Gaming/Unreal Development rig

[BigDan]

Hi all,


EDIT

I've completed my build, and just wanted to share. For those that were helpful I appreciate it.

Here's my completed build write up at http://pcpartpicker.com/b/FVhqqs

And a quick picture of the items (more picks over a pcpp)

 

[DigDog]

no to that case. there is no reason on earth or hell you should drop two-fifty on that case/PSU combo.

and you can get much cheaper SSDs that perform near-identical to that samsung for WAY less.

 

[BigDan]

no to that case. there is no reason on earth or hell you should drop two-fifty on that case/PSU combo.

and you can get much cheaper SSDs that perform near-identical to that samsung for WAY less.

Hrmm...

Case isnt an optional thing.. sorry way too cool to pass up.

As far as the ssd's, do you have an example? I thought M2 was the way to go, and my read times need to be fast for what i'm doing.

I plan to put OS, full adobe suite, UE4 and vs.net on it. the rest i'll "store" on an external or something..games as well.

 

[mnewsham]

What are the specs on the 650w PSU included with the case? As long as it isn't a piece of crap I guess it's fine, $250 is a steep price to pay for a case not made by Lian-Li or similar.

 

[DigDog]

the standard today is the Fractal Designs Define R5, or R4, or a short list of alternatives, which are absolutely faultless. the cost anything between $65 and $100.

a monster 750W platinum efficiency PSU from EVGA is $99. the equally good 650W is $79.



a 480Gb SSD can be had for as little as $99.

Built with a SATAIII 6Gb/s interface that is backwards compatible with SATAII 3Gb/s, the Torch LE SSD has transfer speeds of up to 560MB/s read and varying between capacities, write speeds of up to 425MB/s (120GB), 530MB/s (240GB) and 540MB/s (480GB and 960GB).

truth is, there is really little difference between the top end and the bottom when it comes to SSDs. is it worth it to pay 3x the price?

 

[mnewsham]

truth is, there is really little difference between the top end and the bottom when it comes to SSDs. is it worth it to pay 3x the price?

That really depends what you're doing. If you are needing a large amount of very fast storage to work with, the 950 Pro is a fantastic SSD. 2,000MB/s+ read speeds and 1,500MB/s write speeds are no joke if you can utilize it. The problem is the average user wont be doing anything that will see a benefit from those speeds.

That being said, in development having a large amount of very fast storage can be very beneficial, depending what you're trying to do. If you only need a few GB of space, a RAMDisk is going to be faster and pretty easy to set up, but if you need 300GB+ of working space that can be that fast, then a PCI SSD is your only real choice, and the NVMe 950 Pro is an excellent choice.

So TLDR, if the OP is confident he can utilize the speeds of the 950 pro, it's hard to recommend anything else.

 

[BigDan]

What are the specs on the 650w PSU included with the case? As long as it isn't a piece of crap I guess it's fine, $250 is a steep price to pay for a case not made by Lian-Li or similar.

It's a: Rosewill ARC-650, ARC Series 650W Power Supply, 80 PLUS Bronze Certified, Single +12V Rail, Intel 4th Gen CPU Ready, SLI & CrossFire Ready

As to the case(sheesh you guys dont like the cost of that case)

it comes with its own internal CPU cooling and a power supply... plus it looks pretty awesome. To me its not that much for all of that.

I had a 900D before that, and I know there are better overall cases, but love the unique look of this one.

Also, to your last point..this is why I went with the M2.. Unreal is pretty intensive on moving assets around/constant loading..I need it to be fast so rather pay a premium on that.

 

[lehtv]

it comes with its own internal CPU cooling

It just comes with a preinstalled 360mm AIO liquid cooler. That thing probably makes up the bulk of the price of the case, because a similar cooler bought separately will cost about $140. However, the thing with coolers like that is that they're meant for extreme performance and heavy overclocking, whereas you... well:

I'm not a big overclocker..if its "easy" i'll certainly try, but it's not something I do.

You would be much better off (in terms of value for money) with a standard air cooler HSF for sub $50.

The Rosewill Arc PSU might be fine, but I can't confirm that cos there are no reviews of the unit, or other units in the series. To me, a $2000 PC deserves a Gold efficiency unit with top quality capacitors and excellent performance. 7 year or longer warranty would als be on my shortlist. Arc has Bronze efficiency, and the fact that it has 3 year warranty and is built by ATNG (not so highly regarded but probably fine) suggests that it's a budget oriented unit and capacitor quality might be lacking.

