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[sfried]

The 6600k is much cheaper and should perform pretty similarly for applications that don't use the extra threads and run a bit cooler at similar clock speeds.

But it really depends on your usecase.

I do a lot of graphic illustration, but I also have been playing a lot of PC games as of late. Star Citizen and Elite Dangerous both kickstarted my rekindling love for space sims and was thinking if it were possible to make a minature VR/everything-machine while still maintaining a small form factor (and by small, I mean ITX). Most of my deskspace is occupied by my Intuos 4 and two 1366x768 Samsung monitors (I'm either planning on getting a third screen of the same resolution or buying one of those 16:10 ultrawide monitors, but the latter is too pricey atm).

Also I see most people talk about overclocking when mentioning these two CPUs, so I assumed that at stock speeds the i7-6700k would naturally perform better (I don't intend to overclock).

I've started to slowly assemble my rig piece-by-piece, but I wasn't sure if I should make any last minute changes to the CPU.
My PC Partspicker build.

 

[Dipper145]

What does the used market look like? Maybe you can get a Haswell quad core on a deal, then you could get a good video card new.

There's not much around where I am unfortunately, both for video cards and cpus on the used markets. Plus assembling it myself isn't a possibility for my situation, and I don't have anyone near me with computer building experience to install the cpu for me.

Turns out I can actually squeeze in a r9 380 2gb with a i3-6100, an ssd, and a asrock h170 motherboard and 8gb of ram. for ~15$ over budget, which is reasonable to me. I added that option to the list of options from before. Since I don't plan on doing any overclocking, the z170 to the h170 doesn't seem like much of an issue to me.

 

[Theonik]

I do a lot of graphic illustration, but I also have been playing a lot of PC games as of late. Star Citizen and Elite Dangerous both kickstarted my rekindling love for space sims and was thinking if it were possible to make a minature VR/everything-machine while still maintaining a small form factor (and by small, I mean ITX). Most of my deskspace is occupied by my Intuos 4 and two 1366x768 Samsung monitors (I'm either planning on getting a third screen of the same resolution or buying one of those 16:10 ultrawide monitors, but the latter is too pricey atm).

Also I see most people talk about overclocking when mentioning these two CPUs, so I assumed that at stock speeds the i7-6700k would naturally perform better (I don't intend to overclock).

I've started to slowly assemble my rig piece-by-piece, but I wasn't sure if I should make any last minute changes to the CPU.
My PC Partspicker build.

For games the difference might be less obvious though the lower clock on the 6600k should mean that it will perform worse for those as well. If you are not overclocking and don't feel on cheapening out the 6700k might be the better buy but maybe someone with a similar usecase to you can chime in. You also get 2MB more cache on the 6700k over the 6600k that should help with performance.

Another thing to note is that the k CPUs cost $30 more than the non-k yet their main benefit is the fact you can overclock them. If you are getting a z170 motherboard and a K series CPU not overclocking them is pretty much you just throwing money away on components which are marked up on the expectation you will be overclocking. You are also throwing away 'free' performance.

 

[sfried]

For games the difference might be less obvious though the lower clock on the 6600k should mean that it will perform worse for those as well. If you are not overclocking and don't feel on cheapening out the 6700k might be the better buy but maybe someone with a similar usecase to you can chime in. You also get 2MB more cache on the 6700k over the 6600k that should help with performance.

Another thing to note is that the k CPUs cost $30 more than the non-k yet their main benefit is the fact you can overclock them. If you are getting a z170 motherboard and a K series CPU not overclocking them is pretty much you just throwing money away on components which are marked up on the expectation you will be overclocking. You are also throwing away 'free' performance.

My issue with overclocking is that it will increase my wattage and it will also wear down on the CPUs lifespan. If there's a non-K alternative that uses the Skylake architecture, I might settle for that instead.

Most of the components I chose were for performance reasons while still trying to keep internal temperatures low. Since most gaming motherboards are designed to draw heat away from components (more for overclocking reasons), I thought it was a good fit for an ITX where heat dissipation was still an important factor.

 

[diablos991]

Oh man. Ended up buying a VG248QE and a G-Sync DIY module... What have I gotten myself into?

 

[Hands of Stone]

Oh man. Ended up buying a VG248QE and a G-Sync DIY module... What have I gotten myself into?

The future, my friend.

 

[RGM79]

Ello PC Build GAF. I finished my new build at the start of this year and is handling like a dream so much help from those here that helped me pick stuff. As such however, my girlfriend has inherited my old PC and it needs some upgrades of its own for her uses.

The main point of contention is CPU heat as she wants to do some video render at some point and shit is running too hot at idle right now for comfort (40+). I've installed a big honking heatsink Deepcool Gammaxx 400 in my new rig and I'm familiar with how to install those, but theyve just gone mysteriously completely out of stock here in the UK.

Always wary of CPU coolers and them being TOO big for RAM and indeed even the case, so I need one to fit in this case:

Xigmatek Asgard - (185(W) x 475(D) x 408(H) mm, 0.6mm thickness SGCC)
and preferably not cause RAM slot problems. Motherboard is a H55M-S so standard Intel LGA1156.

Budget is £26 or a bit more.

Also either the cases built in front fan or a fan on my old graphics card (have ruled out CPU fan and back fan) causes an awful whirring on startup which eases off and seems fine for the rest of use.

For that budget, the I recommend the good old standby - the Cooler Master Hyper 212 Evo. There shouldn't be RAM slot problems. Even if there were, you can just slide the CPU cooler's fan upward to allow room underneath for the RAM.

Getting my a new PC for my birthday and I need some advice. It will primarily be used for gaming at 1080p or 720p. I don't plan on doing any overclocking. The parts I can re-use are a 6870 gpu, 4gb ddr3-1333 ram, and a 500gb harddrive. No OS is required because I can get it free through my university, and will be using the 50$ assembly and testing from NCIX. I am also Canadian, so prices are a little rough.

