Got a friend that wants a high-end gaming rig, for $1600 or so. (Feeler thread)

[VirtualLarry]

First, this isn't a proper build thread. More like a "feeler" thread, with a few generalized questions. I've suggested that he get an account here, and post an actual build thread, and get some input from peeps here, but he hasn't done that yet.

I've pointed him at the System Builder's thread ($1000 build) in the past, so he's looked that over a few times in the past.

He also sent me a pic of someone else's build cart image from Newegg. It was a 4790K + GTX980ti build. I think it was around $1500 or so.

I told him that the new hotness is Skylake, and that, for gaming, he would want SKL over DC.

I also suggested, that since new video cards are going to drop very soon now, that if he was going to build in Feb., that possibly he would want to get a GTX970 instead of anything higher-end, because he would be replacing the video card soon after he bought it with a 14nm one. Would that be a wiser option, than buying highest-end right now? (Edit: His monitor is an Asus 1080P monitor, no Freesync / G-Sync, no 1440P/4K, no multi-monitor, and he probably won't be going SLI/CF.)

He wants to stream PC gaming to Twitch, but he's got his existing IVB i3, he said that from discussions with other streamers, that you get a better-quality stream, having a seperate, dedicated, streaming PC, rather than doing the gaming and the streaming on one "big" PC.

I told him that if he did want to game + stream on the same PC, to get a 5820K CPU and go HEDT instead.

I'll need suggestions for motherboards and cases, when he actually decides it's time to build, as I'm not all that well-versed in the "higher end" of those items. I generally buy the cheapest mobos and cases that have the features that I require.

Also, this build may go CLC water-cooling, and I don't have any experience with that yet. Though I've watched a few videos, and think I can handle that fine, assuming that the case in question supports the rad. layout. Probably 2x120mm?

Edit: We do have a Microcenter, less than an hour away. Though, I don't think that he's ever shopped there before. I could take a trip with him there when he gets ready to buy parts. Otherwise, he'll probably buy them from Newegg, and bring them over to my place to assemble.

Edit: So, in general, would he be able to fit an i7-6700K, a somewhat "Deluxe" motherboard, 16-32GB of RAM (would more than 16GB be needed for gaming?), a 1TB SATA6G SSD, 4TB+ HDD (prefer WD Black), and a GTX970, plus case / PSU / DVD or Blu-Ray drive? (I have DVD and BR drives in stock.) In $1600 more or less? (Maybe go with 512MB SSD? Those have been as low as $120 for Mushkin ECO2 or Reactor, SMI controller, MLC NAND, recently.)

Here's my take on it:
$400 i7-6700K
$200 Higher-end Z170 Mobo, like Gigabyte Z170-UD5 or one of their "Gaming" mobos, or maybe an MSI.
$100 per 16GB kit of DDR4-3000 or better RAM. (x2)
$250 1TB SATA6G SSD
$200 4TB WD Black
$300 GTX970

total: $1550

$50 BD-RE drive (14X or 16X LG @ Newegg)

that leaves no room for case + PSU, although he indicated that he could maybe stretch the budget a little bit.

Also, forgot, no cooler included with i7-6700K. A Corsair H110i is like $120, I think.

Edit: Also, are there any 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4 kits that are 3000 or better, and still only 1.2v?

 

[Ken g6]

Who's building this, you or him? Who's overclocking this, you, him, or nobody? Who's supporting this, you, him, or someone else?

Also, are there any 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4 kits that are 3000 or better, and still only 1.2v?

Nope. I thought I found one once, but the voltage was a lie misread by PCPartPicker. 🙁

Overall, this feels unbalanced with a 970 and with a 1080p monitor.

he's got his existing IVB i3

Hmm, replace with i7/Xeon, add 970, and stream with ShadowPlay? (Not the best streaming, but shouldn't be the worst either.)

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Why should he replace the GPU so soon? If the 970 is good enough, it's good enough. Especially if he's just doing a single 1080p display. And if new GPUs are coming out in month, might as well wait and avoid buyer's remorse and an additional hassle.

You're budgeting too much for RAM (16GB kits are like $75. Also, 16GB is plenty.)
You're not budgeting enough for SSD (a 'good' 1Tb is over $300 still.)
You're budgeting too much for the HDD. If it's just "cold" storage, there won't be any appreciable difference between that any anybody else's 4TB 7200rpm drive.
You're budgeting too much for a motherboard. (An SLI-capable Z170 board can be had under $150. Might not set any records, but will handle enough of an overclock to satisfy a guy who's currently rocking an i3.)
By the same token, do not spent $100 on an air cooler. 90% the performance for 50% the price or less.

Elbow curve.

Not your fault, but I'm a little offended that the 6700K seems to be consistently over $400. Sure, it's faster than the 6600K, but I'm not sure it's $150 faster. (Microcenter selling 4690Ks for $200 vs. 4790Ks for $300 was a bit more of a tempting upgrade.)

