt worth the price difference
Just for fun I built the same thing from my favourite Canadian parts vendor - i had to swap the CM 331 chassis for the 330 and the Optiarc DVD-RW wasn't there so i chose the cheapest SATA black DVD-RW. and it came out to CAD $799.91 sadly that was before tax. I do wish that tax was included in our prices here. It's not like we're getting anything cheaper in the end. Either way great read - it's an eye opener.
Originally Posted by Veles Well possibly better airflow, better looking, quieter, more cooling options, more expansion possibilities. Better looking is the main thing.
Although my £25 at the time antec case is good enough for me, just looks a little lame.
That is my point.... the "possibly"... just as Bindibadgi said: for looks and show off. (BTW, what is a niggle?)
A case that can fit 10 HD, How many people use more than 3 that do not have a server? I have never used more than 2. You can fit 5 DVD drives... why? I guess I took the long way to try to get to my point. You could have a basic case inside for most of the people without having the extras that make it cost extra and still make it look nice.
This is the main reason why I arrived in this forum: I was not willing to pay extra for screwless... I want my screw! Err... you know what I mean.
Tim S,
thanks for the clarification. It is a topic that I have never seen discussed at all. For me most of the cases are just too expensive than they are worth. I do not find any of them particularly pretty. The nicest ones I have seen are part of MOTY and MOTM, not commercially available.
Yeah - very good guide. The E2xxx series are a godsend to enthusiasts. Only comments...
1. I would have included a monitor and upped the price £200. A gaming machine requires a decent gaming monitor (ie not a 17" job), and then you would have had to choose the right size and speed for the CPU/Graphics Card to combine with. This would have made the balancing act more interesting.
2. I'm not sure how wise it is to clock an E2160 to 2.9Ghz and game on it, with only the stock cooler and one other fan to cool it. I have my E2160 at 3.15Ghz. I've got a Tuniq Tower sitting on it, and 3 other case fans and the cores still get into the 50s and 60s under load easily. I bet that rig hits 70+!
With the extra £200, I would added something like this Thermalright for £29
and this Asus 22"Monitor for £167, where 1680 res screen would have been a good fit for the CPU/Gfx card combo, and which has an excellent 2ms response time:
very good to see an article like this on Bit. for comparison, the same system would cost ~$1000 NZ which translates to just under £400 (minus shipping but including tax). very good to know that you can get a good budget gaming PC for that money.
over here (new Zealand) in a local department store (Harvey Norman) I've seen for $2300 a pc with a sempron 2.2GHz 2GB ram 160GB HDD HD-DVD drive (unknown if it burns them - they seem to be peddling off a dieing format besides) and usually an 8400GS with a 19"lcd, keyboard mouse & speakers. Here you can get a slightly better specced machine for $1066 {£407} (minus a screen, keyboard and mouse, but still a better deal) <E4600 2.4GHz, 2GB DDR2-667, ASUS P5KPL-VM Intel G31, 500GB HDD, 8400gs, unnamed DVD burner & either XP pro or Vista business>. every time I hear someone talk about getting a new PC I tell them to keep as far away from Harvey Norman as possible.
I agree, the cheapest case will do...a cardboard box will do!
Bought a so called "Gamer" case though...only real benefit is it coming with fanfilters pre-installed...which I need because of the case standing on the ground an there's a cat around producing dustmice.
Otherwise no pluspoints to the cardboard box i used before (was even quieter)
...of course going to LAN's changed that...and the Shuttle comes with a case ;-)
Personal or not it's not a gaming PC when you haven't bought a monitor, speakers, a mouse and a keyboard. All you bought for £400 was a case with stuff in it, it's in no way usable without spending £1XX(+) more on said items >_<
Originally Posted by Orlix A case that can fit 10 HD, How many people use more than 3 that do not have a server? I have never used more than 2. You can fit 5 DVD drives... why? I guess I took the long way to try to get to my point. You could have a basic case inside for most of the people without having the extras that make it cost extra and still make it look nice.
