Building First PC - Need Advice To Reduce Price

MafiosoTheThird

Reputable
Jan 24, 2016
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4,510
Hey! I've been trying to configure my first PC but I don't know if I can reduce the price without losing performance.

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/k89s99

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Core i5 6600 - 216$
CM Hyper 212 Evp - 25$
MSI H170A PC MATE - 104$
Kingston HyperX Fury 8gb - 41$
Samsung 850 Evo 250gb - 84$
WD Blue 1tb - 49$
Asus GTX 970 - 319$
NZXT S340 - 65$
Corsair RM550W - 83$
Windows 10 - 100$
LG 29Um57-P - 372$
Kingston HyperX Cloud II - 100$
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I do have a mouse, mouse pad and keyboard and I would like to know if you could suggest me some other better parts (ex a more powerfull PSU)

Thank you!
 
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DO NOT purchase a Windows license from G2A. That can be a waste of time and money. Many have purchased licenses from them, only to have their product keys blacklisted later.

ALWAYS get Windows from a reputable source, and that is NOT G2A.
Well there's not much you can do to lower the cost at this point.

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/vfCfNG

I switched out some parts for better alternatives (EVGA G2 PSUs are a LOT better in terms of both output and quality than Corsair's RM series. RMi and RMx are great but more expensive). You don't need too beefy a cooler since you can't overclock that CPU (you could only do baseclock overclocking and only on Z170 boards), so I swapped it out with a lower cost alternative and added some high quality thermal paste (trust me, the thermal paste included with coolers and such is utter crap). The Kingston SSD and Seagate hard drive are pretty much as good but a few bucks cheaper.

I didn't want to touch the graphics card but I could check for better alternatives if you wish.
 
For gaming, I think these changes would be a little better.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-6400 2.7GHz Quad-Core Processor ($183.88 @ OutletPC)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler ($24.88 @ OutletPC)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z170-HD3P ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($89.99 @ Micro Center)
Storage: Kingston SSDNow V300 Series 120GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($43.89 @ OutletPC)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($48.88 @ OutletPC)
Video Card: PowerColor Radeon R9 390 8GB Video Card ($259.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Corsair 200R ATX Mid Tower Case ($49.99 @ Micro Center)
Power Supply: EVGA 750W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply ($59.99 @ NCIX US)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM (64-bit) ($87.95 @ OutletPC)
Total: $849.44
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-01-24 09:25 EST-0500
 


I don't get the point of putting an even weaker non-K i5 in a Z170 board. Sure there's "unofficial" overclocking support for Skylake non-K CPUs but that still has its issues and is pretty risky as is. Similarly, don't get the point of an even better cooler on a non-overclockable CPU.

Also, the B2 series are Tier Two whereas for an extra 20$ you get a Tier One G2.

Case is also the absolute last thing I'd touch as it doesn't affect performance and it's ultimately up to the buyer's preference.

Finally, switching out the CPU for an even lower-performance one is imo a bad idea as OP won't be overclocking with non-K anyway so the 6600 would probably last longer.
 

gondo

Distinguished
Off the top of my head the EVGA Supernova G2 650W is the same price and very good. It would give you another 100W of headroom as well. Adding a second video card in the future would put you pretty close to 550W so a 650W would be preferred.

And that monitor. Consider going 144HZ over 21:9. 144Hz is more desirable for gaming. Super smooth tear free gaming. People are hooked on 144Hz it's that good over 60Hz. G-sync is even better but that's expensive. You could get a 24" 144Hz cheaper than that LG or a 27" for the same price. A 27" 1440P 144Hz would be starting around $450 which is a bit more than the LG.

As for your headset, at $100 you can't do much better than a USB headset to override the cheap onboard audio. There are better solutions than USB headsets but it would get more expensive.

Overall a very nice build. Only change I would personally make is an Asus board for personal preferences. And I might look at a Fractal Design or Corsair case over the NZXT. But the NZXT and MSI are still very nice. Just personal preferences.

Nice choice on the single 8GB stick of RAM. You can add a second in the future for 16GB of Dual Channel.






 
First of all, The Z170 is cheaper. It also has features that H board doesn't and allows for higher speed RAM. You can overclock the non K chip with it if you choose, or if you decide to upgrade later to something like an i7 6700k. It will be easier to sell down the road and may also hold it's value better. The 6400 at stock clocks is still a powerful CPU and will run any video card on the market as of right now. More importantly, with TurboBoost the speed ramps up to 3.2 vs the 3.6 for the 6500, so the advantage isn't as big as you might expect. The power supply is a great deal right now and a Tier 2. I would use it in a second. And since the OP is trying to reduce costs, it's well worth it. I agree with you that the case is more or less personal preference, but it has to be able to fit larger video cards and my opinion is that if it doesn't add to the performance of my machine, I can use the money elsewhere that it does.
 

gondo

Distinguished
I think it's overwhelming that the EVGA G2 power supply is a favorite. And the 650W is the same price at $80 something dollars.

True that a Z170 board can be had for the same or less money.

Seagate EVO and WD Blue are very nice, so I wouldn't be rushing to swap those.

Only other change I would look at is that ultra wide monitor. But it's personal preference. Most people prefer 144Hz over ultra wide for gaming. Just though I'd make you aware in case you didn't know.

 

barto

Expert
Ambassador
I want to be the voice of reason here, clock speed on Intel processors isn't very important for gaming. Applications outside of gaming like compression, video rendering etc, it is important. However, just as Intel's former releases (Sandy, Ivy and Haswell) overclocking isn't going to boost FPS as one may think. It comes down to architecture now. With each new architecture release, there's about a 10% performance increase. Not very much.

For budget orientated builds, the Haswell i5-4600 was typically recommended as there was little performance difference between the 4600 and the 4690k. By the time the core clock would be relevant, you'd be building a new computer all over again.

Personally, to reduce cost, I think you should drop the headset and buy it in the future.
 

MafiosoTheThird

Reputable
Jan 24, 2016
6
0
4,510
Thank you for your suggestions!
After reading all the current comments I've decided to make these changes(I'll leave the discution open):
Windows 8 from g2a : https://www.g2a.com/microsoft-windows-8-standard-32-64-bit-cd-key-global.html - 20$ after that I'll upgrade to Windows 10
Changed to Corsair CS Series Modular CS650M - 77$
And that's pretty much it. In my currency I've reduced the price by aprox. 300$
Thank you very much!

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Regarding the i5-6400 I've seen a benchmark on which it did 7 fps lower that the 6600. Not a huge differece but still.
I don't live in UK and here none of the EVGA PSU were on stock since 2014....
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http://pcpartpicker.com/p/g9gR23
 

COLGeek

Cybernaut
Moderator
DO NOT purchase a Windows license from G2A. That can be a waste of time and money. Many have purchased licenses from them, only to have their product keys blacklisted later.

ALWAYS get Windows from a reputable source, and that is NOT G2A.
 
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