Building your own music pc????

[ampassasinbirmingham]

I’ve decided I can’t afford a mac for my next upgrade. so I want a pc for music only. I have around £800. What parts would you recommend? I don’t need a spectacular graphics card but I will need 2 monitors. I need lots of ram and about 500gb hard disk space. Ill be running a fire wire soundcard so pci soundcard compatibility issues wont be a problem. What would be a good case, with plenty of room for expansion? What motherboard should I go for? Which ram will best go with the motherboard? Quiet fans?? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Also, should I run xp or vista, are there any software compatibility problems with vista?

[nigel1210]

Quad core intels are cheap at the moment. But there is supposed to be another price cut coming becuase of the quad core amds coming out.

Vista is supposed to be terrible for music production, so best to stick with xp at the moment.

What size screens do you want? have you got any parts already or are you building it completely from scratch?

[ampassasinbirmingham]

completeley from scratch. i can stretch my budget. Id rather something thats going to last and i need something that will handle a lot of vsts etc. I need a fairly quiet case (although i dont need to go over the top on spending on this) and a lot of ram. If you could tell me a good budget option and the best options i can decide from that.

I was going to buy two of these for screens

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Acer-AL2216Ws-22-Widescreen-LCD-TFT-5ms-Monitor_W0QQitemZ260149727891QQihZ016QQcategoryZ17 4QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

[nigel1210]

When i build a pc i normally do a list of all the components i need. Then fill in the blanks of what components i have got in mind, then tweak the list looking for reviews of products, opinions etc.

Might be better going with one screen with a higher res, rather than 2 but depends how you like your screen layout.

New build pc list:

Cpu:
Ram:
Motherboard:
Case:
Optical Drive:
Hdd:
Graphics:
Soundcard:
Screen/s

Have you got any components in mind so far?

Tell me to stop if i'm going into to much detail lol!

[ampassasinbirmingham]

No that’s perfect. Well before I can fill in that information I need to choose. I need a case that allows me room to expand (and preferably one with some noise control). Im not sure what motherboard to get! Once I know that maybe I can decide on other components. U got any ideas on whats good for music? Should I be going dual core? Can xp run dual core apps? Sorry if I sound a novice, but ive been using macs for about 4 years now, so any help would be appreciated.

[dan the acid man]

dual or quad core are both great, if going dual core make sure its a core 2 duo.

Any decent sized tower case will let you expand with ease, i've always liked coolermaster cases.

Not sure on whats hot or not regarding cpu, ram and motherboards these days, will have a look around.

as for hard drives, i prefer samsung ones these days, make sure its sata.

Don't forget you need a decent psu too, i've got a seasonic one which is excellent, tagan is also a good manufacturer of psu.

[nigel1210]

dual or quad core are both great, if going dual core make sure its a core 2 duo.

Any decent sized tower case will let you expand with ease, i've always liked coolermaster cases.

Not sure on whats hot or not regarding cpu, ram and motherboards these days, will have a look around.

as for hard drives, i prefer samsung ones these days, make sure its sata.

Don't forget you need a decent psu too, i've got a seasonic one which is excellent, tagan is also a good manufacturer of psu.

yeah forgot about the psu lol. yeah as dan said there good psu's or current favourite corsair.

doubt you'll notice that much differnce with quad core becuase alot of apps don't support it yet, but if you want to future proof is ideal.

[nigel1210]

Got this so far, no worries being a novice it's not difficult at all. Fitting the motherboard/cpu is probably the most difficult.

Same as dan, last machine i built was a coreduo 2 about 4 months ago. But looking around the internet, this is what i can find.

