What Hardware Should I Buy? - August 2009

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When only the best will do, there’s a raft of hardware out there to cater to your needs, providing premium performance for a premium price tag. Without going crazy and losing our heads, we've really gone to town to maximise this set up because even with a high budget, we’re not out to waste money and building a top end system isn’t as simple as just buying the most expensive components out there.

We've beefed up this system this month and increased the cost as a result by upgrading a few components to their watercooled alternatives and including a separate sound card for a change: we feel that those a premium PC should not cut themselves short on the extras.

While we still caution those before unleashing the credit card about the degree of hardware depreciation, both the watercooling kit and soundcard will last into future upgrades, so can certainly be thought of as an investment in the future. In addition, OCZ's Vertex SSD is now partnered with an improved three year warranty to provide an extra element of expensive purchase security.

If you’ve just bought that 24in or 30in monitor, surround sound speaker kit and nice comfy leather chair with foot rest (usually called the sub) and are looking for some kick ass performance that won't wait for anyone, this is what we consider the very best hardware in each component class.


Despite still using the same CPU and memory as the Gaming Workhorse PC, we've upgraded the cooling to use water, and the underlying motherboard to the excellent Asus P6T Deluxe V2, so the potential overclock is greater.

Core i7 920 (D0): UK | US
Asus P6T Deluxe V2: UK | US
6GB (3x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800 CL7/8: UK | US

Checking the Radeon HD 4870 X2 prices this month and things have gone crazy! Instead of the usual £250 mark we were seeing last month, we can't find one for less than £330 in stock now! We asked a few AMD partners who expect stock later this month, but not much, so it could mean that the card is being phased out or AMD is purposely restricting supply to put the price back up a bit.

Either way, we've changed our minds and gone back to the fastest single GPU available: Nvidia's GeForce GTX 285, rather than be forced down the route of driver limitation and overhead for multi-GPU products. We've not just spec'd any GeForce GTX 285 though, this one is the MSI HydroGen that features a waterblock for far better cooling and overclocking capacity. We've coupled that with the Swiftech H2O-220 Apex Ultima kit to create a fully watercooled system that neatly fits into the Cooler Master ATCS 840 case!

With the Swiftech kit looped into both CPU and graphics card, it'll greatly reduce the overall system noise (along with the SSD), while also providing more performance through overclocking in the same breath.

MSI GeForce GTX 285 HydroGen: UK
BFG GeForce GTX 285: US + EK GeForce GTX 285 copper VGA waterblock: US

There's no MSI HydroGen for those in the US, in fact, there aren't many watercooling offerings out the box so the only option left is to void your warranty and add your own - combining the EK copper waterblock and BFG GeForce GTX 285 OCX card that comes sold with a pre-overclock.

Swiftech H2O-220 Apex Ultima kit: UK | US
Cooler Master ATCS 840: UK | US

Throw in a quality, PCI-Express soundcard such as the Asus Xonar D2X and there's perfect pitch audio to match the power of the system as a whole. Despite onboard audio reaching such a level that it's suitable for the vast majority of us, if you're dropping nearly two grand on a hardcore PC, there's a strong likelihood you'll also want to balance it with a tasty audio setup. Be sure to keep in mind the Xonar Essence STX as well if you need coaxial connectors instead of 3.5mm audio jacks.

Asus Xonar D2X: UK | US

Combining the Samsung Spinpoint F1 we've recommended on PCs previous with the high performance, but not prohibitively expensive OCZ Vertex SSD means you get cheap mass storage, with a high performance and stutter free SSD. Set the storage drive to turn off if it's not being used and it'll also drop the system noise and vibration too. Perfect!

Obviously there is the Vertex Turbo, Summit and Corsair/Samsung performance series SSDs that are slightly faster, however we don't feel they offer such value for money.

OCZ Vertex 120GB SSD: UK | US
LG GH22NS50 22x DVD-RW SATA Black: UK | US
Samsung Spinpoint F1 1TB Hard Disk: UK | US

To round it all off we still think an 850W PSU is more than enough for this build, and while we do think highly of the Enermax Revolution 85+, its price simply cannot quite match the equally excellent Seasonic M12D 850W. Buying either would be an excellent purchase.

Seasonic M12D 850W PSU: UK | US