New desktop computer

[whm1974]

Thanks.

I am wondering how much RAM do I need as well.

I have been doing some researches on the Internet, and I noticed that Chrome was consuming over 3 GB of memory. As it was consuming too much, I switched to Microsoft Edge, and it still consumed over 3 GB of memory with several tabs opened. In both scenarios, the computer became really slow. I wonder if this would be fixed by more RAM (such as 16 GB).

Suggestions?

If you can afford to do so, then I would just go for 16GB of memory.

 

[skaertus]

If you can afford to do so, then I would just go for 16GB of memory.

Thanks, I will definitely buy 16GB.

I am reading in several websites that the memory bandwidth makes all the difference in AMD Ryzen processors. While Intel processors would run just fine with 2666 MHz memory, I would be better with 3000 MHz memory if choosing to go AMD.

How should I choose memory when buying Intel or AMD?

 

[skaertus]

I was wondering about the heat a desktop computer generates.

The last desktop computer that I built was a Core i7-870 2.93 GHz (95W) with an nVidia GeForce GTX 470 (215W). It made the room hot and it was somewhat uncomfortable to use the computer in the summer.

My family still uses the computer, but the GTX 470 failed and was replaced with a GT 710 (19W). The GT 710 seems to generate far less heat than the GTX 470, but the room is still warmer than the rest of the house.

My current desktop has an i5-7500T (35W) with an integrated graphics card. It seems to run cool, and it does not generate much heat, nor does it make the room warm. It is a somewhat weak computer, but I have no heating issues with it.

I live in Brazil, which is a hot country, so computers running hot may be significantly more uncomfortable than in the U.S., for instance. On the other hand, we usually do not have air conditioning or heating, to help us keep temperatures adequate.

So, I wonder which specs I should go for keeping this is mind. I was wondering whether I should buy an i5-8600K or an i7-8700K, but there is a chance they run hotter than their slower counterparts. And I thought of a GTX 1070 or even 1080 video card, but they may be too hot. I wonder whether any additional performance would be offset by the discomfort caused by the increased heat. Considering that even an i7-870 with a GT 710 generates significant heat, I am a bit concerned about this.

Should I go for Intel or AMD to keep processors cool? Which model or TDP should I go for?

What about the video card? nVidia and not AMD to keep it cool, I suppose? Which model? The GTX 1060 perhaps is cooler than the others?

Or is a laptop-class processor with an integrated video card (ugh!) the only way to keep the computer cool?

Does a good cooling system make any difference here? I heard that a good cooler will not make any difference as the heat will have to be dissipated and will go to the room anyway.

Thanks.

 

[whm1974]

I was wondering about the heat a desktop computer generates.

The last desktop computer that I built was a Core i7-870 2.93 GHz (95W) with an nVidia GeForce GTX 470 (215W). It made the room hot and it was somewhat uncomfortable to use the computer in the summer.

My family still uses the computer, but the GTX 470 failed and was replaced with a GT 710 (19W). The GT 710 seems to generate far less heat than the GTX 470, but the room is still warmer than the rest of the house.

My current desktop has an i5-7500T (35W) with an integrated graphics card. It seems to run cool, and it does not generate much heat, nor does it make the room warm. It is a somewhat weak computer, but I have no heating issues with it.

I live in Brazil, which is a hot country, so computers running hot may be significantly more uncomfortable than in the U.S., for instance. On the other hand, we usually do not have air conditioning or heating, to help us keep temperatures adequate.

So, I wonder which specs I should go for keeping this is mind. I was wondering whether I should buy an i5-8600K or an i7-8700K, but there is a chance they run hotter than their slower counterparts. And I thought of a GTX 1070 or even 1080 video card, but they may be too hot. I wonder whether any additional performance would be offset by the discomfort caused by the increased heat. Considering that even an i7-870 with a GT 710 generates significant heat, I am a bit concerned about this.

Should I go for Intel or AMD to keep processors cool? Which model or TDP should I go for?

What about the video card? nVidia and not AMD to keep it cool, I suppose? Which model? The GTX 1060 perhaps is cooler than the others?

Or is a laptop-class processor with an integrated video card (ugh!) the only way to keep the computer cool?

Does a good cooling system make any difference here? I heard that a good cooler will not make any difference as the heat will have to be dissipated and will go to the room anyway.

Thanks.

In your case I will advise you to get a 65W TDP or lower CPU and good aftermarket HSF to go with it. They 1060 should be fine, but avoid the overclocked/superclocked modelers

 

[skaertus]

I still have not bought my desktop computer, as I waited for the presidential elections in my country (Brazil) to be over so the exchange rates could be more favorable and would stop fluctuating os much. Now I am in the market again.

And still struggling to decide on which desktop to buy.

I found a configuration which called my attention, which is the following:

Intel Core i9-9900K
Water Cooler Corsair H100i V2 dual fan 120mm
Motherboard Gigabyte Z390 Gaming X
32 GB DDR4 3000 MHz Corsair Vengeance LPX
Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 8 GB Gigabyte Gaming
SSD Samsung 970 EVO 1 TB (PCI-E x4)
HDD Seagate Barracuda 3 TB 7200 RPM
Case Aerocool Mid Tower LS-5200
PSU EVGA ATX 750 Watts Semi-modular

It seems a very powerful configuration, and I guess what could be considered ideal. This is selling kind of cheap for Brazilian standards. However, this is still a lot of money as it would still cost me around USD 3,800. I know I can find it cheaper in the U.S., but then there is the whole discussion about how to get the computer into Brazil without paying the abusive taxes (which is the reason why it is so expensive), and which I am not going into, so I will stick with that.

I could even spend that much, but I wonder if this is overkill. I am very picky, I do want a very fast and responsive machine with absolutely no lag, and I am extremely annoyed by bottlenecks. However, my needs are not particularly so demanding (and I also do some gaming, but hardly first-person shooters), so perhaps there is no reason to justify buying this one.

I could buy something far cheaper instead. For instance:

Intel Core i5-8600
(stock cooler)
Motherboard Gigabyte B360M DS3H
16 GB DDR4 2400 MHz Corsair Vengeance LPX
Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 OC 6 GB
SSD Kingston A1000 480 GB (PCI-E x2)
HDD Toshiba P300 2 TB 7200 RPM
Case Aerocool Aero 500 Mid Tower
PSU Corsair CX650 650 Watts

This configuration would still run me some USD 1,650. It is far cheaper but also far less powerful, but perhaps at least it could run cooler. I wonder whether this one would fit my needs and whether I would even notice the performance hit. I also wonder which are the components that would make more of a difference for me. I could upgrade or downgrade some of them.

Is there anything wrong with the configurations above? Perhaps the processor would not make much of a difference, but would the motherboard limit the speed somehow? Or would the slower SSD make any real difference (or should I go with a cheaper SATA III instead)? Or maybe the amount or speed of RAM? Any recommendations on what I should focus on?

Thanks.

 

[Arkaign]

I still have not bought my desktop computer, as I waited for the presidential elections in my country (Brazil) to be over so the exchange rates could be more favorable and would stop fluctuating os much. Now I am in the market again.

And still struggling to decide on which desktop to buy.

I found a configuration which called my attention, which is the following:

Intel Core i9-9900K
Water Cooler Corsair H100i V2 dual fan 120mm
Motherboard Gigabyte Z390 Gaming X
32 GB DDR4 3000 MHz Corsair Vengeance LPX
Nvidia GeForce RTX 2080 8 GB Gigabyte Gaming
SSD Samsung 970 EVO 1 TB (PCI-E x4)
HDD Seagate Barracuda 3 TB 7200 RPM
Case Aerocool Mid Tower LS-5200
PSU EVGA ATX 750 Watts Semi-modular

It seems a very powerful configuration, and I guess what could be considered ideal. This is selling kind of cheap for Brazilian standards. However, this is still a lot of money as it would still cost me around USD 3,800. I know I can find it cheaper in the U.S., but then there is the whole discussion about how to get the computer into Brazil without paying the abusive taxes (which is the reason why it is so expensive), and which I am not going into, so I will stick with that.

I could even spend that much, but I wonder if this is overkill. I am very picky, I do want a very fast and responsive machine with absolutely no lag, and I am extremely annoyed by bottlenecks. However, my needs are not particularly so demanding (and I also do some gaming, but hardly first-person shooters), so perhaps there is no reason to justify buying this one.

