Question Need help and guidance on my first PC build i5-14600K

Oct 10, 2024
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Hey there guys!
I'm a cybersecurity (offensive) prefessional. So, i need to work a lot more on VMware workstation. I just use PC for my work. Nothing else.
And here I'm about to build my first PC ever (i worked on laptop before). I did my own online research and came up with this combination :

Processor:
Intel Core i5-14600K Raptor Lake

Motherboard:
MSI Pro Z790-P Wifi DDR5 LGA1700 ATX

RAM:
G.Skill Trident Z5 RGB Black (2x16GB) 5600MHz DDR5 CL30 1.25V

Cooling Unit:
  • CPU Cooler: Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE
  • Casing Cooler: Noctua NF-A14 PWM 140mm 4-Pin Premium Quiet
SSD:
Western Digital Black SN770 1TB M.2 2280 PCIe Gen4 NVMe

PSU:
Thermaltake Toughpower GFA3 850W 80 Plus Gold Fully Modular

Case:
Darkflash Pollux Mid-tower ATX Gaming Case Tempered Glass Black

Monitor:
Asus VG279Q3A TUF 24" Full HD 180Hz IPS Gaming Monitor

Keyboard & Mouse Combo:
A4Tech 4200N Wireless

UPS:
Not Sure

I need your expert opinions on whether these components are good and compatible with one another or if I'm bound to face any issue whatsoever.
Thanks in advance for your time providing feedbacks!

Kind Regards,
GentleX
 
Hey there guys!
I'm a cybersecurity (offensive) prefessional. So, i need to work a lot more on VMware workstation. I just use PC for my work. Nothing else.
And here I'm about to build my first PC ever (i worked on laptop before). I did my own online research and came up with this combination :

Processor:
Intel Core i5-14600K Raptor Lake

Motherboard:
MSI Pro Z790-P Wifi DDR5 LGA1700 ATX

RAM:
G.Skill Trident Z5 RGB Black (2x16GB) 5600MHz DDR5 CL30 1.25V

Cooling Unit:
  • CPU Cooler: Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE
  • Casing Cooler: Noctua NF-A14 PWM 140mm 4-Pin Premium Quiet
SSD:
Western Digital Black SN770 1TB M.2 2280 PCIe Gen4 NVMe

PSU:
Thermaltake Toughpower GFA3 850W 80 Plus Gold Fully Modular

Case:
Darkflash Pollux Mid-tower ATX Gaming Case Tempered Glass Black

Monitor:
Asus VG279Q3A TUF 24" Full HD 180Hz IPS Gaming Monitor

Keyboard & Mouse Combo:
A4Tech 4200N Wireless

UPS:
Not Sure

I need your expert opinions on whether these components are good and compatible with one another or if I'm bound to face any issue whatsoever.
Thanks in advance for your time providing feedbacks!

Kind Regards,
GentleX
As a VMware admin I have a couple question. How many VMs are you going to be running at once? Are these linux, windows, or both? How much RAM per VM will you be allocating? How much storage are you allocating to each VM?
 
Last edited:
Oct 10, 2024
2
0
10
As a VMware admin I have a couple question. How many VMs are you going to be running at once? Are these linux, windows, or both? How much RAM per VM will you be allocating? How much storage are you allocating to each VM?
1. 3 VMware. And yes, both
2. 4 GB RAM per VM
3. Storage for Linux 50GB & for windows 100GB
 
1. 3 VMware. And yes, both
2. 4 GB RAM per VM
3. Storage for Linux 50GB & for windows 100GB
That build looks good for what you are doing. You don't need an 850W PSU so you could save some money going with a smaller one of similar quality. A 14500 instead of the 14600K will save a few dollars as well. Overall you will have enough storage and RAM. Just remember that with a Type 2 hypervisor (VMware Workstation for example) your VMs take RAM from the host OS. With 3 VMs running at 4GB each they will have 12GB RAM dedicated to them. If you end up sending out 32GB RAM to VMs you will crash your desktop as Windows won't have any RAM. In other words you cannot over provision RAM with Workstation.
 

Misgar

Respectable
Mar 2, 2023
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If you end up sending out 32GB RAM to VMs
I've not used VMware, only Hyper-V, but I have two VMs on this ancient i7-4770K with only 16GB RAM.

Because I have problems running some software in VMs with Dynamic RAM, I set both VMs to 4096MB (fixed) RAM each. That way I can run Windows 10 Pro + Windows 10 VM + Windows 11 VM, without running out of RAM.

In other words you cannot over provision RAM with Workstation.
Presumably Over Provisioning in VMWare is similar to Dynamic Memory in Hyper-V?

I've just checked and with two VMs running, I have 342MB Hardware Reserved (iGPU), 12,306MB In Use, 2,385MB Standby and 1,232MB Free memory out of 16,384MB Total.

I don't normally run more than one VM at a time on the i7-4770K, but it works with two fixed 4GB. I have three more powerful systems, each with 64GB RAM, for normal VM work. There, I tend to allocate 16GB static (not dynamic) per VM.

RAM:
G.Skill Trident Z5 RGB Black (2x16GB) 5600MHz DDR5 CL30 1.25V
With RAM being relatively cheap, I'd be inclined to fit 2x32GB instead of 2x16GB, especially if you decide to save money fitting a 14500 and a 650W or 750W PSU.
 
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Presumably Over Provisioning in VMWare is similar to Dynamic Memory in Hyper-V?
Dynamic memory is different. In ESXi (type 1 hypervisor) I can allocate more resources to VMs than I have on the server. For example I have a server with 8 vCPU and 32GB RAM. I can have 5 VMs with 2 vCPU and 8GB RAM. I have over provisioned my vCPU and RAM from what I physically have. This works because the odds of each VM needing CPU time all at once is pretty low so you don't run into CPU contention. For RAM the hypervisor compresses, balloons, and uses physical storage swap space to reduce the active RAM requirements. On top of that say a VM is only using 2GB of the 4GB allocated. The hypervisor can take that extra 2GB and use it on other VMs. This is only possible with Type 1 Hypervisors. VMware Workstation and Hyper-V on Windows are Type 2 and cannot do that.

Dynamic memory from what I've read is more about having extra RAM for boot and then reducing to a lower steady state later.