I'm officially building my Rig! one part at a time, help required

[Dweedle]

Alrighty!  So I'm looking at the guide on STEP and it suggests that Intel and Nvidia are worth buying over their AMD counterparts..  This is a problem for me as AMD is incredibly cheap in my country and Nvidia and Intel are far more expensive.

 

This worrys me a lot and I would like some assistance so I can get the best for my dollar.  I don't mind spending big (as I'm saving approx $150 a week NZD) but I am hoping to have my PC done by my Birthday in February.. but that probably won't be happening.

 

Anyway!  I'm not a tech head so I don't actually.. at all... understand what I'm buying so with my limited knowledge I have put together a list of what I think will work well (except the motherboard, this is where im truly stumped).  I want to be playing Skyrim with 2K Textures and with ENB at 60-120fps.  I have already bought the Case but am sharing it so you guys know what size it is.

 

Case (Already bought) https://www.mightyape.co.nz/product/Raidmax-Agusta-Titanium-Full-Tower-Gaming-Case/21723691/

 

Heres what I have yet to buy.

 

GPU:  https://www.mightyape.co.nz/product/Gigabyte-Geforce-GTX-760-4GB-Overclocked/21642607/

 

CPU:  https://www.mightyape.co.nz/product/Intel-Extreme-Series-Core-i7-4820K-Quad-Core-LGA2011/21671337/

 

Sound Card:  Unknown, can't decide.

 

Motherboard:  Unknown, can't decide.

 

Hard Drive:  https://www.mightyape.co.nz/product/500GB-WD-Black-WD5003AZEX-SATA-III-Hard-Drive/20903620/

 

Power Supply:  https://www.mightyape.co.nz/product/Corsair-TX-850M-850W-ATX-PSU/20893629/

 

Ram:  https://www.mightyape.co.nz/product/2x8GB-GSKILL-Ripjaws-1866MHz-DDR3-1866/21557170/

 

If anyone can point me in the direction of a motherboard that is compatible with all of this that would be excellent, same with sound card.

 

And if anyone sees some glaring flaw in what ive listed please tell me as I am not knowing what half of the stuff im buying does.

[phazer11]

Well... Since I don't know what retailers are best in your country or where the best prices are (since I know little about the tech scene in New Zealand and am guessing you don't have any local computer stores). You might want to go to overclock.net or similar and state your budget, country and what type of cpu and graphics card family (NVIDIA and Intel instead of AMD and ATI) you prefer and what you'll be using it for the most. Also for PC gaming the AMD model cpu's aren't really any worse off if you get the newest series of chips. Though Intel does seem to perform better for other things such as video processing from what I've seen (I haven't personally used the octocore AMD models).

[Dweedle]

I don't really have a budget im just buying one part at a time when I have the money together. I'm hoping by the end of the month to pick up the CPU for example.

 

I was thinking the AMD 8 core would be a good buy at first cos its only $350ish but I was told by friends to stay away from AMD in general..so yeah lol, I wont be touching AMD.

 

Have what I got listed so far going to be good for ENB Skyrim though?

[Aiyen]

If it purely for ENB purposes then I would always go Nvidia over AMD, since anyone who knows Boris just a little bit knows he swears to Nvidia, and curse AMD to high heaven.

 

That said, then if you are going Nvidia and you do not have a budget then I would always pick EVGA over Gigabyte... you just get better quality and RMA options. For a cost ofc.

 

Since you plan on playing with 2k textures and hence high memory requirements, then a very good Motherboard is also a must. There Gigabyte have some nice models for Intel CPU´s I do not know anything about their recent AMD models. Other then Gigabyte then ofc. ASUS have the best high end Motherboards.

 

For RAM I would not go above 1600Mhz since there are reports of the higher clocks causing issues, in memory heavy applications. Overclocked RAM is never worth it. You would not be able to ever feel the difference between the two clock speeds.

