Build Advice Want to build/buy a new computer in about 2 months for school that can support 2 monitors + a display tablet

[Metallis]

Hi people.

Sorry if the category is a bit off, I wasn't sure how to categorize the subject,

So I just recently bought an artisul d16 15.6" LCD sketch pad and cant get it to mirror the display of my monitor. I did some research and I figure its because I don't have the power supply or graphics card power for it on my computer at the moment. I seem to have 300w power supply and a Nvidia GeForce 210 graphics card. I currently already have a 2 monitor setup.

My semesters going to start in a few days so i don't really have the time to buy and reassemble a new computer right now, but i figure when I have my reading week ( a week off from school) in late October, I will hopefully find time to do it then.

My question is: What parts would you guys recommend i buy to make a new computer for 2 monitors + the artisul sketch pad (so 3 monitors i guess)? I am in school for animation, which is the primary reason for the new setup, so i don't need any super high end specs for hardcore gaming or anything like that (although I do play tf2, and might play something in the future, but i'm not a huge gamer). Its mostly for the hardware capability and the animation software.

Let me know what you guys think, and thanks!

 

[jeremyj_83]

This would probably be enough.
PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 2600 3.4 GHz 6-Core Processor ($139.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: MSI B450M BAZOOKA MAX WIFI Micro ATX AM4 Motherboard ($93.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: GeIL EVO SPEAR Phantom Gaming 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory ($52.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Blue SN550 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive ($104.99 @ Newegg)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER 6 GB SC ULTRA GAMING Video Card ($239.99 @ Walmart)
Case: Cooler Master MasterBox Q300L MicroATX Mini Tower Case ($48.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: SeaSonic FOCUS 550 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply ($99.99 @ Amazon)
Total: $780.92
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2020-09-08 09:14 EDT-0400

 

[Metallis]

This would probably be enough.
PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 2600 3.4 GHz 6-Core Processor ($139.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: MSI B450M BAZOOKA MAX WIFI Micro ATX AM4 Motherboard ($93.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: GeIL EVO SPEAR Phantom Gaming 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory ($52.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Blue SN550 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive ($104.99 @ Newegg)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER 6 GB SC ULTRA GAMING Video Card ($239.99 @ Walmart)
Case: Cooler Master MasterBox Q300L MicroATX Mini Tower Case ($48.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: SeaSonic FOCUS 550 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply ($99.99 @ Amazon)
Total: $780.92
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2020-09-08 09:14 EDT-0400

OOOoooo thanks for making the the list and the amazon order for me!
This computer would be able to handle 3 monitors? Specifically 1 VGA and 2 HDMI? Its just that I want to make absolute sure before i commit to anything.

 

[jeremyj_83]

OOOoooo thanks for making the the list and the amazon order for me!
This computer would be able to handle 3 monitors? Specifically 1 VGA and 2 HDMI? Its just that I want to make absolute sure before i commit to anything.

That GPU has 1 HDMI, 1 DisplayPort, and 1 DVI connection. Technically it will do what you want, you will just need adapters. Finding the correct DVI > VGA adapter is hard so I would use this GPU instead. It has 3x DisplayPort and 1x HDMI. All you need is a full size DisplayPort > HDMI Cable (Note that the cable is unidirectional. In this case that cable goes only from the DisplayPort to HDMI, it will not send a signal from HDMI to DisplayPort.) You will also need a DisplayPort > VGA cable.

 

[Metallis]

That GPU has 1 HDMI, 1 DisplayPort, and 1 DVI connection. Technically it will do what you want, you will just need adapters. Finding the correct DVI > VGA adapter is hard so I would use this GPU instead. It has 3x DisplayPort and 1x HDMI. All you need is a full size DisplayPort > HDMI Cable (Note that the cable is unidirectional. In this case that cable goes only from the DisplayPort to HDMI, it will not send a signal from HDMI to DisplayPort.) You will also need a DisplayPort > VGA cable.

Hey thanks for the reply
The GPU link you gave me only goes to Amazon's front page though Also what is the GPU you are saying I should use instead replacing on the list you gave me? I don't see a GPU on the list.