I would recommend:
EVGA 650 G2 $80 AR - Gold, 7yr warranty, excellent quality and performance, very very quiet, fully modular cables
Phanteks Eclipse $70 AP - white, windowed, similar internal design to Genome
2 x Bitfenix Spectre 120mm $10 - extra fans for the case, it comes with 1 front and 1 rear fan, put additional fans at the front for a total of 3 intake fans
Arctic i32 120mm HSF $25 - plenty for mild OC, very quiet
= $195
-> save $55, get much better PSU and more appropriately sized cooler

Or if you want a liquid cooler, Arctic Liquid Freezer 120 $65 and Liquid Freezer 240 $100 are pretty good, they use the same quiet max 1300RPM fan. With a liquid cooler you can drop one of the extra case fans, perhaps both. Install the 120mm cooler in the rear slot or 240mm in the front of the case.

 

[BigDan]

It just comes with a preinstalled 360mm AIO liquid cooler. That thing probably makes up the bulk of the price of the case, because a similar cooler bought separately will cost about $140. However, the thing with coolers like that is that they're meant for extreme performance and heavy overclocking, whereas you... well:



You would be much better off (in terms of value for money) with a standard air cooler HSF for sub $50.

The Rosewill Arc PSU might be fine, but I can't confirm that cos there are no reviews of the unit, or other units in the series. To me, a $2000 PC deserves a Gold efficiency unit with top quality capacitors and excellent performance. 7 year or longer warranty would als be on my shortlist. Arc has Bronze efficiency, and the fact that it has 3 year warranty and is built by ATNG (not so highly regarded but probably fine) suggests that it's a budget oriented unit and capacitor quality might be lacking.

I would recommend:
EVGA 650 G2 $80 AR - Gold, 7yr warranty, excellent quality and performance, very very quiet, fully modular cables
Phanteks Eclipse $70 AP - white, windowed, similar internal design to Genome
2 x Bitfenix Spectre 120mm $10 - extra fans for the case, it comes with 1 front and 1 rear fan, put additional fans at the front for a total of 3 intake fans
Arctic i32 120mm HSF $25 - plenty for mild OC, very quiet
= $195
-> save $55, get much better PSU and more appropriately sized cooler

Or if you want a liquid cooler, Arctic Liquid Freezer 120 $65 and Liquid Freezer 240 $100 are pretty good, they use the same quiet max 1300RPM fan. With a liquid cooler you can drop one of the extra case fans, perhaps both. Install the 120mm cooler in the rear slot or 240mm in the front of the case.

Thanks,

Since the power supply is free it means nothing to me. I guess what i'll do is i'll keep the case (again, not optional i'm sold on it) and buy your recommended power supply on top of it.

The other power supply can make a nice paperweight or something!

Appreciate all the help guys! Sounds like overall its a good build.

 

[cyclohexane]

At this point, you shouldn't be getting a Maxwell card...

either get a 1070, or wait and get a polaris 10 next week.

 

[BigDan]

At this point, you shouldn't be getting a Maxwell card...

either get a 1070, or wait and get a polaris 10 next week.

Any good reason for that? the 980ti is a super good deal right now.

Also, (in my opinion)AMD sucks..def will never be buying that garbage.

 

[cyclohexane]

Any good reason for that? the 980ti is a super good deal right now.

Also, (in my opinion)AMD sucks..def will never be buying that garbage.

Depends, do you want to spend $199 for r9-480 and get 90% 980ti performance? Plus the 16nm node will give you much better power savings.

nvidia is good for certain applications, but when it comes to gaming there really is not much difference, with AMD even in the lead in certain segments.

 

[mnewsham]

again, not optional i'm sold on it

I guess I just dont understand why you want it besides the gimmick which you admit you wont even use...


Ah well, your money.

 

[BigDan]

Depends, do you want to spend $199 for r9-480 and get 90% 980ti performance? Plus the 16nm node will give you much better power savings.

nvidia is good for certain applications, but when it comes to gaming there really is not much difference, with AMD even in the lead in certain segments.

you're right again..reading all the reviews, its worth just spending the money and getting a 1080 over the 980. i'll just wait a tiny bit longer and do that then once they become a bit more available..

Can't do the amd route..will never happen. Also, I don't just "game" I need the power.

Thanks all!

 

[cyclohexane]

What "power"? Unless you're coding directly with CUDA, there is zero difference between NV and AMD consumer cards in most applications (photoshop, premiere, etc). And if you are serious about high performance computing, then you'd be looking at a Tesla card and not a gaming GPU.

 

[BigDan]

What "power"? Unless you're coding directly with CUDA, there is zero difference between NV and AMD consumer cards in most applications (photoshop, premiere, etc). And if you are serious about high performance computing, then you'd be looking at a Tesla card and not a gaming GPU.

lol, yes i'm going to go spend 5k on a tesla card.

plz close thread, i got the info I needed

 

[sm625]

Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB Video Card ($369.99 @ Newegg)

Good luck with that.

 

[BigDan]

Going to post an update

 

[BigDan]

Hey all,

I've completed my build, and just wanted to share. For those that were helpful I appreciate it.

Here's my completed build write up at http://pcpartpicker.com/b/FVhqqs

And a quick picture of the items (more picks over a pcpp)

 

[Burpo]

Nicely done :thumbsup: