A build that wil last!

[Ttomm]

Hey guys i want to make a gaming/streaming and photo + video editing pc that wil keep playing games at 1080p at 60ish fps for the next 3-4 years.

I wil be playing on a 32" LED tv (dont have room for a monitor aswel) in the future when i have more space and when prices come down im sure il upgrade to a 1440p monitor so it seems logical to beable to accomodate that when the time comes. I dont want to keep upgrading, i want to make the one rig that will last. My price limit for this build is about £700. I wil probably do a mild oc on the cpu. Im in the uk and unfortunately prices are inflated compared to the US..Okay so this is the potential rig:

Cpu: fx 8320
Motherboard: gigabyte ga-990 ud3
Case: phanteks enthoo pro
Ram: G skill ripjaws 8gb 2133mhz (2x4gb)
Cooler: cm hyper 212 evo
Psu: corsair CX 600w bronze
HDD: kingston 120GB SSD
im also using a 500gb HDD iv got lying around..

My biggest query is with the gpu..
I can get:
XFX R9 280x = £180
XFX R9 290 = £225
gigabyte gtx 970 oc = £270
Gigabyte gtx 970 G1 gaming = £290

Would a r9 280x or r9 290 be good enough for the next 3-4 years or is it worth spending the extra £60-£90 on either of the 970's if it means it wil last alot longer in terms of gaming performance? I know its hard to guess what games wil require in the future and im certainly not going to use the "unspeakable phrase"
Any suggestions or advice is much appreciated. Thanks.

 

[LucoTF]

Is windows included in the £700 budget?

 

[Calnin]

Here's my suggestion. If you're willing to just go with a non overclocking build this can do. It's got a GTX 970, an i5, a SSD and 8gb RAM. Don't really need too much more than this. The case I threw into the build is just a holder. If there's another case you like, just mitigate the price from the CPU by downgrading to a 4460.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-4690 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor (£162.18 @ Aria PC)
Motherboard: ASRock H97 Anniversary ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£57.67 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (£58.18 @ Ebuyer)
Storage: Crucial M500 120GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£45.96 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£35.94 @ Aria PC)
Video Card: Palit GeForce GTX 970 4GB JetStream Video Card (£257.99 @ Aria PC)
Case: Cougar MX300 ATX Mid Tower Case (£42.48 @ More Computers)
Power Supply: SeaSonic 620W 80+ Bronze Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply
Optical Drive: Samsung SH-224DB/BEBE DVD/CD Writer (£10.46 @ Aria PC)
Total: £670.86

 

[Ttomm]

Hi, thanks for the replies.
Iv got a copy of windows already. Why would you recomend an i5 instead and although overclocking isnt a necessity to me, but wouldnt it be worth buying a over clocking chip for little extra?

 

[20salmon]

Hi, thanks for the replies.
Iv got a copy of windows already. Why would you recomend an i5 instead and although overclocking isnt a necessity to me, but wouldnt it be worth buying a over clocking chip for little extra?

There is no point in paying extra for overclocking components unless you plan on overclocking. It's like buying a convertible car and never taking the roof down. However, if you get a decent cooler, PSU and an ASUS overclocking motherboard, you can overclock very easily with little pre-knowledge. Then when your PC stats getting out of date you can do a more serious manual overclock to increase performance.

Stay far away from the corsair CX series of PSU's, especially if you are going to overclock. The Seasonic PSU recommended above is a much better option.

 

[LucoTF]

Slightly over but I don't want to skimp on quality:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-4570 3.2GHz Quad-Core Processor (£142.99 @ Aria PC)
Motherboard: ASRock H97 Anniversary ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£57.67 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1866 Memory (£57.53 @ Ebuyer)
Storage: Crucial MX100 128GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£51.99 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 970 4GB Video Card (£269.96 @ Scan.co.uk)
Case: Phanteks Enthoo Pro ATX Full Tower Case (£78.73 @ Scan.co.uk)
Power Supply: XFX 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply (£46.99 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £705.86
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-01-15 11:58 GMT+0000

 

[Ttomm]

Wel my original idea was to buy the fx 8320 and do a high overclock on it when it starts to become slower or outdated. Why would you guys reccomend an i5 instead?
And is this just the CX rage or the hole range of corsair psu's. Also whats your opinion on refurbished products. Iv found a refurbished corsair hx 650w gold psu on scan.
And with the case maybe i should save some cash and go with a case around £50 and get somthing like a corsair spec 01 for £38?

