Need help building a gaming PC for my nephew.

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ShotgunSteven

Lifer
May 31, 2001
15,326
2
0
I've been away from PC gaming and this site for a long time. Various family emergencies and other not-fun life events just sort of snowballed into a mess that was years in the clean up. A couple of years ago got my nephew a Dell XPS laptop (at his request using his money) but we're starting to think it has gone belly up for good, so we're looking at building a desktop gaming machine for him. (To give you some idea how long it's been since I kept up with this stuff, round cables were a novelty back then.)

In accordance with the stickied post:

1. This PC will be used for gaming. Occasionally a paper might be written, but gaming will be the big thing. League of Legends is his major poison, but I know he has a fair-sized STEAM library and does play games across all genres.

EDIT: Just remembered that he likes to record some sessions (especially LoL) to make YouTube videos, which made his laptop chug sometimes.

2. Budget range is $1000.00-$1200.00, but if there's some killer component that would be an extra hundred bucks I'd kick in the money for that myself.

3. Parts will be bought from the U.S., using whatever vendor has non-gouging shipping to Alaska.

4. N/A

5. Brand preference is Intel, NVidia, and Western Digital (but if some HD company is doing better than Western Digital these days, please let me know).

6. Current parts are a monitor I can give him and Win 7 ready for upgrade to 10, so no need to price in a monitor or OS.

7. System will be run at default speeds.

8. Resolution? I don't even know what's out there anymore, sorry. :(

9. We plan to build it in the next 60 days. He said he'd give me money to order parts on Monday, but if we're on the verge of a new release/price drop cycle we'd wait a few weeks.

10. I'm purchasing the OS for him, and anything else we need we can get later as we need it, no need to price that software into the initial build.

Thank you in advance for the assistance, and if you have further questions to help flesh this out I'll answer as I can.
 
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BonzaiDuck

BonzaiDuck

Lifer
Jun 30, 2004
16,656
2,035
126
Because you say the system will only run at default speeds, I did a search likely to turn up variants of the Devils Canyon or Haswell "Refresh" quad-core chips. The price differences that I see so far seem to make it "false economy" to buy a "non-K" processor. That is, the K processors are unlocked for full multiplier over-clocking. So I'd probably recommend either the i5-4690K or i7-4790K. The price-difference between the two models at Newegg is about ~$110. The quad-core 4790 offers Hyperthreading for 8 threads (which may facilitate some gaming at a margin), with a default base clock of 4.0 Ghz and turbo to 4.4. The 4690 i5 has no HT and the default clock range is 3.4 to 3.9 Ghz.

The bang-for-buck socket 1150 CPU is the $70 G3258 -- a dual-core Haswell that is supposedly a superb over-clocker. But for the price saving, I don't think your requirements embrace that possibility. Some may argue the point -- I can't say.

I use ASUS motherboards these days without exception, so obviously I'd recommend a model with Z97 chipset. Here's the list fitting those two choices at the Egg:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...ESTMATCH&Description=ASUS+Z97&N=-1&isNodeId=1

As a rule, I'd say the less expensive boards -- perhaps the Z97-A -- will provide overclocking features, but they'll have budget phase-power-design. They're still good boards: I have a Z77-A board in a system I just built for my brother. So while you say "run at default speeds," no sense in limiting yourself to un-tweakable choices.

If "Western Digital" is a priority among your options, that would be fine for an HDD, but you would really want to spend some money for an SSD as boot-system disk. 250 GB would be adequate; 500 GB would be better. Instead of the Samsung 840 or 850 models, I'd recommend either Crucial MX or BX models in the range between $100 and $250:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...MATCH&Description=Crucial+SSD&N=-1&isNodeId=1

Putting all the eggs in one basket, you could choose to spend on a 1TB SSD. I'd just as soon spend less than $100 on a WD Black HDD, another $40-to-$50 on a small capacity SSD like a Patriot Blaze or Mushkin Chronos of 60GB, and use the ISRT motherboard feature of the Z chipset to cache the HDD. Alternatively, for any motherboard for socket-1150, you could do the caching with a $30 license for Primo-Cache software. Too complicated? Well -- some would say you only really need to use the single HDD for gaming software if the boot disk is an SSD.

Graphics. Some will recommend the Radeon 280/290 cards, but you say NVidia. A GTX 960 might actually be sufficient. You'll spend upwards of $340 or so for a GTX 970, and more for a GTX 980.

