Quick Look Over My Build Please!

[Schmies]

Hey All,

Thank you so much for the help with my last build--especially lehtv. Everything went great... Problem is, now my buddy wants me to put one together for him. 😀

Anyways, could you guys have a quick glance over the build and let me know if I could cut cost on something, choose a different part, etc.?

1. What YOUR PC will be used for. That means what types of tasks you'll be performing.
Mostly playing video games (ie SC2, D3, WOW...and some more graphically demanding games like crysis 2 and skyrim). I'd like to be able to play just about everything out right now on higher settings. Standard stuff like word processing/checking email and listening to itunes. Also might hook up to TV to watch movies. Nothing complicated.

2. What YOUR budget is. A price range is acceptable as long as it's not more than a 20% spread
<$1000

3. What country YOU will be buying YOUR parts from.
US--CALIFORNIA

4. IF YOU have a brand preference. That means, are you an Intel-Fanboy, AMD-Fanboy, ATI-Fanboy, nVidia-Fanboy, Seagate-Fanboy, WD-Fanboy, etc.
No preference

5. If YOU intend on using any of YOUR current parts, and if so, what those parts are.
Just planning on using my 21 inch Dell HD monitor and other peripherals

7. IF YOU plan on overclocking or run the system at default speeds.
Default Speeds

8. What resolution will you be using?
1920x1080
mostly using just 21 inch monitor, will likely be connecting to 1080 TV via HDMI in the future

9. WHEN do you plan to build it?
In the next week or so.

X. Do you need to purchase any software to go with the system, such as Windows or Blu Ray playback software?
Need to purchase windows. Pretty sure we are going to hold off on the blu ray stuff for now.

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/abI4

i5 3570k
AsRock H77 Pro/MVP
Corsair Vengeance 2x4gb
Seagate Barracuda 1TB
Sapphire Radeon HD 7850 2gb
Antec One Case
PC Power and Cooling 600W
Asus DRW-24B1ST/BLK/B/AS DVD/CD Writer
Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 (64-bit)

Lastly, some random questions, if you could :$

Is pcie 3 necessary?
"As a gamer there's little reason to pay more for Intel's Core i5-3570K instead of the i5-2500K. However, it is worth noting that the third-gen Core processor features a lower TDP and includes 16 lanes of PCI Express 3.0 connectivity. If you're buying a 7-series motherboard and Radeon HD 7000- or GeForce GTX 600-series graphics card anyway, enabling a faster connection between the CPU and GPU might be an important check-list feature (even if it isn't an important performance consideration)."
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gaming-cpu-review-overclock,3106-4.html


An aftermarket heatsink/fan is unnecessary right (not planning to overclock)?
Is that a decent power supply? I like the fact its modular...
Minus the power supply, This whole build would be crossfire compatible in the future right?
Best ddr3 1600 ram 2x4gb for under $55?

TIA

 

[lehtv]

Thank you so much for the help with my last build--especially lehtv. Everything went great... Problem is, now my buddy wants me to put one together for him. 😀

No problemos amigo 😛. Let's see what we can do for your buddy...

i5 3570k You said you didn't want to OC...
AsRock H77 Pro/MVP Good... but you could get away with B75.
Corsair Vengeance 2x4gb Can get away with a few $ less
Seagate Barracuda 1TB Good
Sapphire Radeon HD 7850 2gb Good. Overclock it.
Antec One Case Good budget case but limited in space
PC Power and Cooling 600W A bit overkill for a single GPU.
Asus DRW-24B1ST/BLK/B/AS DVD/CD Writer Good
Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 (64-bit) Good

Is pcie 3 necessary?

Not for a single card config, but I'd recommend an Ivy Bridge CPU and a 7-series mobo anyway.

An aftermarket heatsink/fan is unnecessary right (not planning to overclock)?

Yeah, unless you're particularly sensitive to fan noise.

Is that a decent power supply? I like the fact its modular...

Yes, it's good. But slightly overkill, 500W would be fine.

Minus the power supply, This whole build would be crossfire compatible in the future right?

No, the H77 motherboard is limited to running the second card at PCIe 2.0 X4 which will severely limit its performance. If you want SLI/Crossfire, you'll need a Z77 board, in which case you might as well get i5-3570K and overclock it later on. A SLI/CF config would benefit from CPU overclocking because at stock speed you'd probably be CPU bottlenecked.

Most people don't SLI/Crossfire ever. But if you have particularly high requirements for framerates and image quality, and you play the most graphically intensive games, then SLI/CF might just be your thing.

Best ddr3 1600 ram 2x4gb for under $55?

The one you picked? No...

Here's my recommended parts list - non overclocking non SLI/CF build:

Mobo Asrock B75 Pro3 $80 (the main difference to H77 is lack of RAID...)
CPU i5-3550 $210
RAM Crucial 2x4GB 1600 $43
GPU Sapphire 7850 $240
HDD Samsung F3 1TB $80 or Seagate 1TB $90 (faster)
DVD Asus DVD burner $17
PSU Seasonic M12II 520W $60
Case NZXT Tempest 210 $55
OS Windows 7 HP 64-bit $100

= $885-$895 (before tax/shipping). You might be able to get a GTX 670, it'd be slightly over budget but more in line with the goal of playing just about everything on the highest settings.

And here, an OC capable and SLI/CF build:

Mobo Asrock Z77 Extreme4 $135 (4-yr warranty promo)
CPU i5-3570K $230
PSU XFX 650W $75 ($65 AR) [NCIX]
The rest as above.

= $975 ($965 AR) (before tax/shipping). Add another 7850 later and OC the CPU, and pretty much every game will play 60fps constant at ultra.

 

[ShintaiDK]

Remember CPU is much cheaper at Microcenter/Tigerdirect.

 

[lehtv]

What's the tigerdirect deal? 3570K is $240 on their site

 

[ShintaiDK]

Arh sorry. last I checked it was 210$ at Tiger, 190$ at MC. Seems Tiger wanted more...

 

[Schmies]

Hey lehtv, how well do you think those two builds would handle running eyefinity...say running WoW or a flight sim across three monitors. 🙂

 

[Schmies]

And is overclocking and setting up crossfire something that should intimidate me? Or is it fairly straightforward once you put the research in?

 

[lehtv]

If you want to run Eyefinity, get dual GPU / OC build. "Light" games like WOW should run fine with 7850 CF but in more demanding games you'll have to make compromises on image quality.

Setting up Crossfire is easy. Install both cards in the PCIe 3.0 slots, connect power cables, connect CF bridge, connect monitor to top card (not sure if it matters). Boot up, check Catalyst Control Center that CF is working/enabled. You may need to reinstall drivers. Also download the latest CF profiles. It would be good to benchmark each card separately to determine which one runs cooler. Then install the cooler card on the upper PCIe slot.

I've never set up Eyefinity... but I doubt it's very difficult. Here's AMD FAQ.

Overclocking is pretty simple but somewhat time-consuming (mostly the stress testing). But once you get a good stable OC, you never need to tune your settings so it's a one time thing. You can google sandy bridge and ivy bridge overclocking guides to get an idea of what's involved. And you can ask help with your overclock at the CPUs and Overclocking subforum.

Overclocking the GPU is a bit simpler because there are a few less variables and you can do everything without going to BIOS. There's only core clock, memory clock, core voltage and powertune limit. Use MSI afterburner. Essentially you incrementally increase tge core clock and stability test your OC until you hit a wall with stock voltage. Then incrementally increase the voltage along with the core clock until you find the spot where the "next level" of performance would require too much of a voltage increase to be worth it in terms of power consumption, heat and fan noise (I'd keep temps below 80C). Increase powertune in proportion to your OC to allow the card to consume more power. I'd also recommend setting an aggressive fan profile in Afterburner to cool your card while stress testing; you can fine tune the fan profile once you've found your final OC. Also, in Crossfire, your cards have to be clocked the same.

 

[Schmies]

Right on! Thanks man!

If you were here id give you a big fat bro hug...no homo 😀

 

[mfenn]

And is overclocking and setting up crossfire something that should intimidate me? Or is it fairly straightforward once you put the research in?

A proper Eyefinity/Nvidia Surround setup is going to cost way more than $1000 though. I really like lehtv's build as it is given your budget.

 

[Schmies]

Do you mean his OC Xfire build?

My buddy was mostly playing with the idea of being able to upgrade to Xfire and overclocking later. In other words buy the additional gphx card and stuff at a later date.

 

[lehtv]

A proper Eyefinity/Nvidia Surround setup is going to cost way more than $1000 though.

