Need advice on PC build.

Jason Burge

Reputable
Nov 21, 2014
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4,530
This PC I made on parts picker is not from an experienced PC builder by no means, but that is why I am here to get some advice on what I may should do differently.

First this PC will be primarily used for PC gaming. I will also use it for music production, and 3D modeling and rendering.

To describe my build, All that I have listed are things I am going to buy now in my parts list (Except for PSU). I don't have the money to buy every part at once right now. I am hoping one day to have 2 GTX 1080s SLi but I am not sure if the parts I have will allow that. Also I dont have a power supply listed because I don't know what to get honestly.

http://pcpartpicker.com/user/jasonburge1990/saved/#view=DWtmP6

All help is appreciated. Thanks
 
Solution
Gotcha, ok well I got time to burn so I'll break some of this down for you so you can figure out what kind of build you want to do.

CPU: This is your brain. More cores, the more multitasking you can do. It's... more precises than that but just run with that really bad analogy for now. But this whole multi tasking can only happen if the program can take advantage of it. For gaming, you will likely never see a game take advantage of more than 4 cores in this builds lifetime. Hell as it is now, most cant even multithread which is why up till now less expensive single threaded cpu's were generally recommended for gaming. If you're only point was to game, you'd have better performance with an i7-6700k quad core than the 6 core you picked...
So are you planning on overclocking? From the parts listed it looks like you are or you just went for cream of the crop listings. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing if you need the best of best, just helps to know what kind of setup you want to go with.
Also what's your preferred budget for get now, not get eventually.
 


Serious overkill for a system that's only pulling down around 650-700w at load. Would be better off picking up a more reasonable PSU and putting that cash in to more RAM for rendering.
 


the motherboard can hold two more cards and that is why I went for overkill. Compared to what I am running the rest of the parts are serious overkill. I thought it was a theme. lol
 


Umm I don't know how to overclock anything so I just searched for parts that are really powerful. For Now for all the parts I will buy in bulk first is $ 2,500


 


Hey what do you mean by "best you'd get triple at 8x8x8. But yeah overkill does seem to fit it so far"?
 
Gotcha, ok well I got time to burn so I'll break some of this down for you so you can figure out what kind of build you want to do.

CPU: This is your brain. More cores, the more multitasking you can do. It's... more precises than that but just run with that really bad analogy for now. But this whole multi tasking can only happen if the program can take advantage of it. For gaming, you will likely never see a game take advantage of more than 4 cores in this builds lifetime. Hell as it is now, most cant even multithread which is why up till now less expensive single threaded cpu's were generally recommended for gaming. If you're only point was to game, you'd have better performance with an i7-6700k quad core than the 6 core you picked out. However, for editing and 3d rendering it will be a much better pick than a quad core. So really you need to sort out which is the primary use, gameplay or modeling. If its game play, then honestly you might be better of with the less expensive i7-6700k, if its editing, then the i7-5820K is a good start.

Cooler: You picked out a well performing AIO water cooling kit. If you're going to overclock, you picked a decent part. There is just a ton of info on water cooling, AIO vs custom loop, etc. I am not even going to try and get in to that. What I will say is this, if you want to OC you picked a decent part. If you don't intend on overclocking, you just paid double what you needed to for the same performance of a good air cooler that'll create more noise. One of the good things with water coolers is your RAM choices don't get effected because of a heatsink like some air coolers can do.

Motherboard: You picked out the biggest OC board Asus makes. It has a ton of options and bells/whistles that, if you're not going to OC, you'll never use and you'll get as much performance out of that $500 motherboard as a $150 board. Its a good board, don't' get me wrong. But if you're not taking advantage of what it offers, then you might as well put that cash towards another area that you would use. For editing, more RAM or a CPU with more cores or PCIe Lanes, for gaming towards the video cards and monitor(s).

RAM: Oddly the one area you didn't go full on with. Good choice in RAM, tho for editing and 3D rendering maybe a bit on the low side since the x99 platform allows up to 64GB. Plenty for gaming however.

