Got a few questions about z370 boards/ PSU / RAM 2400Mhz compatibility

[Cornboi]

This is my complete part list: https://au.pcpartpicker.com/list/WgvCD2

So currently in terms of the motherboard and CPU i have got AsRock z170M Pro4s and i5-6600k.

So with those details there I have a few questions to ask.
Also, I am not an expert with this stuff, just been reading a lot and watching videos about tech stuff. In addition to this, incase it may be an important bit of info later, I am not intending to overclock my i7-8700k chip yet, I will probably start doing that in 1.5-2 years from when i start using the new CPU. Just for currency sake, I live in Australia.

1. The first is in regards to the motherboard. I do not have the spending cash to buy an expensive motherboard, so some models i have been looking at and are considering on purchasing are ASUS Prime z370-A, Asrock z370 Extreme4 and the GIGABYTE AORUS Ultra. So if anyone can tell me which one of these motherboards is preferable over the other i'd appreciate it. I have currently started looking at the Asrock one and I am liking it so far but yeah, i just do not know why one would be better than the other.

2. The second thing is my PSU. My Power Supply is listed in the parts, but just to make it easier, it is Thermaltake Litepower 550W. So I haven't had any issues at all with my i5-6600k, but with an upgrade to a new z370 motherboard and i7-8700k, it will most likely require more power. So ideally, I would like to upgrade to a 650W or a 700W depending on the price, how necessary it is and how I feel. The main reason i want to swap my PSU is also after reading that PSU tier list on some Linus Forum, and i saw my model all the way down the bottom HAHA. So, that wasn't a reassuring feeling reading that as well. My question is, does anyone have a PSU in mind that doesn't cost too much but is still a good replacement for the 550W one i have now?

3. The final thing I want to ask is about my current RAM. As listed in the part list, I have a 2400Mhz Ram 8GB x 2. I have been reading stuff about the RAM frequency and saw an official statement on the Asrock z370 Extreme4 motherboard saying that "8th Gen Intel CPU Supports DDR4 up to 2666" which I'm guessing is 2666Mhz. So, I have already forked out heaps of money for my CPU and I will soon on my Motherboard and my PSU too. Does this mean that I will also need to upgrade my RAM as well now?

If you've gotten to this point, thanks for reading through. If anyone can help out with this I'd appreciate it. Stressing out heaps about the building aspect of it (taking out the old mobo +parts), now I'm stressing out about having to buy a new RAM set too.

ALSO Bonus Question (Question 4) if someone can answer this. When changing CPU and Motherboard, is there anything that I will need to change or do before I swap it over? I believe my Windows key is not OEM, but if it is ill just buy a key if there is an issue there. So yeah, if someone feels like answering this, feel free to. Any help is appreciated!

 

[maxalge]

This is my complete part list: https://au.pcpartpicker.com/list/WgvCD2

So currently in terms of the motherboard and CPU i have got AsRock z170M Pro4s and i5-6600k.

So with those details there I have a few questions to ask.
Also, I am not an expert with this stuff, just been reading a lot and watching videos about tech stuff. In addition to this, incase it may be an important bit of info later, I am not intending to overclock my i7-8700k chip yet, I will probably start doing that in 1.5-2 years from when i start using the new CPU. Just for currency sake, I live in Australia.

1. The first is in regards to the motherboard. I do not have the spending cash to buy an expensive motherboard, so some models i have been looking at and are considering on purchasing are ASUS Prime z370-A, Asrock z370 Extreme4 and the GIGABYTE AORUS Ultra. So if anyone can tell me which one of these motherboards is preferable over the other i'd appreciate it. I have currently started looking at the Asrock one and I am liking it so far but yeah, i just do not know why one would be better than the other.

2. The second thing is my PSU. My Power Supply is listed in the parts, but just to make it easier, it is Thermaltake Litepower 550W. So I haven't had any issues at all with my i5-6600k, but with an upgrade to a new z370 motherboard and i7-8700k, it will most likely require more power. So ideally, I would like to upgrade to a 650W or a 700W depending on the price, how necessary it is and how I feel. The main reason i want to swap my PSU is also after reading that PSU tier list on some Linus Forum, and i saw my model all the way down the bottom HAHA. So, that wasn't a reassuring feeling reading that as well. My question is, does anyone have a PSU in mind that doesn't cost too much but is still a good replacement for the 550W one i have now?

3. The final thing I want to ask is about my current RAM. As listed in the part list, I have a 2400Mhz Ram 8GB x 2. I have been reading stuff about the RAM frequency and saw an official statement on the Asrock z370 Extreme4 motherboard saying that "8th Gen Intel CPU Supports DDR4 up to 2666" which I'm guessing is 2666Mhz. So, I have already forked out heaps of money for my CPU and I will soon on my Motherboard and my PSU too. Does this mean that I will also need to upgrade my RAM as well now?

