I'm with Steinman on this one. I upgraded my machine recently. Whole new build, except for the hard drive. And I think I was in the $700 range. The machine should easily last me 3 years with the kind of gaming I do, at which point I won't mind plonking down another $700.
new computer build feedback
- Thread starter Bones
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Is 4K streaming of media really the main use for the computer? Because if you weren't joking about that, I don't think you need nearly that much beef.
seriously, i mostly use this thing for watching movies and animu. I hardly even game atp. I have no idea what i should be looking at for parts for a system thats usually just used for watching streaming video, an occasional pc game, and chatting on discord.
Aha! Finally, some stated requirements.
Ok, I have no idea how long this post is gonna go, or whether I'll still be awake by the time it's done.
The reason people (myself included) were throwing heavy hardware at you is that your choice of CPU and motherboard are the ones that a guy at home trying to do 3D fluid simulation or video editing might choose. You don't put 6 cores/12 threads of server-grade silicon into your box unless you plan on mating them with a lot of other high-end hardware for churning through lots of transcoding, 3D models, scientific simulation, or the like.
These days, the majority of games run just fine on only 2 cores, which means any of a number of 4-core processors will easily be able to meet your needs for many years to come. Also they are much cheaper. Video decoding doesn't even need 4 cores, it can easily get by with only two, but I'd still recommend at least 4 for future-proofing. The only question is whether to get an i7 model that supports "hyper threading" (HT) or an i5 model that does not, and the answer to that question is a) Can you afford it (i7 processors tend to cost a bit more than i5) and b) do you see yourself doing any transcoding in the future? If so, then get an i7, because the ability to process an extra 4 threads will really save you time (about 30-40%) when converting between video formats.
If you are wondering why I am not recommending AMD CPUs, that's because they are not competitive on the high end. That might change early next year with their Zen chips, but those aren't here right now.
On to the motherboard. It used to be that the northbridge chip (usually the biggest one on there) ruled just about everything, but so many things have moved to the CPU now that it's not as busy as it once was. This is what I was getting at with "PCIe lanes" in my first CPU recommendation. See, even if the board has 50 PCIe lanes or some other ridiculous number traced onto it, all those lanes have to connect to stuff at both ends, so if your CPU doesn't have enough connections to actually use all those lanes, a bunch of them will just stay dark and unused. When you remember that one graphics card can command 16 all by itself (that's what the "x16" stands for in "PCIe x16"), you can see how much of a difference there would be between your CPU having 28 v. 40. Nowadays, the northbridge chip mainly does a sort of "plumbing" job to bind your CPU and RAM to each other and to the rest of the board, but it still has some other functions, like running your SATA or M.2 ports or the like. Features vary depending on which northbridge (or "PCH" (Platform Control Hub) as Intel likes to call them) is installed on your board AND for this reason your choice of motherboard is probably THE MOST IMPORTANT choice you make when deciding a build, as it is the part that joins all the other components together AND it dictates so many of your other choices.
So here's my advice. Decide which processor "family" you want to go with first based on the performance/price you're looking for, and then decide which motherboard to slide under it based on what you're going to be doing with that processor. For instance, if you won't be using dual graphics cards, then you don't need a full-sized motherboard with extra slots. If you are going to want 6 hard drives in your system to hold all your movies, then get something that has 8 SATA ports to plug them all into.
If you are looking for top end "consumer" processors, right now that means your choice is between these three (oldest to newest): i7-4790k (Haswell), i7-5775c (Broadwell), or i7-6700k (Skylake). All of these run about $330 right now. Their i5-equivalents are the i5-4690k (Haswell), i5-5675c (Broadwell), or i5-6600k (Skylake). The i5's run about $50-$75 cheaper than their i7 counterparts. If you want to see how the i7 variants compare against one another, you can click here for one of the few reviews out there I know of that includes benchmarks of all three (among others). You'll probably be surprised at how closely they perform (at stock speeds, no overclocking applied). If you want to compare the i7 features side-by-side, you can click here to get the skinny directly from Intel (or click here for the i5 comparison). I know you won't necessarily know what all the rows mean (even I don't know what all of 'em mean), but you can see things like operating temperature, maximum resolution using built-in video (All of 'em can do 4k UHDTV @60Hz with just the built-in GPU and no graphics card!), maximum amount of RAM supported, whether or not they support integrated VGA out, or other things you might be interested in knowing (or asking). You might even find the integrated video is good enough for what little gaming you do, and so decide to skip buying a GPU completely for a couple years. It's quite do-able.
