First New Build in 6+ Years... Excited!

[brencat]

Hi folks. Back on the forum after a long time away. Had largely retired from PC gaming years ago shortly after BF4 came out, but now my son, who's a young teen, is getting into computers and I thought it would be a great experience to show him how to build a PC. Something fun for Dad and son to do! So for the past several weeks, I've been getting caught up on all that I've missed since the last builds I did for myself and extended family some 7 years ago. Just for kicks, I'm still on an i5-760 @ 3.8ghz, 4GB RAM, Win 7, and a shader-unlocked 2GB Radeon 6950, using a 2ms BENQ 1920 x 1200, 60hz TN monitor. Never a single issue with this build all these years. What I quickly realized is that many people are still running rigs that are quite old too (though maybe not as ancient as mine, ha).

Anyway, here's what I'm going with so we can enjoy the latest and greatest games at high settings on a new 27” 144hz 1440p monitor.

i7-8700 (non-K)
Noctua NH-U9S cooler
Gigabyte Z370 HD3P Mobo
16GB GSkill DDR4 Trident Z 3200 CL14
Samsung EVO 500gb SSD
EVGA 1070 Ti Black Edition SC
EVGA Supernova 650W G3 PSU
Windows 10 Pro

I was originally going to pick the i5-8600k and do the overclocking thing, but the modest price difference between the two chips ($299 vs $359), lower TDP of the i7, and the fact that the i7 turbos so well made it a no-brainer, IMO. I figure I’ll be able to enable ‘multi-core enhancement’ in Bios to get all cores to turbo at full during games, and that should be enough for me.

Very excited to be back in the saddle after all these years. My only complaints during my parts search would be the price of RAM and video cards (Bitcoin mining...wtf, really??). Anyway, feel free to comment on the build above or anything I may have missed! Thanks for reading.

 

[UsandThem]

The only two things I see that you may want looking at further are:

-The Noctua NH-U12S is not that much bigger, but is quieter and cools better with a larger 120mm fan.

-Depending on what you are paying for that GPU, you might get a GTX 1080 for the same price if on sale.

 

[Campy]

Honestly the build looks really good.The only thing worth mentioning is that 1440p 144 is where the 1080 Ti becomes a really good option if you want to stay at closer to your monitors refresh rate.

Which cases are you looking at?

 

[brencat]

The only two things I see that you may want looking at further are:

-The Noctua NH-U12S is not that much bigger, but is quieter and cools better with a larger 120mm fan.

-Depending on what you are paying for that GPU, you might get a GTX 1080 for the same price if on sale.

Thanks for the reply. I deliberately chose the smaller U9S because I prefer a smaller look in the case. I did the Tuniq 120 and a few other large coolers many many years back. They were extremely heavy and looked a bit ridiculous, tbh. My two dated PCs, including the OC'ed i5-760 I'm typing on, are wearing midsize heatpipe coolers with 92mm fans and they've worked great for years while keeping under-load temps in the sweet spot. The Noctua looks like it gets great reviews and since I'm not overclocking the non-K chip, I'm thinking it'll be sufficient.

As far as the video card... After patiently waiting and searching for nearly 4 weeks, I was never able to secure what I wanted in a GTX 1080 for under $510. But...I did pretty good on price for the 1070 Ti and got a quality card too, so am satisfied there. Frankly, I've never spent over $375 for a video card in my life, so seeing prices well in excess of $400 for cards over a year old, due to the pursuit of cryptocurrency mining, possibly the biggest bubble fad since tulips, is astounding to me.

Honestly the build looks really good.The only thing worth mentioning is that 1440p 144 is where the 1080 Ti becomes a really good option if you want to stay at closer to your monitors refresh rate.

Which cases are you looking at?

Hi. I was planning to reuse a very nice Cooler Master case that I have... nothing fancy, no clear side windows or anything but it's not in a spot where I would show it off anyway. My other PC has a nice, but dated, Lian Li Aluminum case I've reused for 2 builds already. Probably content to save the cash for something else rather than drop another $100. I'll listen to any good suggestions though. Thx again.

 

[Campy]

Hi. I was planning to reuse a very nice Cooler Master case that I have... nothing fancy, no clear side windows or anything but it's not in a spot where I would show it off anyway. My other PC has a nice, but dated, Lian Li Aluminum case I've reused for 2 builds already. Probably content to save the cash for something else rather than drop another $100. I'll listen to any good suggestions though. Thx again.

Oh, I wasn't aware you had already purchased everything. Since you already have a case then it's kind of a no brainer.

There are lots of great cases on the market, but if you already have one with decent cooling and you don't care about looks, it's a perfectly reasonable decision to stay with what you have.

 

[brencat]

Oh, I wasn't aware you had already purchased everything. Since you already have a case then it's kind of a no brainer.

There are lots of great cases on the market, but if you already have one with decent cooling and you don't care about looks, it's a perfectly reasonable decision to stay with what you have.

Thx. Yeah, I love the look of the Lian Li with its side window and quality parts, including many numerous thumb screws and slick black aluminum finish, but the Cooler Master is also an awesome case at about 1/2 the price, with better cable management options, better airflow, and ability to customize the interior a bit. They are in perfect condition... the Lian Li is 12+ years old I think, while the Cooler Master is ~ 7.

You know, I was open to building a Ryzen system too... like a 1600x which seemed like a nice chip that clocked pretty good. But the performance differential vs Intel's i5-8600 / i7-8700, combined with all the mobo and RAM compatibility issues scared me away from AMD. I'm pretty confident I could have navigated most of the issues, but I'm too busy with other responsibilities these days for drama.

 

[Campy]

Thx. Yeah, I love the look of the Lian Li with its side window and quality parts, including many numerous thumb screws and slick black aluminum finish, but the Cooler Master is also an awesome case at about 1/2 the price, with better cable management options, better airflow, and ability to customize the interior a bit. They are in perfect condition... the Lian Li is 12+ years old I think, while the Cooler Master is ~ 7.

Cool. I have an old Lian Li case that I no longer use, from around 14-15 years ago. I remember lack of airflow being a big issue with it.

Just out of curiosity, does your CM case have dust filters? That's a fantastic feature that was rare some years back which has become standard now. I don't think I'll ever build in a case without dust filters again.

You know, I was open to building a Ryzen system too... like a 1600x which seemed like a nice chip that clocked pretty good. But the performance differential vs Intel's i5-8600 / i7-8700, combined with all the mobo and RAM compatibility issues scared me away from AMD. I'm pretty confident I could have navigated most of the issues, but I'm too busy with other responsibilities these days for drama.

Yeah, Ryzen has been the best option for most of the year (pre Coffee Lake), except for gamers and particularly those who play twitch-shooters/care about high refresh rate. Your options were either get a Ryzen 5 with six cores and twelve threads or an i5 with four cores four threads at the same price. After CFL things are a bit different and I don't think you can go wrong with either option now, most of these cpus should last quite a few years and are much better value for money than what was available in the previous years.

Good luck with the build!

 

[brencat]

Just out of curiosity, does your CM case have dust filters? That's a fantastic feature that was rare some years back which has become standard now. I don't think I'll ever build in a case without dust filters again.

Yes it does! It also has 3 5.25" drive bay slots (I still like having an integrated DVD burner handy) and one day while cleaning years back, I accidentally vacuumed up one of the filters that protects the empty bays. The CM case also has an interesting interleave of plastic that makes it difficult for dust to find its way in generally, which is something I wish my Lian Li case had. CM makes good stuff!