The budget for the build is a strict 900$ including taxes (13% HST), 50$ assembly/testing, and S/H. Which gives an effective budget of 750$ CAN.

This leaves me with several options that I've looked into.
(all builds using the same 500W PSU / Case)

1. core-i3 6100 skylake build, z170 mobo, with 8gb ram, a 120gb SSD, and an r7 370 2gb. (~$754)
1.1. same as above, with 4gb ram, no ssd, and a r9 380. (~$772)
1.2. core-i3 6100, h170 mobo, 8gb ram, 120gb ssd, r9 380 2gb (~$769)

2. core-i5 6500 with 8gb ram, z170 mobo, 120gb SSD, and reuse my 6870 video card (~$704)

3. amd 8320, re-use my 4gb ddr3-133 ram, 120gb ssd, r9 380 2gb (~$720)
3.1. same as above but with additional 4gb ram (~$750)

I know the 370 is an upgrade over the 6870, but it's not too substantial of one. The 380 would be a substantial upgrade, but it's a stretch to get it into an i3-6100 build at this budget. I could save about 30$ on the skylake builds by getting a cheaper H170(~120$) motherboard instead of a z170(~$150).

Would greatly appreciate any input/thoughts.

I'd recommend a stronger processor and good motherboard. Use your HD6870 for now and upgrade it later. Going with Skylake and getting a Z170 motherboard means you can overclock your processor, whereas that's not really an option for H170 motherboards (depends on the model). I'd advise against buying an AMD FX-8320 now, they're 3 and a half years old, run hot, and despite being an octo core processor they get rivaled by the latest i3 dual core processors.

I'd go with option #2. Maybe drop the 120GB SSD if you want to save some money and just get a larger one in the future, I tend to recommend 250GB SSDs or larger these days as 120GB can fill up somewhat quickly. Games are getting larger, so at best you can only fit Windows and then a few large games on it before it gets close to being full.

Is there any benefit to using a Core i5-6600k over an i7-6700k? I was also asking earlier over here for some slim form factor cooling options for an ITX case.

The main benefit would be ever so slightly lower temperatures and better cost-to-performance ratio. The i7 6700K is artificially high priced due to lack of stock and retailers driving up prices for what stock there is.

 

[sfried]

The main benefit would be ever so slightly lower temperatures and better cost-to-performance ratio. The i7 6700K is artificially high priced due to lack of stock and retailers driving up prices for what stock there is.

I see. I might wait a bit till prices stabilize, or if some announcement in the coming weeks might present some more interesting options...

If anything, I might end up getting an i5-6600k, although I wish it had a faster base core clock (4GHz like the 6700k would be nice). At the same time, I wonder if the Nano's price might drop even more.</wishfulthinking>

 

[stb]

Currently running:

- R7950 (3 GB XFX DD)
- i7 920 @ 2.67 (stock)
- 6 GB DDR3
- Asus P6T SE
- Samsung 830 120 GB (OS)
- Samsung 840 EVO 250 GB (games)
- Windows 7 64 bit

This build has served me well, living through either 2 or 3 cards since I built it ~2008, but is starting to feel long in the tooth.

I recently tried The Division beta, and was disappointed to only manage a stable 30 FPS at a mix of low and medium settings. I understand The Division is both not fully optimized and very demanding, but needing to run "low" settings for literally anything means it's probably time to put this machine out to pasture.

I've been doing MOST of my gaming on the PS4 (and expect to be for some time), and this machine is more than suitable for its other use cases, so upgrading isn't URGENT for me. That said, I'm missing messing around with games to see the eye candy (Division at good settings at playable framerates, SW Battlefront with the ENB mods, etc.), and want to be running something capable so that when the next game I *need* to get on my PC (e.g. something like a Battlefield 5), I don't need to spend a grand to play it.

Given that context, a few questions:
- is the proc/ram situation holding back the 7950 significantly? i.e. how much is system memory/CPU bottlenecking things these days?
- now that Win10 has been out a while, is there any consensus regarding a performance bump simply by switching OS?
- a searched the thread, and the general feedback about replacing 7950/7970 seems to be to just wait for Pascal (or AMD's equivalent); is that still accurate?
- is there a reason to NOT replace mobo/ram/CPU nowish? e,g, something on the horizon at approximately the same timing as Pascal that would warrant waiting?

Thanks for any input.

 

[Darknight]

I read this a few pages back but lost it....when using DDR4 ram. Is it better to have 4x4 when using 16GB? What about 4x8 when going 32GB??

The post read like 4x4 was the best to use??? I was going to go 2x8GB DDR4 Corsair Dominator PLatinum.

 

[Mattdaddy]

Ok dudes, about to pull the trigger on this. Could this rig pull off running most new stuff on high @ 60fps? 1080 is fine with me too.

This is also my first time building a gaming pc, you guys see anything missing or have any suggestions?? Goal was to stay around $1,100, I think I'm right at it right now.

 

[knitoe]

I read this a few pages back but lost it....when using DDR4 ram. Is it better to have 4x4 when using 16GB? What about 4x8 when going 32GB??

The post read like 4x4 was the best to use??? I was going to go 2x8GB DDR4 Corsair Dominator PLatinum.

Depends if your MB supports dual or quad memory channel. If dual, multiple of 2 sticks, 2x4GB, 2x8 and etc. If quad, multiple of 4 stocks, 4x4GB, 4x8 and etc..

 

[Crisium]

Currently running:

- R7950 (3 GB XFX DD)
- i7 920 @ 2.67 (stock)
- 6 GB DDR3
- Asus P6T SE
- Samsung 830 120 GB (OS)
- Samsung 840 EVO 250 GB (games)
- Windows 7 64 bit

This build has served me well, living through either 2 or 3 cards since I built it ~2008, but is starting to feel long in the tooth.

I recently tried The Division beta, and was disappointed to only manage a stable 30 FPS at a mix of low and medium settings. I understand The Division is both not fully optimized and very demanding, but needing to run "low" settings for literally anything means it's probably time to put this machine out to pasture.

I've been doing MOST of my gaming on the PS4 (and expect to be for some time), and this machine is more than suitable for its other use cases, so upgrading isn't URGENT for me. That said, I'm missing messing around with games to see the eye candy (Division at good settings at playable framerates, SW Battlefront with the ENB mods, etc.), and want to be running something capable so that when the next game I *need* to get on my PC (e.g. something like a Battlefield 5), I don't need to spend a grand to play it.

Given that context, a few questions:
- is the proc/ram situation holding back the 7950 significantly? i.e. how much is system memory/CPU bottlenecking things these days?
- now that Win10 has been out a while, is there any consensus regarding a performance bump simply by switching OS?
- a searched the thread, and the general feedback about replacing 7950/7970 seems to be to just wait for Pascal (or AMD's equivalent); is that still accurate?
- is there a reason to NOT replace mobo/ram/CPU nowish? e,g, something on the horizon at approximately the same timing as Pascal that would warrant waiting?

Thanks for any input.

First Gen i7 can hang decently with modern CPUs, but not so much at stock speeds. You need better than the stock cooler, but many i7 920s can hit 4.0GHz or higher. Certainly trying for a 1000Mhz overclock at the very least would be wise if you have a good cooler.

We are seeing more games that really benefit from 8GB of memory, some are making it a minimum requirement. We are seeing a handful of game that benefit from 16 over 8, although 16 is not a requirement in any major release yet. If you can cheaply add 6GBs of memory and a GHz overclock then you will be able to stretch that system. If not, or regardless, going Skylake on a brand new build now does make sense. AMD Zen may offer a surprise on the CPU front, but it's unlikely to revolutionize performance so there's no need to wait for new tech later this year.

Waiting for Polaris or Pascal on the GPU front makes sense. AMD Polaris is aiming to be released in time for the back to school season, so August-September at the very latest if there are no delays.

If anything, what would make sense to do is get a new Skylake build now and keep the 7950 until Polaris or Pascal. You could cheaply get a used Radeon 290 as a stopgap for example, but with 3GB of RAM and the fact that GCN is still optimized for then the 7950 can still hold admirably until this fall with the right settings.

 

[RGM79]

Does anyone have any suggestions to this build? For 4k gaming / VR. Also specifically wanting SSD only, not separate drives for OS / games /etc.

Trying to stay at or under $3,000... open to suggestions to alternative parts that would be better or cost saving. Also i'm pretty set on the case unless someone can sell me on a different one.. really like the phanteks.
This will be going in the living room as well. So the quieter the better.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i7-6700K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor ($411.88 @ OutletPC)
CPU Cooler: Corsair H75 54.0 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler ($74.99 @ Amazon)
Motherboard: Asus MAXIMUS VIII HERO ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($219.99 @ NCIX US)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance LPX 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2400 Memory ($94.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Samsung 850 Pro Series 1TB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($416.49 @ Micro Center)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB HYBRID Video Card (2-Way SLI) ($689.99 @ Amazon)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB HYBRID Video Card (2-Way SLI) ($689.99 @ Amazon)
Case: Phanteks Enthoo Evolv ATX ATX Mid Tower Case ($184.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA 1000 P2 1000W 80+ Platinum Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($186.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM (64-bit) ($89.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $3060.29
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-02-01 19:10 EST-0500

• If you're going to spend that much money in total, perhaps you should consider getting the hexa core i7 5820K ($320 at Microcenter or $375 elsewhere) instead, which is technically higher end and actually cheaper than the quad core i7 6700K, except for the lower stock clock speed.
• Instead of a water cooler, I'd recommend an air cooler like the Noctua NH-D14 ($75) and NH-D15 ($90) or the Phanteks PH-TC14PE ($70~95 for a variety of colors) which perform slightly better than the Corsair H75 in both temperatures and noise.
• The Asus Maximus Hero motherboard has a middling 3/5 star score after 126 user reviews on Newegg, there seems to be quality control issues so I'd avoid that model.
• I'd recommend the 850 Evo ($326 for 1TB) instead of the 850 Pro for better price-to-performance ratio.
• There are cheaper GTX 980 Ti cards, you don't need the water-cooled models unless you're planning for high end overclocking. Even the air cooled models are perfectly capable of overclocking and if you're interested in silence, you should know only the air cooled models are able to shut down their fans for complete silence.
• Again if silence is key, there are soundproofed cases like the Fractal Define range of cases which have soundproofing foam lining the interior to reduce noise. If you still want to keep the Phanteks EVOLV case, there's also grey and black versions that are cheaper.
• That's a very high end but very expensive power supply. To save money, there are perfectly fine cheaper PSUs you could go with that are gold or even bronze rated, like the EVGA G2 1000 watt model ($145 after $20 rebate).

This is what I recommend with my changes:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i7-5820K 3.3GHz 6-Core Processor ($374.99 @ SuperBiiz)
CPU Cooler: Phanteks PH-TC14PE_BL 78.1 CFM CPU Cooler ($69.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: MSI X99A SLI PLUS ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard ($211.06 @ Amazon)
Memory: Patriot Viper 4 16GB (4 x 4GB) DDR4-3000 Memory ($94.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 1TB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($325.98 @ Amazon)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB FTW ACX 2.0+ Video Card (2-Way SLI) ($639.99 @ Amazon)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB FTW ACX 2.0+ Video Card (2-Way SLI) ($639.99 @ Amazon)
Case: Fractal Design Define S ATX Mid Tower Case ($79.99 @ NCIX US)
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA 1000G2 1000W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($145.98 @ Newegg)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM (64-bit) ($87.95 @ OutletPC)
Total: $2670.91
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-02-01 22:01 EST-0500

 

[Darknight]

Depends if your MB supports dual or quad memory channel. If dual, multiple of 2 sticks, 2x4GB, 2x8 and etc. If quad, multiple of 4 stocks, 4x4GB, 4x8 and etc..