Cpu: Intel Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient 95W Edition" 2.40GHz - £187.99
Ram:GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC6400C4 800MHz Ultra Low Latency DDR2 Dual Channel Kit - £63.44
Motherboard:Gigabyte GA_P35_DS3R (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard - £88.11
Case:
Optical Drive:
Hdd:Samsung SpinPoint T HD501LJ 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM £65.79
Graphics:Asus ATI Radeon EAH2400 Pro HTP Silent 256MB DDR2 HDTV/DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £41.11
Soundcard:N/A
Screen/s

you will need to buy an o/s as well

[ampassasinbirmingham]

CPU--- Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient 95W Edition" 2.40GHz
Ram--- 2GB (2x1GB) PC6400C4 800MHz Ultra Low Latency DDR2 Dual Channel Kit
Motherboard--- Gigabyte GA_P35_DS3R (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
Hdd--- Samsung SpinPoint T HD501LJ 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM
Graphics--- Graphics:Asus ATI Radeon EAH2400 Pro HTP Silent 256MB DDR2 HDTV/DVI (PCI-Express)
Screen/s--- 2 x 22" acer monitors
Case--- coolmaster i-tower 930


Ok so maybe i should look at getting the above??
Is that a pretty decent processor? Should I get more ram, will this run music apps very sufficiently? Do I need to buy anything else, fan etc? Will that graphics card run 2 monitors? Im getting a friend to build it so I don’t have to worry about that. Would you be happy with this system? I take it running a cracked OS is very risky? How could this system be made better?

Thanks in advance guys!!!:)

[ampassasinbirmingham]

ok so ive spotted i need a psu and a cpu fan. Are these expensive? got any options that arnt to expensive?

[Tyrisia]

I can second the Gigabyte boards, they are really fast and also reliable, just got one myself and it's great.

Two things with psu, the most important being efficiency, the second wattage. An efficiency in the high 80% is good, and a lower wattage with higher efficiency can sometimes beat high wattage with lower efficiency. Efficiency isn't being measured by all manufacturers yet, but the good ones are.

£800 will get you a stonker of a pc if you diy, I put one together for about £600 that I'm really happy with, including 19" widescreen monitor (lcd) which I got from dabs for 110 quid, and an Audio Kontrol 1 usb soundcard.

Happy building, and don't forget to earth yourself :)

oh and get a good psu, it meant the difference between the soundcard working or not for me.

[BloodStar]

I think 500W PSU is ok for this configuration. I am pretty satisfied with my Seasonic S12.
You will also need some decent CPU cooler, because the Intel box cooler can be very loud and cooling is not the best. I can recommend you Scythe Ninja, solid construction and very efficient cooling, you can use as passive or active with 12cm fan.
As for the fans, you cant go wrong with low-noise Noctua fans. They are very good,.
Personally I would rather go for 2 HDDs instead of one. One for system and one for data storage.

[nigel1210]

I used this one in my last build, it's pricey but excellent warranty and modular as well so you just use the cable you want. This makes the air flow better in the case.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-005-CS&groupid=701&catid=123&subcat=

As bloodstar says i would go for one system drive and one for storage if you can stretch your budget, or go for a smaller main drive.

[BloodStar]

I dont think cables in case are too important for airflow. When you have proper fans, it doesnt matter if PSU is modular or not. Ofcourse, you cant have cables all over the place,...
If you want really hi performance HDD, go for 10000rpm Raptor. Bit loudy and expensive, but unbeatable performance.

I forgot to add, think twice about these Acer LCDs,. From what I know about the same model but 19", it is not too good. Maybe check some Samsung or HP, it will be deffo much much better.

Anyway, using cracked OS should be ok.

[nigel1210]

I prefer a tidyer case, to be honest and it's not much more for a modular.

Yeah i've got a 74gb raptor in my pc, which is good but alot of drives are near the performance of them now anyway.

[BloodStar]

Yeah i've got a 74gb raptor in my pc, which is good but alot of drives are near the performance of them now anyway.

yeah, today its not too big difference, but still it is 10.000 RPM, so seek and write times are bit faster.

[ampassasinbirmingham]

Thanks guys your being a massive help. I will think twice about the accer lcd’s. As for the hard disk, you think it would be better to have 1 small one for system and 1 large say 500gb for storage? I suppose it will save me partioning it off anyway.