This might be more than you wanted, it might be less, there might even be an inaccuracy or two. But lemme know if it helps.
--Patrick
Ok, I have no idea how long this post is gonna go, or whether I'll still be awake by the time it's done.
The reason people (myself included) were throwing heavy hardware at you is that your choice of CPU and motherboard are the ones that a guy at home trying to do 3D fluid simulation or video editing might choose. You don't put 6 cores/12 threads of server-grade silicon into your box unless you plan on mating them with a lot of other high-end hardware for churning through lots of transcoding, 3D models, scientific simulation, or the like.
These days, the majority of games run just fine on only 2 cores, which means any of a number of 4-core processors will easily be able to meet your needs for many years to come. Also they are much cheaper. Video decoding doesn't even need 4 cores, it can easily get by with only two, but I'd still recommend at least 4 for future-proofing. The only question is whether to get an i7 model that supports "hyper threading" (HT) or an i5 model that does not, and the answer to that question is a) Can you afford it (i7 processors tend to cost a bit more than i5) and b) do you see yourself doing any transcoding in the future? If so, then get an i7, because the ability to process an extra 4 threads will really save you time (about 30-40%) when converting between video formats.
If you are wondering why I am not recommending AMD CPUs, that's because they are not competitive on the high end. That might change early next year with their Zen chips, but those aren't here right now.
On to the motherboard. It used to be that the northbridge chip (usually the biggest one on there) ruled just about everything, but so many things have moved to the CPU now that it's not as busy as it once was. This is what I was getting at with "PCIe lanes" in my first CPU recommendation. See, even if the board has 50 PCIe lanes or some other ridiculous number traced onto it, all those lanes have to connect to stuff at both ends, so if your CPU doesn't have enough connections to actually use all those lanes, a bunch of them will just stay dark and unused. When you remember that one graphics card can command 16 all by itself (that's what the "x16" stands for in "PCIe x16"), you can see how much of a difference there would be between your CPU having 28 v. 40. Nowadays, the northbridge chip mainly does a sort of "plumbing" job to bind your CPU and RAM to each other and to the rest of the board, but it still has some other functions, like running your SATA or M.2 ports or the like. Features vary depending on which northbridge (or "PCH" (Platform Control Hub) as Intel likes to call them) is installed on your board AND for this reason your choice of motherboard is probably THE MOST IMPORTANT choice you make when deciding a build, as it is the part that joins all the other components together AND it dictates so many of your other choices.
So here's my advice. Decide which processor "family" you want to go with first based on the performance/price you're looking for, and then decide which motherboard to slide under it based on what you're going to be doing with that processor. For instance, if you won't be using dual graphics cards, then you don't need a full-sized motherboard with extra slots. If you are going to want 6 hard drives in your system to hold all your movies, then get something that has 8 SATA ports to plug them all into.
If you are looking for top end "consumer" processors, right now that means your choice is between these three (oldest to newest): i7-4790k (Haswell), i7-5775c (Broadwell), or i7-6700k (Skylake). All of these run about $330 right now. Their i5-equivalents are the i5-4690k (Haswell), i5-5675c (Broadwell), or i5-6600k (Skylake). The i5's run about $50-$75 cheaper than their i7 counterparts. If you want to see how the i7 variants compare against one another, you can click here for one of the few reviews out there I know of that includes benchmarks of all three (among others). You'll probably be surprised at how closely they perform (at stock speeds, no overclocking applied). If you want to compare the i7 features side-by-side, you can click here to get the skinny directly from Intel (or click here for the i5 comparison). I know you won't necessarily know what all the rows mean (even I don't know what all of 'em mean), but you can see things like operating temperature, maximum resolution using built-in video (All of 'em can do 4k UHDTV @60Hz with just the built-in GPU and no graphics card!), maximum amount of RAM supported, whether or not they support integrated VGA out, or other things you might be interested in knowing (or asking). You might even find the integrated video is good enough for what little gaming you do, and so decide to skip buying a GPU completely for a couple years. It's quite do-able.