Some people do though, some people have very complex RAID setup. I myself have 3 hard drives plus an external hard drive, and because of my small case (it's anything but small compared to the average PC you'd get from someone like Dell) and the length of the graphics card, I can't put another HDD in one of my 2 remaining slots, if I had SLI then I wouldn't be able to put any more in at all.
You don't necessarily want to fill all of them up either, as a big block of hard drives in front of the intake of your PC won't do good things for the cooling of your case.
With the front bays, as shown in the article, spare bays are great for hiding unused cables so it looks nice and doesn't screw with the airflow. Two optical drives is also the norm usually, and people also have things such as fan controllers, displays, etc.
More expensive cases also have sound dampening, and air filters, although my case has an air filter, it's poorly designed and there's still a large gap that it sucks loads of dust through.
There is a point to the more expensive and bigger cases, but I do agree that for the average consumer, a case like in the article is perfectly fine, but as Tim said, he had trouble getting the PSU to fit into the thing and a removable motherboard tray would make it easier to build the PC. It doesn't look too bad either, we've moved on from the era where any case that wasn't beige and horrible costs the earth, but then again it doesn't really look that good.
How loud is the system - the PSU in my PC is really loud (it's actually one that you gave me Tim - it sounds like a hoover). I want an affordable PSU (round the £30) that is nice and quiet!
Originally Posted by LeMaltor Personal or not it's not a gaming PC when you haven't bought a monitor, speakers, a mouse and a keyboard. All you bought for £400 was a case with stuff in it, it's in no way usable without spending £1XX(+) more on said items >_<
its a comparison with consoles tho isnt it... and you dont get a free hdtv with your console do you...
Originally Posted by LeMaltor Personal or not it's not a gaming PC when you haven't bought a monitor, speakers, a mouse and a keyboard. All you bought for £400 was a case with stuff in it, it's in no way usable without spending £1XX(+) more on said items >_<
its a comparison with consoles tho isnt it... and you dont get a free hdtv with your console do you...
Don't you? :O
edit: So in summary they are both useless lumps, how wonderful :)
I got all excited until i realized this wasn't in dollars. I compared around and realized its about $800 US.
Still a nice article to help get my bearings set straight. Similar things in the future would rock.
Originally Posted by Faulk_Wulf I got all excited until i realized this wasn't in dollars. I compared around and realized its about $800 US.
Still a nice article to help get my bearings set straight. Similar things in the future would rock.
I wouldn't be suprised if the same system cost less than $600 (or £300) in the US. :(
Comments 26 to 50 of 95
People spend EUR300 because those cases often look gorgeous in comparison to something that's EUR50. Not everything is about functionality otherwise we'd still have green/yellow motherboards and ugly heatsinks.
Well possibly better airflow, better looking, quieter, more cooling options, more expansion possibilities. Better looking is the main thing.
Although my £25 at the time antec case is good enough for me, just looks a little lame.
I have the same mobo but a slightly higher spec: E4500 @ 3ghz and 8800GT @ 700/1000.
i have always found mid range hardware to be the best bet for me, i run a 19" monitor and due to that i can turn all the eye candy up on anything i throw at it with no problems. a little bit of overclocking and performance easily matches that of a system £100 - £200 more expensive.
to me the percentage of extra perfomance you get from a high end rig just isnt worth the price difference
A spare £60 could have nearly doubled your Frame rates....:))
cough....cough....
but im sure you'll agree the system would have been pretty useless without an OS! its just a shame gaming on linux is not a viable option as yet
I wasnt referring to a Linux powered machine.....but i think you knew that....:))
ahhh......so hustler is a literal term then? ;-)
better be careful those nice M$ men with the black suits and ear pieces will be knocking
Cheers Tim!
doesnt 800 CAN equal £ 400?
That is my point.... the "possibly"... just as Bindibadgi said: for looks and show off. (BTW, what is a niggle?)