Also my current hard drive can only hold about 1 TB of space, and i deal with a lot of large files; a 1.5 TB or 2TB hard drive might be better for me. Do you know any good ones?

Thanks!

 

[geofelt]

I do not think you need the expense of a new build.
What inputs do your three monitors take?
The key is to find a graphics card that supports all three; possibly needing adapters.

Buy a card that does not need any aux 6 pin power cable.
Such a card will run on pcie slot power only at a max of 75w.

Look for something like a GTX750ti used on ebay for about $50.

 

[jeremyj_83]

Hey thanks for the reply
The GPU link you gave me only goes to Amazon's front page though Also what is the GPU you are saying I should use instead replacing on the list you gave me? I don't see a GPU on the list.

Also my current hard drive can only hold about 1 TB of space, and i deal with a lot of large files; a 1.5 TB or 2TB hard drive might be better for me. Do you know any good ones?

Thanks!

The GPU I referenced is the MSI Ventus XS Geforce 1660 Super. It comes with 3x Display Port and 1x HDMI for video output. Those ports are the easiest for which to find adapters to connect to other inputs like VGA. If you are dealing with large files I still recommend the SSD. However, instead of doing a singular 1TB SSD, you would have a 250+GB SSD for the OS and Applications and then a 1TB SSD to work on the files. You could then have a 2TB HDD to store complete projects so you aren't taking up lots of space on the SSD. The build would look like this:
PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 2600 3.4 GHz 6-Core Processor ($139.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: MSI B450M BAZOOKA MAX WIFI Micro ATX AM4 Motherboard ($111.38 @ Amazon)
Memory: GeIL EVO SPEAR Phantom Gaming 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory ($52.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Blue 500 GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($59.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: MyDigitalSSD BPX Pro 960 GB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive ($149.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Western Digital Blue SN550 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive ($104.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Blue 2 TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive ($49.99 @ Amazon)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER 6 GB VENTUS XS OC Video Card ($249.99 @ B&H)
Case: Cooler Master MasterBox Q300L MicroATX Mini Tower Case ($48.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: SeaSonic FOCUS 550 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply ($99.99 @ Amazon)
Total: $1068.29
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2020-09-14 08:22 EDT-0400
Note there are 2x 1TB SSDs on here. The reason both are there depends on how many writes you will do to your SSD in a given time period. The write endurance of the SN550 is 600TBW (terabytes written) which equates to 320GB of writes per day for 5 years. If you will do that level of writes then using the BPX Pro is worth while as that has a 1665TBW endurance. That comes out to just under 1TB of writes per day for 5 years. It is more expensive to have separate SSDs for OS/Applications and a Work Drive, however, overall it is safer and having your work drive be on SSD will be better than just on HDD.

 

[Metallis]

I do not think you need the expense of a new build.
What inputs do your three monitors take?
The key is to find a graphics card that supports all three; possibly needing adapters.

Buy a card that does not need any aux 6 pin power cable.
Such a card will run on pcie slot power only at a max of 75w.

Look for something like a GTX750ti used on ebay for about $50.

Hi

I think 1 takes a vga and dvi, but im not sure what the diffrecne between those 2 are-- i know it ahs a vga and one that looks like a smaller vga.

The other is vga and hdmi

the final is my artisul display tablet, which is only hdmi.

my computer has also been running out of space and has this problem where it restarts itself every few days, and ic ant seem to figure out why. So a new computer seems to be an order. This one is from like around 2013.

 

[geofelt]

A GT1030 should be able to do the job,

NVIDIA GeForce GT 1030 Feature Roundup

NVIDIA has an answer to AMD’s Radeon RX 550 in the form of the GeForce GT 1030 2GB video card priced at $79.99 USD.

www.eteknix.com

Check on the particular model since the outputs offered will differ.
The blue connector is vga, the rectangular connector is dvi, and the hdmi you know.
You can move this card to a new build if and when you choose to do so.

 

[Metallis]

The GPU I referenced is the MSI Ventus XS Geforce 1660 Super. It comes with 3x Display Port and 1x HDMI for video output. Those ports are the easiest for which to find adapters to connect to other inputs like VGA. If you are dealing with large files I still recommend the SSD. However, instead of doing a singular 1TB SSD, you would have a 250+GB SSD for the OS and Applications and then a 1TB SSD to work on the files. You could then have a 2TB HDD to store complete projects so you aren't taking up lots of space on the SSD. The build would look like this:
PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 2600 3.4 GHz 6-Core Processor ($139.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: MSI B450M BAZOOKA MAX WIFI Micro ATX AM4 Motherboard ($111.38 @ Amazon)
Memory: GeIL EVO SPEAR Phantom Gaming 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory ($52.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Blue 500 GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($59.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: MyDigitalSSD BPX Pro 960 GB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive ($149.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Western Digital Blue SN550 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive ($104.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Blue 2 TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive ($49.99 @ Amazon)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER 6 GB VENTUS XS OC Video Card ($249.99 @ B&H)
Case: Cooler Master MasterBox Q300L MicroATX Mini Tower Case ($48.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: SeaSonic FOCUS 550 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply ($99.99 @ Amazon)
Total: $1068.29
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2020-09-14 08:22 EDT-0400
Note there are 2x 1TB SSDs on here. The reason both are there depends on how many writes you will do to your SSD in a given time period. The write endurance of the SN550 is 600TBW (terabytes written) which equates to 320GB of writes per day for 5 years. If you will do that level of writes then using the BPX Pro is worth while as that has a 1665TBW endurance. That comes out to just under 1TB of writes per day for 5 years. It is more expensive to have separate SSDs for OS/Applications and a Work Drive, however, overall it is safer and having your work drive be on SSD will be better than just on HDD.

Hey! Thanks for all the info.

I'm not too savvy with all the technical jargon here. What exactly is an SSD and how would i use it? Does it work the same as a HDD? Like can I stole files in it the same way? Can I use both my HDD and SDD at the same time? Just give me the rundown.

Also I didn't notice something before but I think one of my monitors actually connects via hdmi (its a VGA I believe to HDMI), and the other is just a VGA to DVI/VGA. So I think to run both monitors and my tablet, I need 2 hdmi inputs and VGA input on my tower/graphics card.

Thanks!

 

[jeremyj_83]

Hey! Thanks for all the info.

I'm not too savvy with all the technical jargon here. What exactly is an SSD and how would i use it? Does it work the same as a HDD? Like can I stole files in it the same way? Can I use both my HDD and SDD at the same time? Just give me the rundown.

Also I didn't notice something before but I think one of my monitors actually connects via hdmi (its a VGA I believe to HDMI), and the other is just a VGA to DVI/VGA. So I think to run both monitors and my tablet, I need 2 hdmi inputs and VGA input on my tower/graphics card.

Thanks!

SSD stands for Solid State Drive, it acts just like a regular Hard Drive it is just much faster. Since there aren't any moving parts on an SSD, the random seek time is multiple orders of magnitude faster and the fastest drives can transfer data in the Gigabytes per second range vs 100-200 Megabytes per second. You are able to use SSD and HDD at the same time. On my desktop I run multiple SSDs for data that needs the best performance and needs to be accessed quickly. The HDD is used for bulk storage of videos, music, documents, and pictures. Since I'm just playing music, videos, or looking at pictures, none of those things will benefit from the much higher performance of an SSD.

If you get a graphics card with HDMI and DisplayPort (DP) connections, you can use an adapter cable to connect DP > VGA and or DP > HDMI.

 

[geofelt]

Hey! Thanks for all the info.

I'm not too savvy with all the technical jargon here. What exactly is an SSD and how would i use it? Does it work the same as a HDD? Like can I stole files in it the same way? Can I use both my HDD and SDD at the same time? Just give me the rundown.

Also I didn't notice something before but I think one of my monitors actually connects via hdmi (its a VGA I believe to HDMI), and the other is just a VGA to DVI/VGA. So I think to run both monitors and my tablet, I need 2 hdmi inputs and VGA input on my tower/graphics card.

Thanks!

I think of a discrete graphics cards as having outputs to the monitors, not inputs.
While some graphics cards have 3 output ports, older cards can only use two of them at the same time.
There are adapters or adapter cables to change to/from the various connector types(vga, dvi,hdmi,displayport}
It is best to use a card that does not need any adapters to connect all three of your devices.

