Build Your Own – Christmas Gaming Rig

Good afternoon all. As those of you who’ve been reading the blog for a while will already know, we like to run a fairly tech-centric or a how-to piece on a Wednesday afternoon. This week’s How-To is basically a build your own PC build we’ve been asked to write up by people who were looking to put together a new machine either in the run up to or just after Christmas.

It’s a nice and simple build, without anything too fancy going on, but it’s also our first build from the charming Ryan in RMA; since Shelton’s been doing all of the builds for a while, it’s about time we gave Ryan a chance

Anyway, enough jibber-jabber, we’ll get straight to the build itself. We’ll take it from the top, opening with the motherboard.

Motherboard – Gigabyte GA-P55-UD4:

There are a couple of reasons we went with this motherboard, but the biggest one was the combination of reliability and the fact that it’s a very solid board for anyone looking to overclock.

Click through to see our product page for the Gigabyte motherboard

We can’t really recommend that anyone try overclocking their equipment, because doing so voids warranties and has the potential to create all kinds of mess… but if you’re the kind of person who’d like to see good overclocking potential in a machine they’re building then this is exactly the kind of board you’d do well to check out.

Moreover, at €145 it’s not a bad old deal by any stretch of the imagination, and things only get better when we move on to the processor end of things. You can check out more of the specifics for the Gigabyte GA-P55-UD4 over at our product page for it, if you’re so inclined.

Special Offers – Halloween Week

Good afternoon all, hopefully the long weekend was kind to you (though not so kind that it’s making the return to work too hard on you). Normally we run our Special Offers for the week on a Monday afternoon, but given the week that’s in it we’re going to have to run with it today instead

This week we’re offering a 1TB extneral hard drive, an AMD processor and an OCZ power supply. Without any more delay, we’ll get to the products themselves.

Packard Bell Carbon 1TB:

Whenever people ask about a low-cost 1TB external drive, we tend to direct them towards the Western Digital Elements, which weighs in at €76. For this week though, Packard Bell’s Carbon is down to €73, which pretty much makes it the cheapest 1TB external drive on offer.

By contrast to the Western Digital Elements, the Carbon is relatively simple aesthetically, lacking the rubberised chunks at either end that keep the Elements raised. This means that the Carbon is a bit easier to store, either in a backpack or just around the house.

Because of its power saving features, it’ll automatically drop itself to low power mode when your machine is turned off but the drive is still connected. That means it’s an excellent drive for those who’ll be happy to just plug it in and leave it on a shelf or desk and use it to store an archive of their media or even something as simple as a backup of a particularly important system.

When you consider the euro per GB cost, you’re getting around 13.6GB for €1, which isn’t a bad deal by any stretch of the imagination (unless my maths is out by miles). If you’re at all interested, you can check out our product page for the Packard Bell Carbon 1TB external to see more details and a few more pictures of the device itself.

At €73 it’s down 18% for this week.

First Timers: Build Your Own PC

This is a guide specifically for those of you who’ve always wanted to put together your own PC, but never quite had the guts to get moving on it. This is basically a twelve-step guide that should cover just about everything you’ll encounter when you go to put together your own machine.

For the absolute beginner, the reasoning behind building your own machine is the wide range of customisation and upgrade options. You can pick and choose your own parts to ensure that your machine will do exactly what you need it to, without overspending.

We do offer kits, for those who like to go with bundles.

Everyone wants something a bit different from their PC; big downloaders are going to want as much space as possible, gamers will want heavy-duty video cards. There are people for whom one or the other is enough, and some who’ll want both. You don’t need to go out and buy a “high performance” machine when you could just build a machine that performs where you need it to.

In the long run, you could save yourself a lot of money (unless you end up like those of us who get a bit obsessive about upgrading your machine). This is a simple enough twelve step program, like dealing with addiction, only you end up with a new machine out of the deal. Each step is described in detail, so you shouldn’t need too much else.

You can also read this article on the main page, with some instructive images, here

Special Offers – Week of October 12th

Good afternoon all, hopefully this week has been kind to you and you’ve had as good a weekend as we have. To those of you we met at the Irish Web Awards, it was excellent to meet you, especially those of you who got up and had a dance

For those of you who aren’t familiar, we do up a fairly simple blog post every Monday afternoon that basically outlines some of the products we have on special offer during the week. We do it on a Monday do you have the maximum amount of time to order it while the price is down, mull it over or convince the husband/wife that it’s a solid buy.

This week we’ve got a graphics card, a solid all ‘round upgrade kit and a case… between them you could build a fair machine with mot much else

Sapphire Radeon HD 4890 1GB:

Sapphire’s Radeon HD 4890 is a solid card, and we’ve got it down to €171.50, so it won’t break the bank. As usual, there are so many different areas people might be interested in when it comes to shopping for a graphics card that it doesn’t really make sense to just list off all of the specifications. If you’re interested in the HD 4890 then you should have a look at the product page for it.

Click through to see the Sapphire Radeon HD 4890 in more detail

For those with an interest in some of the beefier points, it’ll support resolutions up to 2560 x 1600, which isn’t something to sneeze at. It’ll also support two monitors, for those with two displays (or who are looking to add one to an existing arrangement). It’s also won a host of awards, which is always nice to see for a product on sale.

You can check out our page for the Sapphire Radeon HD 4890 for more details. It’s also got a single customer review that rates it at 5/5, which is good to see too