I could buy something far cheaper instead. For instance:

Intel Core i5-8600
(stock cooler)
Motherboard Gigabyte B360M DS3H
16 GB DDR4 2400 MHz Corsair Vengeance LPX
Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 OC 6 GB
SSD Kingston A1000 480 GB (PCI-E x2)
HDD Toshiba P300 2 TB 7200 RPM
Case Aerocool Aero 500 Mid Tower
PSU Corsair CX650 650 Watts

This configuration would still run me some USD 1,650. It is far cheaper but also far less powerful, but perhaps at least it could run cooler. I wonder whether this one would fit my needs and whether I would even notice the performance hit. I also wonder which are the components that would make more of a difference for me. I could upgrade or downgrade some of them.

Is there anything wrong with the configurations above? Perhaps the processor would not make much of a difference, but would the motherboard limit the speed somehow? Or would the slower SSD make any real difference (or should I go with a cheaper SATA III instead)? Or maybe the amount or speed of RAM? Any recommendations on what I should focus on?

Thanks.

Unless you are a very hardcore gamer with a high refresh monitor, you will get better value and upgrade path with a Ryzen system, such as a Ryzen 2700X.

Basically :

Ryzen 2700X or i5 9600k
X470 (AMD) or Z390 (Intel) motherboard
16GB (2x8GB) 3200Mhz B-Die DDR4
~480-512GB nVME SSD PCIe x4
2-4TB HDD
Quality 600+ PSU
Hyper 212+ Evo or better HSF (ideally Noctua 15 or so, avoid watercolors just for the headaches, excellent air coolers are quiet and effective)

2060 (for 1080p/100 or 1440p/60 gaming with appropriate settings)

2070 to 2080 (for 1080p/144 or 1440p/100 or 4k/60 gaming with appropriate settings)

2080ti (for 1440/144 or 4k/60 ultra gaming)

I cannot recommend the Vega 7 at this time due to extremely uneven optimizations. Some games run good, others fairly poorly for the cost.

Ideally find a deal on a good used 1080, 1080ti, or Vega64.

Good AIB models are as follows :

1070ti roughly equal to 2060, perhaps a shade slower

1080 roughly equal to 2070

1080ti roughly equal to 2080

Note : I am not talking about the much slower original 'FE/Founders Edition' 10xx models, but the dramatically faster 11Gbps AIBs such as Strix/Aorus/etc, which had faster ram, faster clocks, better cooling, and performance of as much as 20% higher than FE. Avoid 10xx FEs at all cost, while 20xx FEs are actually quite good.

 

[skaertus]

Unless you are a very hardcore gamer with a high refresh monitor, you will get better value and upgrade path with a Ryzen system, such as a Ryzen 2700X.

Basically :

Ryzen 2700X or i5 9600k
X470 (AMD) or Z390 (Intel) motherboard
16GB (2x8GB) 3200Mhz B-Die DDR4
~480-512GB nVME SSD PCIe x4
2-4TB HDD
Quality 600+ PSU
Hyper 212+ Evo or better HSF (ideally Noctua 15 or so, avoid watercolors just for the headaches, excellent air coolers are quiet and effective)

2060 (for 1080p/100 or 1440p/60 gaming with appropriate settings)

2070 to 2080 (for 1080p/144 or 1440p/100 or 4k/60 gaming with appropriate settings)

2080ti (for 1440/144 or 4k/60 ultra gaming)

I cannot recommend the Vega 7 at this time due to extremely uneven optimizations. Some games run good, others fairly poorly for the cost.

Ideally find a deal on a good used 1080, 1080ti, or Vega64.

Good AIB models are as follows :

1070ti roughly equal to 2060, perhaps a shade slower

1080 roughly equal to 2070

1080ti roughly equal to 2080

Note : I am not talking about the much slower original 'FE/Founders Edition' 10xx models, but the dramatically faster 11Gbps AIBs such as Strix/Aorus/etc, which had faster ram, faster clocks, better cooling, and performance of as much as 20% higher than FE. Avoid 10xx FEs at all cost, while 20xx FEs are actually quite good.

Thanks for this, much appreciated.

I would still have some questions.

1. I received several recommendations of AMD Ryzen processors instead of Intel Core, as they would represent a better value. I have not used or tested AMD processors in more than 10 years now, but I had very bad experiences in the past. I had three AMD processors back in the day, an AM486 DX4, a K6-2, and an Athlon XP. At the time, people recommended me those processors as they would be better than similar chips from Intel and at a better price. I was heavily disappointed, as I found all of them to deliver weak performance. When I see that Ryzen processors have weaker single-core performance, I wonder whether AMD is just increasing the number of cores and threads to keep up with Intel, and whether I would be similarly disappointed if I chose one of these processors. Or have AMD processors dramatically increased over these years so now they are indistinguishable from Intel?
2. Is there any reason why I should consider a Core i5-9600K processor instead of a Core i5-8700, for instance? A Core i5-9600K with a good cooler would have a price similar to a Core i7-8700. Would it make more sense to get a Core i5-9600K with less cores and less L3 cache to get more per-clock speed?
3. Is there any reason why I should consider a Z390 motherboard? Here in Brazil, a Z390 motherboard will usually cost more half the price of a Core i5-9600K processor. A B360M would cost less than half of that amount. A Z370 motherboard would also be considerably cheaper. Does the Z390 make any difference in stock performance? Does it have additional features that the other motherboards do not have, to justify the increased price? Or does it only make sense to get a Z390 to overclock?
4. How much difference does the cooler make? Or does it make sense only if I intend to overclock?
5. Should I consider overclocking at all? I have never overclocked before and, from what I heard and read, it reduces the life expectancy of the components and produce a lot of heat. Instead of buying a more expensive motherboard, cooler and PSU to overclock, isn't it more worth to just buy a more expensive but faster processor?
6. Is there any reason why I should consider 3200 MHz memory? They are far more expensive, and I was under the impression that 8th and 9th gen Intel Core processors support up to 2666 MHz memory only (so it would hardly make any difference).
7. Does a PCIe x4 SSD make sense? In benchmarks, they are dramatically faster than SATA III SSDs. However, I have seen some YouTube videos of SSDs booting Windows and applications, and SATA III and PCIe SSDs performed very similarly, with negligible difference. PCIe SSDs are nearly double the price of SATA III SSDs, so I ask whether it is worth to buy one if I am not planning to play around with very large files all day. Also, does a PCIe x2 make any sense? Most stores sell PCIe x2 SSDs (such as Kingston A1000), and for a somewhat reasonable price; PCIe x4 SSDs are rarer to find, so this would kind of restrict my options.
8. Does it make sense to get a GTX 10xx these days? For what I have read, an RTX 20xx is more energy-efficient and will produce less heat less than an equivalent GTX 10xx. I am no particular gamer, and I have mostly played casual games for some time now, and hardly any first-person shooters, so I suppose an RTX 2060 would be more than enough for me (although I do have a 4K monitor and these ray-tracing effects look really fantastic).
9. What PSU size is worth getting? Are these online calculators (such as http://www.coolermaster.com/power-supply-calculator/) reliable?

Thanks a lot.

 

[Arkaign]

Ryzen is an excellent CPU architecture. It is only slightly slower in gaming, and generally faster in nearly everything else, particularly for $ value. More importantly perhaps, in a blind test of i7 vs 2700X, one would probably be extremely hard pressed to tell the difference in use without checking the system properties i5 8th and 9th gen still deliver elite gaming performance, though deliberately choosing Intel might specifically pay off only if paired with a very VERY fast GPU, and a high refresh Gysnc or Freesync display of 144hz or better.

8th vs 9th gen Intel is very close to a wash, even more so if you follow an OC guide and do some minor OC yourself. In the US, it's often cheaper to just get current specials on new Intel CPUs as old ones are rarely discounted, instead they almost always just pull them from distribution still priced as MSRP. So feel free to basically consider eg; 8600k / 9600k equal, ditto i7 8700k vs 9700k (6C/12T vs 8C/8T, sort of a wash usually).

Z series boards are nearly universally higher quality, and support better features. However, if 390 pricing is extremely poor for you, a well supported Z370 is fine, such as the Gigabyte Z370 Aorus 5 or 7. If you plan on running an Intel CPU for many years, these high quality capacitors and VRMs ensure higher probability of stable operation and excellent performance. B series boards do not really support overclock, and tend to have cheaper components throughout.

HSF makes a lot of sense to me to upgrade to at least a 212+ Evo, as it provides a cooler running and quiet PC. Things like the bigger Noctuas are nice, but probably ok to skip unless i9 or extreme OC.

OC, yes, a conservative overclock will basically mean getting a notch or two higher in performance when paired with a decent motherboard and HSF.

Memory, if 3200 is very expensive there, falling back to 3000 is ok. I have noticed improved gaming performance going from 2400 to 3200, and now to 4000 (using optimized Bdie 3733). Good XMP on Intel z370/390 allows for this, and pays off in performance. Similarly, Ryzen with 3000 or 3200 is perfect. Less definitely does cause a hit to performance, specifically in higher end gaming (eg with a GTX 1070+).

