Help me with my gaming pc build please, complete newcomer here

[Banana-Man]

Approximate Purchase Date: Immediately


Budget Range: £900-1000 (uk prices please)


System Usage from Most to Least Important: Gaming, surfing the internet


Are you buying a monitor: No


Parts to Upgrade: Its a new build


Do you need to buy OS: Yes


Preferred Website(s) for Parts: I have no preference,i would appreciate advice on the best sites to use, i am in the uk though so not newegg


Location: London, England


Parts Preferences: gtx 1060, intel i5


Overclocking: Maybe


SLI or Crossfire: No


Your Monitor Resolution: 1920x1080


Additional Comments: This is a follow on from another thread i created, a couple of builds were posted in there so i will paste them into here


Why Are You Upgrading: My laptop is very old and slow, i can't run any modern games on it, this will be my first gaming pc.

For 1k pounds you can fit a 1070 in there
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-6500 3.2GHz Quad-Core Processor (£181.90 @ Amazon UK)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-H170M-D3H Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard (£95.81 @ More Computers)
Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£74.74 @ CCL Computers)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£44.98 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 1070 8GB Windforce OC Video Card (£393.29 @ Aria PC)
Case: Fractal Design Define R5 (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case (£87.99 @ Ebuyer)
Power Supply: XFX 650W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply (£50.51 @ CCL Computers)
Optical Drive: Lite-On iHAS124-14 DVD/CD Writer (£12.10 @ Amazon UK)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM 64-bit (£82.98 @ Ebuyer)
Total: £1024.30
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-08-31 22:42 BST+0100

A 1060 would bring the price down lower.

Not just you mate.

I'll post this little build here (I'm on mobile & if I forget it'll disappear)

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-6500 3.2GHz Quad-Core Processor (£181.90 @ Amazon UK)
Motherboard: ASRock H170A-X1/3.1 ATX LGA1151 Motherboard (£76.55 @ CCL Computers)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2400 Memory (£32.87 @ CCL Computers)
Storage: Kingston HyperX Fury 240GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£59.98 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£45.78 @ Misco UK)
Power Supply: Antec 550W 80+ Certified ATX Power Supply (£49.99 @ Amazon UK)
Optical Drive: Lite-On iHAS124-14 DVD/CD Writer (£12.10 @ Amazon UK)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM 64-bit (£82.98 @ Ebuyer)
Other: KFA2 GEFORCE GTX 1070 EX OC 8192MB GDDR5 PCI-EXPRESS GRAPHICS CARD (£379.99)
Other: DEEPCOOL KENDOMEN TI Computer Case (£59.99)
Total: £982.13
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-08-31 23:23 BST+0100

Thanks to both of you for those those builds, I am not sure i really need a 1070, 1060 seems like a pretty strong card so i would rather save the money and get that, or put the money towards improving the rest of the system if necessary. I wasn't planning on having an optical drive in the system as i didn't think i would need one, is there a reason why i should definitely have one? I notice that neither of you included a network card in your builds, is wifi capability built into the selected motherboards?

 

[Banana-Man]

Ram speed isn't going to make 'that' much difference .
Bear in mind last years standard was ddr3 1600 or 1866

Mb video outs make little odds , you'll be using the GPU video connections.

Should you really want to up the board the extreme 4 is a decent one

yeah silly me, the ports i need are on the gpu so will a more expensive motherboard actually do anything to improve performance (apart from memory speed limit) or am i just wasting my money? i guess what i am asking is, what is the upside to a more expensive board, is it just more options for upgrading and adding hardware later on? also, what would a person use all those extra ports on the motherboard for? sorry for all the questions i appreciate the help...

 

[madmatt30]

With a locked CPU not really any benefit to a z series board apart from ram speed, sli compatibility (the 1060 cannot be sli'd anyway though)

Nothing wrong with the h170 x1 you've listed at all (apart from it being a tenner more than it was 2 weeks ago )

 

[Banana-Man]

ok thanks for the help, i am going to make a thread in the motherboard section to get more advice on which motherboard to go for...

