Question Looking for advice on build, but so much conflicting info!

[Franknj229]

First, let me just say that I'm not criticizing. I know WHY there is conflicting information. This is a subjective topic. "What would YOU do?" isn't going to lead to a universal consensus. Of course everyone has a different opinion. I get that. So I truly appreciate everyone who chimes in. You obviously know more than me or I wouldn't be here asking for your help.

Here's the problem: I want to build my first PC in many many many years.... and I have a general, to kind of specific, idea of what I'm after, but I don't have it all figured out.

I've asked about certain parts of the build in their respective forums and they were mostly very helpful, but some of it set me back quite a bit from a planning standpoint. Some people commented simply that my build looked good, while others made it sound like some of my choices were a terrible idea. Some say "Intel sucks! 13th/14th gen issues...blah blah blah..." Others say "The issues have been resolved, warranties extended...yada yada yada...."

Is the former just being anti-intel doomsday? Is the latter just being pro-intel rose tinted glasses? It's hard to tell hyperbole from objectivity.

My goal is to build the best overall system I can, that shouldn't need upgrading for at least a few years...with an emphasis on gaming.

Below is my prospective build, but I feel like it's not quite complete. I don't have a budget, per se, but the list below is close to $4000 pre-black Friday deals. That's a tough number to swallow, but I'll live. I would love for it to be less, but I don't want to sacrifice quality and performance. I want this to be viable for several years, at least. If there are substantially similar parts for less, I would love to hear suggestions.

My priorities are, roughly, 50% basic stuff (internet, microsoft office, editing travel videos and drone footage, storage...) and 50% gaming (pretty low demand games lately, but mostly because I haven't had a computer that could handle much for many years). I want to be able to play anything that might come out in the next couple years at very high settings. Certainly anything that's out now should be a walk in the park for this build.

Sorry for such a long lead in. Here's my wishlist:

Prospective build, United States, Philadelphia area:
CPU: Intel - Core i9-14900K Raptor Lake 3.2GHz Twenty Four-Core LGA 1700 (I got a fair bit of pushback, and some support, for this in the CPU forum. I"m open to an AMD build, but the comments are nowhere near unanimous, which suggests there are pros and cons to both. What are they?)
CPU cooler: Noctua - NH-D15S Chromax Black
Motherboard: Gigabyte - Z790 AORUS Elite X WiFi 7 Intel LGA 1700 ATX
Ram: Corsair - Vengeance 64GB (2 x 32GB) DDR5-6000 PC5-48000 CL30 Dual Channel (Don't know anything about the brands. Welcome thoughts. Is 64GB enough long-ish term?)
SSD/HDD: Crucial - T705 2TB Micron 232L TLC NAND PCIe Gen 5 x4 NVMe M.2 Internal SSD (I feel like I'm lacking in this area. *More on that below.)
GPU: Gigabyte - NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4080 Super Windforce V2 Triple Fan 16GB GDDR6X PCIe 4.0 (Don't understand all the versions, ie. "windforce". Does it really make much difference?)
PSU: Lian Li - Edge 850 Watt 80 Plus Platinum ATX Fully Modular (Is this a minimum? Should I be thinking 1000 or 1250?)
Chassis: Lian Li - Lancool 216 Tempered Glass ATX Mid-Tower (The only part I'm pretty set on, as long as it's big enough for my build.)
OS: Microsoft - Windows 11 Home 64-Bit FPP USB (Any advantage to the Pro version, or not necessary? I've heard the term "bloatware". Is there a version I should avoid?)
Monitor: MSI - MPG 321URX 32" 4K UHD (3840 x 2160) 240Hz Gaming Monitor (Not sure if this is overkill. Might I be glad I got it 3 years from now?)

*Regarding storage: I've heard of "boot drives" or drives specifically for the OS, to increase speeds. Other than component advice, I would really appreciate suggestions on configuration/setup. I'd love to have an internal drive just for storing travel videos and office files. And what about backing them up? Another storage drive? I don't want the "basic" side of my computer needs to impact the gaming side.

Sorry again for the length. Happy to provide more info if needed. Thank you in advance for your expertise! I'm hoping to buy the majority of this build this weekend, hoping some of it is on sale.

-Frank

 

[Lafong]

"It's hard to tell hyperbole from objectivity."

Unfortunately, probably truer now than ever before. Don't expect a change. All you can do is hone your hyperbole detector.

In the Olympics diving competitions, they throw out the highest and lowest scores on each dive. Hmmm........maybe you can put that idea to work.

You can expect nit-picking at your parts and will have to decide how informed that opinion is. Preconceived notions die hard. Prepare to hear more about AMD and Intel.

I'd try desperately to not get bogged down in minutae or the search for the "best". Too much stuff you simply CANNOT know. If you end up rending your flesh, it likely won't be because you didn't spend that extra 30 hours of research. Randomness and the unforeseeable will overwhelm you.

Can you live with yourself if you did not have the "latest and greatest" or are you a more practical sort?

Would you gladly spend an extra 300 or 500 dollars to avoid buyer's remorse? "Damn, I really wish I'd bought XYZ! What was I thinking? I'm afraid I'm missing out on something!!"

The correlation between amount spent and "quality" (to use your word) is debatable and likely a lot lower than you'd like. But maybe you have a life-long belief in "you get what you pay for". Another preconceived notion that may die hard.

You are way way out on the diminishing returns curve, which I assume is fine with you, considering you are spending 4k.

It's anybody's guess whether the last 400 dollars of 4000 is buying you anything observable...quality, performance, convenience, fewer headaches. More likely to help with style, aesthetics, and "pride of ownership", whatever that is.

64 GB RAM certainly seems like plenty for your stated purposes. Fight that war in 2030 or whenever it becomes apparent....if ever. But if your budget allows 128 now, then??

G Skill Ripjaws (for Intel) or Flare (for AMD) and Corsair Vengeance are both generally good. Not much payoff when going beyond 6000 speed and 30 CL. I did not check your motherboard's qualified memory list, but that Corsair is a near certainty to work.

Is that Lancool case wide enough to accept the Noctua cooler?

Can't comment on the video card or power supply, but generally your parts list looks OK.

Very little observable real-time advantage to gen 5 SSDs. Some would defy you to tell the difference from gen 4. They run hot, which may not concern you.

Reasonable idea on drives:

One mid sized NVME for the OS and applications. Your "C drive". Maybe 500 GB or 1 TB, whatever you need. Maybe gen 4. Maybe gen 5 if you couldn't otherwise live with yourself.

Another largish second NVME for ALL personal data. Your D drive, single partition, subdivided by a folder structure. Maybe 2 plus TB. Gen 3 or 4.

No real performance advantage to putting OS and data on separate drives, but it can be convenient in certain circumstances. Lots of people do well with putting "everything" on a single drive....leaving aside whatever backups they may have.

You should have a totally separate drive for backups. Could be internal or external. Could be NVME, standard 2.5 inch SSD, or standard spinning hard drive. Depending on budget. Backup to an external via USB port can be very slow. A large spinning internal can work quite well for this purpose, considering it isn't used constantly so speed isn't highly critical. It would likely be fast enough because it's internal and avoids USB.

Minimal advantage to Windows Pro. I have it, but have never used the features it has that Home does not. It's not "faster" or "better". It simply has a few features not activated on the Home version.