Critique this build

[Arachnotronic]

Hi all,

Just spec'd out the following build for a friend of mine. I think it's pretty good but I always love a good discussion and would be very interested in seeing if there are any ways I could improve it within roughly the same budget.

This is a gaming oriented PC first and foremost, but will also be used for general tasks.

CPU: Core i7 4790K - $309
Motherboard: MSI Z97 PC Mate - $85
Memory: G.SKILL Ares 16GB DDR3-1600 - $75
HDD : Western Digital Black 2TB - $120
SSD : Crucial BX200 -$65
GPU: MSI GeForce GTX 970 - $310 (+$20 MIR)
PSU: Corsair RM650 - $80 (+$20 MIR)
Optical: ASUS 24x DVD Burner - $20
Chassis: Corsair Carbide 200R - $60

Any suggestions/discussion would be welcome/fun

 

[VirtualLarry]

I don't know that I would go with the TLC BX200 as an OS drive. The AT review of it wasn't so hot. The 512GB MX200 is $149.99 @ Newegg right now.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820148949&ignorebbr=1
Plus some "Extra savings code".

Also, the price on the 16GB DDR3-1600 isn't so hot. See if you can find some $60 kits of GSkill 16GB.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231455&ignorebbr=1
Here's an 8GB kit of 1866 1.5v for $30 after promo code. Get two of those for $60.

 

[lehtv]

Newer LGA1151 parts would be nice, but it's too bad they're way overpriced right now. LGA1150 it is. EDIT: unless you go i5-6500 or i5-6600.

No decent CPU cooler included. The stock one will be noisy on a 4790K.

WD Black is a little noisy and expensive, WD Green would do the job of a storage drive just fine.

BX200 might look like a good product given the price and that it says Crucial on it, but it performs very badly, can't recommend it. Also if budget allows, I'd recommend a 500GB SSD, 250GB can fill up quite quickly. Balance that cost by downgrading misc storage to 1TB.

Corsair RM650 uses Teapo and Capxon filtering caps, would prefer to see all-Japanese at this budget. EVGA 650 G2 is only $75 AR AP today, it's a superb silent unit with 7 year warranty, well worth the extra over RM650.

Couldn't find that MSI GTX 970 for $290 after rebate.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i7-4790K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor ($309.99 @ Newegg)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler ($19.89 @ OutletPC)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z97X-SLI ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($94.88 @ OutletPC)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($59.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 500GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($147.88 @ OutletPC)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Green 1TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive ($49.89 @ OutletPC)
Video Card: Asus GeForce GTX 970 4GB STRIX Video Card ($318.49 @ SuperBiiz)
Case: Fractal Design FD-CA-CORE-3300-BL ATX Mid Tower Case ($49.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA G2 650W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($74.98 @ Newegg)
Optical Drive: Lite-On iHAS124-14 DVD/CD Writer ($12.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $1138.97
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-12-16 05:45 EST-0500

 

[fourdegrees11]

8gb kit of ddr3 2400 for $35 right now

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231665

Benchmarks seem to show haswell scaling well with faster memory. Not sure what that mobo can handle but there's a few different boards under $90 that can handle heavily oc'd ddr3

The 2TB HD also seems very overpriced, toshiba has a 4TB 7200rpm 128mb cache drive for the same price

 

[lehtv]

Benchmarks seem to show haswell scaling well with faster memory. Not sure what that mobo can handle but there's a few different boards under $90 that can handle heavily oc'd ddr3

Any Z97 board should handle DDR3-2400 fine, no?

 

[VirtualLarry]

Any Z97 board should handle DDR3-2400 fine, no?

Yes.

 

[Arachnotronic]

Thanks for the suggestions so far, everyone!

@ VirtualLarry

Good catch! I found a 16GB kit of DDR3-1600 for $60 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231489).

The reason I am trying to stick to 2x8gb instead of going for 4x4gb is that I want this system to be fairly expandable...as expandable as possible!

Do you (or anybody else) think that the price premium for faster DDR3 is worth it? My friend is willing to boost his budget to accommodate any real "big bangs" in terms of perf/$, but I'm not going to recommend something that adds substantial cost w/o a corresponding performance improvement in games.

@ lehtv

The price on the EVGA PSU looks like it's only good thru today, then it goes up. My friend won't be buying today sadly

Is the difference in terms of quality (I don't know much about PSUs) enough for me to try to talk my friend into spending extra on the PSU you linked?

Also, re: the BX200...I realize that it might not be the world's best performing SSD, but cost is pretty huge consideration here. Will there be a noticeable real world difference in moving to, say, the MX200 or some other drive? The budget is flexible but I only want to ask the guy to spend more for "high impact" improvements.

If there is a better performer at the same price I'd appreciate a link to that! I chose Crucial here because it's cheap and I have always had good luck with them, but I am not wedded to that brand by any stretch of the imagination.

Also, I'd like to stick to the current structure of fairly smallish SSD + big HDD. Having a lot of HDD space is very important to him since he has a lot of games.

I also want to stick with a 7200RPM drive rather than a 5400RPM one since most of his games will be on the HDD rather than the SSD. I was eyeing this drive from Seagate (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...8907&cm_re=seagat3_3tb-_-22-148-907-_-Product) 3TB 7200RPM. This looks like a better bang for the buck in terms of cost/gb but the warranty is much shorter than the one that comes with the WD Black drive which gives me pause.

@ fourdegrees11

I can get DDR3-2400 for $80; a $20 premium to the DDR3-1600 that I linked above. However, in this case an extra $20 is non-trivial. How much of a performance uplift do you think a move to DDR3-2400 will bring to this system?

