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Forums - PC - PC gaming brethren! Need your advice for building a gaming PC

Zekkyou on 19 March 2013

 

So I've spent the last few days trundling around the internets in search of building myself a new gaming PC. I'm pretty much done, but thought it would be wise to ask advice from those who know more about this techno stuff that I do.

My budget is £2000 (about $3000). Here is what I was looking at (Just a note, almost all the links are to ebuyer because I'm a lazy shit):

 

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Case: CM Storm Trooper (http://www.ebuyer.com/288862-cm-storm-trooper-case-sgc-5000-kkn1)

CPU: Intel Core i7 3930K 3.20GHz Socket 2011 12MB Cache (http://www.ebuyer.com/288239-intel-core-i7-3930k-3-20ghz-socket-2011-12mb-cache-retail-boxed-processor-bx80619i73930k)

GPU: EVGA GTX 680 FTW 4GB GDDR5 (http://www.ebuyer.com/410036-evga-gtx-680-ftw-1110mhz-6008mhz-4096mb-gddr5-dual-dvi-hdmi-displayport-04g-p4-3687-kr)

MOBO: Asus P9X79 Socket 2011 8 Channel Audio ATX (http://www.ebuyer.com/320432-asus-mb-p9x79-intel-x79-motherboard-atx-intel-socket-2011-for-2nd-p9x79)

RAM: Corsair Vengeance 16GB (2x 8GB) 1866MHz DDR3 (http://www.ebuyer.com/370063-ddr3-1866mhz-16gb-2x240-dimm-vengnce-red-cmz16gx3m2a1866c10r)

CPUFAN: Sapphire Vapor-X AMD and Intel Universal Processor Cooler (http://www.ebuyer.com/415221-sapphire-vapor-x-amd-and-intel-universal-processor-cooler-4n000-01-40g)

SDD: OCZ 240GB Agility 3 SDD (http://www.ebuyer.com/455032-ocz-240gb-agility-3-ssd-agt3-25sat3-240g-rf)

HDD: Seagate 2TB Barracuda Internal Hard Drive (2 of them) (http://www.ebuyer.com/319641-seagate-2tb-barracuda-internal-hard-drive-st2000dm001)

PSU: Antec 900W High Current Gamer PSU (http://www.ebuyer.com/246658-antec-900w-high-current-gamer-psu-0761345-06221-3)

Blu-Ray Drive (http://www.amazon.co.uk/90-D8C0350-UB0610--BC-12B1ST-Blu-Ray-Drive-Internal/dp/B00652T1U2/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1363132550&sr=8-1)

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Also need to find a keyboard and mouse, but havn't looked into that yet.

Any advice from someone who knows more about all this than i do would be great ^^;



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JEMC on 19 March 2013

WoW, that surely is a niiiiiice machine *envy*.

I one have a couple of things to say: the socket 2011 CPUs use quad channel memory, so it would be better (and maybe cheaper) to get a 4x4GB set of RAM sticks.

I hope you enjoy it!



Please excuse my bad English.

Former gaming PC: i5-4670k@stock (for now), 16Gb RAM 1600 MHz and a GTX 1070

Current gaming PC: R5-7600, 32GB RAM 6000MT/s (CL30) and a RX 9060XT 16GB

Steam / Live / NNID : jonxiquet    Add me if you want, but I'm a single player gamer.

disolitude on 19 March 2013

I honestly think if this is just for gaming, you're wasting your money.
I can't find a single scenario where you would want an X79 rig for gaming to be honest.

Single moitor setup at 1080p - you will hit 60 fps maximum with AMD FX/1155 CPUs easily
Single monitor setup at 2560 - GPU becomes the bottleneck before CPU
Multimonitor setup - GPU is bottleneck
3D gaming - GPU

Only instance where x79 platform makes sense for gaming is if you are doing 3way SLI/Crossfire and have 3 monitors that are 120 hz and you want 3 X 120 frames per second.

For rendering and other CPU intensive stuff its a different story...but for gaming you can save major coin by getting the AMD AM3+ platform or 1155.I'd recommend AMD to be honest due to dollar/performance ratio... Benchmarks show that newer games like Crysis 3 and Metro run as good if not better on AMD's 8 core processors and with consoles going that route, the optimizaton for AMD will only improve.






Zekkyou on 19 March 2013
disolitude said:
I honestly think if this is just for gaming, you're wasting your money.
I can't find a single scenario where you would want an X79 rig for gaming to be honest.