PCIe SSD x4 faster than x2, faster than SATA, etc. This is however probably an area that is less critical, as it does not seem very noticeable in most gaming situations as long as you have enough Ram (16GB or more). The difference primarily comes with large files or very heavy multitasking, such as recording streams while gaming, also running lots of other apps in the background. You can scale back here to get the best fit for your budget without feeling like you've crippled your PC in a major way.

Ironically, RTX has increased power consumption and heat compared to GTX 10xx series for equivalent performance. RTX is extremely expensive, and offers two exclusive features that thus far have been very disappointing. DLSS results in somewhat blurry images compared to native rendering, and Raytracing comes with a fairly massive performance hit that means even the RTX 2080ti is often unable to run at an ideal framerate (RT ultra at 4k = skipped frames and drops well below 60fps, also at 1440p well below high refresh display ideals). This could potentially be different in the future, but we've seen two high profile games built with Nvidia cooperation, Battlefield V and Metro just yesterday, and neither provides a compelling justification for RTX expense, as nearly everyone would choose to just run with the features disabled so they would be able to hit excellent framerate instead of the serious hit to it.

Further, you can simply check your local market prices to see what is cheaper at these performance levels :

GTX 1070ti vs RTX 2060
GTX 1080 vs RTX 2070
GTX 1080ti vs RTX 2080

Note, this expressly means avoiding the Founders Edition blower model 10xx cards. Simply look for the quality units such as Asus Strix, Gigabyte Aorus, EVGA with ACX, etc. During 10xx lifetime, revisions and especially models with better cooling and stock clocks provided very solid leaps from FE specs, leading to improved performance. However, you have to look up specific model reviews to see the true performance gap, as simply looking at a review that shows say a 1080 and a 2070 will invariably only have the old 10Gbps stock clocks FE 1080 as a reference point, despite it being a very rare model, as the only ones commonly available for most of the past couple of years were far better revisions, especially those after the 11Gbps switchover.

At equal pricing in the breakdown above, the RTX option would be preferable in most cases. However, if you see on these equations a GTX 10xx that is noticably less expensive, choose that. For example, I found an Aorus 1080ti OC 11GB model for $400 still under warranty, which has better real world performance than a 2080, and was about half the price. Thus use your best judgement based on the prices and availability. I think you said you had a 4k display, which outside of extremely exotic examples are only 60hz. A 1080/2070 will need to have some settings dialed back to keep good performance there. Even a 1080ti or 2080 will often need some gentle tweaking down from all ultra settings to maintain good 4k/60 performance. Generally notching shadows and AA down a bit is effective without having to touch texture details or resolution. The 2080ti is even unable to always run 4k at 60hz with everything set to ultra/max.

However, if you have a 1080 or 1440 display, then a 1070ti or RTX 2060 is a very respectable matchup (and in my experience, worth it if you get a quality Gysnc or Freesync display, 100 times out of 100 I would choose 100 to 144hz variable refresh 1440p over 4k/60 non VRR).

 

[skaertus]

Ryzen is an excellent CPU architecture. It is only slightly slower in gaming, and generally faster in nearly everything else, particularly for $ value. More importantly perhaps, in a blind test of i7 vs 2700X, one would probably be extremely hard pressed to tell the difference in use without checking the system properties i5 8th and 9th gen still deliver elite gaming performance, though deliberately choosing Intel might specifically pay off only if paired with a very VERY fast GPU, and a high refresh Gysnc or Freesync display of 144hz or better.

8th vs 9th gen Intel is very close to a wash, even more so if you follow an OC guide and do some minor OC yourself. In the US, it's often cheaper to just get current specials on new Intel CPUs as old ones are rarely discounted, instead they almost always just pull them from distribution still priced as MSRP. So feel free to basically consider eg; 8600k / 9600k equal, ditto i7 8700k vs 9700k (6C/12T vs 8C/8T, sort of a wash usually).

Z series boards are nearly universally higher quality, and support better features. However, if 390 pricing is extremely poor for you, a well supported Z370 is fine, such as the Gigabyte Z370 Aorus 5 or 7. If you plan on running an Intel CPU for many years, these high quality capacitors and VRMs ensure higher probability of stable operation and excellent performance. B series boards do not really support overclock, and tend to have cheaper components throughout.

HSF makes a lot of sense to me to upgrade to at least a 212+ Evo, as it provides a cooler running and quiet PC. Things like the bigger Noctuas are nice, but probably ok to skip unless i9 or extreme OC.

OC, yes, a conservative overclock will basically mean getting a notch or two higher in performance when paired with a decent motherboard and HSF.

Memory, if 3200 is very expensive there, falling back to 3000 is ok. I have noticed improved gaming performance going from 2400 to 3200, and now to 4000 (using optimized Bdie 3733). Good XMP on Intel z370/390 allows for this, and pays off in performance. Similarly, Ryzen with 3000 or 3200 is perfect. Less definitely does cause a hit to performance, specifically in higher end gaming (eg with a GTX 1070+).

PCIe SSD x4 faster than x2, faster than SATA, etc. This is however probably an area that is less critical, as it does not seem very noticeable in most gaming situations as long as you have enough Ram (16GB or more). The difference primarily comes with large files or very heavy multitasking, such as recording streams while gaming, also running lots of other apps in the background. You can scale back here to get the best fit for your budget without feeling like you've crippled your PC in a major way.

Ironically, RTX has increased power consumption and heat compared to GTX 10xx series for equivalent performance. RTX is extremely expensive, and offers two exclusive features that thus far have been very disappointing. DLSS results in somewhat blurry images compared to native rendering, and Raytracing comes with a fairly massive performance hit that means even the RTX 2080ti is often unable to run at an ideal framerate (RT ultra at 4k = skipped frames and drops well below 60fps, also at 1440p well below high refresh display ideals). This could potentially be different in the future, but we've seen two high profile games built with Nvidia cooperation, Battlefield V and Metro just yesterday, and neither provides a compelling justification for RTX expense, as nearly everyone would choose to just run with the features disabled so they would be able to hit excellent framerate instead of the serious hit to it.

Further, you can simply check your local market prices to see what is cheaper at these performance levels :

GTX 1070ti vs RTX 2060
GTX 1080 vs RTX 2070
GTX 1080ti vs RTX 2080

Note, this expressly means avoiding the Founders Edition blower model 10xx cards. Simply look for the quality units such as Asus Strix, Gigabyte Aorus, EVGA with ACX, etc. During 10xx lifetime, revisions and especially models with better cooling and stock clocks provided very solid leaps from FE specs, leading to improved performance. However, you have to look up specific model reviews to see the true performance gap, as simply looking at a review that shows say a 1080 and a 2070 will invariably only have the old 10Gbps stock clocks FE 1080 as a reference point, despite it being a very rare model, as the only ones commonly available for most of the past couple of years were far better revisions, especially those after the 11Gbps switchover.

At equal pricing in the breakdown above, the RTX option would be preferable in most cases. However, if you see on these equations a GTX 10xx that is noticably less expensive, choose that. For example, I found an Aorus 1080ti OC 11GB model for $400 still under warranty, which has better real world performance than a 2080, and was about half the price. Thus use your best judgement based on the prices and availability. I think you said you had a 4k display, which outside of extremely exotic examples are only 60hz. A 1080/2070 will need to have some settings dialed back to keep good performance there. Even a 1080ti or 2080 will often need some gentle tweaking down from all ultra settings to maintain good 4k/60 performance. Generally notching shadows and AA down a bit is effective without having to touch texture details or resolution. The 2080ti is even unable to always run 4k at 60hz with everything set to ultra/max.

However, if you have a 1080 or 1440 display, then a 1070ti or RTX 2060 is a very respectable matchup (and in my experience, worth it if you get a quality Gysnc or Freesync display, 100 times out of 100 I would choose 100 to 144hz variable refresh 1440p over 4k/60 non VRR).

Thank you so much, you have been extremely helpful.

As for the Intel and AMD comparison, I would love to, but I am afraid I cannot do a blind test, as there are hardly any physical stores at hand in which I could spend some time with these processors. This is why, and to just play safe, I have been choosing Intel over the last few years. I recognize AMD may have improved over the years, but I would have to buy one to do the test.

Prices are approximately as follows for Intel:

i5-8400: US$ 274
i5-9400F: US$ 286
i5-8500: US$ 307
i5-8600: US$ 329
i5-9600K: US$ 393
i5-8600K: US$ 410
i7-8700: US$ 537
i7-8700K: US$ 620
i7-9700K: US$ 685

And for AMD:

Ryzen 5 1600: US$ 180
Ryzen 5 2400G: US$ 204
Ryzen 5 2600: US$ 246
Ryzen 5 2600X: US$ 301
Ryzen 7 2700: US$ 388
Ryzen 7 2700X: 491

They are all very expensive, but everything tech-related is highly taxed here in Brazil (these are some of the cheapest I could find).

