Build a Budget PC - #4

Choosing the Storage

What is Storage?

Storage is the place inside a PC where larger amounts of less frequently visited data sets are kept. This includes anything that is either too large or not needed often enough to be allocated space in the RAM.  This includes data such as the operating system, games, photos and videos. Almost everything is stored outside of the RAM in this storage. Storage has slower access speeds compared to RAM but it has higher capacities and also lower costs. 

What does storage look like?

Storage comes in two almost polar opposite forms. Solid State Drives (SSD's) and Hard Disk Drives (HDD's). The image further up the pager is an HDD with its front panel off. As you can see it has a series of magnetic metal disks with arms sliding between them. There is also a lower portion where there a controller to manage the movement of the lever arm. The tip of the lever is highly sensitive and can both detect and write data onto the disk as it spins at 5200 RPM. Small sections in the drives can be left either 'on' or 'off' (a binary storage system). 

Pictured below the HDD is an SSD. This is a NAND storage flash drive. It composes of a set of storage chips and a microcontroller to manage the data storage. SSD's have no moving parts but they still use the same on/off system as an HDD for storing data from your PC. Both HDD's and SSD's both generally use the same connectors as well. SATA power and data cables have to be plugged in for both drives to work. The power cable comes directly from your PSU and the data cable plugs into a connector on your MOBO.

Which should I get?

There are pros and cons of both SSD's and HDD's.

SSD's are good because:

• They have faster read and write speeds both sequentially and in 4k chunks.
• They will last longer and are more reliable due to a lack of moving parts.

SSD's drawbacks are:

• They are much more expensive.
• Poorly manufactured drives can experience more 'data drops' than HDD's.
• Some cases don't have support for them

HDD's are good because:

• They are much cheaper per Gb and start at lower price points.
• Cases usually have support for multiple hard drives.

HDD's drawbacks are:

• They are prone to breaking after several years of constant use.
• They have slower sequential and 4k speeds. 

Which did I get?

I decided from an early stage that the superior £/Gb ratio of an HDD took my fancy. If you buy a HDD from a reliable manufacturer you should not have to worry about horror stories of hard drives breaking soon after purchase. My particular hard drive came with a 2 year warranty which is good. I will be careful though when the end of this period is coming up because it could be a time the drives are prone to loosing data. I am happy with my Western Digital caviar blue 500Gb HDD but it does only operate at SATA 2 speeds which is half the bandwidth of SATA 3. In the future I plan to buy a 250Gb SSD for the OS and frequently opened applications.

Build a Budget PC - #3

Choosing the RAM

What is RAM?

RAM is Random Access Memory. This is where the data that is currently in use by the CPU is 'stored'. You can look at RAM as your computer's short-term memory. This is a very fast access data storage solution and holds data that is likely to be needed soon. It is normally 100x faster for your CPU to communicate with the RAM then compared to even a very fast SSD. This makes it ideal for storing a few Gb of data that is in frequent use. The higher capacity your RAM is the more data can be stored in this 'SUPERFAST' solution.

How can I make sure my RAM is compatible?

Ram compatibility is one of the easiest things to do when building a budget PC. All you have to do is see what DDR your MOBO supports (DDR3 in my case), and install it making sure it is 240pin DIMM. The 240 pin means it is desktop RAM rather than laptop RAM. Do not worry too much about the frequency of the RAM because it is mainly just a selling point. Higher frequency does not always offer a performance boost. In some cases, super high-frequency RAM can be 4-5% slower than 1600MHz RAM.

How much RAM do I Need?

You can have anywhere from 1Gb to 128Gb on a modern PC so how can I work out how much RAM I need? For most PC users I would recommend 8Gb of RAM. This seems to be the sweet spot. 8Gb gives you enough headroom to render objects in 3D, use photoshop, play almost any AAA rated game. You could probably run on 4Gb but you would be wanting more headroom very soon. As you can see from my memory stats when browsing the web with 3-4 tabs open there is about 3Gb of memory usage. For this reason, if you are not doing anything intensive on your PC then 4 should be enough, but for gaming, I would recommend 8 or even 16. I would recommend getting any RAM in a dual channel set (if your MOBO supports it).

