Gaming Rig to outlast PS4 and XBOX One - $900

[ShariqAnwer]

I want to build a gaming rig to outlast the next generation of consoles.
I am in India so shipping from US sites/stores is not an option.

Approximate Purchase Date:
July 13, 2013 - Can wait 1 month if something great is on the horizon.

Budget Range:
$800 - $900 (At max. $1000)

System Usage from Most to Least Important:
Gaming, Photo-editing, Watching Movies, Surfing

Are you buying a monitor: Yes / No
No.

Preferred Website(s) for Parts:
India -
Flipkart.com
mdcomputers.in

Location: City, State/Region, Country -
Kolkata, West Bengal, India.

Overclocking: Yes / No / Maybe
Maybe

SLI or Crossfire: Yes / No / Maybe
No

Your Monitor Resolution:
1440 x 900 - Current
1920 x 1080 or 1920 x 1200 - In October 2013

Additional Comments:
Looks don't matter. Performance at justified price does.
As PS4 and XBOX One 8-cored with GPU ~ HD 7870, need something to play games at High Settings for next 3 years.
GTX 760 or HD 7950 with boost? (3 GB 7950 - More Futureproof)
FX-8350 (8 Cores - More Futureproof?)
Seasonic s12ii 620 watts or Corsair TX 650 V2?
Corsair Vengeance 8 GB DDR3 1600
Corsair 300R or HAF 912 Combat?

Softwares -
Photoshop, GIMP, Far Cry 3, Crysis 3, Skyrim, Hitman - Absolution, Tomb Raider, NFS Most Wanted, COD, and Half Life 3 [/i]

And Most Important Why are You Upgrading:
Upgrading from 6 year old working Core 2 Duo E6550/8800 GTS PC

 

[Sleepingforest]

I'm going to break this to you gently: there is pretty much no way you'll get more out of a $900 gaming rig than a $500 console in the long run. That's because consoles, especially towards the end of their life, get pretty heavy optimizations, while PCs get not-so-great ports. A few more points about the folly of "futureproofing":

• By the time games need 3GB VRAM, a 7950 will be too weak to get more than like 30 frames per second on low/medium settings.
• By the time computing really needs 8 cores, you'll see 8 core CPUs commonly, and for relatively cheaper.
• Furthermore, AMD's "octocore" processors are not true 8 cores. An AMD octocore has 4 "modules," each of which have 2 integer cores and one floating point unit (FPU).
• Game physics and AI, the primary use of CPUs while gaming, use primarily floating point calculations. Thus, an AMD 8-core CPU is typically no better than an Intel 4-core, especially at the same clock speed.

 

[ShariqAnwer]

@Sleepingforest - Thanks for the information. I agree with what you say.
I'm open to all suggestions. I have no purchase anything yet.
I also do photo-editing on my PC. So getting a console is out.
What configuration would you suggest? The primary requirements being playing games in high details on 1080p monitor and photo-editing.

 

[mfenn]

I agree with SF, expecting a PC to outlast a dedicated gaming console is a losing proposition. What you can expect is that the PC will provide a consistently higher quality experience assuming you're willing to put a couple hundred bucks in it every few years.

Since you're buying in India, what's your budget in rupees? Should I do a straight conversion from dollars or did you do some other adjustments?

 

[ShariqAnwer]

Budget in Rupees - 60000. The cost in India is more than the straight conversion from USD. 60k is equivalent to around $850.

 

[mfenn]

Here's a build. I opted for Ivy Bridge because the CPUs and mobos are cheaper and that lets you get a better GPU.

i5 3570K Rs. 15.1K
ASRock Z77 Pro3 Rs. 7.5K
G.Skill DDR3 1600 8GB Rs. 4.7K
Sapphire 7950 3GB Rs. 24.1K
Seagate 500GB 7200RPM Rs. 3.3K
Corsair VS550 Rs. 3.3K
Bitfenix Merc Alpha Rs. 3.3K
Total: Rs. 61.3K

If you need to be strictly under 60K, you can drop the CPU to an i5 3470 and the motherboard to an ASRock H77 Pro4/MVP. You'll lose out on overclocking capability though.

 

[ShariqAnwer]

Thanks @mfenn.
Would VS550 be sufficient? I had PSU issues in my old rig with 8800 GTS till I switched to Cooler Master 550. And that was 6 years ago.
FX - 8350 costs 3k less than i5 - 3570K. Is it worth spending more? The comparison shows mixed results. http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/697?vs=701

 

[Essence_of_War]

Uhhh...in the handful of those that were actually gaming benchmarks, there were no mixed results. The i5 crushed the 8350.

 

[ShariqAnwer]

Which would be best for my build? (HD 7950 + CM Hyper 212 Evo + Moderate Overclocking)
1. FX 8350 + Asrock 990FX Extreme 4 (12800 + 11025 = 23825)
2. FX 8350 + Asus M5A99FX PRO R2.0 (12800 + 11232 = 24032)
3. Intel Core i5 3570k + Asrock Z77 Pro 4 (15300 + 8925 = 24225)
4. Intel Core i5 3570k + Asrock Z77 Pro 3 (15300 + 7500 = 22800)

Never heard of bitfenix.
Is Bitfenix Shinobi as good as 300R or HAF 912 Combat?

 

[DSF]

Assuming you will have no need of the features on the Pro4, option 4 would be the best.

