New Gaming Rig Advice - First Time PC builder

[NocturnalMoron]

Hi there,
I'm looking into building a gaming rig. Budget is $2000 to $2500 for rig alone. This will be my first time. I would prefer buying the components during the thanksgiving sale next week.
I looked at various sites and created this component list:
AeroCool StrikeX-Air Black SECC Open Case Computer Case $150
AMD Radeon R9-295X $800
Intel Core i7-4790K $340
ASUS MAXIMUS VII HERO LGA 1150 Intel Z97 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard $204.99
CORSAIR Vengeance Pro 16GB (2 x 8GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 2133 Desktop Memory Model $178
Segate Hybrid Drive ST4000DX001 4TB MLC/8GB 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s NCQ 3.5" Desktop SSHD $169.99
EVGA SuperNOVA 1300 G2 80 PLUS GOLD Certified 1300W $195
Pioneer Blu-ray Burner SATA BDR-209DBK $55
ASUS PCE-N15 Wireless Adapter IEEE 802.11b/g/n PCI Express 300/300Mbps $30
Creative Sound Blaster Audigy SE 7.1 Channels 24-bit 96KHz PCI Interface Sound Card $30

I would like to use a bigger display and since I'm mainly going to be gaming on this rig, I think this should be good for my needs:
Samsung UN50HU6950FXZA 50" UHD 4K Smart LED TV $800

For the graphics card, I looked at 290 and 290X but they both seem to run very hot which is why I figured that the 295 X will be a much better choice. I also looked at the GeForce 780Ti SLI configuration but R295x2 seems to be a much better performer.
For the CPU, I did look at the new Hashwell-E processors but since I'm not going to be doing any video editing and so on at present, the 4790K seemed like a much more economical choice that would satisfy my requirements just as well.

List of games I plan on playing on PC is given below. I would like to run all these games @4k/60 fps with ULTRA settings on all
Current Releases:
Shadow Warrior
Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes
Metal Gear Solid V: Phantom Pain
Watch Dogs
Dragon Age: Inquisition
Far Cry 4
Assassins Creed Unity
Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor (PS4)
Alien: Isolation (PS4)
Wolfenstein: The New Order
Civilization 4
Civilization 5
Civilization: Beyond Earth
Guild Wars 2
Tera

Future Releases (I would like to run these at ULTRA at @4k/60 fps as well):
The Witcher 3
Cyberpunk
The Divison
Final Fantasy XV (Not sure if this'll make it to the PC)
Batman: Arkham Knight

I would like to know if:
1. This build is sufficient for the next 2 years or so. Can I run games @4k/60 fps for the next year or 2? Or will I have to dial down to 1080p/60 fps?
2. What are the chances of me hitting a consistent 120 fps @1080p on most games with this build?
3. Do I need liquid cooling or can I just get away with stock components itself?
4. I have not looked at a CPU cooler. Do I need one or can I use the stock component?
5. Will I be able to achieve ULTRA settings @4k/60 fps on most games without having to overclock anything (I plan on overclocking in the future once I learn more about it and get some experience building a PC)
6. Is the HDTV I've chosen good enough (I'm hoping somebody has some experience with using 4k TVs for gaming)
7. Will playing at 60 FPS give me some kind of soap opera effect? I have seen newer TVs in stores and stuff and I don't like the way movies/TV shows look on them. However, I do understand that movies and games is not a 1:1 comparison and the soap opera effect could be a result of the TV trying to do some kind of smoothing to the image etc. Additionally games render things differently so higher frame rates in games need not bring about the soap opera/realistic effect. Basically, I just want to know how different games look at 60 or even 120 fps from 30 fps. I'm hoping some of the people who own PCs and consoles and regularly game at both 30 and 60 fps can provide some input.
8. This is the PC Upgrade path I'm planning:
(a) Upgrade RAM to 32 GB after a year or two
(b) Upgrade HDD to SSD after two years maybe (hopefully SSD costs will come down and 2TB SSDs will be more affordable)
(c) Add another R295x2 graphics card after 2 - 3 years
(d) Move CPU + Motherboard to X99 architecture (or whatever else is better and reasonably priced at the time) and maybe add liquid cooling (if needed)

If somebody could please take a look at my build and my gaming requirements and give me some guidance I would be very grateful for the help.
Thanks a lot in advance

 

[Burpo]