 

[madmatt30]

ok thanks for the help, i am going to make a thread in the motherboard section to get more advice on which motherboard to go for...

then you will open a can of worms becasue everyone has their favourites ;-)

if you really want the faster ram compatibility then this gigabyte is cheapish & a nice board

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Gigabyte-Z170-GAMING-Socket-Express-Motherboard/dp/B01AUSEBHE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1476550250&sr=8-1&keywords=gigabyte+z170

the extreme 4 will probably look nicer in the phantom white case though.

3000mhz ram for the same price as 2133

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Corsair-CMK16GX4M2B3000C15-Vengeance-Performance-Desktop/dp/B0134EW7G8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1476550295&sr=8-1&keywords=ddr4+3000

 

[Banana-Man]

ok thanks for the help, i am going to make a thread in the motherboard section to get more advice on which motherboard to go for...

then you will open a can of worms becasue everyone has their favourites ;-)

if you really want the faster ram compatibility then this gigabyte is cheapish & a nice board

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Gigabyte-Z170-GAMING-Socket-Express-Motherboard/dp/B01AUSEBHE/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1476550250&sr=8-1&keywords=gigabyte+z170

the extreme 4 will probably look nicer in the phantom white case though.

3000mhz ram for the same price as 2133

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Corsair-CMK16GX4M2B3000C15-Vengeance-Performance-Desktop/dp/B0134EW7G8/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1476550295&sr=8-1&keywords=ddr4+3000

thanks for your input, which motherboard would you go for, gigabyte z170 K3 or asrock z170 extreme 4? i am leaning towards the gigabyte just so i can have red theme parts inside the case. also i don't think the network adaptor i selected will do the job, reviews state that it is not compatible with windows 10 so if you can recommend a cheap one that will do the job that would be great, does it need to be usb 3.0 to work with my system?

 

[madmatt30]

Both decent , if you want red buy the gigabyte - will match the GPU you're buying anyway.

Wireless adapter wise - go for a pci-express card.

Who's your provider ?? Speeds etc??
Do you have a 5g network ??

Im on virgin & the superhub 3 pushes 5g & 2g networks simultaneously , 5g is faster but unless you're on 100meg+ not going to make a massive difference in all honesty

 

[Banana-Man]

Both decent , if you want red buy the gigabyte - will match the GPU you're buying anyway.

Wireless adapter wise - go for a pci-express card.

Who's your provider ?? Speeds etc??
Do you have a 5g network ??

Im on virgin & the superhub 3 pushes 5g & 2g networks simultaneously , 5g is faster but unless you're on 100meg+ not going to make a massive difference in all honesty

i am with virgin media also, i am on 50mb broadband. you see i thought i just needed a wireless adaptor to plug into the motherboard to get wifi. do i need a network card, i thought that stuff was built into the motherboard?

 

[madmatt30]

Wired Ethernet is built in.
Wireless isn't .
A pci-express card is just neater mate , that's all.
No cables hanging out the back etc.

http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/product/Chh9TW/tp-link-wireless-network-card-tlwn881nd

Decent ,cheap, last time I used it win 10 installed drivers automatically on install.
Decent reception , should saturate your internet connection easily.

 

[Banana-Man]

Wired Ethernet is built in.
Wireless isn't .
A pci-express card is just neater mate , that's all.
No cables hanging out the back etc.

http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/product/Chh9TW/tp-link-wireless-network-card-tlwn881nd

Decent ,cheap, last time I used it win 10 installed drivers automatically on install.
Decent reception , should saturate your internet connection easily.

great, thanks for the help

 

[Banana-Man]

guys i am just wondering, do i need to buy thermal paste or will there already be some on the cpu?

 

[Isokolon]

usually your cooler comes with some

 

[Banana-Man]

usually your cooler comes with some

ok, do you think i should add my own to cover the whole cpu?

 

[Banana-Man]

i have calculated the amount of power i will need using a calculation site, it says i will need 394 watts. that doesn't include overclocking of cpu and gpu tho, will 550 watts power supply be sufficient when overclocking is taken into account?

 

[madmatt30]

Impossible to push an i5 skylake past 100w, impossible to push a 1060 past 150w.

You'll pull 280w max at standard speeds , a 550w is more than enough.