Ok got it!! Thanks

 

[stb]

First Gen i7 can hang decently with modern CPUs, but not so much at stock speeds. You need better than the stock cooler, but many i7 920s can hit 4.0GHz or higher. Certainly trying for a 1000Mhz overclock at the very least would be wise if you have a good cooler.

We are seeing more games that really benefit from 8GB of memory, some are making it a minimum requirement. We are seeing a handful of game that benefit from 16 over 8, although 16 is not a requirement in any major release yet. If you can cheaply add 6GBs of memory and a GHz overclock then you will be able to stretch that system. If not, or regardless, going Skylake on a brand new build now does make sense. AMD Zen may offer a surprise on the CPU front, but it's unlikely to revolutionize performance so there's no need to wait for new tech later this year.

Waiting for Polaris or Pascal on the GPU front makes sense. AMD Polaris is aiming to be released in time for the back to school season, so August-September at the very latest if there are no delays.

If anything, what would make sense to do is get a new Skylake build now and keep the 7950 until Polaris or Pascal. You could cheaply get a used Radeon 290 as a stopgap for example, but with 3GB of RAM and the fact that GCN is still optimized for then the 7950 can still hold admirably until this fall with the right settings.

Thanks.

I do have an aftermarket cooler. When I built the machine, I went with the Noctua NH-U12P with any eye toward overclocking. I just never got around to it because CPU bottlenecks just weren't a problem.

I think on the Asus P6T SE, I can do 6x4GB for up to 24GB. I'm currently running 3x2GB (for 6GB total). I'm not 100% sure, but I think I could just drop in a 3x4GB set for a total of 18 GB for 50-75$. It looks like PC3-8500 stuff is hard to find, but the PC3-10600 should just run at the slower speed.

Seems like a cheap stopgap.

And Skylake makes sense; after a quick search it looks like this is it until mid-2017. Is that right? And it looks like that $50-75 in DDR3 could migrate to a new Skylake-based system. Looks like I have some homework to do...

 

[Wowfunhappy]

Okay, so, um, I guess this is as good a place to ask as any. I'm on a quest to make an old game work, and it doesn't like nVidia cards.

I need a full height, half-width Radeon card which is at least as powerful as a 2400 HD, compatible with Windows XP, and QUIET.

...any suggestions?

I bought a 2400 off of eBay which works perfectly, but it's loud as heck. Like, seriously... It's incredibly tiny, and yet it sounds like a jet engine.

 

[Hazaro]

Okay, so, um, I guess this is as good a place to ask as any. I'm on a quest to make an old game work, and it doesn't like nVidia cards.

I need a full height, half-width Radeon card which is at least as powerful as a 2400 HD, compatible with Windows XP, and QUIET.

...any suggestions?

I bought a 2400 off of eBay which works perfectly, but it's loud as heck. Like, seriously... It's incredibly tiny, and yet it sounds like a jet engine.

Single slot R7 250?

 

[Vestal]

Hey GAF, so I am planning on building my own server to run Plex Media Server along with running a few VMs.

Currently looking at the following and want input.(Will probably run Ubuntu Server)

Intel BX80662I36100 Core i3-6100 3M Cache, 3.70 GHz Processor
Gigabyte Motherboard Micro ATX DDR4 LGA 1151 GA-B150M-D3H-GSM
Corsair Vengeance LPX 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4 DRAM 2133MHz (PC4-17000) C13 Memory Kit - Black (CMK16GX4M2A2133C13)
Corsair Carbide Series Air 240 High Airflow MicroATX and Mini-ITX PC Case - Black (CC-9011070-WW)
EVGA SuperNOVA 750 B1 80+ BRONZE, 750W Semi Modular 5 Year Warranty Power Supply 110-B1-0750-VR

Already have a Samsung M.2 240GB SSD and 2 2TB WD HDDs for data(For now at least more later probably).

Suggestions are welcome.

 

[RGM79]

Hey GAF, so I am planning on building my own server to run Plex Media Server along with running a few VMs.

Currently looking at the following and want input.(Will probably run Ubuntu Server)

Intel BX80662I36100 Core i3-6100 3M Cache, 3.70 GHz Processor
Gigabyte Motherboard Micro ATX DDR4 LGA 1151 GA-B150M-D3H-GSM
Corsair Vengeance LPX 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4 DRAM 2133MHz (PC4-17000) C13 Memory Kit - Black (CMK16GX4M2A2133C13)
Corsair Carbide Series Air 240 High Airflow MicroATX and Mini-ITX PC Case - Black (CC-9011070-WW)
EVGA SuperNOVA 750 B1 80+ BRONZE, 750W Semi Modular 5 Year Warranty Power Supply 110-B1-0750-VR

Already have a Samsung M.2 240GB SSD and 2 2TB WD HDDs for data(For now at least more later probably).

Suggestions are welcome.

You can save money on the power supply. Your build would run just fine on a 250~300 watt PSU or even less. That 750 watt PSU is overkill.

 

[Vestal]

You can save money on the power supply. Your build would run just fine on a 250~300 watt PSU or even less. That 750 watt PSU is overkill.

Was looking for modular.. Any suggetions on a decent one?