If you've gotten to this point, thanks for reading through. If anyone can help out with this I'd appreciate it. Stressing out heaps about the building aspect of it (taking out the old mobo +parts), now I'm stressing out about having to buy a new RAM set too.

ALSO Bonus Question (Question 4) if someone can answer this. When changing CPU and Motherboard, is there anything that I will need to change or do before I swap it over? I believe my Windows key is not OEM, but if it is ill just buy a key if there is an issue there. So yeah, if someone feels like answering this, feel free to. Any help is appreciated!

1 the asrock is good, just because a motherboard is pricey doesnt mean its good. Look for the features you want.

2 a 550w psu would be more than enough for your part list, its about quality not wattage
( a lot of cheap manufacturers LIE about this, their units BLOW if you try to get the 'rated' wattage out of it )
Yes the power supply you currently have is low tier

3 no, while higher speed ram does give a slight boost for intel it is not as dramatic a difference as to be worth spending additional money on your part.
Also you can probably easily set that ram to 2666 by overclocking it. Read some guides on how to do so.



In addition, the Deepcool - GAMMAXX 300 is niot good enough for a 8700k

You want a cryorig R1 or Noctua NH-14 or NH-15 to properly cool it and give you the possibility to OC it at 5ghz



PCPartPicker part list: https://au.pcpartpicker.com/list/B3Kbw6
Price breakdown by merchant: https://au.pcpartpicker.com/list/B3Kbw6/by_merchant/

CPU: Intel - Core i7-8700K 3.7GHz 6-Core Processor ($499.00 @ Mighty Ape)
CPU Cooler: Noctua - NH-D14 65.0 CFM CPU Cooler ($103.00 @ Skycomp Technology)
Motherboard: ASRock - Z370 Pro4 ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($159.00 @ Mwave Australia)
Power Supply: Corsair - CX (2017) 650W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($88.00 @ Shopping Express)
Total: $849.00
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2018-07-21 17:48 AEST+1000

 

[smorizio]

the asrock as posted is not a bad mb. when looking at a vs b mb look at the size and number of vrm on the mb. the better the vrm the more stable a mb is under gaming loads. the cheaper b and h mb vrm are not as good as z. so they dont make as good as gaming mb. for power supply look at the seasonic units and xfx and higher end cosair. intel older cpu had default speed of 2100/2400 for ram. the newer ram contorlers now do 2600 as max stock ram speed. using slower ram is fine. if the faster ram comes down in price as some point then go with it. in real world your not going to see any real fps changes between 2400 or 3000 speed ram. only in demo software will there be a hit on speed. if you can wait a bit on upgrading there newer nvidia gpu and newer intel chipset mb dropping soon the x390 chipset mb. i would go with the x390 and newest cpu from intel.

 

[smorizio]

on microsoft web page and online they show you how to unrigerster windows 10 from one pc so you can reuse the digital licence on another pc. if you reloaded windows to many time you may have to use phone support.

 

[bmockeg]

Why are you changing processors, you aren't going to see much improvement from a 6600k to 8700k.

What are you using the computer for? What do you feel it isnt doing to meet your needs? What do you expect from the upgrade?

 

[Cornboi]

1 the asrock is good, just because a motherboard is pricey doesnt mean its good. Look for the features you want.

So you reckon i should go ahead with the Asrock Extreme 4 motherboard? I saw that it does not go over 5Ghz in Overclocking, but i mean that's the only "disadvantage" i noticed which does not really bother me too much. If you don't mind, what exactly is a reason for this motherboard being good other than the price point, although most of the boards i mentioned above are around the $220~ range in Australia.

2 a 550w psu would be more than enough for your part list, its about quality not wattage
( a lot of cheap manufacturers LIE about this, their units BLOW if you try to get the 'rated' wattage out of it )
Yes the power supply you currently have is low tier.

Corsair - CX (2017) 650W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply is the Power supply you linked below. I was just wondering is that something that i should urgently upgrade, or am i good to wait a bit? I feel that the 650W is probably a good option for me. Thanks for that. ALSO, i keep seeing bronze, silver, gold certified, what does this mean? How reliable the testing is? (I can Google this at a later time, so if you can't be bothered replying, that's all good.)

3 no, while higher speed ram does give a slight boost for intel it is not as dramatic a difference as to be worth spending additional money on your part.
Also you can probably easily set that ram to 2666 by overclocking it. Read some guides on how to do so.

Okay, so I guess maybe in 6 months or so I should consider a RAM upgrade but for the current moment I should be fine right?