With only a single graphics card, I'd narrow the power-supply choices to those below 650W, but I'd pick a good Seasonic modular unit, so figure $100 +/-.

8GB or a 2x4GB kit of DDR3-1600 RAM will probably run you less than $70. I'd recommend G.SKILL -- others will point to a variety of kits.

That leaves the choice of a case and an aftermarket cooler. I'd buy the aftermarket CPU cooler whether or not you choose to overclock the processor, but for $30 to $35, the Coolermaster Hyper 212 EVO is compact, efficient and good enough for the range of chips I mentioned.

Does this help? I'm sure a lot of other members would want to narrow your choices to some specifics. I figured you needed to come up to speed with this year's chipsets and processors. I think you can probably do this -- with the better options I proposed -- for less than $1,400.

You could save money on a computer case by recycling one already in your possession with sufficient airflow for adequate cooling. You could save money on the boot-system disk by choosing an SSD with capacity between 120 and 250GB. You can compromise the Graphics with a GTX 960 card and save another $100 over the 970. Cut the cost of a quad-core processor with the 4690K versus the 4790K, and the non-K units may only save an additional $50. The auxiliary hard disk of between 500GB and 1TB is still relatively chump-change. DDR3 RAM these days is pretty cheap, but 8GB is neither inadequate nor excessive.
 
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mfenn

Elite Member
Jan 17, 2010
22,400
5
71
www.mfenn.com
BonzaiDuck said:
The bang-for-buck socket 1150 CPU is the $70 G3258 -- a dual-core Haswell that is supposedly a superb over-clocker. But for the price saving, I don't think your requirements embrace that possibility. Some may argue the point -- I can't say.
Click to expand...

There's no point in going with a G3258 when the OP has a budget of $1000-1200. That chip is solely in the budget category. An i5 4690K or a Xeon E3-1231 V3 make the most sense.
 
BonzaiDuck

BonzaiDuck

Lifer
Jun 30, 2004
16,656
2,035
126
mfenn said:
There's no point in going with a G3258 when the OP has a budget of $1000-1200. That chip is solely in the budget category. An i5 4690K or a Xeon E3-1231 V3 make the most sense.
Click to expand...

I also agree -- but that's a corollary to the "necessary and sufficient" lack of need to overclock.

On the Xeon, does this make sense for Canyon-class performance with hyper-threading, or about $100 less than the price of the 4790K?

Does anyone know how this Xeon over-clocks compared to the Devils Canyon? The OP has the option, but I'm interested in the processor-line and these assertions. I still haven't made final commitment to the choices when I pull the check-out trigger for the machine I've put off since around February 2014.

And honestly -- my 2600K and 2700K -- take a lickin' and keep on tickin'. The only things I miss are the m.2 or SATA-Express type of SSDs, native Intel USB3, etc. All I need is ability to reserve a PCI-E x4 (or more) slot to add 4 more SATA-III drives. I think I can still have 2x SLI with that.

By the way: OP should check this -- look up some reliable reviews, etc.:

[Maximum PC June 2015 rating of "9"] -- Zotac GTX 750 Ti, shown here:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814500327

With the games that I play, I think I'm assuredly over-powered -- with 2x GTX 970. But I can compare an GTX 780 single GPU against the SLI, and for my simulators -- I can't much tell the difference.

If he wants to prepare for 4K, he should look into whatever prospects exist. That's just as likely to be easier with next-gen graphics. In the meantime, with a 1920x1080 Full HD monitor, that GTX 750 looks interesting. And -- think of it -- Two of them would cost around $280 to $300 with all the peripheral charges or tax.

There are also other 750 Ti models that don't need the six-pin power connection from the PSU.

The verdict, according to Max PC: "750 Ti more important to PC Gaming than the new GTX Titan X."
 
M

mfenn

Elite Member
Jan 17, 2010
22,400
5
71
www.mfenn.com
BonzaiDuck said:
I also agree -- but that's a corollary to the "necessary and sufficient" lack of need to overclock.
Click to expand...

I disagree. Even with a monster overclock, the G3258 isn't going to perform at the level of an i5 4690K (or other quad core) in most games. It just doesn't make sense at this budget level.

BonzaiDuck said:
Does anyone know how this Xeon over-clocks compared to the Devils Canyon? The OP has the option, but I'm interested in the processor-line and these assertions. I still haven't made final commitment to the choices when I pull the check-out trigger for the machine I've put off since around February 2014.
Click to expand...