Found a cheaper one.. 500w

EVGA 500 W1 80+, 500W Continuous Power, 3 Year Warranty Power Supply 100-W1-0500-KR

 

[Pachinko]

So here's roughly what I have right now -
i7 860 CPU running at 2.8 GHZ
Noctua cooler
8 GB DDR3 memory (1600mhz ? I think? )
1155 socket MB / Gigabyte something or other ( it has lots of USB ports)
NO SSD
1TB 7200 RPM 32MB cache HDD
650 watt PSU
DVD drive
Windows 7
Corsair tower (I think)

This computer has served me very well since it built it right at the end of 2009 (I didn't actually receive it until early January 2010) but I feel like I've upgraded it about as far as I can now and I'm ready to push forward.


i7 6700 CPU
16 GB DDR4 Gskill Ripjaws V seris F4-3000c15d-16gvr 3000mhz 8GBX2
1151 socket MB / Asus z170-a
SSD - Sandisk X300 512 GB
HDD - WD blue 1TB - 70$ OR WD BLACK 2TB
Power supply - cooler master v750
Case/tower - (fractal R4 window)
optical drive - 24X dvd read/write any brand
OS - windows 10

Pricetag - aprox. 1200+ (depending on how effective price matching is)

Obvious - Putting my XFX 290 4GB in this when it shows up , disabling intel APU

Later on - buying another 16 GB of DDR ram to bump up to 32 GB
After that - buying a probably 2017 GPU with 12+ GB of ram

Does anyone see any issues with the above, for example, are the sandisc x300 solid state drives any good ? it seemed cheaper and it's 512 GB. Also as far as I can tell the memory is 4 slots but it's 2 dual channel slots, I'm not sure if it toggles to quad channel when 4 Ram chips are inserted or what but like I wrote above - I plan to uprade it later so I'd rather buy 2 8 GB chips and then 2 more in a year or 2 if needed. It's what I did with my current PC , back in 2009 I bought just 4 GB of ram and later upgraded it to 8 GB. Only other question I have - it looks like that Motherboard combined with the tower will give me quite a few USB ports but will I have enough for all my stuff ? I've got a wacom cintiq and a scanner right now , I'd hate to have them not operate correctly.

How important is a cooler though ? I picked the 6700 instead of the 6700K because I didn't really intend to overclock (although it does sound like this MOBO makes it easier to do so). The skylake chips apparently all come with on board Video so I shouldn't have to worry about picking a video card out right now , I've got a year old XFX R290 in my current PC that I'll happily just toss in. On the note of my chosen (overly expensive CPU) , I figured if I'm going to buy a new computer I may as well get the newest chip that feels like a proper upgrade to what I have, which is a 4 core (hyper threading to 8 cores) chip.

Doing a bit of research , it seems like this hypothetical computer should run close to twice as fast as my current one and the GPU I have might be less bottlenecked so even it can possibly show off a bit more.

Is there anything else I should be aware of ?

 

[Wunder]

Hey guys, I'm thinking of putting together my first build this month and I basically took the "Enthusiast" build from the OP and just found the pieces/alternatives on PCPartPicker. Does this look good?

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-6600K 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor (£199.96 @ More Computers)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler (£25.98 @ Ebuyer)
Motherboard: Asus Z170-A ATX LGA1151 Motherboard (£119.90 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2400 Memory (£69.98 @ Novatech)
Storage: Crucial BX100 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£59.99 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£42.99 @ Ebuyer)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 980 4GB Superclocked ACX 2.0 Video Card (£430.97 @ Amazon UK)
Case: Phanteks Enthoo Pro ATX Full Tower Case (£85.54 @ Amazon UK)
Power Supply: EVGA 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply (£90.11 @ Amazon UK)
Optical Drive: Samsung SH-118CB/BEBE DVD/CD Drive (£8.75 @ Amazon UK)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM (64-bit)
Total: £1134.17
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-02-02 06:23 GMT+0000

 

[sueil]

I don't really need any upgrades right now but was wondering how far away intel 8 core consumer models are?

 

[RGM79]

Was looking for modular.. Any suggetions on a decent one?

Found a cheaper one.. 500w

EVGA 500 W1 80+, 500W Continuous Power, 3 Year Warranty Power Supply 100-W1-0500-KR

Assuming you're in the US.. the cheapest one would be the Corsair CX500M ($35 after $20 rebate). Not exactly high quality, but should be decent enough for your needs.

So here's roughly what I have right now -
i7 860 CPU running at 2.8 GHZ
Noctua cooler
8 GB DDR3 memory (1600mhz ? I think? )
1155 socket MB / Gigabyte something or other ( it has lots of USB ports)
NO SSD
1TB 7200 RPM 32MB cache HDD
650 watt PSU
DVD drive
Windows 7
Corsair tower (I think)

This computer has served me very well since it built it right at the end of 2009 (I didn't actually receive it until early January 2010) but I feel like I've upgraded it about as far as I can now and I'm ready to push forward.


i7 6700 CPU
16 GB DDR4 Gskill Ripjaws V seris F4-3000c15d-16gvr 3000mhz 8GBX2
1151 socket MB / Asus z170-a
SSD - Sandisk X300 512 GB
HDD - WD blue 1TB - 70$ OR WD BLACK 2TB
Power supply - cooler master v750
Case/tower - (fractal R4 window)
optical drive - 24X dvd read/write any brand
OS - windows 10

Pricetag - aprox. 1200+ (depending on how effective price matching is)

Obvious - Putting my XFX 290 4GB in this when it shows up , disabling intel APU

Later on - buying another 16 GB of DDR ram to bump up to 32 GB
After that - buying a probably 2017 GPU with 12+ GB of ram

Does anyone see any issues with the above, for example, are the sandisc x300 solid state drives any good ? it seemed cheaper and it's 512 GB. Also as far as I can tell the memory is 4 slots but it's 2 dual channel slots, I'm not sure if it toggles to quad channel when 4 Ram chips are inserted or what but like I wrote above - I plan to uprade it later so I'd rather buy 2 8 GB chips and then 2 more in a year or 2 if needed. It's what I did with my current PC , back in 2009 I bought just 4 GB of ram and later upgraded it to 8 GB. Only other question I have - it looks like that Motherboard combined with the tower will give me quite a few USB ports but will I have enough for all my stuff ? I've got a wacom cintiq and a scanner right now , I'd hate to have them not operate correctly.

