Custom PC Quote Opinion

[Kennymclay]

Hi there LTT forum,

 

I've been looking to get a custom PC built for a while now and have been given a quote from one company and I'd like your opinion on it since I don't know a whole lot about computers. 

 

The main use of my PC will be for Video editing and gaming (First person RPGs, strategy games, pretty much most any game being able to run at a decent level).

 

I'm from the UK, and my budget was about £1200-1400 since I still need to purchase a monitor, keyboard, and mouse.

 

Any thoughts or opinions would be much appreciated.

 

Many thanks,

Kenny

[jaslion]

This seems like a really shitty pc.

 

2 cases why?

All parts cost more than normal.

60pounds for some cheap sleeving is A LOT.

Very small ssd.

Mystery psu and NO WAY is it going to be a high quality unit at 700w gold for 60 pounds.

 

Honestly don't get this it's not a good system for the money.

[Acewing]

Seconding not going with the suspicious PSU and the odd presence of two cases 
 

[mariushm]

Uhmmmm  ... no, the CPU is 100 pounds more expensive than normal... unless it includes VAT ... and even then...? 

 

Here's a configuration without video card ... buy whatever video card is available:

 

https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/h9zCyK

 

PCPartPicker Part List: https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/h9zCyK

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 5600X 3.7 GHz 6-Core Processor  (£239.59 @ Overclockers.co.uk) 
CPU Cooler: Scythe Mugen 5 Rev. B 51.17 CFM CPU Cooler  (£48.98 @ Overclockers.co.uk) 
Motherboard: Gigabyte B550M AORUS PRO-P Micro ATX AM4 Motherboard  (£103.05 @ Amazon UK) 
Memory: Crucial Ballistix 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory  (£106.21 @ Amazon UK) 
Storage: Western Digital Blue SN550 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive  (£69.98 @ Amazon UK) 
Storage: Western Digital Blue 2 TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive  (£44.99 @ AWD-IT) 
Case: Lian Li Lancool II Mesh ATX Mid Tower Case  (£92.96 @ CCL Computers) 
Power Supply: Corsair RM (2019) 650 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply  (£69.94 @ CCL Computers) 
Total: £775.70
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
 

 

Note that 5800x is around 300 pounds and may be worth it over the 5600x.

[Chris Pratt]

32 minutes ago, mariushm said:

Note that 5800x is around 300 pounds and may be worth it over the 5600x.

I can't see a scenario where you would actually need 32GB of RAM, yet be fine with a 6-core part. Definitely go for a 5800X, or if this is just purely for gaming, drop down to 16GB of RAM.

[Acewing]

1 hour ago, Chris Pratt said:

I can't see a scenario where you would actually need 32GB of RAM, yet be fine with a 6-core part. Definitely go for a 5800X, or if this is just purely for gaming, drop down to 16GB of RAM.

As someone who runs 32 gig with a 6 core CPU, I'd say RAM requirements honestly depend on what you do with your computer and how you do it  
There's no one solution that fits all 
In my case I often have Slack + VSCode + Some sort of database client + Bunch of tabs on Edge or Firefox for work purposes
And when I start a game, most of the time I am not in a position to fully close these things down. So I open my games on top of all this 
Admittedly, most people probably close down other things before starting a game, and this is an edge case 
But it's always good to take your own use cases into account when deciding 
OP does seem to be doing video editing, and depending on things, that can also be pretty memory intensive 
 

[Middcore]

2 hours ago, Kennymclay said:

Hi there LTT forum,

 

I've been looking to get a custom PC built for a while now and have been given a quote from one company and I'd like your opinion on it since I don't know a whole lot about computers. 

 

The main use of my PC will be for Video editing and gaming (First person RPGs, strategy games, pretty much most any game being able to run at a decent level).

 

I'm from the UK, and my budget was about £1200-1400 since I still need to purchase a monitor, keyboard, and mouse.

 

Any thoughts or opinions would be much appreciated.

 

Many thanks,

Kenny

 

I'm confused by what appears to be two cases with one of them listed as "Ballista." Is "Ballista" just what the system integrator calls this particular configuration? And the 180 is just like an assembly fee?

 

Non-specified PSU is probably junk at that price.

 

They've already blown past the high end of your budget. 

[Kennymclay]

Thanks all for the opinion.

 

Just got quoted different specs from another company.

 

What's your thoughts on this?