Storage: Great choices all around for an editing SSD boot drive and a storage HDD. I'm a fan of the Hitachi Deskstar and Ultrastar drives so I like the one you picked out. The NVM SSD's get great speed for applications like 3D rendering. For gaming, you'd never notice the difference between that and a Samsung Evo. The downside to PCIe SSDs like the 950 Pro is they take up PCIe Lanes. This and the video cards is where that 8x8x8 thing comes in. You only have so many PCIe lanes in a CPU. The i7-5820 has 28 lanes. So if you were to run SLI video cards and a PCIe SSD you would have 16x lanes for the primary GPU, 8x lanes for the second GPU, and 4x lanes for the PCIe SSD. If you were to want to run triple SLI, (each card getting 8x lanes) you wouldn't be able to run the PCIe SSD because you'd run out of lanes. This can be fixed if you want to the next higher CPU that gives 40 lanes, but thats a whole different discussion.

GPU: Good pick, the 1080s are great. Tho I'd wait till more manufactures have their models out but Asus strix are not a bad model. One thing to look at is if the games you want to play support SLI. Some do, some don't, some have problems with it. Before you drop over 1k on just the video cards, make sure its right for what you want to play.

Case: Go with what you like as long as it fits everything. I personally hate full towers, but then I've had to carry the heavy sons of bitches up flights of stairs. There are an absolute ton of options out there, so look around. Phanteks make some really sexy cases, but while big they aren't one of the top ones people know right off. Corsair, Cooler Master being the two most people can name right off. Nzxt also make some cool looking cases. An empty 20lb case just makes my back hurt thinking about it, but if thats the style and size you like then run with it.

PSU: A very, very important part of the build that a lot of people seem to overlook. Its not just about having enough rated wattage, but have good clean power coming in. This is a part of the build that will literately power everything else. It's your heart, treat the decision of which model to get as such. The build you have listed so far runs close to 700watts at full load. Yes you can get a massive 1300watt PSU if you want, and if you think you'll add stuff to use that much power than go for it. Otherwise, pick something good around the 800-850 range and you'll be good to go. Bump it to 1000 if you think you might go with an OC setup and might want to try out custom loop cooling. A good listing of models to look at can be found here
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/id-2547993/psu-tier-list.html

DVD: Kinda shocked to see this, but handy if you know you're going to need it. Only downside to it is it can limit your case choices, as a lot are now being designed with no 5.25 bay.

OS: Yep that'll work. You could even get away with the Home edition. The pro version gives more power user tools that you may or may not care about. If the budget allows, I always say its better to have the option than not. But then I remote in to my stuff a lot. A good quick and dirty rundown on the differences can be had here.
http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/feature/windows/windows-10-home-vs-windows-10-pro-uk-difference-3618710/

Monitors: Noticed you didn't have this section set up. If you don't have them, you will need them. I am not the go to guy for gaming monitors since I'm set up for color correction. This is a topic worthy of an entire thread by itself so it might be worth doing that way.

Keyboard/Mouse: If you like to game, and you do it a lot, then look in to some good mechanical keyboards. Same with a mouse. You spend a lot of time using these guys, so you might as well invest in a set that'll feel good 5 hours in to a marathon session. Everyone had their preference, but best bet if you can is hit up a store and see how they feel. Frys and best buy tend to have an ok selection so you can at least get some feel for it.
 
Solution
what about this
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i7-5820K 3.3GHz 6-Core Processor ($369.99 @ SuperBiiz)
CPU Cooler: Thermaltake Water 3.0 Ultimate 99.0 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler ($119.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-X99-Designare EX ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard ($431.21 @ Amazon)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance LED 32GB (2 x 16GB) DDR4-3200 Memory ($206.10 @ Amazon)
Storage: Samsung 950 PRO 256GB M.2-2280 Solid State Drive ($186.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Storage: Western Digital BLACK SERIES 4TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($196.99 @ B&H)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 1080 8GB Video Card (2-Way SLI) ($669.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 1080 8GB Video Card (2-Way SLI) ($669.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Case: Silverstone SST-PM01WA-W ATX Mid Tower Case ($117.98 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: EVGA 1000W 80+ Platinum Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($169.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Pro OEM 64-bit ($129.95 @ B&H)
Total: $3269.17
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-07-23 07:42 EDT-0400