Ryzen are generally cheaper than Intel, and the motherboards tend to be marginally cheaper (I suppose), but it would require faster RAM (as I have read).

As for the motherboard, my question is whether it is really worth it. I read in several places that a motherboard does not really make any difference unless I plan to overclock. But later I have seen some benchmarks which showed that a bad motherboard might result in a performance hit, so I am really curious about this. A Z390 motherboard costs around US$ 200, a Z370 costs US$ 175, a B360M costs US$ 115, and a H310M costs US$ 90. I wonder if the price premium is worth it, if there is really any improvement in performance.

What is the potential of the OC harming the machine in any form, or increasing the temperature of the room?

As for the memory, there are some price differences, and I was under the impression (from what I heard) that it did not make any real difference in performance using Intel processors (but they would if I was to use AMD). Each 8 GB chip would cost approximately as follows: 2400 MHz for US$ 97; 2666 MHz for US$ 105; 3000 MHz for US$ 135; 3200 MHz for US$ 150; 3600 MHz for US$ 212. Faster chips are hard to find. And I wonder if the performance gain justifies paying a high premium or when it does make sense to stop increasing the speed of the RAM.

In terms of video cards, is there any brand that is worth going for? Or are they all the same basically? There are some video cards from a brand called Gainward, which I never heard of before; are they reliable? Prices of video cards are kind of like this:

GTX 1060: US$ 293 - 399
RTX 2060: US$ 477 - 565
GTX 1070: US$ 575 - 787
RTX 2070: US$ 730 - 1,120
RTX 2080: US$ 1,057 - US$ 1,294
GTX 1080 Ti: US$ 1,180
RTX 2080 Ti: US$ 1,690 - 1,800

They are quite different and all from the same store. The GTX 10xx cards are increasingly rare to find, and I can hardly find the GTX 1070, 1080 and 1080 Ti. And for the prices above, I guess the RTX 2060 or the RTX 2070 could be good options.

 

[Arkaign]

Ouch, yeah I forgot about just how dire the markups are for Brasil. Obrigado for the reminder and insight into the PC scene there.

Ok, so assuming this range of options is both sufficient to be adequate for the other PC purposes (even a fairly low end i5 or Ryzen 5 is still VERY powerful for general use) and that your primary reason for getting something is to be able to game adequately for a good period of time, I think focusing on GPU will pay the biggest return, within reason.

Looking at your prices, an i5 8400, 9400F, and Ryzen 5 2600 are the best bets to keep budget sane. Intel 6C/6T, better gaming performance. AMD 6C/12T, better multitasking performance and may possibly age better (eg; Intel i5 2500k vs i7 2600k, 4C/4T vs 4C/8T, the i7 indeed aged better with modern games and is even still viable today with a good OC. A 4.8Ghz 2600k paired with a 2070 is a pretty stout combo lol). Let's choose i5-8400, it's probably 1% slower than 9400F, but instead of disabled iGPU, it has one, which can be handy should you be without a GPU for a time, or if you want to perhaps sell your system without the dGPU and rebuild to something else in the future. It just gives you more options in that way.

As it is not overclockable, you can pair it with a B-series motherboard and not miss out. Only reason to go Z370/390 is for unlocked overclocking and high end features and construction. But for stock clocks, any respectable brand B series will be ok. On the subject of overclocking and damage, even though it will not apply here, unless you go bananas with voltage, it's extremely safe. I have built many many thousands of PCs since the 1980s, and haven't seen a CPU die from OC since the Athlon XP days.

For cooling, absolutely go with a CM 212 if it isn't very expensive. It will make for a very very quiet combo with the i5. Stock Intel HSF are just fairly poor, and can ramp up and become noisy when ambient temps are high and/or high CPU load. Of course here, that's a $25-$30 part. If it's out of control there, then you could compromise. Note, look up the Cooler Master 212+ Evo to get a good idea of what it looks like and the overall aspects of it. There are now countless clones of it, and one of those may be more affordable in your stores. They all perform fairly similarly.

Memory, it hurts to see how bad that pricing is, as 3000/3200 are definitely the sweet spot for performance with both Intel and AMD's current offerings, but if the $30 difference between 2666 and 3000 is a serious hit to the budget, then 2666 will be adequate. You may have luck using a higher XMP profile to at least 2800 speed (I am running 4000Mhz on 3777Mhz Spec myself).

Given the prices you are showing on GPUs, the 10xx are definitely not an option that makes any sense. We have a plentiful and solid second-hand market here (I particularly like our FS/FT section where we have many trusted members selling solid products) and the 10xx $ for $ here is often an outstanding deal. But those prices you listed, no, the new RTX is hands down the better deal, all the more so with new sealed product, no wear on the fan motors, game coupons, etc. Building from this direction down, you now need to look at what you have in the budget to work with.

RTX 2060 is faster than 1070, but is not really very effective at running RTX features in the games released so far. 6GB in the face of new 9th gen consoles hitting streets next year (thus, all new PC gaming ports often aimed at console specs, and these will have likely 10-12GB available for VRAM) means that I wouldn't put it at the top of my list for a PC that would hold up really well for 3-4 years. I expect that 2060 will look really good through 2019 and 2020, then start to buckle a bit in 2021 when games start loading up texture detail in crossgen stuff aimed at PS5/etc. Dropping settings of course can mitigate this to one degree or another.

RTX 2070 doesn't make a lot of sense to me. It's way more expensive than 2060, but not very much faster. The 8GB is better, but again, may not even begin to really pay off for about two years.

RTX 2080 if you can swing it is probably the best option. It is about 1080ti performance, but with the plusses of extra features on the gamble that they eventually pay off in ways we haven't seen yet, but with the slight negative of 8GB vs 11GB VRAM. On average though I think 2080 and 1080ti will age about the same.

RTX 2080ti is simply absurdly priced. I couldn't honestly recommend one unless money literally had no meaning to you.

So I think the choice is 2060 or 2080. For 4K, the 2080 will offer far more satisfaction for sure. You'll just have to weigh it yourself and decide if the massive price difference is worth it. If you have access to a 1440p monitor (particularly one with good Freesync or Gysnc support), it would probably give a much better experience. Locking 4K/60fps is a tough ask for all GPUs, and it can be a jittery/torn frame mess if you don't keep your minimums up well. Variable refresh displays maintain smooth performance even with uneven framerates, and when hitting the 75-144hz range look absolutely amazing in person compared to 60 or 30. If you do just match one of these cards with a 4K/60 TV, then DEFINITELY become an expert on tuning settings for each game.

In general :

Anisotropic filtering / AF, can be maxed out with no problems or significant performance hit.

Textures can be maxed out with no problems or significant performance hit UNLESS you exceed VRAM limits. Then things plummet and hitch/stutter like crazy. Most games won't have problems with this yet of course.

Shadows, this is an area which can offer substantial performance differences at each stage between low and ultra/max. I often notch this back to medium or high if it means I can maintain a higher or more stable framerate, and to me it's much less noticeable than dropping textures, resolution, or lighting.

Lighting. This is an area which can be extremely variable, but it's more noticeable to drop compared to Shadows for sure. Case by case basic depending on how you think the changes look in person vs the performance change.

Ambient Occlusion / AO, eg HBAO/HBAO+. Generally results in a much better experience, though you can swap through the settings to decide for yourself. Can definitely bring a performance gap.

Antialiasing / AA, eg TAA, FXAA, MSAA, etc. This can have moderate to extreme performance hits. I notice this much much less on high refresh/high resolution displays as compared to the old 1080p/1200p days. I also personally very much dislike overly blurry forms of AA, so I often simply run AA disabled for the combination of extremely sharp image and maximum performance, even at the cost of some aliasing on edges. It's a case by case basis, and this is one of the most 'eye of the beholder' settings to look at. Some people really want aggressive and often blurry AA even at some hard performance drops, some people want the sharper look and higher performance, even with some jaggy aliasing on some edges at times. AA type, forced in driver vs in-game, which engine a game is using, developer implementation of the setting, patches that later offer more/fixed AA, all of this is VERY game-by-game (admittedly a part of why I simply run without it much of the time, it can be pretty time consuming to figure out the best option for every game, I just got to the point where 9 out of 10 times I didn't like the results either for the blur or the performance drop or both, and am not bothered by a bit of aliasing). Only you can decide what looks/feels like the best compromise here.

