Gaming/development system suggestions to accompany single GTX980Ti

Nucrus

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Dec 1, 2015
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I've been putting off building a new PC for a while now but with the end of year nearing and me finding myself with a bit more free time I've decided to finally take the dive.

I will primarily be using this PC for gaming and want to be able to fully enjoy the Oculus Rift when it finally releases early next year (I bought the SDK a year or so ago and have been hooked ever since). I'm also getting into game development so being able to reliably run Unreal Engine and Unity 5 (primarily for Oculus) and also the likes of Blender for modelling would be required.

Id like to spend about $2000 (~$3000 NZ) but that's not something I'm set on and would rather let requirements dictate (be it higher or lower).

At this stage I'm looking at a single GTX980Ti (with potential for another further down the line if necessary) and have pretty much settled on the GIGABYTE GeForce GTX 980 Ti N98TXTREME 6GB but am open to other suggestions as this is obviously taking a large chunk of my budget.

With the majority of my budget aimed at the graphics card what I'm mainly looking for is advice on CPU and Motherboard (including the X99 vs Z170 debate).
I'm currently looking at the below but think it may be overkill for my purposes...?

Motherboard: GIGABYTE G1 Gaming GA-Z170X
CPU: Intel Core i7-6700K

Any suggestions/advice appreciated :)
 
How's this:

PCPartPicker part list: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/7hJWFT
Price breakdown by merchant: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/7hJWFT/by_merchant/

CPU: Intel Core i7-6700K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor ($359.99 @ Micro Center)
CPU Cooler: Corsair H100i GTX 70.7 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler ($99.99 @ Micro Center)
Motherboard: Asus Z170-A ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($153.89 @ OutletPC)
Memory: Kingston HyperX Fury Black 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2133 Memory ($96.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($77.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($49.98 @ OutletPC)
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB Video Card ($649.99 @ B&H)
Case: Corsair 750D ATX Full Tower Case ($114.99 @ Micro Center)
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA NEX 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($92.10 @ Amazon)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM (64-bit) ($84.98 @ OutletPC)
Monitor: Asus VG248QE 144Hz 24.0" Monitor ($259.99 @ Adorama)
Keyboard: Cooler Master CM Storm Devastator Gaming Bundle Wired Gaming Keyboard w/Optical Mouse ($21.98 @ Newegg)
Total: $2062.86
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-12-01 16:03 EST-0500

This is a nice build that will play pretty much all games at over 80 FPS at 1080p. In the future you could upgrade to a 1440p panel without a GPU upgrade, or you could add another 980ti and upgrade to a 4K panel. This also has a nice black and white color scheme 😀

Also, that GPU you linked is WAY overpriced, you can get basically the same thing for ~$650. Sometimes those prices are really screwed up!:)
 
I'm not an expert on motherboards, but I think sometimes people tend to overspend on them. Consider cheaper alternatives, I know that this site has a pretty good guide on motherboards. The CPU will be excellent, but unless you're gaming on a high resolution screen, it may be unnecessary to have one that powerful. If your budget is 2000, you may be limited because a high resolution screen required to really take advantage of your build can be very costly. I would put together an entire build with your ideal parts, and if it's too expensive, you can work your way back, finding parts that you could downgrade or find alternatives for. You want every part to take advantage of the system, and to not bottleneck anything. You especially don't want to be spending money where you don't have to. Good luck!
 
Hi Guys thanks for the replies, I should probably clarify a few things

Newegg links were just for reference (Also I'm in New Zealand so they were potentially in $NZ), I will definitely shop around for the best deal on a per part basis.
I already have peripherals and software/OS sorted (probably fine for storage as well), so on that budget I'm just looking for the box itself.

Couple of questions:
Would it not be possible to game in 4k (single display) with a single GTX980Ti? I was under the impressions that it would be fine for "most" games, but may not be able to run at "Ultra" on some.
Are there any advantages to sticking with the same brand? ie. Gigabyte Motherboard with a Gigabyte Video Card.
 