A ssd is exactly like a sata HDD. It has the same data and power connector.
It will be 2.5" in size. You can buy a 3.5" to 2.5" adapter tray to mount one in a normal 3.5" HDD location.
If needed, you can leave a ssd on the bottom of the case or even duct tape it there. They weigh very little.
A ssd is some 40x faster in random I/O. What is what windows does most of the time.
A ssd is about 4x faster than even a 10.000 rpm HDD in sequential performance.

If you buy a samsung ssd like the samsung 860 evo, it is easy to convert your windows C drive to a ssd using the samsung ssd migration app.
The ssd must be large enough to hold the used contents of your HDD.
Here is a 500gb ssd, they come in all sizes.
https://www.newegg.com/samsung-860-evo-series-500gb/p/N82E16820147674?&quicklink=true
You can download the app and user instructions here:

Tool & Software Download | Samsung Semiconductor Global

Download various software related to your product, including Samsung Magician, designed for use with Samsung's memory products, and find related information.

www.samsung.com

You install the ssd in your pc, run the app which copies your C drive to the ssd.
Then either change the boot order or switch data cables and you are done.
You can do what you wish with the old HDD. I would repurpose it to an external backup.

Trust me on this, once you have used a ssd, you will never again build without one.

 

[Metallis]

SSD stands for Solid State Drive, it acts just like a regular Hard Drive it is just much faster. Since there aren't any moving parts on an SSD, the random seek time is multiple orders of magnitude faster and the fastest drives can transfer data in the Gigabytes per second range vs 100-200 Megabytes per second. You are able to use SSD and HDD at the same time. On my desktop I run multiple SSDs for data that needs the best performance and needs to be accessed quickly. The HDD is used for bulk storage of videos, music, documents, and pictures. Since I'm just playing music, videos, or looking at pictures, none of those things will benefit from the much higher performance of an SSD.

If you get a graphics card with HDMI and DisplayPort (DP) connections, you can use an adapter cable to connect DP > VGA and or DP > HDMI.

Alright thanks man/woman! Ill probably use your updated part picker list for my new computer in about a month, with maybe some of geofelt's suggestions as well.

Last thing though, do you know any good guides forcomputer assembly? i havent done it before lol

 

[Metallis]

Hey if anyone is still around here to help out, on the PCpartpicker list I was given by jeremy its states at the bottom of the page: "1 additional M.2 2280 M-key compatible slot is needed. " as a warning for incompatibility and "Some physical dimension restrictions cannot (yet) be automatically checked, such as cpu cooler / RAM clearance with modules using tall heat spreaders. " as a note as well. Can anyone tell me what that means?

 

[jeremyj_83]

Hey if anyone is still around here to help out, on the PCpartpicker list I was given by jeremy its states at the bottom of the page: "1 additional M.2 2280 M-key compatible slot is needed. " as a warning for incompatibility and "Some physical dimension restrictions cannot (yet) be automatically checked, such as cpu cooler / RAM clearance with modules using tall heat spreaders. " as a note as well. Can anyone tell me what that means?

The reason for the M.2 problem is I had given 2 options for the SSD. "The reason both are there depends on how many writes you will do to your SSD in a given time period. The write endurance of the SN550 is 600TBW (terabytes written) which equates to 320GB of writes per day for 5 years. If you will do that level of writes then using the BPX Pro is worth while as that has a 1665TBW endurance. That comes out to just under 1TB of writes per day for 5 years."

The second part is just saying that it cannot automatically determine if the RAM and CPU Cooler will clear themselves.

 

[Metallis]

The reason for the M.2 problem is I had given 2 options for the SSD. "The reason both are there depends on how many writes you will do to your SSD in a given time period. The write endurance of the SN550 is 600TBW (terabytes written) which equates to 320GB of writes per day for 5 years. If you will do that level of writes then using the BPX Pro is worth while as that has a 1665TBW endurance. That comes out to just under 1TB of writes per day for 5 years."

The second part is just saying that it cannot automatically determine if the RAM and CPU Cooler will clear themselves.

OOOHH ok thanks! some of the parts you gave me on the list are outta stock here and there but im hoping to find suitable similar replacements. Thanks again! I should probably get to buying the parts now lol