 

[LucoTF]

Wel my original idea was to buy the fx 8320 and do a high overclock on it when it starts to become slower or outdated. Why would you guys reccomend an i5 instead?
And is this just the CX rage or the hole range of corsair psu's. Also whats your opinion on refurbished products. Iv found a refurbished corsair hx 650w gold psu on scan.
And with the case maybe i should save some cash and go with a case around £50 and get somthing like a corsair spec 01 for £38?

i5 - because it straight up beats the FX in the majority of gaming benchmarks, even with the fx-8xxx OC'd to the nuts

CX - Corsair do make some quality units, but not CX, VS, CM. I wouldn't get refurb personally, the PSU is soooo important

Spec-01 is a perfectly decent case

 

[LucoTF]

With the case savings on a spec-01 you could get an overclockable i5 instead:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-4670K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor (£166.74 @ Aria PC)
Motherboard: ASRock Z97 Anniversary ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£70.76 @ Scan.co.uk)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1866 Memory (£57.53 @ Ebuyer)
Storage: Crucial MX100 128GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£51.99 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 970 4GB Video Card (£269.96 @ Scan.co.uk)
Case: Corsair SPEC-01 RED ATX Mid Tower Case (£37.99 @ Amazon UK)
Power Supply: XFX 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply (£46.99 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £701.96
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-01-15 12:15 GMT+0000

And throw in a cooler at a later date (the spec-01 will fit the 212 evo) when you start to OC

 

[Ttomm]

Alright sweet so are the h81 boards similar to the z97 boatds but with the over clocking capabilities? The asrock h81 board mentioned above isnt sold personally by amazon and has another £12 p+p added on so its more like £70.. :/
Would you recomend a different board taking this into accound?
id love a fancy white case with tonnes of features like the enthoo pro, but i just dont need it.
Also why a crucial SSD rather than a kingston SSD?

 

[qubits]

4 phase z board that wont let you sli.. junk if you ask me

 

[Ttomm]

Just checked out the i5 4670k on partpicker for £166 but on arias website its actually £180

 

[LucoTF]

Alright sweet so are the h81 boards similar to the z97 boatds but with the over clocking capabilities? The asrock h81 board mentioned above isnt sold personally by amazon and has another £12 p+p added on so its more like £70.. :/
Would you recomend a different board taking this into accound?
id love a fancy white case with tonnes of features like the enthoo pro, but i just dont need it.
Also why a crucial SSD rather than a kingston SSD?

Z board are overclockable, H boards are not. Some B boards are also overclockable.

H81 are typically budget boards
B85 are better
H87 / H97 are midrange and H97 offer forward compatibilty with the newest processors
Z87 / Z97 are oveclockable

None would affect performance on a non overclocking chip but you will miss other features on a budget board (less sata ports or less sata 3 ports, no usb 3 support, less ram slots...)

Crucial ssd is better quality imo. That's all.

 

[qubits]

partpicker might be showing you a mail in rebate price.. sometimes it can actually cost more going with several different suppliers with the shipping costs and some suppliers will actually give you free shipping on large orders so you should weigh that in

if you want a z motherboard with good overclocking support that will let you sli then you cant go wrong with a gaming 5

 

[LucoTF]

partpicker might be showing you a mail in rebate price.. sometimes it can actually cost more going with several different suppliers with the shipping costs and some suppliers will actually give you free shipping on large orders so you should weigh that in

if you want a z motherboard with good overclocking support that will let you sli then you cant go wrong with a gaming 5

Yeah you won't get SLI for under £100, v hard to get a gtx 970 + k chip + sli z97 in budget