Also would be offended if I budgeting $1600 for a build and didn't get a top-end GPU.

Run this by him and see.

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/yPFDGX

But yeah, if new GPUs are coming out next month... wait.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Who's building this, you or him? Who's overclocking this, you, him, or nobody? Who's supporting this, you, him, or someone else?

He's buying the parts, I'm building it for him (for a small fee, yay), and as far as support, I suppose I'm on the hook for that, within reason. I don't know if he want to overclock or not. I had overclocked a Q6600 rig that I had built, perfectly stable for a month straight under 24/7 load @ 3.6Ghz at a low voltage. A cherry chip. Unfortunately, after he got it, he stuck it in a closed cabinet, and it apparently kind of cooked itself, such that it had instability problems that just got worse through its lifetime. He brought it back to me, eventually, and I down-clocked it to a more reasonable 3.2 or 3.3Ghz, and replaced the PSU. But he also bought an i3 3.4Ghz (stock) PC from me, with an SSD. (The SSD died some months in, after the power at his place failed. Now he's a little SSD-shy too.)

Nope. I thought I found one once, but the voltage was a lie misread by PCPartPicker. 🙁

Overall, this feels unbalanced with a 970 and with a 1080p monitor.

Why? Isn't a 970 a decent card for 1080P gaming? Edit: Are you suggesting that on that large a budget, that he should splurge for a higher-res monitor? He's streaming, I don't think that he wants to go higher than 1080P, nor does he want a bigger / better monitor.

Hmm, replace with i7/Xeon, add 970, and stream with ShadowPlay? (Not the best streaming, but shouldn't be the worst either.)

He wants a quality stream. From what I've read, ShadowPlay doesn't result in as high a quality stream at 1080P as CPU encoding.

 

[fourdegrees11]

If he wants the best performance now 4790k + 980ti absolutely destroys 6700k + 970 in every way imaginable except cpu benchmarks that have no effect on anything. For a 1080 rig there would be no reason to upgrade the gpu this year with a 980ti.

 

[Fallen Kell]

New GPU's aren't coming out in a month, but they are coming out in about 6 months. That said, these are really the first "new" GPU's in 4 years (finally getting a manufacturing process node change off of 28nm down to 16nm). Expectations are minimum of a 60-80% performance boost over current GPUs, with possibility of seeing a 150-200% boost. In other words, any GPU you buy right now is about to get blown away performance wise in just a few months.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Why should he replace the GPU so soon? If the 970 is good enough, it's good enough. Especially if he's just doing a single 1080p display. And if new GPUs are coming out in month, might as well wait and avoid buyer's remorse and an additional hassle.

That's the thing, I don't know when the new 14nm GPUs are dropping? Have you heard anything about the release date? He's building in Feb., most likely. I wasn't sure if the GPUs would be coming out in June (*) or whatever. (* Random guesstimate date.)

But yeah, if new GPUs are coming out next month... wait.

When are they coming out?

I guess, I just figured that the depreciation of whatever GPU he buys (in Feb.), would be less, if he bought lower on the product stack, and then he could buy a newer one six months later.

 

[VirtualLarry]

New GPU's aren't coming out in a month, but they are coming out in about 6 months. That said, these are really the first "new" GPU's in 4 years (finally getting a manufacturing process node change off of 28nm down to 16nm). Expectations are minimum of a 60-80% performance boost over current GPUs, with possibility of seeing a 150-200% boost. In other words, any GPU you buy right now is about to get blown away performance wise in just a few months.

That's the thing, my friend wants to build next month, and not hold it up for six months.

Does my idea of not buying too high on the product stack, because of the coming depreciation due to new cards, hold any merit?

 

[VirtualLarry]

Run this by him and see.

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/yPFDGX

But yeah, if new GPUs are coming out next month... wait.

Hmm. I have a few issues with your parts list.

Only 2133 RAM, with a Z170 mobo? Given how much FPS increase there is with faster DDR4 on SKL, I would get 2400 or 2800 RAM at the least, even if it's $10 more.

Edit: PCPP is showing $70 for a 16GB kit of those Crucial 2133, Newegg fairly recently had some Avexir 16GB of DDR4-2400 for the same price, and I know that the 8GB kit of Avexir 2400 will OC to 2600 or more fairly easily.

Second, GTX980? I've read that that card is kind of in a no-man's land as far as price / performance goes. Either drop down to 970, if on a budget, or go up to 980ti if you want performance. Plus, I think that the depreciation of a 980 would be worse, due to less demand and less resale value, than a 980ti.

Third, only a micro-ATX mobo and case? I haven't looked at the features of the ASRock Z170 Extreme4-M board, but their Pro4S ATX board, is often only $80 + ship at Newegg, rather than $130. I don't know what the difference is between the Extreme versus the Pro, but I know that the Pro4S has Intel gigabit ethernet, which is nice.