 

Sounds card: If you are getting a quality motherboard you will most likely get a very decent onboard sound card that performs more then well enough for games and streaming etc. The only reason to get a dedicated sound card is if you do anything sound related, or use your computer in conjunction with some big AV setup where super high quality sound is what you are used too.

It is just a waste of power and a slot that hampers air flow otherwise.

[Dweedle]

Well good to know I can skip out on a sound card, saves me some time and $$.

 

thanks for the tips guys but im still not sure about which motherboard, I mean, I dont know what im actually looking for.. like what specs etc.. im really confused

[Aiyen]

Lock in your CPU choice and the MB choice is much easier to pick out. Every CPU has a socket, and motherboards for it.

Then just search by price, and then start reading up on the reviews of the top ones.

[Spock]

If you really want to know what to buy and you are not on budget look at Xtremesystems.org (be ware: If you really want the best hardware plan on spending some weeks there).

I don't know much about the current CPUs and Mainboards around (google "[motherboard name] northbridge heat issue" though, it's really an issue with qpi chips), only that you should go intel if you want high end hardware. For ram go G.Skill. Recent reviews showed that clocks and latencies are really not that important. On my rig I got a huge boost by overclocking my memory controler (I7 920, 6gb tripple channel ram), I'd advise a custom north bridge cooler if you did that though.

Get a good PSU. Seriously modern CPUs can demand quite a lot of power ad hock. Silverstone has been a good brand over the past few years but I'd do some more research on that topic (see Xtremesystems).

If you are going for air cooling get a case with 2 120x120 fans (Noctua is the best brand afaik, don't believe manufacturer db when choosing fans) blowing in at the front and at least one 120x120 fan blowing out at the back and at the top. You will probably pumping 500 or more watts of heat into that thing, that will have to go somewhere, especially on hot days. I've made extremely good experiences with LianLi. Make sure it has a good dust filter that is easy to clean (do it regulary) at the intakes, dust is the no1 hardware killer!

If you are audiophile get the Terratec 7.1 PCI-E, it's the best sound card you can get if you don't wanna go professional.

 

About AMD vs NVidia:

I'm no fanboy, I owned as many Radeon GPUs as NVidia GPUs (most of NVidia vs AMD threads n the net are derailed by fanboys). But currently I'd advise everyone to get a r9, here's why:

1. The two main consoles run on AMD only and AMD just released a tool to optimize graphics for AMD GPUs near machine level. You will see a lot of AMD optimized games in the coming years.

2. Currently AMDs architecture is better suited for the future of gaming because it has much more shader and compute power (the r9 cards manage as much as a Titan). Carmack sais this will be of growing importance for games.

3. More bang for your buck. The best reviews are currently on techreport, they measure 99th percentile frames instead of avarage fps. You won't notice a few average fps in your games, but you will notice when your game stutters.

 

One good point for NVidia is GSync though, but you would have to get a compatible monitor (and spend extra to upgrade it for GSync). And if you build soley for Skyrim, get an NVidia card since Skyrim is NVidia optimized.

 

In my humble oppinion the ASUS R9 280x with 1070 boost clock (310$) is currently the best buy out there if you are willing to spend the money. Make sure you have good case ventilation though since all the 280x don't have blower coolers meaning over 300 watts of heat will go into your case! There is a little down throttling reported with the 290 and the reference cooler but the card is also good bang for your buck if you want to spend more (I'd rather get a new GPU in a few years for that money though).

 

About your FPS goal: That will pretty much be resolution dependant. I get 60 FPS but only at 1280x800. At native 2560x1200 I get about 33, only dropping below 30 in very gpu intensive areas. But I'm not sure 2 SLI Titans can do that...

 

Sorry for typos, I don't have a typo checker on this PC.

[rootsrat]

This thread is more suitable for Banter Inn, rather than Skyrim forum. Moving.

[WilliamImm]

I myself build custom computer configurations - so I can help you a lot with your choices.