 

1x NZXT H510 Flow Tempered Glass Case - Black

1x Intel Core i5-12600K CPU, 10 Cores* / 16 Threads, 3.6 - 4.9GHz

1x Chillblast Centurion Direct Contact ARGB CPU Cooler

1x Asus TUF Gaming B660-PLUS WIFI D4 Motherboard

1x 32GB DDR4 3200MHz Memory (2 x 16GB Sticks) 

1x NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 12GB Graphics Card

1x 500GB Seagate Firecuda 520 M.2 PCIe Gen 4 Solid State Drive

1x Seagate 2TB BarraCuda 7200RPM Hard Disk

1x Chillblast 700W 80+ Bronze PSU

1x Windows 11 Home

 

£1282.76 ex VAT / £1539.31 inc VAT
 

[Middcore]

13 minutes ago, Kennymclay said:

Thanks all for the opinion.

 

Just got quoted different specs from another company.

 

What's your thoughts on this?

 

1x NZXT H510 Flow Tempered Glass Case - Black

1x Intel Core i5-12600K CPU, 10 Cores* / 16 Threads, 3.6 - 4.9GHz

1x Chillblast Centurion Direct Contact ARGB CPU Cooler

1x Asus TUF Gaming B660-PLUS WIFI D4 Motherboard

1x 32GB DDR4 3200MHz Memory (2 x 16GB Sticks) 

1x NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 12GB Graphics Card

1x 500GB Seagate Firecuda 520 M.2 PCIe Gen 4 Solid State Drive

1x Seagate 2TB BarraCuda 7200RPM Hard Disk

1x Chillblast 700W 80+ Bronze PSU

1x Windows 11 Home

 

£1282.76 ex VAT / £1539.31 inc VAT
 

 

I'm torn on the use of the 12600k on a motherboard that can't overclock. The 12600k does get you efficiency cores and higher clock speed even without OC but I wonder if it's worth the price difference.

 

"Chillblast Centurion" is what they've renamed some other off-the-shelf CPU cooler, I'd like to know what one. Same deal with the PSU. 

 

In general I am not a big fan of the H510 flow that both of these builds have although it's easy to see why system integrators use them since they're rather cheap and people like their looks. 

 

If the choice is between the two then I'd say go with this second list because the 12600k will outperform the 5600X and has a better upgrade path, the 3060 beats the 3050, and it comes in cheaper. 

[IkeaGnome]

2 hours ago, Middcore said:

 

I'm confused by what appears to be two cases with one of them listed as "Ballista." Is "Ballista" just what the system integrator calls this particular configuration? And the 180 is just like an assembly fee?

 

Non-specified PSU is probably junk at that price.

 

They've already blown past the high end of your budget. 

Yes, Ballista appears to be the "base model" of this computer. Seems like that 180 GBP is their build fees and what not. 

This build looks like it has a CM MWE 

Spoiler

https://utopiacomputers.co.uk/pages/ballista#configure

The 12600k APPEARS to have a CWT GMP bronze. Tier D. The link to the picture on the Chillblast site has the link saying CWT, and it looks very very similar to the listing for a GMP on Amazon.

Spoiler

https://www.chillblast.com/build-a-full-size-atx-12th-gen-intel-pc.html#product-details-tab-customise

Interestingly, in the configurator, I can't get that cooler or motherboard to see which one it is. I found it under the AMD build, and it looks awfully Hyper 212.

Spoiler

 

[Middcore]

1 minute ago, IkeaGnome said:

Yes, Ballista appears to be the "base model" of this computer. Seems like that 180 GBP is their build fees and what not. 

This build looks like it has a CM MWE 

  Hide contents

https://utopiacomputers.co.uk/pages/ballista#configure

https://utopiacomputers.co.uk/pages/ballista#configure

The 12600k APPEARS to have a CWT GMP bronze. Tier D. The link to the picture on the Chillblast site has the link saying CWT, and it looks very very similar to the listing for a GMP on Amazon.

  Hide contents

https://www.chillblast.com/build-a-full-size-atx-12th-gen-intel-pc.html#product-details-tab-customise

Interestingly, in the configurator, I can't get that cooler or motherboard to see which one it is. I found it under the AMD build, and it looks awfully Hyper 212.

  Hide contents

 

 

Unfortunately, cutting corners with lousy PSU's to take advantage of people who only read topline specs like CPU and GPU model is what I expect from places like this. 