Thanks for making the effort, that's kind of basically the ballpark of stuff that I was looking for.

Good find on that $35 Blu-Ray Reader / DVD Writer, that's $5 cheaper than a 14X LG Blu-Ray Writer that I was considering. I don't really know how useful writing to Blu-Ray discs is going to be, but for my personal rigs, I did get writers.

Edit: What about dropping both the SSD and 4TB HDD, for a 2TB 7200RPM Seagate Hybrid Drive? I've used one of those personally; they're pretty decent. And dropping down to a GTX970? That would drop the price quite a bit.

 

[fourdegrees11]

The real question is, is he okay building a $1600 system now and then dropping $600 in 6-8 months for the gpu, or should he be setup with a $1000-1200 system now where he can drop $$ on the gpu upgrade down the road? 980ti is 50% faster then a 970, it isnt going to become a paper weight in 6 months

 

[VirtualLarry]

The real question is, is he okay building a $1600 system now and then dropping $600 in 6-8 months for the gpu, or should he be setup with a $1000-1200 system now where he can drop $$ on the gpu upgrade down the road?

Yes, I think that's something to be considered. (Building a $1200 rig now, and dropping $$$ on a massive 14nm GPU in the future.)

980ti is 50% faster then a 970, it isnt going to become a paper weight in 6 months

But isn't it twice the price? For 50% performance gain? Ok, everybody here seems to think that a 6700K with a GTX970 is "unbalanced". I had thought that a 970 was adequate for 1080P gaming, and you only had to move up to a 980ti, if you were doing higher res, or multi-monitor, or VR, or something. Is this not true?

Are there games on the market today, that a 6700K with a 970 will not get 60FPS regularly, but it would with a 980ti?

 

[ElFenix]

Normally I'm not a fan of waiting but we really are on the verge of the first real generational change for GPUs in years. Even then, if his budget were lower I say build now.

At $1600 he's close to a 980ti, if not there depending on exactly which board and whether microcenter has a better price on SKL before he builds. And if I'm spending that much I want a premium gaming experience. That means no 970, no 970ti 980. I want a 980ti.

Then again, I also don't want buyer's remorse in April when a $350 X70 or R9 480 is beating my $650 card.


That said I have no knowledge of what game streaming requires so this may be completely inappropriate for it.

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/FsPpf7

 

[VirtualLarry]

Thanks, ElFenix. A little over budget, but it's got a Samsung M.2 and a 980ti.

Next time I talk to him, I'll run these builds by him.

 

[fourdegrees11]

Sure the current $300 gpus can handle most games right now at 1080 very well, but there are a few games that even push a 980ti. 100% more money for 50% more performance is just the law of diminishing returns. The problem I have with some of the logic here is if a 980ti is too much for 1080 gaming what sense would it make to upgrade the gpu for 14/16nm? The only real question I have about 980ti performance into next years games is if driver support will be nerfed...

Anyway, I would probably recommend something like this with the options available to upgrade the gpu for next gen ($ saved now), or wait until AMD drops Fury prices shortly and just swap that in instead of what I'm showing here. The CPU could be upgraded within a couple years if needed

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i7-5820K 3.3GHz 6-Core Processor ($319.99 @ Micro Center)
CPU Cooler: Corsair H100i GTX 70.7 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler ($104.20 @ Amazon)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-X99-SLI ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard ($179.99 @ Micro Center)
Memory: G.Skill Value 16GB (4 x 4GB) DDR4-2400 Memory ($79.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 500GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($150.99 @ NCIX US)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 3TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($82.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Video Card: PowerColor Radeon R9 390 8GB Video Card ($259.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Fractal Design Define R4 (Black Pearl) ATX Mid Tower Case ($69.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: XFX TS 750W 80+ Gold Certified ATX Power Supply ($69.99 @ Newegg)
Optical Drive: LG WH14NS40 Blu-Ray/DVD/CD Writer ($46.39 @ OutletPC)
Total: $1364.51
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-01-20 21:16 EST-0500

Pricing for X99 is just too good vs Z710, especially with MC prices

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

I would wait for HBM2 to come out and see how it performs.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Third, only a micro-ATX mobo and case?

You know I love my compact systems.

Edit: What about dropping both the SSD and 4TB HDD, for a 2TB 7200RPM Seagate Hybrid Drive? I've used one of those personally; they're pretty decent.

*wince*

No. Don't do that.

 

[zir_blazer]

Memory: G.Skill Value 16GB (4 x 4GB) DDR4-2400 Memory ($79.99 @ Newegg)

I would pick 4 * 8 GB to be honest.