A second 7850 and two more monitors would cost ~$500. It'd run almost any game as long as settings were toned down... And less demanding games like WOW at high settings. Not an optimal setup but not that expensive either 🙂

My buddy was mostly playing with the idea of being able to upgrade to Xfire and overclocking later. In other words buy the additional gphx card and stuff at a later date.

Yeah. Chances are though that he's not going to CF on a single 1080p monitor. The extra needed to pay for the compatibility makes most sense if he's serious about Eyefinity later on.

As for overclocking without SLI/CF that's also an option. OC'ing is good for minimizing or removing a possible CPU bottleneck on the graphics card. 7850 2GB overclocked would be a bit bottlenecked in CPU limited/heavy games. And certainly later on when you upgrade the GPU to something faster, it's good to have an overclocked CPU, as it allows you to get more out of the new GPU without upgrading the platform. You'd need to take the non-CF/SLI build and swap to Asrock Z77 Pro3 $100 and 3570K $220 (NCIX) or $230 (newegg) (+ an aftermarket cooler). The PSU doesn't need to be more than 500W for 3570K+7850 overclocked.

 

[mfenn]

A second 7850 and two more monitors would cost ~$500. It'd run almost any game as long as settings were toned down... And less demanding games like WOW at high settings. Not an optimal setup but not that expensive either 🙂

Not that expensive in the grand scheme of things, sure. But it would still blow the OP's friend's budget. 🙂

 

[lehtv]

I thought Eyefinity and Crossfire were planned for a later upgrade with a separate budget.

 

[Schmies]

I thought Eyefinity and Crossfire were planned for a later upgrade with a separate budget.

This is true.

 

[Schmies]

Here's my recommended parts list - non overclocking non SLI/CF build:

Mobo Asrock B75 Pro3 $80 (the main difference to H77 is lack of RAID...)
CPU i5-3550 $210
RAM Crucial 2x4GB 1600 $43
GPU Sapphire 7850 $240
HDD Samsung F3 1TB $80 or Seagate 1TB $90 (faster)
DVD Asus DVD burner $17
PSU Seasonic M12II 520W $60
Case NZXT Tempest 210 $55
OS Windows 7 HP 64-bit $100

Any reason why you'd recommend going with the 3550 instead of the 3570 ($220 on amazon right now) even if he didn't plan on overclocking. Also, why not the sandy bridge 2500k. Tom's hardware suggests it's the best gaming cpu for under 200.

 

[Schmies]

Also, what would you say is the problem with the Corsair RAM I suggested? The reviews seem much better to me than the crucial, but what the hell do I know. 🙂 If it's just to save 3 bucks I think I'd like to just order the Corsair.

 

[Schmies]

Also, FWIW, I have amazon prime and prefer to order through them for the free 2 day shipping and lack of sales tax.

 

[krnmastersgt]

Any reason why you'd recommend going with the 3550 instead of the 3570 ($220 on amazon right now) even if he didn't plan on overclocking. Also, why not the sandy bridge 2500k. Tom's hardware suggests it's the best gaming cpu for under 200.

With the same clock speed, IB processors are a bit faster than SB processors, and the 2500K is great if you plan on overclocking it, if not then you are better off with the 3550. They also run a bit cooler, they don't deal with increased voltages that well but at stock they're quite good.

Also, what would you say is the problem with the Corsair RAM I suggested? The reviews seem much better to me than the crucial, but what the hell do I know. 🙂 If it's just to save 3 bucks I think I'd like to just order the Corsair.

The flashy "gaming" RAM is typically just that, flashy. While heatspreaders do help they aren't necessary for anything except the most die-hard overclockers. If you want the "best" DDR3-1600 RAM I'd say this Samsung 8GB set is probably what's considered best currently.

 

[lehtv]

Any reason why you'd recommend going with the 3550 instead of the 3570 ($220 on amazon right now) even if he didn't plan on overclocking. Also, why not the sandy bridge 2500k. Tom's hardware suggests it's the best gaming cpu for under 200.

Exactly that - he doesn't plan on overclocking. No point in buying an overclockable processor. The 3550 saves your $10 compared to 3570K.

As for 2500K, the same applies, no point buying an overclockable CPU for the B75 chipset. The Sandy Bridge of choice here would be i5-2500 for $195. It consumes a bit more power and performs slightly worse than 3550. Personally I'd pay the $15 premium just to have newer and better hardware.