@bloodstar- how much is a Scythe Ninja psu, and how much is a noctua fan, wil they dop the job well for the specs im working on at the mo?

@Tyrisia- Is your monitor any good? It might be worth getting two of those rather than the 2 acer. Acer stuff is a bit like behringer in terms of build quality and reliability

[BloodStar]

As for the partitioning, if you plan to use the machine not only for audio but also for internet, games etc. It is good to make 2partitions. 1for audio, 1 for internet.
Data can be stored on other HDD, 500Gb is good for that,imo.

Scythe Ninja CPU cooler is around £35.
http://www.specialtech.co.uk/spshop/customer/product.php?productid=4125

Noctua fans are the bests you can have. I would suggest you following:
Noctua NF-S12-800 120mm Case Fan (£ 14) - place this one on the rear of case. It has only 800rpm and 8dB noise (you dont have hi rpms fan in the rear, because there is also PSU who sucks the hot air out of case)
Noctua NF-S12-1200 120mm Case Fan (£ 14) - place this one on front side of the case. It has 1200RPMs and will blow fresh air on your HDDs, you dont need to run it on full RPMs.

Scythe Ninja + Noctua = top notch.

[ampassasinbirmingham]

CPU--- Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient 95W Edition" 2.40GHz (£187)
Ram--- 2GB (2x1GB) PC6400C4 800MHz Ultra Low Latency DDR2 Dual Channel Kit (£63)
Motherboard--- Gigabyte GA_P35_DS3R (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard (£88)
Hdd--- Samsung SpinPoint T HD501LJ 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (£65)
Graphics--- Graphics:Asus ATI Radeon EAH2400 Pro HTP Silent 256MB DDR2 HDTV/DVI (PCI-Express) (£41)
Case Fan1 -Noctua NF-S12-800 120mm Case Fan (£14)
Case fan 2 - Noctua NF-S12-1200 120mm Case Fan (£ 14)
Case--- coolmaster i-tower 930 (£100)
PSU-???????
Screens-???????



Total- £572 without Screens


This all looks very promising, thanks guys. Any recommendations for psu and screens would be cool. Is this a dual head graphics card? Any other modifications? Is this a decent case? Anything maybe cheaper? Dot to bothered about loudness of machine as wont be recording vox or anything.

[BloodStar]

Hmm I am just looking at this Coolermaster case and the organization of components inside looks bit too complicated,. or different from what i am used to. If it would be me, I would go for something around £50 with usual organization of components.
I see you have only 1HDD in the list. Also I am not sure if the graphic card have 2xDVI-out.

[nigel1210]

I used this psu in my last build and it was excellent:

Corsair HX 520W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU (CMPSU-520HXUK) £68.14 inc VAT

how about this for a screen?

http://overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MO-054-SA

considering it is for music making, i guess colour accuracy isn't a concern?

[BloodStar]

I really like these new Samsung LCDs. 2x 20" would be nice
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MO-051-SA&groupid=17&catid=510&subcat=

[ampassasinbirmingham]

nice screen. Yeah only 1 HD because it wil only be for music. Any recomendations on a case? I wasnt to sure on that one either

[BloodStar]

Aha, ok. but I would still think about 1HDD for system and 1 for data :)
Not 2x500, but lets say 2x250?

As for the case, I have got this one which cost me around £35 in my country. In UK will be bit higher, but still good price.
http://www.thermaltake.com/product/Chassis/midtower/matrix/vd2000.asp

[dan the acid man]

I used this one in my last build, it's pricey but excellent warranty and modular as well so you just use the cable you want. This makes the air flow better in the case.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-005-CS&groupid=701&catid=123&subcat=

As bloodstar says i would go for one system drive and one for storage if you can stretch your budget, or go for a smaller main drive.

i'd avoid modular power supplies, i read an excellent article by a top electical engineer stating how bad modular power supplies are compared to normal ones.