How important is a cooler though ? I picked the 6700 instead of the 6700K because I didn't really intend to overclock (although it does sound like this MOBO makes it easier to do so). The skylake chips apparently all come with on board Video so I shouldn't have to worry about picking a video card out right now , I've got a year old XFX R290 in my current PC that I'll happily just toss in. On the note of my chosen (overly expensive CPU) , I figured if I'm going to buy a new computer I may as well get the newest chip that feels like a proper upgrade to what I have, which is a 4 core (hyper threading to 8 cores) chip.

Doing a bit of research , it seems like this hypothetical computer should run close to twice as fast as my current one and the GPU I have might be less bottlenecked so even it can possibly show off a bit more.

Is there anything else I should be aware of ?

What country are you in, and what's your budget? How much does each part cost? It sounds like you've done some good research on your part, so it looks alright, besides concerns about how much you're paying for the parts.

Hey guys, I'm thinking of putting together my first build this month and I basically took the "Enthusiast" build from the OP and just found the pieces/alternatives on PCPartPicker. Does this look good?

Seeing as you're in the UK, I recommend skinflint.co.uk, it's better than PCPartPicker when it comes to selection and comprehensiveness.

http://skinflint.co.uk/?cat=WL-637060&wlkey=59895e8d6fa66ddfdbb7cbcd4f027b11
1 x Toshiba DT01ACA 1TB, SATA 6Gb/s (DT01ACA100)
1 x Crucial BX100 250GB, SATA (CT250BX100SSD1)
1 x Intel Core i5-6600K, 4x 3.50GHz, boxed without cooler (BX80662I56600K)
1 x Kingston HyperX Savage (Rev. 2) DIMM kit 16GB, DDR4-2800, CL14-14-14 (HX428C14SB2K2/16)
1 x Gigabyte GeForce GTX 980 Ti Windforce 3X, 6GB GDDR5, 2x DVI, HDMI, 3x DisplayPort (GV-N98TWF3OC-6GD)
1 x Gigabyte GA-Z170XP-SLI
1 x Cooler Master Hyper 212 Evo
1 x Fractal Design Define S, noise-insulated (FD-CA-DEF-S-BK)
1 x EVGA 650 GQ 650W ATX 2.3 (210-GQ-0650)
1 x Microsoft: Windows 10 Home 64bit, DSP/SB (English) (PC) (KW9-00139)
Total of all best prices: £ 1167.42

With some careful parts picking, I was able to put together a build that for about £30 more includes a stronger graphics card and should have better overall performance.

I don't really need any upgrades right now but was wondering how far away intel 8 core consumer models are?

There's the i7 5960X. If that's not for you, then you're going to be waiting for a while, unless you don't mind the entry level i7 processors which are 4 cores with hyperthreading for 8 threads.

 

[sueil]

There's the i7 5960X. If that's not for you, then you're going to be waiting for a while, unless you don't mind the entry level i7 processors which are 4 cores with hyperthreading for 8 threads.

Nah I'll wait I don't really need an upgrade.

 

[Burgess_101]

Hey GAF, so I am planning on building my own server to run Plex Media Server along with running a few VMs.

Currently looking at the following and want input.(Will probably run Ubuntu Server)

Intel BX80662I36100 Core i3-6100 3M Cache, 3.70 GHz Processor
Gigabyte Motherboard Micro ATX DDR4 LGA 1151 GA-B150M-D3H-GSM
Corsair Vengeance LPX 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4 DRAM 2133MHz (PC4-17000) C13 Memory Kit - Black (CMK16GX4M2A2133C13)
Corsair Carbide Series Air 240 High Airflow MicroATX and Mini-ITX PC Case - Black (CC-9011070-WW)
EVGA SuperNOVA 750 B1 80+ BRONZE, 750W Semi Modular 5 Year Warranty Power Supply 110-B1-0750-VR

Already have a Samsung M.2 240GB SSD and 2 2TB WD HDDs for data(For now at least more later probably).

Suggestions are welcome.

You can buy decent microservers for like £100. I have one running at home doing what you want to do and it works fine.

 

[TheTrain]

Hi guys, I want to change my GPU and I need suggestion. I've an MSI 970 and I'm looking to do a step forward in terms of performance. I was looking at the 980TI but Pascal is coming this year (?)so well... do you think that is better to wait and see? I was also intrigued from the Titan X but I'm too rational to pull the trigger on it
The config is already good so there will be no problem in terms of bottleneck:
I7 6700K
16gb ddr4
1080p 144hz gsync
I play basically all genre, RTS FPS JRPG Space Sim and so on so yeah
Thank you in advance

 

[luffeN]

Hello guys!

I seem to have some problems with my new setup. I have a Dell S2716DG on display port and a Benq XL2411T on DVI. I have a GTX 970 and run Windows 10. Is there any way to set the Dell as a primary monitor from a hardware perspective? Or at least the display port as "number 1"? The boot screen appears on the Benq and today the Dell was not even recognized properly.

 

[Nothing1016]

What's a good monitor for 1080p/60? I have a 970 and 4590

 

[ISee]

Hi guys, I want to change my GPU and I need suggestion. I've an MSI 970 and I'm looking to do a step forward in terms of performance. I was looking at the 980TI but Pascal is coming this year (?)so well... do you think that is better to wait and see? I was also intrigued from the Titan X but I'm too rational to pull the trigger on it
The config is already good so there will be no problem in terms of bottleneck:
I7 6700K
16gb ddr4
1080p 144hz gsync
I play basically all genre, RTS FPS JRPG Space Sim and so on so yeah
Thank you in advance

I'm not quite sure if I'm on track as there were some new rumors last week, but afaik:
The Nvidia Titan X2 with HBM2 is going to launch in April/May and the successor to the gtx 980 (gddrx5 and not hmb2) in June 2016.
The Titan X2 is rumored to be around 1.8 times faster than the current 980Ti. The GTX "1080" should come with GDDRX5 and be around 50% faster than the current 980.
If you're willing to buy a Titan X then waiting till April/May for the Titan X2 should be the way to go for you, in my opinion.