In addition, the Deepcool - GAMMAXX 300 is niot good enough for a 8700k

You want a cryorig R1 or Noctua NH-14 or NH-15 to properly cool it and give you the possibility to OC it at 5ghz

Alright, I guess i should look into those options to upgrade my CPU fan, but is this the same deal with the RAM in the sense that I buy it later when I properly consider to do overclocking? or are you saying that my CPU fan will not cool it well at stock settings?

THANKYOU SO MUCH FOR YOUR REPLY, I REALLY APPRECIATE IT. Obviously I am not very educated in computer tech but everyone is real helpful with this.

 

[Cornboi]

on microsoft web page and online they show you how to unrigerster windows 10 from one pc so you can reuse the digital licence on another pc. if you reloaded windows to many time you may have to use phone support.

Thanks mate I'll go onto microsoft forums and stuff for that bit then.

 

[Cornboi]

Why are you changing processors, you aren't going to see much improvement from a 6600k to 8700k.

What are you using the computer for? What do you feel it isnt doing to meet your needs? What do you expect from the upgrade?

The main reason for this upgrade was because a lot of my games would bottleneck such as Battlefield 1 and Rainbow Six Siege. I just game with this computer but I also want to stay with this CPU for the next 3-4 years (how ever long it can last me) and then I will upgrade or swap it out at that point. Especially with all the new games coming out being CPU intensive as well as GPU intensive, the last thing i want is for my GPU to not get it's full potential. With my GPU which is the GTX 1070, I will most likely seek to replace that in 2-3 years or until i feel like it is underperforming and have the disposable income for it.

I am aware that me buying it may sound pretty stupid, but i just feel comfortable doing it since I had the cash to spend and heard nothing but good things about the processor. Hope i answered your question mate, thanks for the concern.

 

[Cornboi]

the asrock as posted is not a bad mb. when looking at a vs b mb look at the size and number of vrm on the mb. the better the vrm the more stable a mb is under gaming loads. the cheaper b and h mb vrm are not as good as z. so they dont make as good as gaming mb.

Sweet I took a while to understood the letters but i get you. I read about the Asrock Extreme 4 board about VRM and from a quick read there were good things written about the VRM but this is the first time i heard about VRM. I will have to read more about this. I will most likely get the Asrock Extreme 4 at this point, read a lot of good things about it.

For power supply look at the seasonic units and xfx and higher end cosair.

Sweet any that don't break the bank that you can recommend? The first replier gave me one to choose from, if you have some more the suggest, I'd appreciate it just so i can compare between them.

intel older cpu had default speed of 2100/2400 for ram. the newer ram contorlers now do 2600 as max stock ram speed. using slower ram is fine. if the faster ram comes down in price as some point then go with it. in real world your not going to see any real fps changes between 2400 or 3000 speed ram. only in demo software will there be a hit on speed.

Sweet, so there should be no issue with my RAM. So you reckon get a 3000Mhz RAM set if the price goes down, but there really isn't an immediacy with upgrading.

if you can wait a bit on upgrading there newer nvidia gpu and newer intel chipset mb dropping soon the x390 chipset mb. i would go with the x390 and newest cpu from intel.

Thanks for the information about the new stuff coming out soon, but I will probably skip the X series stuff since i really don't require it since all I do with my PC is uni work and Gaming (with watching youtube/netflix on the side). Whereas for the new GPU's that is something I will consider buying maybe a year or a half (give or take) after their release if I feel the need and have money to upgrade.

 

[bmockeg]

My recommendation would be to get the best GPU you can and put it in your current system. There's no reason that shouldn't last you at least 2 more years playing what you want. You will get much more for your money that way. Lots of people are just now upgrading 3 and 4 series Intel processors.

 

[Cornboi]

I already bought the processor, can't return that one. Plus my brother needs an upgrade from his old CPU so he's getting my old one .

 

[bmockeg]

Alright, sounds good. Are you not leaving the RAM for your brother?

 

[Cornboi]

Nah will be using the same RAM, he already has DDR4 RAM.

 

[bmockeg]

Ok, you will be fine using DDR 2400 with an 8700K. As others have stated tge RAM speed plays a very minor part with Intel.

If you get a set in the future get 3200mhz.

 

[Cornboi]

Ok, you will be fine using DDR 2400 with an 8700K. As others have stated tge RAM speed plays a very minor part with Intel.

Thanks for the help mate. You got any PSUs and CPU cooler you can recommend?

 

[bmockeg]

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU Cooler: CRYORIG - H7 49.0 CFM CPU Cooler ($55.00 @ PCCaseGear)
Power Supply: SeaSonic - FOCUS Gold 650W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply ($129.00 @ Mwave Australia)
Total: $184.00
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2018-07-22 15:57 AEST+1000

This would be sufficient. Cooler should allow light to modest overclocking if you desire.