A case that can fit 10 HD, How many people use more than 3 that do not have a server? I have never used more than 2. You can fit 5 DVD drives... why? I guess I took the long way to try to get to my point. You could have a basic case inside for most of the people without having the extras that make it cost extra and still make it look nice.
This is the main reason why I arrived in this forum: I was not willing to pay extra for screwless... I want my screw! Err... you know what I mean.
Tim S,
thanks for the clarification. It is a topic that I have never seen discussed at all. For me most of the cases are just too expensive than they are worth. I do not find any of them particularly pretty. The nicest ones I have seen are part of MOTY and MOTM, not commercially available.
1. I would have included a monitor and upped the price £200. A gaming machine requires a decent gaming monitor (ie not a 17" job), and then you would have had to choose the right size and speed for the CPU/Graphics Card to combine with. This would have made the balancing act more interesting.
2. I'm not sure how wise it is to clock an E2160 to 2.9Ghz and game on it, with only the stock cooler and one other fan to cool it. I have my E2160 at 3.15Ghz. I've got a Tuniq Tower sitting on it, and 3 other case fans and the cores still get into the 50s and 60s under load easily. I bet that rig hits 70+!
With the extra £200, I would added something like this Thermalright for £29
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/ProductInfo.asp?WebProductID=683686
and this Asus 22"Monitor for £167, where 1680 res screen would have been a good fit for the CPU/Gfx card combo, and which has an excellent 2ms response time:
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/ProductInfo.asp?WebProductID=688560
over here (new Zealand) in a local department store (Harvey Norman) I've seen for $2300 a pc with a sempron 2.2GHz 2GB ram 160GB HDD HD-DVD drive (unknown if it burns them - they seem to be peddling off a dieing format besides) and usually an 8400GS with a 19"lcd, keyboard mouse & speakers. Here you can get a slightly better specced machine for $1066 {£407} (minus a screen, keyboard and mouse, but still a better deal) <E4600 2.4GHz, 2GB DDR2-667, ASUS P5KPL-VM Intel G31, 500GB HDD, 8400gs, unnamed DVD burner & either XP pro or Vista business>. every time I hear someone talk about getting a new PC I tell them to keep as far away from Harvey Norman as possible.
Bought a so called "Gamer" case though...only real benefit is it coming with fanfilters pre-installed...which I need because of the case standing on the ground an there's a cat around producing dustmice.
Otherwise no pluspoints to the cardboard box i used before (was even quieter)
...of course going to LAN's changed that...and the Shuttle comes with a case ;-)
Some people do though, some people have very complex RAID setup. I myself have 3 hard drives plus an external hard drive, and because of my small case (it's anything but small compared to the average PC you'd get from someone like Dell) and the length of the graphics card, I can't put another HDD in one of my 2 remaining slots, if I had SLI then I wouldn't be able to put any more in at all.
You don't necessarily want to fill all of them up either, as a big block of hard drives in front of the intake of your PC won't do good things for the cooling of your case.
With the front bays, as shown in the article, spare bays are great for hiding unused cables so it looks nice and doesn't screw with the airflow. Two optical drives is also the norm usually, and people also have things such as fan controllers, displays, etc.
More expensive cases also have sound dampening, and air filters, although my case has an air filter, it's poorly designed and there's still a large gap that it sucks loads of dust through.
There is a point to the more expensive and bigger cases, but I do agree that for the average consumer, a case like in the article is perfectly fine, but as Tim said, he had trouble getting the PSU to fit into the thing and a removable motherboard tray would make it easier to build the PC. It doesn't look too bad either, we've moved on from the era where any case that wasn't beige and horrible costs the earth, but then again it doesn't really look that good.
its a comparison with consoles tho isnt it... and you dont get a free hdtv with your console do you...
Don't you? :O
edit: So in summary they are both useless lumps, how wonderful :)
Still a nice article to help get my bearings set straight. Similar things in the future would rock.
Well everything is real cheap now, last year you couldn't get a decent pair of 2GB sticks for under £150, I spent £250.
I wouldn't be suprised if the same system cost less than $600 (or £300) in the US. :(