[IkeaGnome]

34 minutes ago, Middcore said:

 

Unfortunately, cutting corners with lousy PSU's to take advantage of people who only read topline specs like CPU and GPU model is what I expect from places like this. 

Chillblast seems to use a lot of marketing terms. Direct contact cooler? Ever seen an indirect contact CPU cooler? I'd love to see how that works. 

I agree that it's the better of the two. I just wish it left enough budget for OP to get a PSU right away. In all reality, if OP got it and then saved up for a better PSU it's not a bad build. 

They're charging 50 GBP for a drive that you can find for 40GBP else where. 

The RAM has chillblast branded heatsinks, so who knows what speed or timing that is, but they're charging 56.58 GBP more than a 2x8 kit of that ram. 20 GBP more than 2x8 3200 MHZ Trident Z RGB. Crucial Ballistix 2x16 3200 is 120 GBP with the Trident Z coming in at 90GBP on PCPP. 

There's some places OP could save some money for sure with this build, swap out PSU, and walk away with a decent build. 

[Kennymclay]

24 minutes ago, IkeaGnome said:

Chillblast seems to use a lot of marketing terms. Direct contact cooler? Ever seen an indirect contact CPU cooler? I'd love to see how that works. 

I agree that it's the better of the two. I just wish it left enough budget for OP to get a PSU right away. In all reality, if OP got it and then saved up for a better PSU it's not a bad build. 

They're charging 50 GBP for a drive that you can find for 40GBP else where. 

The RAM has chillblast branded heatsinks, so who knows what speed or timing that is, but they're charging 56.58 GBP more than a 2x8 kit of that ram. 20 GBP more than 2x8 3200 MHZ Trident Z RGB. Crucial Ballistix 2x6 3200 is 120 GBP with the Trident Z coming in at 90GBP on PCPP. 

There's some places OP could save some money for sure with this build, swap out PSU, and walk away with a decent build. 

Thanks for the advice. To be honest, their own branded products are what put me off that build. They don't seem to offer any other RAM on their website apart from their own branded 'Chillblast', and I can change out the PSU to a Corsair RM750 for £70 extra.

 

I'm trying to weigh up what the best option would be since I want the to get my money's worth, however don't think I'd be skilled enough to build the PC myself.

[Chris Pratt]

3 hours ago, Acewing said:

As someone who runs 32 gig with a 6 core CPU, I'd say RAM requirements honestly depend on what you do with your computer and how you do it  
There's no one solution that fits all 
In my case I often have Slack + VSCode + Some sort of database client + Bunch of tabs on Edge or Firefox for work purposes
And when I start a game, most of the time I am not in a position to fully close these things down. So I open my games on top of all this 
Admittedly, most people probably close down other things before starting a game, and this is an edge case 
But it's always good to take your own use cases into account when deciding 
OP does seem to be doing video editing, and depending on things, that can also be pretty memory intensive 
 

Short of just having a bunch of memory heavy things hanging out in the background while you're playing, my point was that the workloads that actually require 32GB of RAM require more than 6 cores as well. Video editing may be RAM heavy, but it's also going to definitely benefit from a beefier processor as well.

[IkeaGnome]

11 minutes ago, Kennymclay said:

Thanks for the advice. To be honest, their own branded products are what put me off that build. They don't seem to offer any other RAM on their website apart from their own branded 'Chillblast', and I can change out the PSU to a Corsair RM750 for £70 extra.

What's the link to the configurator you're using? When I did one of their Intel builds, I couldn't get a B660 board or that CPU cooler? 

If we're working off the same options, it might help see what you're looking at. 

11 minutes ago, Kennymclay said:

I'm trying to weigh up what the best option would be since I want the to get my money's worth, however don't think I'd be skilled enough to build the PC myself.

Building a computer really isn't that hard, and there's plenty of people here would be willing to help you. If you were to be comfortable with that, here's about what I'd suggest.