Storage: Seagate Barracuda 3TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($82.99 @ SuperBiiz)

You can't be serious about recomending the infamous HD that BackBlaze kills like flies - I would go for the Seagate 7200.15 4 TB model just because they have better reliability stats. Or a 3 TB Hitachi.

Optical Drive: LG WH14NS40 Blu-Ray/DVD/CD Writer ($46.39 @ OutletPC)

Unless optical media is going to be used, I would skip spending on one. USB Flash Drives are much more flexible than optical discs.

 

[fourdegrees11]

I would pick 4 * 8 GB to be honest.


You can't be serious about recomending the infamous HD that BackBlaze kills like flies - I would go for the Seagate 7200.15 4 TB model just because they have better reliability stats. Or a 3 TB Hitachi.


Unless optical media is going to be used, I would skip spending on one. USB Flash Drives are much more flexible than optical discs.

I'm of the impression that failure rates are just high in general for non enterprise HDD's across the board, not just specific seagate models, if I'm wrong then hey it's not a huge deal to swap models given the price flexibility of the build.

Why would 32 gb of RAM be needed? That mobo also has 8 slots, so it's easily expandable.

OP listed a BR burner, so it's included

 

[Charlie98]

Larry, does he have a current GPU he could use in a new system until the new cards come out?

Does he really need 3-4+GB storage?

In a single 1080 monitor, a GTX970 would work very well (I'm doing it now...) and be usable until the newer tech prices level off in a year or so (think Black Friday 2016.)

 

[VirtualLarry]

Larry, does he have a current GPU he could use in a new system until the new cards come out?

I sold him a 1GB 7790 card of mine for his i3 rig, when he said he wanted to use it to play PC games.

Does he really need 3-4+GB storage?

Not really. He could probably get by with a 512GB SSD as a primary OS drive. I was just thinking, if he expanded his streaming and PC game collection.

In a single 1080 monitor, a GTX970 would work very well (I'm doing it now...) and be usable until the newer tech prices level off in a year or so (think Black Friday 2016.)

I didn't think that the 970 was so bad for 1080P gaming. Granted, there may be a few 2015 titles that strain it a bit.

 

[VirtualLarry]

*wince*

No. Don't do that.

Well, my thinking was, with a single Hybrid Drive, he wouldn't have to worry about shuffling things (data backup, game installs, etc.) between the primary OS SSD, and the HDD.

The i3 I supplied him with, had a primary SSD, and a secondary HDD. I don't think that he ever even used or considered using the secondary HDD. At least, he didn't use it to back up important stuff that was on the primary SSD, so he lost some of it.

Nor has a different friend of mine.

I'm very seriously thinking of going with Hybrid drives for several of my friends that aren't complete tech-heads like myself, because of this factor.

 

[Charlie98]

I sold him a 1GB 7790 card of mine for his i3 rig, when he said he wanted to use it to play PC games.

Not really. He could probably get by with a 512GB SSD as a primary OS drive. I was just thinking, if he expanded his streaming and PC game collection.

I didn't think that the 970 was so bad for 1080P gaming. Granted, there may be a few 2015 titles that strain it a bit.

I don't know how the 7790 stacks up nowadays, but maybe... at least for a few months until the new tech arrives. In this manner, he can get used to his new rig, and then go even further with a new tech GPU in a few months... But I'm a cheapskate.

I have a 512GB SSD as my primary drive in my GAME rig, it has something like 15 games on it, including 2 big flight sims, along with the OS (W7) and it's at 75% I don't see why you can't install a 1-2TB HDD and a 256GB SSD, and put the game files on the HDD to save some money. If you set it up for him, any new games would store on the HDD by default, and he wouldn't run into storage problems.

The newest game I run on my rig is BF4, it runs without problems at high settings... but I can't quote you FPS readings and such.

 

[nerp]

Sounds like he shouldn't have an OC'd machine. And it really doesn't matter to OC if he sinks $1500 into it. I'd cut the size of that HD in half, get a H170 instead of a Z170 motherboard and use those savings for more cpu

 

[cbn]

I don't see why you can't install a 1-2TB HDD and a 256GB SSD, and put the game files on the HDD to save some money. If you set it up for him, any new games would store on the HDD by default, and he wouldn't run into storage problems.

Yes, if they are Steam Games that should happen automatically (provided Steam is installed on the HDD).

With that mentioned, I wonder how large his Steam Library is? Also does he buy games outside of Steam and not add them to his library?

 

[ArisVer]

Well, my thinking was, with a single Hybrid Drive, he wouldn't have to worry about shuffling things (data backup, game installs, etc.) between the primary OS SSD, and the HDD.

The i3 I supplied him with, had a primary SSD, and a secondary HDD. I don't think that he ever even used or considered using the secondary HDD. At least, he didn't use it to back up important stuff that was on the primary SSD, so he lost some of it.

For a hybrid disk you need something > 64GB NAND. And teach your friend to backup.