New PC with twin monitors

True_Blues

Hi,
We are looking to buy a new PC for home and would really appreciate some advice. Please see below for the key points:

• It's primarily going to be used for MS office / internet / e-mails.
• It will also be used for editing the backlog of home film footage (I thinking to try hitfilm3 express for that).
• It may be used for some games, but this is not the priority.
• I don’t have a fixed budget but was thinking around the £500 mark (inc the monitors). I'm not sure how this budget fits, we can go higher if it's worthwhile.
• I do want to use twin screens (I’m thinking 21”?), it is something that I use at work and find it useful. Ideally I’d like to buy it as a package but it’s not a problem to buy the screens separate to the PC

Can anyone advise a decent spec PC and monitors?
Many thanks

bingo_bango

That's an optimistic budget for a PC and two monitors. Definitely achievable, but I'm not sure you'll get enough grunt for video editing on that budget. Have a look at these.

Monitors - £60 each at Currys.

PC - £400 at PC Specialist.

I think you'll struggle to get what you want at £500, but play about with the PC spec and see if you can build your own system at a price that suits.

Fightsback

bingo_bango wrote: »

That's an optimistic budget for a PC and two monitors. Definitely achievable, but I'm not sure you'll get enough grunt for video editing on that budget. Have a look at these.

Monitors - £60 each at Currys.

PC - £400 at PC Specialist.

I think you'll struggle to get what you want at £500, but play about with the PC spec and see if you can build your own system at a price that suits.

Ignore this post, there is a lot wrong with it on many levels:

1 ) Currys

2 ) The monitor is VGA input only

Buy a box with at least 2 HDMI outputs which usually means something with a discrete graphics card. Buy the monitors separately as a pair and make sure they are 1080p and have HDMI input.

Are you prepared to add your own discrete graphics card and some extra RAM ?

bingo_bango

Yes, ignore it. Apparently there is only one opinion that counts.

Fightsback

bingo_bango wrote: »

Yes, ignore it. Apparently there is only one opinion that counts.

Yes the right one and not the one steering towards a lemon from Currys which is VGA input only.

True_Blues

Thank you both for assisting, please don't fall out.


Fightsback - I'd prefer to buy an out of the box PC rather than customising it myself

Fightsback

True_Blues wrote: »

Thank you both for assisting, please don't fall out.


Fightsback - I'd prefer to buy an out of the box PC rather than customising it myself

An example of a couple of 22inch IPS monitors are:

http://www.ebuyer.com/739144-lg-22mp58vq-22-dvi-hdmi-ips-monitor-22mp58vq-p

You can end up spending fortunes on them but these will probably be good enough.

My concern always is when someone says gaming, are you looking to game over two screens in the future as this can require graphic card capabilities in the quite expensive range.

Otherwise if not I'd suggest looking at a combination i5, Nvidia GTX 1050 and 8GB RAM. You could get this for about £500 new if you were prepared to slot the card in yourself and add 4gb ram.

http://www.box.co.uk/Cube_Essence_Home_PC_i5_Skylake_with_Bui_2032917.htm

Caveat, it's Win 8.1 but if you hurry up you can put W10 on for free before MS close the loophole

This will overshoot your budget by £180 (with monitors) but it depends how you want to cut your cloth. You could probably ask the box to fit the extra ram and video card but they'll charge you for it. Otherwise look for a second hand box to bring the price down.

Can anyone find any other deals for the OP ?

Cisco001

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Zoostorm-Core-i5-4440-Quad-Core-Desktop-PC-1TB-8GB-GT-740-Win-8-1-WiFi-/262703277329?hash=item3d2a55e511:g:4noAAOSwZVlXqw20

How much video editing are you doing?
If you do it just occasionally, the £300 PC above should be OK.


Alternative option is this
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Zoostorm-Core-i7-4790-Quad-Core-Gaming-PC-3TB-16GB-GTX-750Ti-WiFi-Win-8-1-/262702182026?hash=item3d2a452e8a:g:Z30AAOSwA3dYGhMX

True_Blues

Fightsback & Cisco - Thanks for the links.

Fightsback wrote: »

An example of a couple of 22inch IPS monitors are:

http://www.ebuyer.com/739144-lg-22mp58vq-22-dvi-hdmi-ips-monitor-22mp58vq-p

My concern always is when someone says gaming, are you looking to game over two screens in the future as this can require graphic card capabilities in the quite expensive range.

Otherwise if not I'd suggest looking at a combination i5, Nvidia GTX 1050 and 8GB RAM. You could get this for about £500 new if you were prepared to slot the card in yourself and add 4gb ram.

http://www.box.co.uk/Cube_Essence_Home_PC_i5_Skylake_with_Bui_2032917.htm

I'm not looking to play games over both screens. I'm not planning to spend too much time editing home videos, it's just something that has backed up and needs sorting.

Fightsback - I like the look of the monitors, just need to finalise the PC. I can contact the box about upgrading to the Nvidia GTX 1050 and 8GB RAM. You mentioned previously about needing 2 HDMI outputs - is that a straightforward upgrade or is there any specific brand / model.

Many thanks

Fightsback

True_Blues wrote: »

Fightsback & Cisco - Thanks for the links.



I'm not looking to play games over both screens. I'm not planning to spend too much time editing home videos, it's just something that has backed up and needs sorting.

Fightsback - I like the look of the monitors, just need to finalise the PC. I can contact the box about upgrading to the Nvidia GTX 1050 and 8GB RAM. You mentioned previously about needing 2 HDMI outputs - is that a straightforward upgrade or is there any specific brand / model.

Many thanks

Not all GTX 1050 cards have twin HDMI and there are only very few with them as yet. Mostly they have 1 x DVI, 1 x HDMI and 1X display port. You can connect one monitor by DVI and one by HDMI, it won't make any noticeable difference for your set up. It's just nice for neatness to have a twin HDMI port but they are a little bit of a premium with the 1050 at the moment.

This particular model does:

https://www.scan.co.uk/products/gigabyte-geforce-gtx-1050-g1-gaming-2gb-gddr5-graphics-card-640-core-1417mhz-gpu-1531mhz-boost

The box has very limited stock in 1050s and is a bit more expensive than elsewhere for the price of their 1050 cards.

It's very simple to fit your own graphics card.

For example:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqbPpg2GCjw

DoaM

You can also get DisplayPort to HDMI adaptors if necessary ... or use DVI if the monitor has a DVI port on it.