This is £10 more than the z97 anniversary though http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/part/asus-motherboard-b85progamer

and although it ain't SLI it's at least 8 phase

 

[LucoTF]

Ok this one is limited to just amazon or ebuyer and leaves a little for delivery charges

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-4570 3.2GHz Quad-Core Processor (£155.78 @ Ebuyer)
Motherboard: ASRock B85 Anniversary ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£59.17 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1866 Memory (£57.53 @ Ebuyer)
Storage: Crucial MX100 128GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£51.99 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 970 4GB WINDFORCE 3X Video Card (£274.98 @ Amazon UK)
Case: Corsair SPEC-01 RED ATX Mid Tower Case (£37.99 @ Amazon UK)
Power Supply: XFX 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply (£46.99 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £684.43
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-01-15 13:00 GMT+0000

 

[Ttomm]

Ol so im going to take your guys advice and go with:
Cpu i5 4460 £138
Corsair spec 01 £38
Gigabyte gtx 970 £175
G skill ripjaws 8gb £63
Crucial 120gb ssd £46
Psu either the xfx 550w £47 or the evga 500w B £38
Do you guys know of a decent motherboard that supports M2 and is preferably a z97 chipset for around £70 (incase i choose to buy a i7 4790k in the future) sli would be a nice feature aswel just in case.
Thanks for all your advice. Has really helped.

 

[LucoTF]

you won't get OC (decent OC) and SLI for under £100, sorry

You may be better off getting a cheapish board for now and upgrading mobo at the same time as the cpu - which could be a while, the i5-4460 is a great midrange CPU and should be for a couple years yet

 

[Ttomm]

So LucoTF, you would recommend the asrock h97 anniversary? Does this board support M.2? I would like to make the most of my SSD. Iv just checked the price on amazon and its actually about £75. No worries about Sli. Probably wont buy another gpu anyway.

Would you recommend another motherboard for around £60?

And what about the evga psu or the xfx?

 

[Calnin]

http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/part/asus-motherboard-z97p This one is around 60 and has a M.2 slot.
http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/part/asus-motherboard-h97me << This one too if you're buying from amazon only.

XFX > EVGA for ~500-600w psus.

If you can't find a mobo with a M.2 slot, it shouldn't be a huge deal anyways.

 

[LucoTF]

h97 anniversary does not have m.2

cheapest h97 with m.2 is http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00K80MYNS/?tag=pcp0f-21#productDetails

 

[sora]

Hi, thanks for the replies.
Iv got a copy of windows already. Why would you recomend an i5 instead and although overclocking isnt a necessity to me, but wouldnt it be worth buying a over clocking chip for little extra?

i5s have stronger cores and what do you mean an overclocking chip?

 

[Ttomm]

Thanks for your recommendations calnin. The asus z97-p looks like a winner at around £60 (so around the same price as the h97 boards) ,has M.2 and is a z97 board so i have the option to upgrade to a k series i7 in the future if i wish too. Will also buy the xfx psu. Would you say the XFX psu is worth the extra £10?
And to sora,,, i mean a k series i5 such as a 4670k rather than a none overclockable chip like the 4460...

 

[LucoTF]

Thanks for your recommendations calnin. The asus z97-p looks like a winner at around £60 (so around the same price as the h97 boards) ,has M.2 and is a z97 board so i have the option to upgrade to a k series i7 in the future if i wish too. Will also buy the xfx psu. Would you say the XFX psu is worth the extra £10?
And to sora,,, i mean a k series i5 such as a 4670k rather than a none overclockable chip like the 4460...

The xfx has a 5 year warranty
The corsair cx has a 3 year warranty

That should tell you a little about the quality difference between them

 

[Ttomm]

Ah wow. Yeah xfx clearly have the better product heard alot of good things. Its just none modular so may have untidy unsued cables :/
I know the 4460 is an overall better cpu than the fx 8320. I suppose i wont really notice the benefit of the 8320s 8 cores when it comes to photshop/video editing in real life.
Im considering spending £40 extra and going with the fractal define R5.
Also has anyone got experience with the arctic F12 fans fir £3.90?