Saves 200 GBPish after VAT. Keeps the 12600k. Air cooler is a very reliable one. Wouldn't really be enough if you decided to overclock the CPU. B660 boards won't allow that, and I don't get the impression you'd want to anyways. Saved a bit of money there. I went with 16gb RAM. It keeps some RGB in the build. If you don't care about RGB, we might be able to get the cost down a bit more. If you think you need 32GB, the 2x16 kit is 50 GBP more. I grabbed a bigger M.2 as a boot/game drive. There isn't much need to separate boot drives and game drives anymore. Bigger storage and faster game storage with a bit of a cost savings. I kept the H510 flow since you went with that in both builds. Some money might be able to be saved there. For the GPU I grabbed a 3060, but a triple fan model to help with cooling it a bit more. I grabbed the 750W RMX since it's a much better PSU than what's been in either prebuilt and isn't that much more than the 650W version. There's grey market sites where you can get cheap Windows Keys. I'm not sure how much W11 keys are on there, but you could get a W10 key cheap and then upgrade to W11 with that key.

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: Intel Core i5-12600K 3.7 GHz 10-Core Processor  (£263.98 @ CCL Computers) 
CPU Cooler: be quiet! Pure Rock 2 Black CPU Cooler  (£32.50 @ Technextday) 
Motherboard: MSI MAG B660 TOMAHAWK WIFI DDR4 ATX LGA1700 Motherboard  (£177.75 @ Infinite Computing) 
Memory: G.Skill Trident Z RGB 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory  (£104.09 @ Newegg UK) 
Storage: Samsung 970 Evo Plus 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive  (£103.45 @ Amazon UK) 
Video Card: MSI GeForce RTX 3060 12 GB VENTUS 3X OC Video Card  (£525.00 @ Computer Orbit) 
Case: NZXT H510 Flow ATX Mid Tower Case  (£69.98 @ Amazon UK) 
Power Supply: Corsair RM (2019) 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply  (£74.99 @ Scan.co.uk) 
Total: £1351.74
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2022-02-23 18:12 GMT+0000

[Acewing]

Reverse image searching gives some fun results. I think even an old Hyper 212 may do better than this
EDIT: Scratch that. Appears to be a http://www.idcooling.com/Product/detail/id/207/name/SE-224-XT ARGB V2 with the logo erased which would put in in the same tier as a Hyper 212 Black Edition according to the tier list here (Though I suppose no guarantee it really is that, even if the image is clearly "stolen" from there)

 

1 hour ago, Chris Pratt said:

Short of just having a bunch of memory heavy things hanging out in the background while you're playing, my point was that the workloads that actually require 32GB of RAM require more than 6 cores as well. Video editing may be RAM heavy, but it's also going to definitely benefit from a beefier processor as well.

True 
If you are going to stick to just one thing at a time, yes, and like I said, a lot of people will probably do things that way
But always important to know your own needs when configuring RAM 
 

[Middcore]

4 minutes ago, Acewing said:

Reverse image searching gives some fun results. I think even an old Hyper 212 may do better than this
 

 

The SE 224 XT is an OK cooler from everything I've heard. On par with the newer models of the Hyper 212 family. Certainly nothing special. There's not going to be a huge difference in single-tower 120mm air coolers unless somebody catastrophically cheaped out/fucked up on design. I think I would want more to overclock a 12600k. 

[Acewing]

4 minutes ago, Middcore said:

 

The SE 224 XT is an OK cooler from everything I've heard. On par with the newer models of the Hyper 212 family. Certainly nothing special. There's not going to be a huge difference in single-tower 120mm air coolers unless somebody catastrophically cheaped out/fucked up on design. I think I would want more to overclock a 12600k. 

Yeah I just found out and edited my post. But I wasn't fast enough. 
Assuming it really is that, it seems to be on par with the 212 Black Edition which should do just fine. (Without overclocking, that is)

[Kennymclay]

1 hour ago, IkeaGnome said:

What's the link to the configurator you're using? When I did one of their Intel builds, I couldn't get a B660 board or that CPU cooler? 

If we're working off the same options, it might help see what you're looking at. 

Building a computer really isn't that hard, and there's plenty of people here would be willing to help you. If you were to be comfortable with that, here's about what I'd suggest.