This might be more than you wanted, it might be less, there might even be an inaccuracy or two. But lemme know if it helps.
--Patrick
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so one last question, as far as it seems, should i keep the m2 os drive ssd and the 1080 or drop back to the regular ssd and 1070? my build is now sitting just under 2400(which is more than doable for me) with the first set and changing back to the 6700K and a sabertooth mk 1 board. if that seems like a doable mix for what I have said im going to pull the trigger today.
i fell like it will be a good mix of enthusists and not crazy mad power either.
so in short.
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant
CPU: Intel Core i7-6700K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor ($339.99 @ Newegg)
CPU Cooler: Corsair H100i v2 70.7 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler ($94.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: Asus SABERTOOTH Z170 MARK 1 ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($249.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: Corsair Dominator Platinum 32GB (2 x 16GB) DDR4-3200 Memory ($229.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Samsung 950 PRO 512GB M.2-2280 Solid State Drive ($315.62 @ Newegg)
Video Card: Asus GeForce GTX 1080 8GB ROG STRIX Video Card ($714.98 @ Newegg)
Case: Fractal Design Define XL R2 (Black Pearl) ATX Full Tower Case ($109.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: Corsair 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($96.82 @ Newegg)
Optical Drive: LG WH14NS40 Blu-Ray/DVD/CD Writer ($49.99 @ Newegg)
Optical Drive: LG GH24NSC0B DVD/CD Writer ($19.49 @ Newegg)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM 64-bit ($89.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $2311.83
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-09-16 08:11 EDT-0400
does that make more sense for a user like me?
i fell like it will be a good mix of enthusists and not crazy mad power either.
so in short.
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant
CPU: Intel Core i7-6700K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor ($339.99 @ Newegg)
CPU Cooler: Corsair H100i v2 70.7 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler ($94.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: Asus SABERTOOTH Z170 MARK 1 ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($249.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: Corsair Dominator Platinum 32GB (2 x 16GB) DDR4-3200 Memory ($229.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Samsung 950 PRO 512GB M.2-2280 Solid State Drive ($315.62 @ Newegg)
Video Card: Asus GeForce GTX 1080 8GB ROG STRIX Video Card ($714.98 @ Newegg)
Case: Fractal Design Define XL R2 (Black Pearl) ATX Full Tower Case ($109.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: Corsair 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($96.82 @ Newegg)
Optical Drive: LG WH14NS40 Blu-Ray/DVD/CD Writer ($49.99 @ Newegg)
Optical Drive: LG GH24NSC0B DVD/CD Writer ($19.49 @ Newegg)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM 64-bit ($89.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $2311.83
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-09-16 08:11 EDT-0400
does that make more sense for a user like me?
On the one hand, for "mostly watching videos and occasionally playing a game", that's still fairly overkill. On the other hand, that build looks to me like it'll give you everything you want and will do so for many years to come.
As for video card... A 1070 will be more than enough, and an upgrade in 2 or 3 years to whatever-they-call-them-by-then-a-1150-or-something might be more cost efficient.
As for video card... A 1070 will be more than enough, and an upgrade in 2 or 3 years to whatever-they-call-them-by-then-a-1150-or-something might be more cost efficient.
agreed im going with what i had and replaced the 1080 with the 1070, ill keep the M2 drive though
its dumb and overkill, but now if i decide to be an uber gamer later im set lolOnly got 20min before I have to leave for work, but want to recommend you take the price savings you got from stepping down to the 1070 and put that into the PSU. Spring $200 for the Seasonic Prime 750 (or the Seasonic Prime 850 if you're going to add a second GPU later) and then never have to worry about your PSU again (they come with a 10yr warranty). They are expensive, but independent testing repeatedly shows that nothing else compares to them. Nothing.
Also, get a USB 2TB external or something for backup. They're only $60-ish. Avoid future sobbing.
--Patrick
Also, get a USB 2TB external or something for backup. They're only $60-ish. Avoid future sobbing.
--Patrick
already did so lol, ill get the external in the near future. I have a 500 GB already so that can be my stopgap for now.