 

[Flayed]

Wow those prices are harsh. I'd suggest an i5-8400, a B360M board, 16GB DDR4 2666 and an RTX 2060.

 

[Arkaign]

Wow those prices are harsh. I'd suggest an i5-8400, a B360M board, 16GB DDR4 2666 and an RTX 2060.

Lol, pretty much my take, summarized Caveat : with the 2080 if budget allows (he is on 4k). However, judicious settings should still be workable with the 2060 build.

 

[skaertus]

Ouch, yeah I forgot about just how dire the markups are for Brasil. Obrigado for the reminder and insight into the PC scene there.

Ok, so assuming this range of options is both sufficient to be adequate for the other PC purposes (even a fairly low end i5 or Ryzen 5 is still VERY powerful for general use) and that your primary reason for getting something is to be able to game adequately for a good period of time, I think focusing on GPU will pay the biggest return, within reason.

Looking at your prices, an i5 8400, 9400F, and Ryzen 5 2600 are the best bets to keep budget sane. Intel 6C/6T, better gaming performance. AMD 6C/12T, better multitasking performance and may possibly age better (eg; Intel i5 2500k vs i7 2600k, 4C/4T vs 4C/8T, the i7 indeed aged better with modern games and is even still viable today with a good OC. A 4.8Ghz 2600k paired with a 2070 is a pretty stout combo lol). Let's choose i5-8400, it's probably 1% slower than 9400F, but instead of disabled iGPU, it has one, which can be handy should you be without a GPU for a time, or if you want to perhaps sell your system without the dGPU and rebuild to something else in the future. It just gives you more options in that way.

As it is not overclockable, you can pair it with a B-series motherboard and not miss out. Only reason to go Z370/390 is for unlocked overclocking and high end features and construction. But for stock clocks, any respectable brand B series will be ok. On the subject of overclocking and damage, even though it will not apply here, unless you go bananas with voltage, it's extremely safe. I have built many many thousands of PCs since the 1980s, and haven't seen a CPU die from OC since the Athlon XP days.

For cooling, absolutely go with a CM 212 if it isn't very expensive. It will make for a very very quiet combo with the i5. Stock Intel HSF are just fairly poor, and can ramp up and become noisy when ambient temps are high and/or high CPU load. Of course here, that's a $25-$30 part. If it's out of control there, then you could compromise. Note, look up the Cooler Master 212+ Evo to get a good idea of what it looks like and the overall aspects of it. There are now countless clones of it, and one of those may be more affordable in your stores. They all perform fairly similarly.

Memory, it hurts to see how bad that pricing is, as 3000/3200 are definitely the sweet spot for performance with both Intel and AMD's current offerings, but if the $30 difference between 2666 and 3000 is a serious hit to the budget, then 2666 will be adequate. You may have luck using a higher XMP profile to at least 2800 speed (I am running 4000Mhz on 3777Mhz Spec myself).

Given the prices you are showing on GPUs, the 10xx are definitely not an option that makes any sense. We have a plentiful and solid second-hand market here (I particularly like our FS/FT section where we have many trusted members selling solid products) and the 10xx $ for $ here is often an outstanding deal. But those prices you listed, no, the new RTX is hands down the better deal, all the more so with new sealed product, no wear on the fan motors, game coupons, etc. Building from this direction down, you now need to look at what you have in the budget to work with.

RTX 2060 is faster than 1070, but is not really very effective at running RTX features in the games released so far. 6GB in the face of new 9th gen consoles hitting streets next year (thus, all new PC gaming ports often aimed at console specs, and these will have likely 10-12GB available for VRAM) means that I wouldn't put it at the top of my list for a PC that would hold up really well for 3-4 years. I expect that 2060 will look really good through 2019 and 2020, then start to buckle a bit in 2021 when games start loading up texture detail in crossgen stuff aimed at PS5/etc. Dropping settings of course can mitigate this to one degree or another.

RTX 2070 doesn't make a lot of sense to me. It's way more expensive than 2060, but not very much faster. The 8GB is better, but again, may not even begin to really pay off for about two years.

RTX 2080 if you can swing it is probably the best option. It is about 1080ti performance, but with the plusses of extra features on the gamble that they eventually pay off in ways we haven't seen yet, but with the slight negative of 8GB vs 11GB VRAM. On average though I think 2080 and 1080ti will age about the same.

RTX 2080ti is simply absurdly priced. I couldn't honestly recommend one unless money literally had no meaning to you.

So I think the choice is 2060 or 2080. For 4K, the 2080 will offer far more satisfaction for sure. You'll just have to weigh it yourself and decide if the massive price difference is worth it. If you have access to a 1440p monitor (particularly one with good Freesync or Gysnc support), it would probably give a much better experience. Locking 4K/60fps is a tough ask for all GPUs, and it can be a jittery/torn frame mess if you don't keep your minimums up well. Variable refresh displays maintain smooth performance even with uneven framerates, and when hitting the 75-144hz range look absolutely amazing in person compared to 60 or 30. If you do just match one of these cards with a 4K/60 TV, then DEFINITELY become an expert on tuning settings for each game.

In general :

Anisotropic filtering / AF, can be maxed out with no problems or significant performance hit.

Textures can be maxed out with no problems or significant performance hit UNLESS you exceed VRAM limits. Then things plummet and hitch/stutter like crazy. Most games won't have problems with this yet of course.

Shadows, this is an area which can offer substantial performance differences at each stage between low and ultra/max. I often notch this back to medium or high if it means I can maintain a higher or more stable framerate, and to me it's much less noticeable than dropping textures, resolution, or lighting.

Lighting. This is an area which can be extremely variable, but it's more noticeable to drop compared to Shadows for sure. Case by case basic depending on how you think the changes look in person vs the performance change.

Ambient Occlusion / AO, eg HBAO/HBAO+. Generally results in a much better experience, though you can swap through the settings to decide for yourself. Can definitely bring a performance gap.

Antialiasing / AA, eg TAA, FXAA, MSAA, etc. This can have moderate to extreme performance hits. I notice this much much less on high refresh/high resolution displays as compared to the old 1080p/1200p days. I also personally very much dislike overly blurry forms of AA, so I often simply run AA disabled for the combination of extremely sharp image and maximum performance, even at the cost of some aliasing on edges. It's a case by case basis, and this is one of the most 'eye of the beholder' settings to look at. Some people really want aggressive and often blurry AA even at some hard performance drops, some people want the sharper look and higher performance, even with some jaggy aliasing on some edges at times. AA type, forced in driver vs in-game, which engine a game is using, developer implementation of the setting, patches that later offer more/fixed AA, all of this is VERY game-by-game (admittedly a part of why I simply run without it much of the time, it can be pretty time consuming to figure out the best option for every game, I just got to the point where 9 out of 10 times I didn't like the results either for the blur or the performance drop or both, and am not bothered by a bit of aliasing). Only you can decide what looks/feels like the best compromise here.

Thanks a lot, again!

I found a store which is reasonably cheaper but not everything is available. They have a physical store here in São Paulo that I may visit Saturday (so I do not have to buy it online) and they build the computer themselves. This here would be a high-end configuration:

Core i9-9900K
Zero K Z2 PCYes cooler
Asus Z390-Plus motherboard
32 GB DDR4 3000 MHz Corsair Vengeance
Gigabyte GeForce RTX 2080 Gaming OC 8 GB
480 GB SATA III SSD Kingston A400
3 TB SATA III HD Segate Barracuda 7200 RPM
PSU Corsair 750W real
Gamemax Infinit M908 case
US$ 3,200

Now this one here is far more affordable:

Core i5-8400
Zero K Z2 PCYes cooler
Gigabyte B360M Gaming motherboard
32 GB DDR4 3000 MHz Corsair Vengeance
Gigabyte GeForce RTX 2060 6 GB Mini ITX OC
480 GB SATA III SSD Kingston A400
3 TB SATA III HD Segate Barracuda 7200 RPM
PSU Gigabyte 650W Bronze 80 Plus
Gamemax Infinit M908 case
US$ 1,675

These prices are not out of this world considering the range here in Brazil. I can, of course, change the configuration as I like, but there are not too many options.

Processor

The Intel ones:

Core i5-8400, US$ 270
Core i5-8500, US$ 368
Core i5-8600K, US$ 372
Core i5-9600K, US$ 372
Core i7-8700, US$ 482
Core i7-8700K, US$ 616
Core i7-9700K, US$ 639
Core i9-9900K, US$ 810

As for AMD:

Ryzen 5 2600: US$ 269
Ryzen 7 1800X: US$ 332
Ryzen 7 2700: US$ 434

Not too many options for AMD Ryzen in this store. The Intel processors worth taking a look seem to be (I guess) the i5-8400, the i5-9600K, the i7-8700, the i7-9700K, and the i9-9900K.