Which RAM did I Choose?

When I first started looking for RAM I thought RAM was just RAM. This is what a lot of people will tell you saying that if sold as it actually is it does not matter what RAM you buy. After my experience of buying RAM off the internet for half the price as is on newegg.com, you would think differently. I purchased a 2x4GB kit from a seller online with over 4,000 5 star reviews. It seemed too good to be true and it was. The ram didn't work! I had to send it back and get my money back so be careful what you buy. Eventually, I got two 4Gb sticks of Integral RAM at 1600MHz. This works perfectly and as you can see from my graph gives me plenty of headroom and speed.

Build a Budget PC - #2

Choosing a Motherboard

What is a Motherboard?

The Motherboard or MOBO is the main hub of every PC. This is the place where all the components connect together physically and through software. The MOBO have lots of I/O (input/output) connectors and ports on them and it is key to choose the right ones for your parts. For example if you want USB 3.0 on your computer you need a USB 3.0 header on your Motherboard. The MOBO also contains the chipset. The chipset manages the transfer of data between all parts of a PC. You can now probably tell that compatibility between components is a key factor to consider when purchasing a MOBO.

How can I ensure my MOBO is compatible?

Firstly you need to ensure the socket type is the same as the CPU you purchased. In my case this is an AMD AM3+ socket. This might sound a bit confusing but you simply need them to be the same on both of the parts. Different socket types are essentially the same things but with a certain number of pins for the CPU to physically connect to.
The size of the MOBO is also important. For example if you want a smaller build you could use a Mini ITX board or a Micro ATX. A full size ATX board will have more connectors and ram slots. When building a budget PC size doesn't really matter so a large MOBO can be good. With more ram and PCIe slots it leads to better upgradability in the future. But on the other hand an extra £20 saved here can be spent on a better GPU for example. Also a smaller board can often offer everything a budget build needs. For example a budget build is unlikely to have more than one GPU so less PCIe slots are needed.

How can I get USB-3?

USB 3.0 is a relatively new standard in data transfer. If you are ever planning on transferring data from a camera for example to your PC I would highly recommend getting a USB 3.0 system. This means you will require one or more USB 3.0 headers on your MOBO. The company selling the Motherboard is likely to use the USB 3.0 headers as a selling point so it is normally easy to see which ones have them.

Which MOBO did I choose?

Photo from Gigabyte website.

I purchased the Gigabyte GA-78LMT-USB3. This is a mATX form factor board. This means it has all the necessary headers and connectors but no more. With four RAM slots, two PCIe connectors, and a regular PCI slot. This provides the minimum requirements to fit all my components and also has room for more expansion in the future. For example the four ram slots are a place where I can easily upgrade my RAM capacity at a later date. Gigabyte are also a well known brand and are known for building durable long lasting boards.









Come back next week for part #3 of our budget PC series.

Build a Budget PC - #1

Choosing the CPU

What is a CPU?

The CPU (Central Processing Unit) is the main brain for your computer. This is where most of the mathematical calculations happen within your PC. This ultimately means it converts input code to output code for the rest of your PC to use. From this you probably now see how important choosing the right CPU is. 

Who makes CPU's?

There are two main producers in the world of processors or CPU's, AMD and Intel. Generally Intel create more expensive processors focused around performance per core and on the other hand AMD manufacture processors with more cores but lower per core performance rates. Other companies do make CPU's but none have the same wide range of components to go with the CPU that AMD and Intel have.

What are Cores?

CPU's have different numbers of cores varying from one to eight (in normal desktop CPU's). Inside a single core one task can be performed. This means a CPU with more cores has better multitasking ability. The processing power of each of the cores also determine the processors computing speed.

Which CPU did I choose?

I chose an AMD FX-6300 CPU for my build because I believe that it has the best performance in the price range I am focusing on. The FX-6300 is a CPU with 6 cores so there will be a good level of multitasking compared to dual or quad core CPU's. This means programmes that have multiple tasks such as editing tools or rendering software will run faster due to the relatively high core count. I also got the black edition CPU which means the chip can be overclocked with the correct chipset motherboard.

Come back next week for part #2 of our budget PC series!