 

Firstly, I highly recommend using PC Part Picker, it really streamlines building your own custom rigs. I use it myself - it's really helpful.

 

Now, here are my recommendations:

 

CPU: At this point, Intel is miles ahead of AMD in performance. For the suggested chip, I would not get an i7 - over the i5, you only get hyperthreading (won't matter when gaming is concerned), a cache size increase (again, won't matter), and a slight clock speed increase (overclock the processor if you are really concerned about that). That's not worth $100 USD extra.

 

My recommendation would be to get the Core i5 4670K. This is the latest and the greatest of the Core i5 line, and it only costs $269.48 NZD - 200 less than the i7 you chose. You won't notice the difference, trust me.

 

Cooling: Stock coolers suck. You should seriously look at a aftermarket cooling solution. Currently, a Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO is one of the best things for cooling a CPU, but you can also invest in a water cooling solution (Corsair makes good versions of those). Oh, and whichever solution you pick, if it involves adhesing to the CPU, always make sure you have some Arctic Silver 5 handy. It's as essential as a screwdriver for PC building.

 

(EDIT: Turns out Corsair's cooling solution does NOT require thermal paste. Good to know.)

 

Motherboard: Really, I'd go for one that is fairly cheap and does the job quite nicely. I'd say a good motherboard would cost you from $100-$200 USD (or 122.14-244.17 NZD). My current pick at the moment would be the Gigabyte GA-Z87X-UD4H, through you should really look hard on PC Part Picker for what mobo you want.

 

Memory: This is pretty dependent on your mobo - let PC Part Picker help you with that. Myself, I would restrict to DDR3-1600 memory only (there is no noticeable difference between that and say, 1866 or 2133 memory, unless for some reason you are stuck with using a internal GPU, which should NEVER happen), and also, ATM, just get 8GB (if you have a little extra to spare, you could get 16 GB and have further future proofing, but 8 GB is good enough for now). I have no specific recommendation here, just sort by price and see which memory you like the best.

 

Storage: I don't know about you, but your storage selection is the major problem for me. Firstly, you are missing a SSD. At this day and age, you can't build a gaming PC without at least having some form of SSD in there. It will make Windows, your key applications, and your games load up a LOT faster. Secondly, 500 GB is... not actually a whole lot. Especially if that's your only storage. I find that this day and age, if you seriously game a lot, a 500 GB drive will get filled up fast. My recommendation is to get an SSD and a high storage hard drive (2-4 TB is a good size for them). OCN hosts a really good guide for SSD buying - here's the link. If it helps, what I'm planning on getting is a 240 GB Crucial M500 and a 3TB Seagate hard drive.

 

GPU: As Aiyen said, Nvidia cards are much better for ENB users. Also, seriously go for EVGA over other manufacturs, for the slightly increased cost, you're getting more reliability. Myself, I use a 660 GTX 3GB - it runs Skyrim Revisited like a dream. However, really, my recommendation is to get the biggest, baddest Nvidia card you can. Case size is not a concern, and you should not concern yourself with running SLI. If you have a budget limit, spend the rest of the money on the GPU, you will NOT regret it. And please, make sure the VRAM of the card is higher than 2GB, else you'll run into issues with heavilly modded Skyrim.

 

Case: Since you have already ordered it, I really don't think it would be wise to suggest another case. Really, all I have to say is that it looks damn cool, and it would probably fit even the biggest video cards. No idea on if it's actually good or not (never head of the specific case or manufacturer), but that's for you to find out.

 

Power Supply: Use PC Part Picker to find one. I'd say, look around 700W-800W for your supply. If you can find one that's affordable and fits your needs, go for that.

 

Optical Drives: You would need one to install Windows (unless you are using a USB flash drive). You could get away with getting a cheap DVD writer if you are just using it to install Windows and the few disk-based stuff you have, but you can use a Blu-Ray writer if you want to watch Blu-Ray movies on your PC, or make your own Blu-Ray disks (ya never know).