Single moitor setup at 1080p - you will hit 60 fps maximum with AMD FX/1155 CPUs easily
Single monitor setup at 2560 - GPU becomes the bottleneck before CPU
Multimonitor setup - GPU is bottleneck
3D gaming - GPU

Only instance where x79 platform makes sense for gaming is if you are doing 3way SLI/Crossfire and have 3 monitors that are 120 hz and you want 3 X 120 frames per second.

For rendering and other CPU intensive stuff its a different story...but for gaming you can save major coin by getting the AMD AM3+ platform or 1155.I'd recommend AMD to be honest due to dollar/performance ratio... Benchmarks show that newer games like Crysis 3 and Metro run as good if not better on AMD's 8 core processors and with consoles going that route, the optimizaton for AMD will only improve.


I should probably have mentioned this is for my youtube channel, so it will be used for a lot of rendering and video storing (hense 2 2TB hardrives). I do want it to be pretty future proof (so in 3 years time still be able to run games at max. Though that's hard to judge with the next gen popping along). Would it still be worth moving down on the platform? I know little about computers past the basics of what each part in general does :/ But thanks for your time ^^



disolitude on 19 March 2013
Zekkyou said:
disolitude said:
I honestly think if this is just for gaming, you're wasting your money.
I can't find a single scenario where you would want an X79 rig for gaming to be honest.

Single moitor setup at 1080p - you will hit 60 fps maximum with AMD FX/1155 CPUs easily
Single monitor setup at 2560 - GPU becomes the bottleneck before CPU
Multimonitor setup - GPU is bottleneck
3D gaming - GPU

Only instance where x79 platform makes sense for gaming is if you are doing 3way SLI/Crossfire and have 3 monitors that are 120 hz and you want 3 X 120 frames per second.

For rendering and other CPU intensive stuff its a different story...but for gaming you can save major coin by getting the AMD AM3+ platform or 1155.I'd recommend AMD to be honest due to dollar/performance ratio... Benchmarks show that newer games like Crysis 3 and Metro run as good if not better on AMD's 8 core processors and with consoles going that route, the optimizaton for AMD will only improve.


I should probably have mentioned this is for my youtube channel, so it will be used for a lot of rendering and video storing (hense 2 2TB hardrives). I do want it to be pretty future proof (so in 3 years time still be able to run games at max. Though that's hard to judge with the next gen popping along). Would it still be worth moving down on the platform? I know little about computers past the basics of what each part in general does :/ But thanks for your time ^^

In that case it does make more sense to invest in to an X79 platform and intels 6 core processor. The question comes down to if AMD's 8 core will be able to do the job for 50% less money. X79 platform is more powerful, but is it worth the money? I think gaming wise you have nothing to worry about on the AMD side. Game optimization will only improve and swing towards AMD's favor of more cores.

Also it is believed that AMD will release another CPU on the AM3+ platform which should improve performance so upgradability may be an option down the road.

Check out this vid, it specifically talks about streaming while gaming while comparing AMD to Intel CPUs -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4et7kDGSRfc



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bertlsenix on 19 March 2013
Zekkyou said:
disolitude said:
I honestly think if this is just for gaming, you're wasting your money.
I can't find a single scenario where you would want an X79 rig for gaming to be honest.

Single moitor setup at 1080p - you will hit 60 fps maximum with AMD FX/1155 CPUs easily
Single monitor setup at 2560 - GPU becomes the bottleneck before CPU
Multimonitor setup - GPU is bottleneck
3D gaming - GPU

Only instance where x79 platform makes sense for gaming is if you are doing 3way SLI/Crossfire and have 3 monitors that are 120 hz and you want 3 X 120 frames per second.

For rendering and other CPU intensive stuff its a different story...but for gaming you can save major coin by getting the AMD AM3+ platform or 1155.I'd recommend AMD to be honest due to dollar/performance ratio... Benchmarks show that newer games like Crysis 3 and Metro run as good if not better on AMD's 8 core processors and with consoles going that route, the optimizaton for AMD will only improve.