 

[Niklas_13]

ATM the evga supernova G2 550w and 650 W are about 8 bucks apart I would go with the 650W just for headroom

also on thos PSU website is should ask you if you're OCing the cpu gpu ect

https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/products/power-supply/

 

[Banana-Man]

ATM the evga supernova G2 550w and 650 W are about 8 bucks apart I would go with the 650W just for headroom

also on thos PSU website is should ask you if you're OCing the cpu gpu ect

https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/products/power-supply/

but won't it be more expensive to run a 650 watt power supply?

 

[Isokolon]

ATM the evga supernova G2 550w and 650 W are about 8 bucks apart I would go with the 650W just for headroom

also on thos PSU website is should ask you if you're OCing the cpu gpu ect

https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/products/power-supply/

but won't it be more expensive to run a 650 watt power supply?

uhm..no?
if your pc draws 300W, it draws 300W no matter if your PSU can deliver 450W or 1500W

 

[Isokolon]

ATM the evga supernova G2 550w and 650 W are about 8 bucks apart I would go with the 650W just for headroom

also on thos PSU website is should ask you if you're OCing the cpu gpu ect

https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/products/power-supply/

but won't it be more expensive to run a 650 watt power supply?

uhm..no?
if your pc draws 300W, it draws 300W no matter if your PSU can deliver 450W or 1500W

 

[Isokolon]

ATM the evga supernova G2 550w and 650 W are about 8 bucks apart I would go with the 650W just for headroom

also on thos PSU website is should ask you if you're OCing the cpu gpu ect

https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/products/power-supply/

but won't it be more expensive to run a 650 watt power supply?

uhm..no?
if your pc draws 300W, it draws 300W no matter if your PSU can deliver 450W or 1500W

 

[Banana-Man]

ATM the evga supernova G2 550w and 650 W are about 8 bucks apart I would go with the 650W just for headroom

also on thos PSU website is should ask you if you're OCing the cpu gpu ect

https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/products/power-supply/

but won't it be more expensive to run a 650 watt power supply?

uhm..no?
if your pc draws 300W, it draws 300W no matter if your PSU can deliver 450W or 1500W

ok i understand, i have been researching power efficiency ratings which confused me a bit. so if i have a 650 watt power supply and i am only using 400 watt, and the psu is 80% efficiency that means the psu is pulling 480 watts from the wall, is that correct?

 

[madmatt30]

^ absolutely that - a bronze PSU is 80% efficient minimum though, normally at 75-80% load you'll be closer to 90% so 450-460w.

 

[Banana-Man]

^ absolutely that - a bronze PSU is 80% efficient minimum though, normally at 75-80% load you'll be closer to 90% so 450-460w.

great thanks for the help, do you think a gold rated supply is worth the extra cost?

 

[madmatt30]

Nor really no - it would save you about £1 per year.

The g2s are just plain great supplies though.

If you want to save money though £55 for a cx550m which is a great PSU & a great price IMO

Corsair CP-9020102-UK CX Series CX550M ATX/EPS Semi-Modular 81 Plus Bronze 550 W Power Supply Unit https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01C3FFLZ8/ref=cm_sw_r_em_apa_Dz3jybHJYZ2K4

& 550w is still plenty as I said before.

 

[Banana-Man]

Nor really no - it would save you about £1 per year.

The g2s are just plain great supplies though.

If you want to save money though £55 for a cx550m which is a great PSU & a great price IMO

Corsair CP-9020102-UK CX Series CX550M ATX/EPS Semi-Modular 81 Plus Bronze 550 W Power Supply Unit https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01C3FFLZ8/ref=cm_sw_r_em_apa_Dz3jybHJYZ2K4

& 550w is still plenty as I said before.

great thanks again for the help...

 

[madmatt30]

No problem mate

Just a word of warning here - I'm UK too & have contacts in retail .
When it comes to PC components the prices have been rising steadily the last 3 weeks because of the decline of the value of the pound.
Do not expect big sales on component prices , I've been warned to expect up to 10% rises in the next 2 months.

If you have the money & find good deals then put your money down & buy now.
Things will absolutely not get cheaper towards Xmas as they normally do when it comes to specialist luxury items like components.