Help needed on new gaming PC build (UK) - £1200 budget approx.

[ICNMatt]

Hey all. I'm new here but a long time lurker. You are all probably fed up with these type of threads but I'm grateful for help.

I use an Alienware 18 with 880m SLI for gaming on the go but recently I haven't been on the go as much as usual so have decided to build my own gaming rig for home use. I play almost every type of game and grab just about every single new game as it comes out (impatient). I plan on running games at 1080p but occasionally I might push them through my (1080p) 3 screen setup.

I have found the R9 290 GPU (not the X version) on Amazon UK for £280 so I am planning on running XFire. This takes away £560 of my budget before we start so I am left with around £640 for the rest of the build. Feel free to let me know if this isn't really an ideal budget.

I have found a tower I like the look of here but I'm not sure if the cards will fit:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/In-Win-Tempered-Glass-Aluminium/dp/B00GKTRK1M/

If I have to I can go over budget but I want to try my best to stick to it.

Can I have some views on the rest of the build please? I need recommendations on mobo, processor (although I'll be trying to stick to an i7), RAM, PSU, cooling, 240GB SSD (I probably don't need a secondary hard drive as I store everything in the cloud).

Cheers all!

 

[bamato]

Is there a reason you aren't considering AMD? If it's just for gaming, you don't need much RAM, 8gb @1866 would work well. The Samsung EVO drives have come down significantly in price, but you'll honestly want more than 240 for all those games you plan on playing unless you like uninstalling them after you finish. You could do a 240 for the OS and some of the higher end games that would benefit from the speed, then add on a 2TB WD Black drive for everything else. I'd also recommend an 860-1000w power supply for those power hungry cards. The case looks nice, but I question mounting to GPU's in there with how close the PSU is mounted to the bottom of the mobo. I'd also be concerned with heat, as those two cards are going to spit out quite a bit of heat into that case. I'd go with a larger case (more room to work and to have better wire management options) that will accommodate more fans and a larger CPU cooler.

Just my $.02.

 

[bob4933]

You have a monitor already? That would heavily play into your budget and gpu needs.

 

[ninjacore]

That case does look pretty neat, but I wonder about the efficacy of enclosing all of those heat-producing components twice.

Crossfire 290s is complete overkill for a single 1080P display. I would get a 290X now (which will still be overkill for 1080P, but will let you toy around with 3 displays) and later, if you decide you really do want 3 displays for gaming, then add the second 290x. Price will be the same as two 290s now and your resulting performance in the end will be greater. Just make sure the case you end up getting can support two cards just in case

 

[bob4933]

totally didn't see you had 1080p listed already. disregard that previous comment. That case is very sharp! Very classy.