Help with identifying component for a PC between £800-£1100

[CptGoodar]

Hey,

This may have been asked before, but I'm looking to build a gaming PC with a budget of upto £1100 ideally as cheep as possible.
Games that would be played would be like Witcher 3, Star Wars Battlefront, Overwatch etc...
But with enough speed to run work programs such as Matlab, Solidworks, Ansys (Enginering Compitantional Fluids Dynamics Program)


Currently I own a 250gb Samsung Evo 840 SSD, Windows 10 OS, a gaming Keybord & mouse.


Parts needed;
CPU, GPU, Ram, Case, CPU cooler, Motherbord, HDD& Monitor

Parts not needed;
Mouse,Keybord, headset, OS & SSD

From my intial looks Im currently thinking of

i5-6600k CPU
Cool master 212 Evo CPU cooler
Nvidia 1070 GPU
MSI Z-170A pro ATX Motherbord
Seagate Baracudda 2TB 7200 rpm HDD
2x 4gb G.Skill Ripjaw DDR4-2133 RAM
EVGa 500w + power supply
Asus 228H-P 21.5 1920x1080 monitor

Link on pcpartpicker below

http://pcpartpicker.com/list/vc7tgL

I was just wondering if any of you would be able to recommend any changes. Is the 1070 worth the extra money over the 1060 or could that money be used on another component?

Thanks for any and all the help 😀

 

[Alex_120]

A few things:

1. Unless you are planning to do CPU overclocking, don't bother getting the 6600k. Get the i5-6500, it's a cheaper and you won't notice the performance difference.

2. If you do plan on overclocking your 6600k... A 500w power supply is cutting it pretty close, would recommend maybe a 650w Gold certified. I think it's better to be safe than sorry.

3. If you want to "future proof" your computer, getting 16GB of ram is not that much more than the 8GB, but will guarantee you won't have any problems a couple years down the road.

4. On the GPU... The 1070 is a great card, and will have no problems running resolutions up to 4K and even VR. The main difference that's worth noting between the 1060 and the 1070 is the amount of VRAM; 6GB on the 1060 is good, and 8GB on the 1070 is great. This sort of thing goes along with the whole "future proofing" idea. Whether it's worth it or not is up to you.


I actually just built a new computer with a 1070 and 6600k (I'm overclocking it quite a bit) and it's has been destroying games. Playing Rise of the Tomb Raider with all settings maxed at 1080p never falling below 50fps, and Shadow of Mordor with all settings maxed running at DSR 4k with avg fps around 50.

 

[CptGoodar]

Hi Alex_120,
Thanks for the help, a few questions

1) what would be the benefits for CPU overclocking? Would this make a note able difference in performance for the extra price of both the CPU and motherboard?

2) the 2gb of VRAM how much of a difference will that make to performance, like you said more is better?

3) is VRAM memory only used when the GPU is being used or could it be used for other application? I.e could I have in theory upto 24gb memory (16 + 8VrAM?)

Thanks

 

[Alex_120]

Hi Alex_120,
Thanks for the help, a few questions

1) what would be the benefits for CPU overclocking? Would this make a note able difference in performance for the extra price of both the CPU and motherboard?

2) the 2gb of VRAM how much of a difference will that make to performance, like you said more is better?

3) is VRAM memory only used when the GPU is being used or could it be used for other application? I.e could I have in theory upto 24gb memory (16 + 8VrAM?)

Thanks

Hey, I'll just jump right in to answering your questions..

1. Short answer: Yes, you can get better performance out of your CPU, sometimes A LOT better. Do you need to do it? probably not...
Long answer: CPU overclocking is often used as a method to keep an older processor up to speed (no pun intended) with more current models. I.e. You might have a 5 year old AMD vishera, but with a little know-how you can OC it and get another years worth of usefulness out of it. On the opposite side of the spectrum, you have people who buy a brand new processor and OC it right out of the box. Now the i5-6600k out of the box runs great, but to those who choose to overclock are doing it as a means of bragging rights over other PC gamers. "Hey I got my X processor all the way up to Y Ghz." It's sort of a way to flex your computer prowess to the rest of the PC master race community.

2. The extra 2GB of VRAM will, in a lot of games, go completely unused. Hell, the extra 4GB of VRAM will go unused a lot of the time. The key thing here is the aforementioned "future proofing" concept. Currently, I don't think there is a game out there that requires 6GB of VRAM, at least at 1080p gaming. Though Witcher III might be pretty close to that 6GB.. I haven't had the chance to play that yet. Have you ever heard of the saying "buy it nice, or buy it twice"? I think this applies pretty well here, and in building computers in general. Buy an okay GPU now, and upgrade in 2-3 years. Buy a great GPU, and upgrade in 5 years. I can't say definitively which is better (the 1060 or the 1070), because one is cheaper while the other has a slight, but notable, performance advantage. You know what sort of PC you want and your budget better than I, so ultimately it's up to you.

3. VRAM and RAM serve very different purposes, and therefore cannot be combined in the matter in which you asked. RAM is used by the processor to load applications so that when you want to use them again, you can. VRAM is used specifically in gaming or video/image editing because it is significantly faster than regular RAM. The game will load all of its assets (textures and stuff) into VRAM, and if you run out of VRAM, i.e. you only have 4GB but the game you are playing uses 5GB, the game will start putting the overflow into your RAM, which will greatly reduce performance.

Hope this helps! Sorry for the longish responses. Feel free to ask more if I was not clear.