 

[Brandon F]

Does anyone have any suggestions to this build? For 4k gaming / VR. Also specifically wanting SSD only, not separate drives for OS / games /etc.

Trying to stay at or under $3,000... open to suggestions to alternative parts that would be better or cost saving. Also i'm pretty set on the case unless someone can sell me on a different one.. really like the phanteks.
This will be going in the living room as well. So the quieter the better.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i7-6700K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor ($411.88 @ OutletPC)
CPU Cooler: Corsair H75 54.0 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler ($74.99 @ Amazon)
Motherboard: Asus MAXIMUS VIII HERO ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($219.99 @ NCIX US)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance LPX 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2400 Memory ($94.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Samsung 850 Pro Series 1TB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($416.49 @ Micro Center)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB HYBRID Video Card (2-Way SLI) ($689.99 @ Amazon)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB HYBRID Video Card (2-Way SLI) ($689.99 @ Amazon)
Case: Phanteks Enthoo Evolv ATX ATX Mid Tower Case ($184.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA 1000 P2 1000W 80+ Platinum Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($186.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM (64-bit) ($89.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $3060.29
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-02-01 19:10 EST-0500

I built an almost identical rig as you last month(minus the dual 980's, and certain ancillary part choices), but I would also suggest avoiding the ASUS Maximus. Most likely you will be fine, but I had the unfortunate luck of my i7-6700k going defunct after two weeks and relentless mobo errors I couldn't figure out. Ended up replacing the mobo for a Gigabyte variant and got a new i7 replacement which all works flawlessly now.

Also there is a monster thread on the ASUS forums concerning the Corsair Vengeance RAM we both have and some seriously compatibility issues affecting lots of people with the VIII hero when activating XMP profiles to clock the RAM to 3000+(not exclusive to the corsair ram either). Essentially the mobo becomes unstable and users are reporting to keep their settings underclocked at 2133 to actually boot to POST. Apparently ASUS is aware and has been trying to update bios with fixes that so far haven't helped or made things worse for some.

That said its a popular board and mileage varies, but I would probably suggest playing it safe with a diff brand as I did.

 

[Flintty]

This is a great thread, the links in the OP are really useful.

It's my daughter's birthday in April and she wants a PC for playing games with her friends. I've tried using the parts picker but aside from the CPU & HDD I really don't know what I'm doing (eg. what CPU cooling to get??) Can anybody offer some friendly advice?

She mainly plays three games - Minecraft, Marvel Heroes & Sims 3. She currently plays on a non gaming laptop which really struggles (10 fps on lowest setting lol). I'm looking for something that will play those games comfortably - nothing high end but good enough to run them looking half decent with a stable framerate. A little bit of future proofing is desireable but not essential. The budget is around £300. Help me GAF, please

 

[Burgess_101]

I built an almost identical rig as you last month(minus the dual 980's, and certain ancillary part choices), but I would also suggest avoiding the ASUS Maximus. Most likely you will be fine, but I had the unfortunate luck of my i7-6700k going defunct after two weeks and relentless mobo errors I couldn't figure out. Ended up replacing the mobo for a Gigabyte variant and got a new i7 replacement which all works flawlessly now.

Also there is a monster thread on the ASUS forums concerning the Corsair Vengeance RAM we both have and some seriously compatibility issues affecting lots of people with the VIII hero when activating XMP profiles to clock the RAM to 3000+(not exclusive to the corsair ram either). Essentially the mobo becomes unstable and users are reporting to keep their settings underclocked at 2133 to actually boot to POST. Apparently ASUS is aware and has been trying to update bios with fixes that so far haven't helped or made things worse for some.

That said its a popular board and mileage varies, but I would probably suggest playing it safe with a diff brand as I did.

On a similar note I have had nothing but trouble with ASUS boards. Gigabyte has always worked for me, no issues.

 

[Poker360]

• If you're going to spend that much money in total, perhaps you should consider getting the hexa core i7 5820K ($320 at Microcenter or $375 elsewhere) instead, which is technically higher end and actually cheaper than the quad core i7 6700K, except for the lower stock clock speed.
• Instead of a water cooler, I'd recommend an air cooler like the Noctua NH-D14 ($75) and NH-D15 ($90) or the Phanteks PH-TC14PE ($70~95 for a variety of colors) which perform slightly better than the Corsair H75 in both temperatures and noise.
• The Asus Maximus Hero motherboard has a middling 3/5 star score after 126 user reviews on Newegg, there seems to be quality control issues so I'd avoid that model.
• I'd recommend the 850 Evo ($326 for 1TB) instead of the 850 Pro for better price-to-performance ratio.
• There are cheaper GTX 980 Ti cards, you don't need the water-cooled models unless you're planning for high end overclocking. Even the air cooled models are perfectly capable of overclocking and if you're interested in silence, you should know only the air cooled models are able to shut down their fans for complete silence.
• Again if silence is key, there are soundproofed cases like the Fractal Define range of cases which have soundproofing foam lining the interior to reduce noise. If you still want to keep the Phanteks EVOLV case, there's also grey and black versions that are cheaper.
• That's a very high end but very expensive power supply. To save money, there are perfectly fine cheaper PSUs you could go with that are gold or even bronze rated, like the EVGA G2 1000 watt model ($145 after $20 rebate).

