Budget-ish PC for light gaming and video encoding, suggestions appreciated

[aekkusu]

I simply would like to ask you guys to look over this list and see if I made the right choices and if you'd have some suggestions for parts that would better suit me:

CPU - Intel Core i5-4460 3.2GHz Quad-Core
MOBO - MSI B85-G41 PC Mate ATX LGA1150
PSU - nJoy 450WGX
RAM - Kingston Savage 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600
GPU - Gainward NVIDIA GeForce GTX 750
Case - Deepcool TESSERACT BF ATX
SPU - Asus Xonar D1 24-bit 192 KHz

What's my aim with this build:
- Will last me at least 5 years before becoming obsolete technology-wise
- Will do some "light" gaming on (accurate game console emulators, some new-ish sim/strategy games like Cities: Skylines, Minecraft, The Sims 3/4, run some stuff with Wine, and some others I forgot)
- Doesn't consume a lot of power / Not interested in OC
- Works well on Linux / I want to avoid having to use Windows
-Can encode videos reasonably fast


This is my first build ever, and I spent a few hours picking and choosing the components to best suit my needs, and I made sure as much as I could that they are all compatible with each other. I realise the PSU likely isn't that great, but as I mentioned earlier, I'm not interested in overclocking so as long as it doesn't break down the whole PC, I'll be fine. Similarly I'm not sure about the CPU, and if it will "last" at least 5 years (again, technology-wise), and I know it's impossible to predict what's going to come next, but it would be great if anyone could suggest me alternative models if there's anything better. Also I haven't picked any peripherals or HDDs, it's because I already have two HDDs that I could use, and I think I'll buy an SSD separately for the OS partitions. I also have a monitor (but I'm thinking of buying a new one in the near future), headphones, mouse, keyboard so I won't need to buy any new ones just yet.

So anyway, if you have any suggestions for better picks in terms of price/performance or such, I would really appreciate you input. I don't know if any of your suggestions would be available to me in my country, but at least I can know what to look out for.

Thanks in advance!

 

[Outlander_04]

Ditch the sound card . The sound built in to most motherboards is better than all but the most expensive computer speakers .

Change the mb to one that uses an H97 chip set .

Only use 80+ bronze or better rated psu ...... from reputable manufacturers

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-4460 3.2GHz Quad-Core Processor ($170.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Motherboard: ASRock H97M PRO4 Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($74.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($44.89 @ OutletPC)
Power Supply: Corsair CX 500W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply ($34.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $325.86
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-09-30 16:55 EDT-0400

The mb is m-ATX so you can use either an ATX midtower or a micro ATX case which will take up less space

 

[ramindersk]

Jump to 750ti will give you a good boost with just few $s more.

 

[ComputerSecurityGuy]

I would use an FX chip over an i5. An equivalent FX chip crushes the i5 at multithreaded things, namely video encoding and (sometimes) strategy games. For a GPU, I would use the GTX 950 as it has an integrated H.265 encoder/decoder. The FX-8350 is $20 cheaper than the i5 and way better at transcoding, and a decent GPU with H.265 acceleration seems a smart bet.

 

[aekkusu]

Thanks for the suggestions guys!

Ditch the sound card . The sound built in to most motherboards is better than all but the most expensive computer speakers .

I'm not using speakers, I'll be using some Sony cans which sound great. The main reason I wanted to get a sound card is to be able to listen to 24bit 192KHz audio "natively". I likely won't buy it at build-time, but rather as an addition in the future.

Change the mb to one that uses an H97 chip set .

The ones on offer are 40% more expensive. Is there any reason why I should chose those?

Only use 80+ bronze or better rated psu ...... from reputable manufacturers

Is this really necessary, even considering I won't overclock? If yes then can you suggest some cheap models? The 500W one seems a bit of an overkill for my needs.

The mb is m-ATX so you can use either an ATX midtower or a micro ATX case which will take up less space

I prefer ATX

Jump to 750ti will give you a good boost with just few $s more.

Yeah, I was going for the TI, but it went out of stock. Still it will take some time before I can buy all those, so I'll likely find another TI. And speaking of which, is there any difference between the OC and non-OC versions of these cards? The OC ones seem to be lower in price, and I'm guessing OC stands for overclocked... would this suggest they're performing worse than the non-OC ones?

I would use an FX chip over an i5. An equivalent FX chip crushes the i5 at multithreaded things, namely video encoding and (sometimes) strategy games. For a GPU, I would use the GTX 950 as it has an integrated H.265 encoder/decoder. The FX-8350 is $20 cheaper than the i5 and way better at transcoding, and a decent GPU with H.265 acceleration seems a smart bet.

I'm not sure if I'm ready to jump over to AMD, are they as reliable as Intel nowadays? Also 8 cores seems a bit of an overkill to me, but in 5 years time it might not... I guess? I'm also wary of power consumption, I won't want to go too overboard...
Does the FX chip come with an on-board cooler? If not the build price will be more expensive than with the i5 since it does come with a cooler. I know those are generally not that great, but I can live with the extra noise until I can get a better one...
About the GPU, GTX 950 is a little bit too pricey for me, here it costs double compared to 750 TI, and for just being able to encode/decode H.265 natively it's not really a justified move for the time being.

Oh, and I forgot to mention in my first post something related to the CPU. I've read somebody saying that Xeon CPUs would be cheaper than i5's at the same performance, the only downside for them being that they can't be overclocked. Since I'm not interested in overclocking the CPU, I was thinking maybe this could be a viable solution too, since the i5 really is a bit too expensive. Can somebody confirm this and perhaps suggest a good model?

 

[Outlander_04]

You will not hear the sound difference unless your cans are exceptional , and you are under 25 years old [ or so ]

Yes the H series motherboard is worth it IMO . The list of advantages is easy to research by comparing the chipsets , and the respective sound chips on the boards

YES you must use a bronze rated psu for power efficiency and for much better control of voltage . Modern processors are very sensitive to voltage fluctuations and only 80+ rated psu's include the circuitry to do that . The psu I mentioned is the highest quality but it will be lightly loaded by your build and should last a long time while running cool and quiet .

Im glad you have space under your desk for ATX , and are willing to pay a premium for that

There are plenty of 750ti models in stock . last time I looked the MSI was great value .


Yes the FX is a possibility . There are ZERO concerns about 'reliability". It will encode faster than the i5 . Yes it will use more power , but not much . Probably id stick with the i5 for this build

 

[ramindersk]

Yes OC stand for overclocking. Well thats good if you get oc card with lower price. No oc versions have higher clocks than the non-oc versions that means its already overclocked and you can overclocked it more. So its better to get OC card most of the time. You can go for Evga msi gigabyte.