Cooler

I could not find a Cooler Master 212 Evo for sale here in Brazil. Nowhere to be found. There is a Cooler Master H411R which I found for sale, for some US$ 39. I am not sure whether this cooler I mentioned is good or not, it has a 600-1200 RPM speed, and 14-23.8 dB noise level, and costs US$ 20 only. Not too many options here.

I wonder if this cooler would be OK even for a faster processor which could be overclocked such as the i5-9600K or the i9-9900K.

Motherboard

You mentioned that high-end motherboards may have high-end features. What those would be? Intel Optane support, for instance, and is it worth it? Does every 1151 motherboard support boot via a PCI-E SSD, for instance? What would a Z390 motherboard deliver that a B360M won't?

Would there be a performance hit in choosing a better processor (such as a 9th gen K-one) and a B360M motherboard?

I came across some motherboards I never heard of before, such as Z270, DQ670W, TB250, B250, B150, and so on. There are some cheap models, and I am not really sure what to look at.

I can buy a better motherboard if that is the case, but I do not think it makes sense to buy a motherboard that costs almost the same as the processor itself. Or does it?

Memory

This 32 GB 3000 MHz Corsair Vengeance RAM kit is really a bargain here, for US$ 354. The 16 GB set for the same memory is selling for 210. A 16 GB 2666 MHz kit sells for US$ 185. So I suppose that I do not really need 32 GB, but that would be sweet and it may be worth it.

Video card

That is the expensive part. Not too many options in this store.

Galax GeForce RTX 2080 Ti 11GB OC, US$ 1,743
Gigabyte GeForce RTX 2080 Gaming OC 8GB, US$ 1,355
Asus GeForce RTX 2070 Dual OC 8GB, US$ 890
Galax GeForce RTX 2070 EX OC 8GB, US$ 832
Galax GeForce RTX 2070 OC 8GB, US$ 780
Gigabyte GeForce RTX 2060 6GB Mini ITX OC, US$ 512
Gigabyte GeForce GTX 1060 6GB G1 Gaming, US$ 435
Galax GeForce GTX 1060 6GB, US$ 357

I suppose the RTX 2060 or the RTX 2070 could make more sense here, but not sure.

Storage

Not too many options. The 480 GB Kingston A400 is not great, but sells for US$ 97. Apart from that, the Sandisk Plus with 960 GB sells for US$ 246.

The 3 TB Seagate HD sells for US$ 110, and there are not too many options. There are some 5400 and 5900 RPM HDs, but I think those would be too slow.

PSU

There are some really cheap PSUs, from brands which I never heard of, such as Akasa or Knup. I am afraid of buying those, and even brands such as Thermaltake I may avoid. Perhaps I should go with more expensive Corsair or Cooler Master or EVGA.

I wonder which PSU I would need.

As for the case, not too many options here, I just want something that is OK.

 

[skaertus]

Wow those prices are harsh. I'd suggest an i5-8400, a B360M board, 16GB DDR4 2666 and an RTX 2060.

Thanks. The prices here are absurd. This is an option, and it would run me some US$ 1,500 at least. An upgrade to an RTX 2080 would cost me some double that amount.

 

[Flayed]

It's a good idea to define what you want to do with your computer and set a budget before picking out parts.

I had a friend a few years ago build his first PC, he wanted the best parts so he got an i7 6700k and a Titan graphics card (back when they were the fastest).
He bought all the stuff an expensive SSD, AIO cooler and overclocked it to 4.8Gz as I recall. I found it funny because he didn't like to play games, he learned some C and Java Programming on it and some web stuff. All he used it for was notepad++ and netbeans IDE.

I think he liked building it more than using it. He ended up selling it on craigslist to buy blow lol

 

[Arkaign]

The i9 9900k is not something I would ever recommend on anything less than a fairly overbuilt Z370 or Z390 board. The VRMs and power phases, as well as capacitor quality is pretty varied from cheaper H or B series boards compared to Z series premium boards. In fact, the cheaper Z series boards I wouldn't recommend for a 9900k given the fairly absurd power requirements even to run it at ideal stock settings, let alone any OC at all. The 9900k is sort of pushed right near the limits right out of the box.

The CM 411R is definitely fine for a non-K Core i5 or i7, but that's about it. It would definitely fail or severely throttle on a 9900k, given that the better CM 212+ Evo already suffers with a 9900k before OC. 9900k you want a DH15 or so (which is above entry level water coolers!).

Beyond the power delivery and overall quality of Z370 such as an Aorus Gaming 5, the other advantages of Z over B/H tend to be better memory profiles and performance, better ICs for network and sound, better power isolation to prevent electronic crosstalk and noise in other areas, better cooling and layout for features including the M.2 slots, etc.

In the good old days of roughly 2500k-7700k, just getting an entry level Z series board or good B series was pretty good. However, with Coffee Lake 6C and beyond, these things are much thirstier than before. I built an 8700k with the base model MSI Z370 board, and it was unable to reach a stable situation even with outstanding cooling and an excellent PSU. Upgrading to an Aorus Z370 a couple notches higher made a world of difference. I would only use a B series board for an i3 or Pentium for 8th or 9th Gen Intel CPUs.

 

[skaertus]

It's a good idea to define what you want to do with your computer and set a budget before picking out parts.

I had a friend a few years ago build his first PC, he wanted the best parts so he got an i7 6700k and a Titan graphics card (back when they were the fastest).
He bought all the stuff an expensive SSD, AIO cooler and overclocked it to 4.8Gz as I recall. I found it funny because he didn't like to play games, he learned some C and Java Programming on it and some web stuff. All he used it for was notepad++ and netbeans IDE.

I think he liked building it more than using it. He ended up selling it on craigslist to buy blow lol

Thanks.

Well, the first purpose of the PC is to able to handle my tasks (work and general purpose). The kinds of applications that I use suggest I am not a heavy user: it is Microsoft Office, Adobe Reader, web browsers. Well, I guess I am kind of a heavy user after all. I use over 100 tabs opened in Chrome, and use several other applications simultaneously.

I currently have a mini desktop with a Core i5-7500T, 8GB RAM DDR4 2400 MHz, and a 240GB SSD. My CPU and memory usage are both at 100% and disk usage at 50%. My SSD is almost full. I use a 4K monitor and the integrated video card can hardly handle it. Clearly my desktop cannot even deal with my daily tasks. I want a desktop that can handle these daily tasks easily and swiftly, without any sign of effort, powerful enough to not even need to flex its muscles to get anything done.

Plus, I want to play games as well. Not all the time, not spend nights awake playing. But still be able to play some games. If I can get to play at 4K, then even better. And, by the way, ray tracing looks amazing. I may not be willing to pay an obscene amount of money to get some additional fps, but I also have a flexible budget and I can accommodate additional spending if it is worth it.

 

[Arkaign]

Man, you are just about the perfect match for a Ryzen lol. Madman multitasking is just way more affordable for a Ryzen build, and gaming is roughly identical unless you either have a 144hz type display AND a 1080ti/2080 or better.

 

[skaertus]

The i9 9900k is not something I would ever recommend on anything less than a fairly overbuilt Z370 or Z390 board. The VRMs and power phases, as well as capacitor quality is pretty varied from cheaper H or B series boards compared to Z series premium boards. In fact, the cheaper Z series boards I wouldn't recommend for a 9900k given the fairly absurd power requirements even to run it at ideal stock settings, let alone any OC at all. The 9900k is sort of pushed right near the limits right out of the box.

The CM 411R is definitely fine for a non-K Core i5 or i7, but that's about it. It would definitely fail or severely throttle on a 9900k, given that the better CM 212+ Evo already suffers with a 9900k before OC. 9900k you want a DH15 or so (which is above entry level water coolers!).

Beyond the power delivery and overall quality of Z370 such as an Aorus Gaming 5, the other advantages of Z over B/H tend to be better memory profiles and performance, better ICs for network and sound, better power isolation to prevent electronic crosstalk and noise in other areas, better cooling and layout for features including the M.2 slots, etc.

In the good old days of roughly 2500k-7700k, just getting an entry level Z series board or good B series was pretty good. However, with Coffee Lake 6C and beyond, these things are much thirstier than before. I built an 8700k with the base model MSI Z370 board, and it was unable to reach a stable situation even with outstanding cooling and an excellent PSU. Upgrading to an Aorus Z370 a couple notches higher made a world of difference. I would only use a B series board for an i3 or Pentium for 8th or 9th Gen Intel CPUs.

Thanks, very helpful. Perhaps I should consider a better motherboard then. How is the H370 compared to B360M and Z370? A middle ground?