I should probably have mentioned this is for my youtube channel, so it will be used for a lot of rendering and video storing (hense 2 2TB hardrives). I do want it to be pretty future proof (so in 3 years time still be able to run games at max. Though that's hard to judge with the next gen popping along). Would it still be worth moving down on the platform? I know little about computers past the basics of what each part in general does :/ But thanks for your time ^^

Yep you are right.It will be hard to judge especially with prices of current hardware dropping with the PS4 around the corner and new hardware coming out.
You have to think - A 500-700€ machine can run everything on Max Settings with ease depending how lucky you are with the price of the single pieces.
RIght now and this is MY opinion those parts you listed are somehow a waste of money cause you don't need them at all RIGHT NOW...
They will die of boredom cause there is nothing out to challenge them...not even Crysis 3.
When NextGen is coming out it will be different and so will be the available PC hardware and their prices.

Short before a NextGen is launching it is probably the hardest time to build a PC cause you can't be completely sure if its worth the money right now.
"Your" PC will be able with ease to do NextGen games but it could be better and probably cheaper in a while and it will survive longer.
Depends on how much you need a new rig right now probably.



Soleron on 19 March 2013

disolitude, come on, AMD is not an option for a £2000 gaming+rendering rig.

Zekkyou, that is a good build. You don't need the CPU fan, it should come with one and you're not overclocking.

The Agility 3 may be too slow, there are newer and faster SSDs.



Zekkyou on 19 March 2013
disolitude said:
Zekkyou said:
disolitude said:
I honestly think if this is just for gaming, you're wasting your money.
I can't find a single scenario where you would want an X79 rig for gaming to be honest.

Single moitor setup at 1080p - you will hit 60 fps maximum with AMD FX/1155 CPUs easily
Single monitor setup at 2560 - GPU becomes the bottleneck before CPU
Multimonitor setup - GPU is bottleneck
3D gaming - GPU

Only instance where x79 platform makes sense for gaming is if you are doing 3way SLI/Crossfire and have 3 monitors that are 120 hz and you want 3 X 120 frames per second.

For rendering and other CPU intensive stuff its a different story...but for gaming you can save major coin by getting the AMD AM3+ platform or 1155.I'd recommend AMD to be honest due to dollar/performance ratio... Benchmarks show that newer games like Crysis 3 and Metro run as good if not better on AMD's 8 core processors and with consoles going that route, the optimizaton for AMD will only improve.


I should probably have mentioned this is for my youtube channel, so it will be used for a lot of rendering and video storing (hense 2 2TB hardrives). I do want it to be pretty future proof (so in 3 years time still be able to run games at max. Though that's hard to judge with the next gen popping along). Would it still be worth moving down on the platform? I know little about computers past the basics of what each part in general does :/ But thanks for your time ^^

In that case it does make more sense to invest in to an X79 platform and intels 6 core processor. The question comes down to if AMD's 8 core will be able to do the job for 50% less money. X79 platform is more powerful, but is it worth the money? I think gaming wise you have nothing to worry about on the AMD side. Game optimization will only improve and swing towards AMD's favor of more cores.

Also it is believed that AMD will release another CPU on the AM3+ platform which should improve performance so upgradability may be an option down the road.

Check out this vid, it specifically talks about streaming while gaming while comparing AMD to Intel CPUs -

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4et7kDGSRfc

So looking at that video the AMD is the better choice to go with performance wise? Are there any kind of quality differences between the two, or is the Intel price point purley because they have brand trust?



Zekkyou on 19 March 2013
CGI-Quality said:
Zekkyou said:

Also need to find a keyboard and mouse, but havn't looked into that yet.

Any advice from someone who knows more about all this than i do would be great ^^;

First off, let me say that this will be a sweet build (I would have agreed with Disolitude, but once you mentioned rendering, it became a solid purchase choice, and he agrees, which is a plus).

Second, depending on how far you want to take it:

Keyboard (same as mine):

Mouse (same as one of mine):


Aah those look perfect, thanks :D (the way you said one of brings me to the conclution you are a multi armed being)



disolitude on 19 March 2013
Soleron said:

disolitude, come on, AMD is not an option for a £2000 gaming+rendering rig.

Zekkyou, that is a good build. You don't need the CPU fan, it should come with one and you're not overclocking.

The Agility 3 may be too slow, there are newer and faster SSDs.

It doesn't sound like he is going to use his rig for rendering but streaming and uploading to youtube. AMD is perfect for that stuff and frankly better than 1155. Those cores come in handy when youre gaming + streaming at the same time.

And the whle point is that AMD rig wont cost him 2000 but 1200 and accomplish everything the x79 rig does.

And I agree about Agility 3. Vertex 3/4 and the mighty Vector are all better options from OCZ, let alone other manufacturers.