My antec modular psu blew within the first year, taking out my motherboard too, and to be honest, by the time you've fitted all the cables you need, i still had loads of spare ones i had to tie out of the way.

[nigel1210]

i'd avoid modular power supplies, i read an excellent article by a top electical engineer stating how bad modular power supplies are compared to normal ones.

My antec modular psu blew within the first year, taking out my motherboard too, and to be honest, by the time you've fitted all the cables you need, i still had loads of spare ones i had to tie out of the way.

each to there own i suppose, the corsair units rails where really stable and also the 5 year warranty on it was really good.

[dan the acid man]

I really like these new Samsung LCDs. 2x 20" would be nice
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MO-051-SA&groupid=17&catid=510&subcat=

these are excellent monitors, im about to order one for myself after seeing a friends.

i'd personally recommend this psu, it's what im running and it's been the best psu i've ever used by far (touch wood)

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-003-SS&groupid=701&catid=123&subcat=589

[nigel1210]

review of the seasonic psu here, sounds good.

http://modders-inc.com/reviews-story-5-117.html

[BloodStar]

i'd personally recommend this psu, it's what im running and it's been the best psu i've ever used by far (touch wood)

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-003-SS&groupid=701&catid=123&subcat=589

i've got the S12, great psu.

[Tyrisia]

@Tyrisia- Is your monitor any good? It might be worth getting two of those rather than the 2 acer. Acer stuff is a bit like behringer in terms of build quality and reliability


It's a Hanns-G, it got an excellent rating on dabs anyways, and was the best value for money there, but the best thing about them was that people were reporting that the dead pixel problem that seems to plague new monitors was not a problem at all with these, they were pretty much gonna work straight outta the box.

I'm gonna buy another as soon as funds allow, and the screen size on the one has actually left me wondering if I need 2.

[ampassasinbirmingham]

those monitors look sweet. and 300 for 40 inches .....nice. that psu also looks great

[ampassasinbirmingham]

hi guys. is this case worth getting?

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Coolermaster-Praetorian-732-Aluminum-Midi-Tower-Case_W0QQitemZ280156445946QQihZ018QQcategoryZ80168 QQrdZ1QQssPageNameZWD7VQQcmdZViewItem

Will i need another fan for it?

Where can i get a Scythe Ninja psu? any other maybe cheaper options?

[BloodStar]

looks fine.
Scythe Ninja is not PSU but CPU cooler....
for good PSU check Seasonic S12+

[ampassasinbirmingham]

do i need a cpu cooler as well?

[ampassasinbirmingham]

ahh they arnt to expensive

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/SCYTHE-NINJA-PLUS-Revision-B-CPU-COOLER_W0QQitemZ110170971043QQihZ001QQcategoryZ131 493QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

[ampassasinbirmingham]

will that fit into this case

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Coolermaster-Praetorian-732-Aluminum-Midi-Tower-Case_W0QQitemZ280156445946QQihZ018QQcategoryZ80168 QQrdZ1QQssPageNameZWD7VQQcmdZViewItem

[dan the acid man]

depending on the speed of your processor, you may need a fan for that cpu cooler, it will tell you in the instructions if you need one, they're not expensive if you do have to buy one.

The case looks nice, you wont need anymore fans for it either

[ampassasinbirmingham]

cheers dan. I will keep you guys posted as and when i buy different bits for advice.

[ampassasinbirmingham]

ok guys bought that case mentioned in a my post a couple up.

will this motherboard fit into that case
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-088-GI&tool=3

If it does is the rest of this all compatible:

CPU--- Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient 95W Edition" 2.40GHz (£187)
PSU- Scythe Ninja Plus Rev.B CPU Cooler (£28.99) (comes with optional fan)


Also- Any more ideas on a dual head graphics card?

IS a firewire soundcard more efficient than a pci based one?


BTW guys your being a massive help