As for coolers, I have some options of water coolers in the store, which are more expensive but not something really out of this world.

And perhaps I should not buy an i9-9900K after all.

 

[skaertus]

Man, you are just about the perfect match for a Ryzen lol. Madman multitasking is just way more affordable for a Ryzen build, and gaming is roughly identical unless you either have a 144hz type display AND a 1080ti/2080 or better.

Really??

Is the single core speed of a Ryzen decent? I am afraid it may be too weak, but I could find somewhere to test.

Is a Ryzen 2700 decent? How does it compare to a, say, I7-8700?

Wouldn’t it be worth to wait for Ryzen 3 then, which is expected to launch by the middle of then year with up to some crazy 16 cores/32 threads?

 

[Arkaign]

Really??

Is the single core speed of a Ryzen decent? I am afraid it may be too weak, but I could find somewhere to test.

Is a Ryzen 2700 decent? How does it compare to a, say, I7-8700?

Wouldn’t it be worth to wait for Ryzen 3 then, which is expected to launch by the middle of then year with up to some crazy 16 cores/32 threads?

Yes, the Ryzen 2700 is quite good.

Do not trust acolytes who claim supremacy for either AMD or Intel. Their current lineups are for the most part excellent, and have varying strengths and weaknesses, but more than perhaps any time in many many years, are nearly indistinguishable in most use cases. The general rule currently is that Ryzen offers better multitasking performance per $, while very high end gaming scenarios favor Intel with the important caveat that that also means high refresh displays (eg; 2560x1440 144hz or better) AND a very high end GPU. Given that most people have less than the elite level of GPUs, it's much more common that someone is bottlenecked by their GPU before the CPU comes into play.

For example : a Ryzen 2700 vs a 9700k, paired with an RTX 2070, on a 4K/60 or 1440/100hz display, in nearly all scenarios you could never tell the difference. The GPU would be slower than the CPU is capable of running any recent or future AAA game.

However, Ryzen 2700 vs 9700k, paired with a 1080ti, 2080, or 2080ti, running on a 2560x1440 144hz display, you might see a gap between them at very high refresh rates that might warrant the expense of going with the Intel build for that purpose. This is my particular use case (I have a 5.2Ghz i7-8086k with an Aorus 1080ti, running a 3440x1440 Ultrawide Gysnc).

On the flip side, my 6C/12T 8086k is slower than a 2700X in extremely heavy multitasking. Not by a huge amount, but it is definitely a case of pros vs cons. Now is my 8086k bad at multiasking? No. Same as the 2700 or 2700X is not bad at gaming by any reasonable standard. It's just that they might be 10/10 in some things and 9/10 in others.

In fact, I might rate the 2700X 10/10 in general use, 9/10 for gaming, and 8700k/8086k/9700k 9/10 in general use, 10/10 for gaming.

Read through this to get a really good grip on how the Ryzens stand up against contemporary Intels :

Anandtech Review of Ryzen 2000 series

The other major thing about having a new Ryzen build, is that AMD has flatly stated that the upcoming 7nm Ryzen 3000 series will be a direct drop-in upgrade for current 4xx motherboards. If the performance increase is as solid as expected, this could give a great opportunity for extending the life of the system down the line, perhaps to a 12C/24T CPU or even higher. That's a pretty nice thing, whereas the Z370/390 Socket 1151 is 99.9% probably a dead end beyond the 9900K. New Intel gen will mean new motherboard entirely.

 

[skaertus]

Yes, the Ryzen 2700 is quite good.

Do not trust acolytes who claim supremacy for either AMD or Intel. Their current lineups are for the most part excellent, and have varying strengths and weaknesses, but more than perhaps any time in many many years, are nearly indistinguishable in most use cases. The general rule currently is that Ryzen offers better multitasking performance per $, while very high end gaming scenarios favor Intel with the important caveat that that also means high refresh displays (eg; 2560x1440 144hz or better) AND a very high end GPU. Given that most people have less than the elite level of GPUs, it's much more common that someone is bottlenecked by their GPU before the CPU comes into play.

For example : a Ryzen 2700 vs a 9700k, paired with an RTX 2070, on a 4K/60 or 1440/100hz display, in nearly all scenarios you could never tell the difference. The GPU would be slower than the CPU is capable of running any recent or future AAA game.

However, Ryzen 2700 vs 9700k, paired with a 1080ti, 2080, or 2080ti, running on a 2560x1440 144hz display, you might see a gap between them at very high refresh rates that might warrant the expense of going with the Intel build for that purpose. This is my particular use case (I have a 5.2Ghz i7-8086k with an Aorus 1080ti, running a 3440x1440 Ultrawide Gysnc).

On the flip side, my 6C/12T 8086k is slower than a 2700X in extremely heavy multitasking. Not by a huge amount, but it is definitely a case of pros vs cons. Now is my 8086k bad at multiasking? No. Same as the 2700 or 2700X is not bad at gaming by any reasonable standard. It's just that they might be 10/10 in some things and 9/10 in others.

In fact, I might rate the 2700X 10/10 in general use, 9/10 for gaming, and 8700k/8086k/9700k 9/10 in general use, 10/10 for gaming.

Read through this to get a really good grip on how the Ryzens stand up against contemporary Intels :

Anandtech Review of Ryzen 2000 series

The other major thing about having a new Ryzen build, is that AMD has flatly stated that the upcoming 7nm Ryzen 3000 series will be a direct drop-in upgrade for current 4xx motherboards. If the performance increase is as solid as expected, this could give a great opportunity for extending the life of the system down the line, perhaps to a 12C/24T CPU or even higher. That's a pretty nice thing, whereas the Z370/390 Socket 1151 is 99.9% probably a dead end beyond the 9900K. New Intel gen will mean new motherboard entirely.

Thank you.

I have not used or even tested an AMD processor in years. My previous experiences with AMD were bad, but my last one was back in 2005, I guess, over ten years ago. So a lot may have changed. I was concerned that AMD's per clock performance would be too weak.

Perhaps I should try to find out and test the Ryzen processors to check how they would perform. My current PC has been using a lot of the processor; there is always something running in the background or something, and the processor is usually busy even when I am doing very little. So, it should not hurt to get more cores or threads.

Now I am looking into Ryzen 3's rumors and they are mind-blowing, but perhaps somewhat exaggerated. Intel is seriously lagging behind, and struggling as its processors are now four years using a 14nm process. The 9th gen Core does not even seem to have any new significant improvement, just a clock and core boost, which is disappointing.

At the same time, the rumors around Ryzen 3 seem unrealistic and too good to be true. AMD revealed some benchmarks last December, which pointed out that a Ryzen 3 processor a little bit faster than Core i9-9900K. It is not clear to me which Ryzen 3 processor was compared to the Core i9-9900K, but some sources say it was one with 8 cores and 16 threads. If this is true, then AMD would have managed to make Ryzen 3 nearly as good as 9th gen Core in core-per-core performance, which sounds unrealistic even if moving to a new architecture and a new process, as Ryzen 2 is currently lagging behind in this department.

The possible line-up and prices also puzzle me (https://www.forbes.com/sites/antony...16-cores-and-5-1ghz-frequencies/#806b19c2bbaf). If AMD manages to reach this kind of performance, I do not know why it would ever offer it at so lower prices. If an 8-core Ryzen 3 is equal to a Core i9-9900K, I wonder why AMD would offer it for US$ 229, less than half of the price of Intel's offering. And I am not sure it would make sense for AMD to sell a 16-core processor for as low as US$ 499. I think either Ryzen 3 cannot offer this kind of performance, or the prices will be very different from what is rumored.

Anyway, if that is all true, then it might be worth waiting for Ryzen 3 or buying a Ryzen 2 and then replacing it when Ryzen 3 launches. But I do not think a publicly held company such as AMD would risk displeasing its shareholders so much by offering such high-performance processors for such a lower price, especially at a time when Intel is having production issues.

 

[Flayed]

@Arkaign is right the Ryzen cpu's are good. The only thing is the prices you have listed makes them kind of expensive compared to Intel. For example the 2600 is usually cheaper than an i5 8400 at least by a small amount. The prices are crazy, I personally would never spend $500 on a CPU nevermind $810 for a 9900k lol. I guess from the price list a 2700 would be a good fit for you but it's hard for me to recommend a CPU that costs so much lol. If I was you I'd buy the cheapest one you listed the 8400 just because well money is hard to come by lol

 

[skaertus]

@Arkaign is right the Ryzen cpu's are good. The only thing is the prices you have listed makes them kind of expensive compared to Intel. For example the 2600 is usually cheaper than an i5 8400 at least by a small amount. The prices are crazy, I personally would never spend $500 on a CPU nevermind $810 for a 9900k lol. I guess from the price list a 2700 would be a good fit for you but it's hard for me to recommend a CPU that costs so much lol. If I was you I'd buy the cheapest one you listed the 8400 just because well money is hard to come by lol

Thanks.