 

[cbk]

I want to build a gaming rig to outlast the next generation of consoles.
I am in India so shipping from US sites/stores is not an option.

Approximate Purchase Date:
July 13, 2013 - Can wait 1 month if something great is on the horizon.

Budget Range:
$800 - $900 (At max. $1000)

System Usage from Most to Least Important:
Gaming, Photo-editing, Watching Movies, Surfing

Are you buying a monitor: Yes / No
No.

Preferred Website(s) for Parts:
India -
Flipkart.com
mdcomputers.in

Location: City, State/Region, Country -
Kolkata, West Bengal, India.

Overclocking: Yes / No / Maybe
Maybe

SLI or Crossfire: Yes / No / Maybe
No

Your Monitor Resolution:
1440 x 900 - Current
1920 x 1080 or 1920 x 1200 - In October 2013

Additional Comments:
Looks don't matter. Performance at justified price does.
As PS4 and XBOX One 8-cored with GPU ~ HD 7870, need something to play games at High Settings for next 3 years.
GTX 760 or HD 7950 with boost? (3 GB 7950 - More Futureproof)
FX-8350 (8 Cores - More Futureproof?)
Seasonic s12ii 620 watts or Corsair TX 650 V2?
Corsair Vengeance 8 GB DDR3 1600
Corsair 300R or HAF 912 Combat?

Softwares -
Photoshop, GIMP, Far Cry 3, Crysis 3, Skyrim, Hitman - Absolution, Tomb Raider, NFS Most Wanted, COD, and Half Life 3 [/i]

And Most Important Why are You Upgrading:
Upgrading from 6 year old working Core 2 Duo E6550/8800 GTS PC

I would not get an 8 core CPU. Go for a Core i5, they are better for gaming, which is the main use for this build

 

[mfenn]

Would VS550 be sufficient? I had PSU issues in my old rig with 8800 GTS till I switched to Cooler Master 550. And that was 6 years ago.

Yes, a 550W is plenty for a 7950.

Which would be best for my build? (HD 7950 + CM Hyper 212 Evo + Moderate Overclocking)
1. FX 8350 + Asrock 990FX Extreme 4 (12800 + 11025 = 23825)
2. FX 8350 + Asus M5A99FX PRO R2.0 (12800 + 11232 = 24032)
3. Intel Core i5 3570k + Asrock Z77 Pro 4 (15300 + 8925 = 24225)
4. Intel Core i5 3570k + Asrock Z77 Pro 3 (15300 + 7500 = 22800)

Uhhh...in the handful of those that were actually gaming benchmarks, there were no mixed results. The i5 crushed the 8350.

:thumbsup:

Assuming you will have no need of the features on the Pro4, option 4 would be the best.

Agree.

Never heard of bitfenix.
Is Bitfenix Shinobi as good as 300R or HAF 912 Combat?

I would rank them from best to worst as 300R, Shinobi, HAF 912. Get whichever costs less between the 300R and the Shinobi.

 

[ShariqAnwer]

Thanks guys. Your support is much appreciated.

Based on your suggestions, I have shortlisted the following components -
1. PSU - Seasonic S12II 620 Watts - 5500 (Second Choice - Corsair TX 650 V2 - 6400)
2. Cabinet - Corsair 300R - 4900 (Second Choice - Cooler Master HAF 912 Combat - 5100)
3. CPU Cooler - Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO - 2500 (Will get after 2 months)
4. GPU - Sapphire HD 7950 VAPOR-X 3GB DDR5 OC - 24500 (Second Choice - Zotac GTX 760 2GB DDR5 AMP Edition - 24000)
5. RAM - Corsair Vengeance 8GB DDR3 1600FSB - 3800 (Will get another 2 GB later)
6. DVD RW - ASUS DVD RW 24X - 1100
9. HDD - Seagate or Western 1 TB - 4300

Still doing flip-flops over the processor - FX 8350 (12800) or i5 3570K (15300)?
Considering 3570k costs 2500 more and has better performance in single core/thread games. But the next-gen consoles have 8 core processor and future games may be better optimized for multiple cores/threads. My speculation is that multi-threaded optimized games will start appearing next year. What should I do?

 

[Essence_of_War]

For reference, people had similar concerns about the Xbox360 and PS3, and it never really materialized.

If you were playing at REALLY high resolutions (3x 1080, 2560x1440, 2560x1600) Anandtech has a great article where they show that basically EVERY game is GPU bound at those resolutions at high settings, and CPU choice matters less than you might expect. In modern games, at your resolutions, the i5 will perform better.

It's possible things will change in the future, but it seems like a highly dubious proposition to intentionally purchase an underperforming cpu NOW, in the hopes that it will suddenly overperform LATER.

 

[ShariqAnwer]

@Essence_of_War - You are right. Present is Now. Ignoring present for future is foolish.
I got some game backlog to clear too. Will go for 3570k.

Thank you and everyone else for your help. Much appreciated.
And It's not a Goodbye. Planning to be regular here. Great company.

 

[Essence_of_War]

Let us know how the build goes!

 

[mfenn]

@Essence_of_War - You are right. Present is Now. Ignoring present for future is foolish.
I got some game backlog to clear too. Will go for 3570k.

Thank you and everyone else for your help. Much appreciated.
And It's not a Goodbye. Planning to be regular here. Great company.

Good choices and good luck.