I don't know if you're trying to save space or what, but I'd think hard about getting the AeroCool StrikeX-Air Black SECC Open Case. I use a similar open case, and they collect dust badly, and have to be cleaned regularly. And, I doubt even with the 295X that you'll be able to play ALL games at 4k 60fps (no dips).
Also, from reviews on the Samsung 4k tv..
"From my testing (and confirmed by a Samsung tech support rep), the display itself is only physically capable of 4:4:0 subsampling. You can look up the "Chroma subsampling" page on Wikipedia for some background, but it basically means that for every two vertical pixels, the display can only present one color (but different brightnesses). Unfortunately, HDMI2 does not define 4:4:0 subsampling as a valid subsampling, so when not in SmartHub the display is further downgraded to 4:2:0 subsampling, which is one color (but four brightnesses) for every block of 2x2 pixels. That means that while the display is 4K in luminance (brightness), it's really only 1080p in chroma (color). In fact, an HDMI2 device can support 4:2:0 without actually supporting the higher bandwidth provided by the spec. It's disingenuous of Samsung to highlight the HDMI2 advertising point when they don't support its single most critical consumer-facing feature (4K @60 Hz with no subsampling)."

"I'm sorry but I have to rate this TV at one star due to disingenuous marketing practices. This is not a true HDMI 2.0 set.

At 60Hz you are limited to reduced chroma with 4:2:0 downsampling. At 30Hz you can get true 4:4:4 but this is a very limited refresh rate which prevents its use as a computer monitor or gaming display.
These formats have been possible since HDMI 1.4. So where's the claimed HDMI 2.0 support?"

 

[Cerb]

I would like to run all these games @4k/60 fps with ULTRA settings on all

You can like it, but it's not gonna happen. The Civ games, at the least, can and will chew up any CPU can get, even if you can get your CPU past 5GHz. The thing is, 60FPS in some of these games will not happen at any resolution. You need to be playing very old/weak games to maintain that or higher FPS rates, such as CS, or TF2. That, or pretend that only the best 90 percentile of frames actually exist.

P.S. OTOH, some games are just going to be stuck. Even with the latest hardware, TES: Morrowind will get in the mid 20s in cities, and it came out 12 years ago! You can't fix stupid, and you can't fix Gamebryo.

1. This build is sufficient for the next 2 years or so. Can I run games @4k/60 fps for the next year or 2? Or will I have to dial down to 1080p/60 fps?

Depends. Most you'll have to dial settings down on (not a big deal, really--in practice, high quality light and shadows make or break most first-person experiences, and while heavy, you can turn other things down, and will only notice them in screenshots, not playing). For some of the games, there simply is no CPU that keep up high FPS for long games, period.

2. What are the chances of me hitting a consistent 120 fps @1080p on most games with this build?

0. You'll reach 120FPS, sure, but not maintain.

Now, this is not to say the performance or image quality will suck, just that most people saying they get 60FPS or 120FPS constant in most new games, on the highest settings, haven't actually logged their FPS or frame times and taken a look, but merely occasionally glanced up at a FPS reading they've turned on.

3. Do I need liquid cooling or can I just get away with stock components itself?

There's quite a spectrum in between those two, and it depends. I lean towards aftermarket air cooling.

4. I have not looked at a CPU cooler. Do I need one or can I use the stock component?

Best answer with info given: yes. The stock HSF will keep the CPU from frying, but may result in it slowing down due to high temperatures, under sustained loads, where a better cooler would not.

5. Will I be able to achieve ULTRA settings @4k/60 fps on most games without having to overclock anything (I plan on overclocking in the future once I learn more about it and get some experience building a PC)

Even with overclocking, and at 1080P, probably not. You should get 60FPS easily on basic console ports, with only rare dips. But, buggy games like Watch Dogs, will have issues regardless; and well-made PC games usually have settings that are too much for current hardware. Crysis, the first one, is an excellent example of the latter, especially after some updates it got.

6. Is the HDTV I've chosen good enough (I'm hoping somebody has some experience with using 4k TVs for gaming)

Doesn't look it, and good TVs are going to be tough to find, anyway.

7. Will playing at 60 FPS give me some kind of soap opera effect? I have seen newer TVs in stores and stuff and I don't like the way movies/TV shows look on them.