Thanks to all of you for your help and advice. I have a strange mux of parts i would have never considered if not for you folks. I have one more question while im waiting for it to arrive. anyone have any suggestions on case fans and cables? Sounds crazy i know but just felt worth asking. Looking at 140 mm fans for the bix and need sata cables for my new drives as ill be keeping the current computer intact. Thanks again!
GasBandit
Staff member
Usually the motherboard comes with a couple SATA cables.
There were cables with the HDD, with the MB, with the graphics card,....We could have just as much of a discussion on fans as we do on any other part.
But you're basically going to have to choose between 3-pin (dumb-fixed speed) and 4-pin (PWM-variable speed) fans.
Variable-speed ones are quieter.
And then there's the bearing type.
Ball bearings usually last the longest, but are the noisiest.
Sleeve bearings are the least expensive and work great...until they dry out.
Fluid Dynamic Bearing (FDB) are an improved sleeve bearing.
And then there are the magnetic ones that have no bearings.
--Patrick
But you're basically going to have to choose between 3-pin (dumb-fixed speed) and 4-pin (PWM-variable speed) fans.
Variable-speed ones are quieter.
And then there's the bearing type.
Ball bearings usually last the longest, but are the noisiest.
Sleeve bearings are the least expensive and work great...until they dry out.
Fluid Dynamic Bearing (FDB) are an improved sleeve bearing.
And then there are the magnetic ones that have no bearings.
--Patrick
If you need cheap cables, here's what you do.
Step one, find a radioshack near you. There's probably one close, they built those things all over.
Step two, go to its closeout sale, as it's probably going out of business.
Step three: realize that all they sell is cell phones, silently decree that they deserved to die, and go back home to order online.
Step one, find a radioshack near you. There's probably one close, they built those things all over.
Step two, go to its closeout sale, as it's probably going out of business.
Step three: realize that all they sell is cell phones, silently decree that they deserved to die, and go back home to order online.
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So what you are saying is i need a 3 ton hitch!
But seriously, is there a primer somewhere i can read?
If only they had actually done it.
There has to be, but with technology changing, they aren't always up to date. Lemme see...
This article is from 2006, but much of it is still relevant.
Keep in mind this article only covers axial fans (ones that look like window fans), not centrifugal ones (ones that look like floor blowers).
--Patrick
Noctua NF-A14 industrialPPC-3000 PWM seems like a solid fan? it has good reviews and they seem to be well known for pushing high amounts of air at lower rpms. my board supports more than enough 4-pin fans so would these be a good investment in the future?
THANK YOU EVERYONE! HAL Mk II is up and running, i accidentally fried my old storage drive with all my random junk on it, which sucks, but is just stuff, nothing world ending. I wonder what is best? maybe a WD black/blue to replace it? the other question i have is my network drive doesnt seem to show up on my new computer, any one remember how you get that to appear?
edit: I has dumb, i have access to my back-up NAS again. i just needed to log my network credentials.
edit: I has dumb, i have access to my back-up NAS again. i just needed to log my network credentials.
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You only need the SSHD if speed matters. If your secondary drive is going to be nothing more than a big storage unit, or it's going to be used only when copying something big back and forth, then it probably doesn't matter. One bit of advice, though--don't get a drive that says "NAS-ready" or "TLER-enabled" or something like the WD Red or Seagate's NAS line. Those drives are engineered to not care as much about disk errors, which is great when you have multiple drives sharing the data, but not so great when it's the only other drive in your computer. Right now the most reliable seems to be HGST, and if you're not actually going to be doing anything intensive with the drive, you should be able to get by with any slower/low-power versions they might have.
--Patrick
--Patrick
I'd like to point out our discussion on hard drives from over in the other thread as well. You may find useful data in there.
--Patrick
--Patrick
There's usually a price premium for the blacks because of their "enhanced performance." I honestly don't know if there's any enhanced durability to go with it. Nobody seems to build a mechanical hard drive with longevity in mind, they only seem to build them for size.
There used to be a green tier, but those were rolled into the blue lineup a while back. So now you just have to look for the -X or -Z ending to tell whether it's a 7200 or 5400 RPM version, respectively.
--Patrick
There used to be a green tier, but those were rolled into the blue lineup a while back. So now you just have to look for the -X or -Z ending to tell whether it's a 7200 or 5400 RPM version, respectively.
--Patrick