Sorry about the price, I didn't see the NZ next to it. Here is a build that will perform better in SLI configurations (with NZ prices):

PCPartPicker part list: http://nz.pcpartpicker.com/p/wy82Jx
Price breakdown by merchant: http://nz.pcpartpicker.com/p/wy82Jx/by_merchant/

CPU: Intel Core i7-5820K 3.3GHz 6-Core Processor ($649.74 @ PB Technologies)
CPU Cooler: Corsair H100i GTX 70.7 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler ($215.00 @ 1stWave Technologies)
Motherboard: Asus X99-A ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard ($499.00 @ PC Force)
Memory: Kingston HyperX Fury Black 16GB (4 x 4GB) DDR4-2666 Memory ($230.00 @ Paradigm PCs)
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB Video Card ($1195.00 @ 1stWave Technologies)
Case: Corsair 750D ATX Full Tower Case ($281.00 @ Paradigm PCs)
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA NEX 650W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($154.00 @ 1stWave Technologies)
Total: $3223.74
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-12-02 14:07 NZDT+1300

To address some of your questions, yes, 4K is definitely possible with a single 980ti, but it may dip to low framerates on ultra. If you don't care about ultra settings, 4K is definitely playable on high or medium settings. Also, I don't think there is any advantage to sticking with a brand, at least I haven't seen any.
 
So now I'm back to the question of whether to go with X99 or Z170.

I understand that X99 performs better in SLI than Z170, but does that mean that the reverse is also true? (that Z170 performs better in single card systems?) Because it is likely to be a while before I need to purchase another graphics card (if I end up doing this at all).

Aside from the SLI/single argument is there any other reason to prefer one over the other? I'm just worried I'm missing out on something by having the potential to go that route in the future, and whether it's worth it in the long run.

Also as a side note I noticed that both of your builds have liquid cooling for the CPU, I'm just curious if this is a matter of requirement or preference?

 


X99 has better SLI support because it has almost 3x more PCI lanes than the Z170 platform does. In terms of pure performance in single card systems, Z170 outperforms X99 by a small margin, but in SLI systems (especially ones with more than two cards) a Z170 chip could potentially bottleneck the cards, but the performance hit would be barely noticeable. If you plan to upgrade to only two cards in the near future, you won't be missing out on anything the X99 platform. The only other reason to consider the X99 platform is better workstation performance (more cores). If you plan on doing heavy video or audio editing and production, the extra cores may give you a slight edge (25% - 50% better render times). In my opinion, I think you should go with Skylake for now and upgrade to a platform like Kaby Lake (X99's next iteration) in the future if the need arises.

The watercooler is personal preference, with some justification. If you plan on overclocking your system, which I strongly recommend doing, a watercooler will allow you to squeeze every last bit of performance out of your system unlike some air coolers. Also, I like the way watercoolers look 😀

Here's a Skylake build without peripherals:

PCPartPicker part list: http://nz.pcpartpicker.com/p/J3V9kL
Price breakdown by merchant: http://nz.pcpartpicker.com/p/J3V9kL/by_merchant/

CPU: Intel Core i7-6700K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor ($579.95 @ Computer Lounge)
CPU Cooler: Corsair H100i GTX 70.7 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler ($215.00 @ 1stWave Technologies)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z170XP-SLI ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($279.00 @ PC Force)
Memory: Kingston HyperX Fury Black 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2133 Memory ($184.00 @ 1stWave Technologies)
Storage: Kingston SSDNow V300 Series 120GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($74.50 @ 1stWave Technologies)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($89.00 @ PC Force)
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB Video Card ($1195.00 @ 1stWave Technologies)
Case: Corsair 750D ATX Full Tower Case ($281.00 @ Paradigm PCs)
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA NEX 650W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($154.00 @ 1stWave Technologies)
Total: $3051.45
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-12-02 17:09 NZDT+1300
 
Thanks for your help, I like it.

I'm considering reusing my current power supply and case (changes here)

I added them in pcpartpicker and it didn't seem to find any incompatibilities, do you know if this check generally extends to checking whether the case has space for the CPU cooler?

Aside from that I think I'm sorted, just gotta decide if it's gonna be worth waiting for the likes of boxing day sales, or just buying it now 😀
 


The build looks completely compatible (PcPartPicker does check case compatibility). It was my pleasure to help! 😀