Totally different. In games, you want as many frames per second as you can get, at least until all games can constantly do X FPS, and implement motion blur well (it should happen, but not tomorrow). The 60Hz, 120Hz, 240Hz, etc., on TVs is interpolation. They are basically doing the same sort of thing as with 25->30FPS conversions, and it's 100% gimmickry. 60FPS or 120FPS with PC gaming means that many distinct images rendered in a row to the monitor, for smoother appearance of motion, and less lag time to the display, not 30 images with in-between steps made by a DSP in the monitor.

The whole, "it's cinematic," thing is a bunch of crap. Let's say the new consoles' CPU is 10x better than the old one (understatement for PS4, probably not far off for XBO, but the XB360's could do way more arithmetic). They want to make games as rich as AC:U and cram it on there. While that game has some issues, sure, it's way more than 10x as rich, in terms of the environment, as the best they could pull off with the last gen consoles' molasses CPUs. So they go for this CYA BS of, "it's more cinematic," because the reality is that for 1080P@60FPS, they would need to keep the games no more detailed than PC releases from 2-4 years ago. Skyrim, and The Witcher 2, for example, without boatloads of mods (though, for Skyrim, that's practically blasphemy), look incalclulably better on a midrange PC of today than they did on the last gen consoles. With expectations of better image quality, they have to give something up to make souped up netbook CPUs with low-end GPUs do what they want.

I'm hoping some of the people who own PCs and consoles and regularly game at both 30 and 60 fps can provide some input.

I get physically uncomfortable seeing first-person console games, with the too-narrow FOV, blurriness, and choppiness that is so common. It's not the 30 v. 60FPS, though (many games don't stay at 30FPS, either, but max out at it, and stay there a majority of the time). With clear pixels, wider FOV (you can pretty much always adjust FOV, even if you have to edit text files--same with mouse acceleration), and a mouse, it's a different experience.

Those differences are of course pretty minor for many types of games, like 3rd person RPGs, strategy, etc..

(a) Upgrade RAM to 32 GB after a year or two

For things other than gaming, sure. For gaming, no. I commonly have 4-8GB used before starting a game, so 16GB works out for me, and I may get 32GB in not too long. But, right now, and for the near future, 8GB is enough, and provides headroom for Windows and some background programs, if you mostly use your RAM up with games.

(b) Upgrade HDD to SSD after two years maybe (hopefully SSD costs will come down and 2TB SSDs will be more affordable)

NO. Include an SSD from the start. They may not be cheap, but they are cheaper than they've ever been, and worth it. Apple didn't ditch HDDs almost entirely for nothing.

You're looking at spending $300 on a CPU, and more for a GPU, when $70 could get you both a CPU and GPU. Why? Because the more expensive ones will run faster. Spend $200 or more on an SSD, as well, so that your storage will also be fast.

(c) Add another R295x2 graphics card after 2 - 3 years

In 2-3 years, you will be able to replace it with newer and better cheaper. Plus, matching models that are likely to work well in CF may be hard to find. They are, from the start, low-volume parts.

(d) Move CPU + Motherboard to X99 architecture (or whatever else is better and reasonably priced at the time) and maybe add liquid cooling (if needed)

Worry about that when the time comes, now now. Either go X99 today, or put the money elsewhere in the system.

 

[NocturnalMoron]

@Burpo:
Thanks a lot for the response. Based on feedback from you and Cerb, I think I should stick to 1080p. I would consider 1440p but I want to play on a big screen (50" +) and I don't think any of them do 1440p at that size.

As for the case, I considered it mainly because of cooling. I thought the components I was using would overheat if I put them into a full/mid tower case, even with a CPU cooler. But if the open case gets too dusty, maybe I can get a full tower. Will overheating be a problem in that case though?


@Cerb:
So based on your reply, it seems like the build I'm thinking of cannot do 60 fps consistently at ultra settings for most games. Did I understand that correctly? Also, what kind of a PC could max out all these games at Ultra and consistently give a 1080p/60fps output?

I'll put in a SSD as the main drive based on your feedback. And I think for the display, based on everything you said, I should just stick to 1080p and get some good Samsung HDTV which has a 120Hz refresh rate.

Thanks a lot for the detailed response by the way.

 

[Cerb]

So based on your reply, it seems like the build I'm thinking of cannot do 60 fps consistently at ultra settings for most games. Did I understand that correctly? Also, what kind of a PC could max out all these games at Ultra and consistently give a 1080p/60fps output?

For some games, none that currently exist. For others, not far from what you're looking at building.