That's easy, the Xeon doesn't OC.
 
BonzaiDuck

BonzaiDuck

Lifer
Jun 30, 2004
16,656
2,035
126
mfenn said:
I disagree. Even with a monster overclock, the G3258 isn't going to perform at the level of an i5 4690K (or other quad core) in most games. It just doesn't make sense at this budget level.
Click to expand...

Well -- I WOULDN'T disagree with your disagreement. Personally, I dismissed the brief hype spun about the dual-core processor. I could see, if you wanted a decidedly budget-build system, how some might spring for a $70 processor. But you're right about the OP's budget figure, and I'd choose either of the Devils Canyon or "refresh" quad-cores for what he wants.

mfenn said:
That's easy, the Xeon doesn't OC.
Click to expand...

Funny I would overlook that, but I just didn't know. It seems intuitively obvious, though.
 
S

ShotgunSteven

Lifer
May 31, 2001
15,326
2
0
Sorry, I'm back. Schedule change at work and I haven't been able to meet up with my nephew until today to go over the thread with him.
 
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escrow4

Diamond Member
Feb 4, 2013
3,339
122
106
If you are near or can get someone to a microcentre instead of a 4790K you can go full hexa core for $300 and get a 5820K:

http://www.microcenter.com/product/437203/Core_i7-5820k_33_GHz_LGA_2011_V3_Tray_Processor

I'd take 6 real cores anyday over a 4790K now if you want a long lasting build. Matching mobo isn't too pricey either; I use this one myself:

http://www.microcenter.com/product/446603/X99_Extreme4_LGA_2011-3_ATX_Intel_Motherboard

Only the RAM is spendy; DDR4 still isn't cheap. Even if the chip is an utter dog overclocking wise it should still clock up to 4.0GHz at least.
 
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nsafreak

Diamond Member
Oct 16, 2001
7,093
3
81
Too bad on the Microcenter, every time I do a new build I'm happy that I'm all of 10 minutes away from one. That being said here's what I would suggest for your nephew:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i7-4790K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor ($325.99 @ SuperBiiz)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler ($26.98 @ OutletPC)
Motherboard: ASRock Z97 PRO4 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($89.99 @ Micro Center)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($49.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($97.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($70.89 @ OutletPC)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 970 4GB Video Card ($319.98 @ NCIX US)
Case: Fractal Design Define R4 w/Window (Black Pearl) ATX Mid Tower Case ($79.99 @ NCIX US)
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA NEX 650W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($64.99 @ NCIX US)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 8.1 OEM (64-bit) ($87.98 @ OutletPC)
Total: $1214.77
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-06-08 12:04 EDT-0400

Potential areas to change:

1) The CPU: Going with an i7 4790k is purely optional. It will help things out if he's recording a session of LoL while playing it or if he streams a session of LoL across twitch. It won't make or break it though when doing those activities much less when he's just gaming. If you want to pay extra for it fine, otherwise feel free to drop down to an i5 4690k.

2) The SSD: I don't consider it optional myself but you can take it out of the build, or you can purchase a 500 GB for not too much more.

3) Case: They're largely personal preference. I really like a lot of the cases from Fractal Designs and InWin myself but feel free to go with something like a Corsair Carbide 200R or another case should you so choose.
 
S

ShotgunSteven

Lifer
May 31, 2001
15,326
2
0
It'll do what he wants and can be shipped to Alaska for cheaper than the other. The places I've checked with free shipping for the R4 are proportionately more expensive in price.
 
M

mfenn

Elite Member
Jan 17, 2010
22,400
5
71
www.mfenn.com
N

nsafreak

Diamond Member
Oct 16, 2001
7,093
3
81
mfenn said:
A HAF XB will work if your nephew is down with the look. It's a little bit of a weird arrangement because the motherboard is laying flat and the drives and PSU under it, but it's not too bad. It also has no sound dampening whatsoever, so expect it to be loud compared to a fully-enclosed case.
Click to expand...

Agree with mfenn on this one, all of the HAF series are typically on the loud side because they're designed around the idea of High Air Flow thus the HAF designation. Although you can have a lot of air flowing through a quiet case as well as has been shown with the R4 & R5 series of cases from Fractal Designs. Are you an Amazon Prime subscriber? If that's the case then might I suggest the Aerocool Aero-1000 or perhaps the Corsair Carbide 500r.
 
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