Also, using DDR3-2400 requires that the user OC the IMC by quite a lot. Is it generally accepted that the Haswell IMCs can routinely handle such an overclock or is it a matter of silicon roulette? The 6700K in my sig isn't stable at all at DDR4-3000 speeds no matter how much I try; have to back it down to DDR4-2800.

 

[Burpo]

Stay away from the Seagate..
I use these Hitachi HUA723020ALA641 2Tb Enterprise drives and they're slightly faster (and quieter) than the WD Black. Priced right, but 1 yr warranty. Listed as Reurbs, they're actually NOS (0 hrs.) & will last many years..

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9SIA5AD2NA9155

 

[lehtv]

Do you (or anybody else) think that the price premium for faster DDR3 is worth it? My friend is willing to boost his budget to accommodate any real "big bangs" in terms of perf/$, but I'm not going to recommend something that adds substantial cost w/o a corresponding performance improvement in games.

RAM speed doesn't really matter in the end because the performance differences are so small. But $10 here or there doesn't really matter either. IMO any of these is fine:

16GB DDR3-1600 $60
16GB DDR3-2133 1.5V $75
16GB DDR3-2400 1.65V $68

Out of 8GB kits, this is the only one worth buying really, because lower speeds aren't any cheaper, and you can run this 1.5V 1600-1866 if needed (or maybe even 1.6V 2133)

8GB DDR3-2400 $35

The price on the EVGA PSU looks like it's only good thru today, then it goes up. My friend won't be buying today sadly

When will he be buying then?

Is the difference in terms of quality (I don't know much about PSUs) enough for me to try to talk my friend into spending extra on the PSU you linked?

At that $75 price, definitely. More than that, maybe not - because there'll be other PSU's at the $60-80 range worth buying. In any case, the budget is big enough that you don't have to sacrifice top quality capacitors, so don't buy the RM650.

Also, re: the BX200...I realize that it might not be the world's best performing SSD, but cost is pretty huge consideration here. Will there be a noticeable real world difference in moving to, say, the MX200 or some other drive? The budget is flexible but I only want to ask the guy to spend more for "high impact" improvements.

I beg to differ, cost seems like a minor consideration at a $1100 budget. I think a 850 EVO is well worth the extra over BX200, it's just that much better. And with longer warranty too - the extra 2 years of warranty already cover the extra cost IMO, plus you get lots of extra performance too.

I also want to stick with a 7200RPM drive rather than a 5400RPM one since most of his games will be on the HDD rather than the SSD.

How do you figure that? With 500GB of SSD space, practically all the games he currently plays will be on the SSD. Does he actually have more than 400GB of games anyway?

When needed, it's pretty easy to move Steam games around different disks, just make a backup, remove local files, then reinstall from backup to new location.

In any case, loading times between 7200 RPM and and 5400 RPM drives are practically the same compared to loading times on the SSD, so it hardly matters what RPM the drive is. Any game where loading times actually matter will be installed on the SSD.

Also, WD Green isn't 5400 RPM, it's variable RPM (IntelliPower) but lower than 7200 RPM.

However if you want 7200 RPM, WD Blue is the same price as WD Green. Would stick with WD in any case, rather than Seagate.

 

[fourdegrees11]

Any Z97 board should handle DDR3-2400 fine, no?

I came across this board on pcpartpicker that only listed up to 2200

http://pcpartpicker.com/part/msi-motherboard-z97mg43

I didnt bother to look any further but yes it can go to 3000+ like all of the other z97 boards claim.

RAM speed doesn't really matter in the end because the performance differences are so small. But $10 here or there doesn't really matter either. IMO any of these is fine:

This is just one haswell benchmark, there's plenty more around that show 10+% in gaming. The price of 2400 is pretty close right now to 1600.

 

[lehtv]

403 Forbidden

This is just one haswell benchmark, there's plenty more around that show 10+% in gaming. The price of 2400 is pretty close right now to 1600.

That's what I meant. 10% is not a big number, doesn't really impact the subjective gaming experience. Most of the time it will be a lot less than 10%.

 

[fourdegrees11]

That's what I meant. 10% is not a big number, doesn't really impact the subjective gaming experience. Most of the time it will be a lot less than 10%.

We've already seen SC2

I look at it like the difference between a gtx 950 -> gtx 960 or 380 -> 380x. As far as cost difference vs performance ddr3 ram is a much better deal. The cheapest 8gb ddr3 kit right now is 1866 for $30, 2400 cost $35. Absolutely no reason not to get 2400. If all adds up in the end for your overall system performance.

(going above 2400 is ridiculously expensive for ddr3, no reason to go that route as you might as well go with a platform the uses ddr4 for the $)

 

[lehtv]

We've already seen SC2

First off, let me be clear I'm not advising against higher speed RAM. All I'm saying is it doesn't really matter. You can try to convince me it matters, but I've seen enough benches and tests that it's not going to happen. Buy whatever RAM speed you like as long as it's in your budget and doesn't require you to make sacrifices in other parts choices, is what I'm saying.

We haven't seen SC2 since the image you posted didn't work.

What other hardware is used here? How about 1920x1080 benches? Memory becomes more important when you have a CPU bottleneck which is what 1280x800 creates provided you're testing on a CPU and GPU balanced for 1080p gaming.

 

[fourdegrees11]

source for 1280x800

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/memory/display/haswell-ddr3_7.html#sect0

I can still see the other SC2 bench image?

Here's another one

I find it strange that people make a huge deal over skylake memory speeds (in the cpu forum), but disregard haswell?