I'm not saying you won't get higher performance and image quality than with a lesser PC, nor that you shouldn't get a higher-res display. I'm saying you shouldn't go in with such high expectations as to be able to set the game's settings as high as they can go, while still keeping super high FPS, because many games can and will not be able to meet those expectations. They will still look far better, while playing smoother, than console counterparts (excepting buggy ports, of course, which are much rarer than they used to be), even when not keeping up with the refresh rate. Based on prior releases of the franchise, FI, I'd bet that at release, no PC will be able to max out TW3 4K, and maybe not at any res. But, even not quite at the highest settings, it'll still surely both look better and play smoother than on the consoles, just as the prior ones did.

 

[NocturnalMoron]

Thanks Cerb. I have a lot more clarity now and looks like the build I'm planning won't overheat or have any incompatible parts. I just need to nail down what display I should use with this. I'll think about it some more and figure out what I need to do. Thank you for all your help.

 

[Cerb]

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i7-4790K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor ($324.99 @ NCIX US)
CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-D14 65.0 CFM CPU Cooler ($71.80 @ Amazon)
Motherboard: Asus Z97-A ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($129.99 @ Newegg)
Memory: Patriot Viper 3 Low Profile Red 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1866 Memory ($69.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Crucial MX100 512GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($202.15 @ NCIX US)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 3TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($104.99 @ Newegg)
Video Card: Sapphire Radeon R9 295X2 8GB Video Card ($799.99 @ Amazon)
Case: Corsair 450D ATX Mid Tower Case ($99.99 @ NCIX US)
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA 1300 G2 1300W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($151.99 @ Amazon)
Optical Drive: Pioneer BDR-209DBK Blu-Ray/DVD/CD Writer ($63.59 @ Directron)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 8.1 (32/64-bit) ($94.99 @ B&H)
Total: $2099.46
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-11-20 22:39 EST-0500

No open case, less RAM, some of the same other parts, and a fancy CPU cooler. No wifi adapter, either, but pretty much any will do. Asus and TP-Link are both good brands of them, IMO. 16GB RAM wouldn't hurt, by any stretch, but I doubt it's needed, either. You may or may not overclock, but those parts will allow for some, if you choose to. I would speculate that you can get another 10% performance from the CPU without even changing voltages, just raising the power limits, turning multicore enhancement on, and trying to bump the max multiplier up a little bit. The expensive Asus motherboard I just don't see the value in, especially as a first timer.

The R9 295X2 uses boatloads of power, and needs a 120mm fan intake or exhaust somewhere, for the cooling. Two GTX 970s would overall perform better, but right now, there seem to be some issues with their SLI performance, and the R9s might be a bit better, overall. Two R9 290Xs would be identical to the R9 295X2, but for handling air cooling, and taking up 2 sets of 2 slots. I would defer to others on whether 2 cards is best, and the practical state of SLI v. CF at that price point.

If you get an SSD and HDD, install Windows before hooking up the HDD. If the HDD gets enumerated first, the installer may quietly put the bootloader and reserved partition on the HDD, rather than the SSD. That risk is removed by adding the HDD after Windows is successfully booting from the HDD.

Using so much power peak, you might need to spend some time with temperatures and fan setup, and possibly end up buying a fan or two to add. It's often hard to say, and where it gets put in any given room can change the best fan setup, too.

 

[escrow4]

I wouldn't recommend gaming on a TV. I have a basic 42" and I get eye strain trying to focus on the game on a console (never mind the poor graphics). Too used to 22-24" monitors. I also wouldn't recommend Crossfire with AMDs poor drivers, a single 290X would be sufficient with some settings turned down.

 

[Cerb]

Telling someone to spend less money? What's wrong with you? :awe: As said, I'm going with performance charts and varied user reports, and can't speak to the actual effectiveness/quality of either the latest SLI or CF, save that there are clearly driver issues for Maxwell, still (over time, likely all will be fixed, though). So, I'm rolling with the OP's initial choices, there.

A single quality GTX 980 would be good, too, if going single card, like a Gigabyte G1.

For varied reasons, I got a 24", but if investing in a monitor to keep for some time (I was using one from 2007, until it started whining), and spending accordingly, I would get a 27-32" 2560x1440 (4x720p) or 3840x2160 (4K, 4x1080p). Another thing not yet mentioned, is that games that have issues with high resolutions can be played at 1080P just fine on most 4K monitors, with each rendered pixel taking up a 2x2 square.