 

OS: Gonna assume you have a copy of Windows (7 or 8) somewhere. If you do, use what you have. No need to upgrade to 8 if using a PC. If you don't have a copy of Windows, just get a copy of it somewhere.

 

Sound Card: Unless you are doing serious audio work or your computer is set up for 5:1 sound or something, skip a sound card and just use a HDMI monitor - the internal audio can do the sound work for you quite well.

 

Monitor: Again, I assume you have one (unless you want to upgrade). If you don't have one (or want to upgrade), I believe that (if you shop around on ebay), you can get Korean PLS monitors (really high quality ones) for around 200-300 USD. Here's a thread detailing info about them.

 

Do you have a max budget? (in NZD I presume) If so, I can make a example PC using my recommendations (as a proof of concept).

 

EDIT: Just fooled around on the New Zealand PC Part Picker and I found out that components are somewhat more expensive over there (shipping?). My advice still applies, though you might want to consider looking for a different mobo than the one I picked (which is more expensive in NZ than here).

[rootsrat]

SNIP Firstly, I highly recommend using PC Part Picker, it really streamlines building your own custom rigs. I use it myself - it's really helpful. SNIP

Excellent website! Why Phenom II X6 are not included though? Strange...

[mothergoose729]

Don't buy one part at at time. Nothing wrong with your build, but you should save up and get it all at once.

 

Prices get better over time, so parts you want now might be cheaper at a later date

 

Parts of a computer don't do you any good, so it makes no difference whether they come in all at once or piece meal.

 

The warranty for parts start ticking away the moment you buy them. You opportunity to RMA for a full refund likewise.

 

Having a thousand dollars worth of computer parts in your closet is not usually a good idea. It would be pretty unfortunate if something happened to one of them before you got all your parts and put them in your box.

 

A couple small critiques on your build:

 

The LGA 2011 socket is a performance socket. Its meant for the super high end builds. Stuff like 4 graphics cards and quadruple channel memory and two CPUs on a single motherboard. The LGA 1155 mainstream socket is much cheaper and more affordable and performs identical in all applications doing just about everything.

 

The i7 CPU have a technology called hyper threading in them, which is really cool and very beneficial in some applications. It won't help you game any better at all though, and you pay about a 100 dollar premium for it. I would recommend one of the i5 p processors, specifically a westmere one if you can get it, although ivy bridge is almost just as good. The p series processors are the same as the regular ones, just a low power consumption and cheaper because they don't include on die graphics. You are getting a beasty nvidia GPU so you won't need and it therefore shouldn't have to pay for it.

 

I would also take a look at the AMD graphics equivalents for your nvidia choice. It doesn't matter which brand you choose, but you should try and get the one that is better priced. Try a R9 290, or 280x. A 7950 would be worth looking at too.

[WilliamImm]

@mg729 - as Ayien and I said, ENB works better for Nvidia users than AMD. Also, I would recommend getting the 4xxx i5 processors - as they are the latest in Intel's line. Hey, if you have the money, you would spend it on the latest and the greatest, right?

[mothergoose729]

If you get a westmere, aka 4xxx processor, then you need the 1150 socket not the 1155. In the US, the cheaper westmere i5 are only about 30$ more than the cheaper ivy bridge i5. Except for some changes to AVX and a minor bump in clock speed and IPC, they are the same though, so again buy according to price/performance.

[WilliamImm]

....mg729, you are using the wrong name for the processors. The official codename for the 4xxx series of processors is Haswell, not Westmere. Westmere was the codename for the chips released... 3 years ago. Also, all of the Haswell chips come with integrated graphics, so if you are shopping for Haswell chips (as you should be), you'll always get the intergrated GPU no matter what. Hey, at least it's a backup in case the graphics card fails for some reason.

 

In any case, PC Part Picker will exclude non-1150 slot motherboards, so it makes it a lot easier for you to pick which memory you want.

[mothergoose729]

Ah thanks william. Yes, haswell is the one one you want. My mistake.