Well, Brazil indeed has some of the most expensive electronics in the world, due to taxes which amount to some 50% of the final price. I hate it but I got used to it, as I do not really have a choice. Most people here buy very low end computers, but I really prefer to spend some money and get a better experience.

This is why I can spend some US$500 in a processor, and it would still be OK.

Would the i7-8700, for instance, be a better fit than the Ryzen 2700? The prices are not that different. It is a choice between core count and core speed, I suppose.

 

[Arkaign]

Well, perhaps it's a pragmatic thing after all. Let's look at some history of processor pricing to get an idea (US prices for reference, but it should be a decent reference point).

Way back when Intel released the Pentium 2, it was on a different interface than the previous consumer cpus. Prior to this, AMD and Intel processors shared the same motherboards in many cases, K5 and K6 series in Socket 7 alongside Pentium and Pentium MMX, and if course before that, 386 and 486. Aside from some various leapfrogging, the general rule was that Intel was often faster, but also more expensive. In these days however pricing even for modest PCs were still fairly high.

When P2 hit, essentially a consumer version of the Pentium Pro / P6 with some enhancements, using a cartridge format to store a good bit of local but off-die cache (contrast to previous gens depending on motherboard cache!) and generally being a pretty expensive upgrade all around but with some definite advantages. AMD was forced to stay on Socket 7, working with some mfgs to create 'Super 7' motherboards to stay in competition, and pushing faster FSB, more cache, and instruction set innovation like 3dnow to try and compete. Pretty quickly it became a mixed bag. Very competitive in some areas, but badly behind in others, AMD really needed a new architecture and new motherboard design to compete with the higher range Pentium II and III CPUs. But, the pricing tended to heavily favor AMD for value, but high ASP for Intel.

So, AMD K7 on Slot A, Irongate Chipset. This first gen was basically a head to head equal footing with Intel, and, the pricing reflected this. Then process tech improved to no longer need off-die cache, so cheaper interfaces went back to sockets for both AMD and Intel, but they didn't start sharing motherboards again. Socket A vs 370, Athlon, Duron, and Athlon XP vs Pentium III and Celeron. Aggressive price wars brought PC prices way down for pretty reasonable performance, savvy overclocking could make for some stellar systems with wise choices of particularly good AMD or Intel options.

Some funny things happened during this time frame. Race to 1Ghz, and at least twice, Intel released CPUs that were basically overclocked/barely stable at stock speeds. The initial slot 1 Pentium III 600 used 2.05v instead of 2.0v, and it was not uncommon for them to fail in benchmarks. It happened again when Intel tried to go beyond 1Ghz and a 1.13Ghz P3 was so bad it had to be recalled.

Looking forward a bit, Intel really hit a wall with the move to the Pentium 4 Willamette on Socket 423. On paper, the new CPU sounded amazing. Huge leaps forward in clock speed, new buzzwords like netburst, new technology like Hyperthreading. And tied initially to a very fast but VERY expensive new memory called RDRAM, aka Rambus. This was something of a Waterloo for Intel, as it fared rather poorly in a lot.of things compared to ever faster Athlon XPs, using way cheaper motherboard, DDR memory, and CPU pricing. This gave Intel a black eye for most of these years in terms of value and even performance amongst many enthusiasts.

The interesting thing is that once Intel got to the improved generations of the Pentium 4, it was actually a very good CPU. Northwood revisions on 533 and 800 bus, with improved DDR memory remained equal or faster than Athlon XP for basically the duration of these generations, with both AMD and Intel also offering compelling lower models that were very capable of overclocking to the top echelons to compete with $1000 models. And whether you hit Athlon XP 3000+/3200+ or 3-3.4Ghz P4, you had a monster for the era.

Then we got to the most vulnerable period in the history of Intel. The new Prescott die shrink of Pentium 4 was a bitter disappointment, offering little improvement to speak of, and even having worse thermals and some IPC drop compared to the outstanding Northwood C variants. This couldn't be more poorly timed, as AMD began rolling out first Opteron Socket 940, and then Athlon 64 on both socket 940 and 939. A profound performance lead opened up favoring AMD in most cases, particularly so when looking at clock speeds and efficiency. In the very beginning it was more subtle, but as AMD moved beyond the initial 3200+ range to 3500+, 3800+, and beyond, Intel was unable to ramp P4 Prescott up to remain competitive, eventually having to scrap plans for the entire roadmap they had planned.

But, this success did not come at bargain prices. AMD moved ASP sharply up, and in 2003-2006 era, when they offered the Athlon 64 FX and X2 models, they began to outright flip and become the more expensive option in a lot of scenarios. $1000 flagship models became common, and with their X2s, their 'bargain' model was over $500, with a cheaper option not appearing until much later, and only then for $300+.

Is it possible they could have gathered even better traction with more competitive pricing? Would their shareholders understood? I'm not sure, but in my opinion at least some of their opportunity was blown here, as weirdly you could get more value from a mid-range P4 or Pentium D build for a time, despite the AMD products becoming absolutely supreme in the higher performance tiers.

Then, pretty much a Titanic moment for AMD arrived. Conroe aka Core 2 Duo. I was just looking at the March 9th 2006 Performance Preview and July 14th 2006 reviews of Core 2 Duo, and the comments are insanely entertaining. Several years of AMD offering increasingly dominant products created an atmosphere where many simply couldn't comprehend a leap forward like Conroe represented. Overnight, all previous Intel and AMD products were essentially obsolete. It was a truly monumental leap forward in efficiency. And, although they still offered flagship models ('Extreme' editions), they launched with models less than $200 for dual-core! Instead of over $500 at launch, or $300+ a year later!

The reaction initially looked like confusion, then panic, then desperation. We were told to wait for Phenom, which was supposed to be AMDs response. It whimpered out the door, buggy, slow, and with hardly a chance. Phenom I was a disgrace.

The Core 2 family continued to get faster, and with more options from dirt cheap to quad core monsters of their day. And pricing remained fairly good in the budget and mid-range areas, despite this dominance.

AMD managed to get the Phenom II out the door, which brought them roughly on par with Core 2 Quad + or - in most things. And this was very good, but perhaps poorly timed. Ph2 was was the first Phenom should have been, and then in 2009 Intel launched first the pro socket 1366 CPUs, then soon after moved to Socket 1156 and then 1155, and the Core i3/i5/i7 became more than Phenom II could keep up with. It was irrevocably forced to the 'bargain' segment, as even i3s offered superior gaming performance, and a 2500k or so could reach levels that Phenom II could not follow.

AMD had something of another 'Phenom I' moment with the AMD 'FX', compromised designs that were supposed to get them back into the flagship battles, but it was a mixed bag of ultimately disappointing products. Very good at a handful of tasks, but failing in efficiency and especially chipset features, and at its best only with fairly expensive motherboards. This replaced Phenom II as at least a decent 'bargain' PC option though.

It all changed when Ryzen hit. You'd have to back to Athlon 64 to see a time when AMD had something this solid. Class leading in various areas, and capable of meeting the competition at a huge variety of market segments, the Ryzen architecture has been a home run. You saw situations where a $300-$500 Ryzen handily outperformed $1000 and up Intel products in virtually all areas. It forced Intel to the table with 6 and 8 core consumer i5 through i9 major upgrades, and even bringing i3 to quad core status.

Unlike their leadership during the AMD64 days however, they're not seeming to push for monstrous price increases. In fact, their pricing actually dropped between 1000 series and 2000 series. Perhaps they observed Intel finding good balance during the Sandy Bridge through Kaby Lake era : $100-$300 roughly for consumer models, and this brought continued success. Intel could have been very greedy here, setting the floor at $1k for i7 models, etc, but it would have been an unpopular and ultimately self defeating move. By not going crazy with pricing despite the performance crown, Intel managed to keep respectable popularity with consumers during this dominant period.

Now with Ryzen being stellar competition, it appears that they are definitely not repeating their chase into absurd pricing like the old days.

That said, we don't know for sure what Ryzen 3000 series will bring. I am pretty confident that it will be a solid upgrade, but I do not really believe it will be anything earth shattering. However, most crucially for those buying in this time frame, it offers at least some path forward with new SKUs and upgrade potential, whereas current Intel motherboards do not.

As a very happy owner of an Intel build, it is still easy for me to say that current Ryzen options make a great deal of sense in many situations. Yours is probably one of the easiest ones to see where Ryzen is nearly ideal.