Saves 200 GBPish after VAT. Keeps the 12600k. Air cooler is a very reliable one. Wouldn't really be enough if you decided to overclock the CPU. B660 boards won't allow that, and I don't get the impression you'd want to anyways. Saved a bit of money there. I went with 16gb RAM. It keeps some RGB in the build. If you don't care about RGB, we might be able to get the cost down a bit more. If you think you need 32GB, the 2x16 kit is 50 GBP more. I grabbed a bigger M.2 as a boot/game drive. There isn't much need to separate boot drives and game drives anymore. Bigger storage and faster game storage with a bit of a cost savings. I kept the H510 flow since you went with that in both builds. Some money might be able to be saved there. For the GPU I grabbed a 3060, but a triple fan model to help with cooling it a bit more. I grabbed the 750W RMX since it's a much better PSU than what's been in either prebuilt and isn't that much more than the 650W version. There's grey market sites where you can get cheap Windows Keys. I'm not sure how much W11 keys are on there, but you could get a W10 key cheap and then upgrade to W11 with that key.

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: Intel Core i5-12600K 3.7 GHz 10-Core Processor  (£263.98 @ CCL Computers) 
CPU Cooler: be quiet! Pure Rock 2 Black CPU Cooler  (£32.50 @ Technextday) 
Motherboard: MSI MAG B660 TOMAHAWK WIFI DDR4 ATX LGA1700 Motherboard  (£177.75 @ Infinite Computing) 
Memory: G.Skill Trident Z RGB 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory  (£104.09 @ Newegg UK) 
Storage: Samsung 970 Evo Plus 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive  (£103.45 @ Amazon UK) 
Video Card: MSI GeForce RTX 3060 12 GB VENTUS 3X OC Video Card  (£525.00 @ Computer Orbit) 
Case: NZXT H510 Flow ATX Mid Tower Case  (£69.98 @ Amazon UK) 
Power Supply: Corsair RM (2019) 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply  (£74.99 @ Scan.co.uk) 
Total: £1351.74
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2022-02-23 18:12 GMT+0000

Appreciate this a lot! I've messaged some other places to request quotes sill I'll continue to post the specs to this thread for any opinion, however you might have swayed me into looking into trying to build my own. I'm going to go do a bit more research to see what my best option is. If I do end up building my own I would definitely be open to using the maximum amount in my budget so potentially upgrade some parts and change out the case(This was just the preselected case from both companies).

[IkeaGnome]

12 minutes ago, Kennymclay said:

Appreciate this a lot! I've messaged some other places to request quotes sill I'll continue to post the specs to this thread for any opinion, however you might have swayed me into looking into trying to build my own. I'm going to go do a bit more research to see what my best option is. If I do end up building my own I would definitely be open to using the maximum amount in my budget so potentially upgrade some parts and change out the case(This was just the preselected case from both companies).

For what it's worth, if we use the whole budget and change to a much better case and get rid of the RGB ram, you can squeeze a dual fan 3060 ti into it. For about 50 GBP more than your budget with a windows key you could get a triple fan 3060 ti.

Spoiler

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: Intel Core i5-12600K 3.7 GHz 10-Core Processor  (£263.98 @ CCL Computers) 
CPU Cooler: be quiet! Pure Rock 2 Black CPU Cooler  (£32.50 @ Technextday) 
Motherboard: MSI MAG B660 TOMAHAWK WIFI DDR4 ATX LGA1700 Motherboard  (£177.75 @ Infinite Computing) 
Memory: Crucial Ballistix 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3600 CL16 Memory  (£74.99 @ AWD-IT) 
Storage: Samsung 970 Evo Plus 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive  (£103.45 @ Amazon UK) 
Video Card: Palit GeForce RTX 3060 Ti LHR 8 GB Dual Video Card  (£579.99 @ Technextday) 
Case: Phanteks Eclipse P300A Mesh ATX Mid Tower Case  (£58.99 @ AWD-IT) 
Power Supply: Corsair RM (2019) 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply  (£74.99 @ Scan.co.uk) 
Total: £1366.64
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2022-02-23 20:02 GMT+0000

That being said, it's going to be hard to get that with a prebuilt. I'm not saying don't get a prebuilt, you just should be aware of some of the parts that they try to sell with it. Charging for thermal paste is interesting when coolers come with it or have it pre applied. Just little things like that add up in a prebuilt build. 

[Kennymclay]

Another update, this is another quote I received today. I don't what everyone else think but this one looks much better to me. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

[Guest]

14 minutes ago, Kennymclay said:

Another update, this is another quote I received today. I don't what everyone else think but this one looks much better to me. Any thoughts would be appreciated.

I wouldn't buy a Ryzen 3000 series in 2022. There are better options. The 5800X is about £40ish more on pcpartpicker. Or you could consider a 12700F and B660 build.  Also that B550 board is terrible.