This is what I recommend with my changes:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i7-5820K 3.3GHz 6-Core Processor ($374.99 @ SuperBiiz)
CPU Cooler: Phanteks PH-TC14PE_BL 78.1 CFM CPU Cooler ($69.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: MSI X99A SLI PLUS ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard ($211.06 @ Amazon)
Memory: Patriot Viper 4 16GB (4 x 4GB) DDR4-3000 Memory ($94.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 1TB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($325.98 @ Amazon)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB FTW ACX 2.0+ Video Card (2-Way SLI) ($639.99 @ Amazon)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB FTW ACX 2.0+ Video Card (2-Way SLI) ($639.99 @ Amazon)
Case: Fractal Design Define S ATX Mid Tower Case ($79.99 @ NCIX US)
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA 1000G2 1000W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($145.98 @ Newegg)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM (64-bit) ($87.95 @ OutletPC)
Total: $2670.91
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-02-01 22:01 EST-0500

Great recommendations. Do you think the 5820k out performs the 4790k?

I built an almost identical rig as you last month(minus the dual 980's, and certain ancillary part choices), but I would also suggest avoiding the ASUS Maximus. Most likely you will be fine, but I had the unfortunate luck of my i7-6700k going defunct after two weeks and relentless mobo errors I couldn't figure out. Ended up replacing the mobo for a Gigabyte variant and got a new i7 replacement which all works flawlessly now.

Also there is a monster thread on the ASUS forums concerning the Corsair Vengeance RAM we both have and some seriously compatibility issues affecting lots of people with the VIII hero when activating XMP profiles to clock the RAM to 3000+(not exclusive to the corsair ram either). Essentially the mobo becomes unstable and users are reporting to keep their settings underclocked at 2133 to actually boot to POST. Apparently ASUS is aware and has been trying to update bios with fixes that so far haven't helped or made things worse for some.

That said its a popular board and mileage varies, but I would probably suggest playing it safe with a diff brand as I did.

I think I will be changing my motherboard now. Thanks for the tip

 

[TheTrain]

I'm not quite sure if I'm on track as there were some new rumors last week, but afaik:
The Nvidia Titan X2 with HBM2 is going to launch in April/May and the successor to the gtx 980 (gddrx5 and not hmb2) in June 2016.
The Titan X2 is rumored to be around 1.8 times faster than the current 980Ti. The GTX "1080" should come with GDDRX5 and be around 50% faster than the current 980.
If you're willing to buy a Titan X then waiting till April/May for the Titan X2 should be the way to go for you, in my opinion.

First, thank you
So whatever i'll decide to pick between a 980Ti and a Titan the best thing I can do now is to wait for new info about the next releas, 4-6 month

 

[hooijdonk17]

Bought my new monitor, a Dell P2414H. I love it. There is some slight backlight bleed at the lower right and a very tiny bit at the upper edge, but otherwise the uniformity, color correctness of the panel once calibrated, is top notch.

There is, however, one small falut. Somewhere near the middle of the screen there is this one pixel that is netiher dead, nor stuck. It just.. doesn't glow as bright as the others. I've taken photos of the thing, and it looks like the green subpixel is less bright compared to the adjacents. Anyone know what kind of pixel defect this is?

You guys reckon I should try to return this? I'm otherwise 100% satisfied with it, and I'm not really sure I want to gamble my chances and end up with a panel with dead/stuck pixels or backlight bleed problems (which would be terribly more difficult to prove if I try to re-return it..)

 

[Vuze]

You guys reckon I should try to return this? I'm otherwise 100% satisfied with it, and I'm not really sure I want to gamble my chances and end up with a panel with dead/stuck pixels or backlight bleed problems (which would be terribly more difficult to prove if I try to re-return it..)

If you're otherwise happy and the pixel doesn't annoy you when using the screen, I'd say stick with it. My XB270HU also has a one pixel-sized dust corn on the far right but I don't even notice it if I don't look for it.

===

I'm still looking for a Mini ITX case btw. I feel like I've seen any recent case for the form factor but they all look too gamey, are too huge or simply don't fit my imagination. Closest thing I've found that suits my taste is the Lian Li PC-Q19, I just wish it would be available in pearl white.
So again, if somebody has any suggestions, maybe knows of sleek and elegant custom cases, let me know. I decided against using a discrete GPU for this hackintosh office/media build, so I don't need room for that jfyi. Apart from that I've pinned down the components I'll be using .

 

[Woffls]

This is the only place I know where to ask the following: Is there a thread where people figure out how to fix whatever Nvidia broke in their most recent drivers?

I usually uninstall the Nvidia audio drivers so that my AVR actually gets a signal, but now it shows two HD audio devices and does nothing. I've had so much trouble with this shit. Tried rolling back but get the same issue so maybe it's mobo drivers but fuuuuck this shit man.

 

[bomblord1]

Ok dudes, about to pull the trigger on this. Could this rig pull off running most new stuff on high @ 60fps? 1080 is fine with me too.

This is also my first time building a gaming pc, you guys see anything missing or have any suggestions?? Goal was to stay around $1,100, I think I'm right at it right now.

You can get that EXACT (same manufacturer and everything) GPU $40 cheaper on sale right now on newegg
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127833&cm_re=MSI_970-_-14-127-833-_-Product

Also that SSD is ridiculous. If it's a must have for you ok but I tend to recommend a smaller (120-240GB) SSD for the OS and then a 500GB-1TB HDD for game installs since the price per GB is considerably cheaper. You would save about $150 and get the same boot times with this setup.

CPU is good but 1 generation out of date and doesn't support DDR4 RAM so when you upgrade in the future it's worth noting you will have to completely swap out your RAM and won't be able to carry it over. Both the RAM and CPU though are cheaper than their skylake equivalents if price is important.

Is Gold rating on your PSU important? It means it's more efficient (less wasted electricity) but if you drop down to a bronze you could save $20-$30

 

[e90Mark]

Oh man. Ended up buying a VG248QE and a G-Sync DIY module... What have I gotten myself into?

Where'd you find one of those?

I see. I might wait a bit till prices stabilize, or if some announcement in the coming weeks might present some more interesting options...

If anything, I might end up getting an i5-6600k, although I wish it had a faster base core clock (4GHz like the 6700k would be nice). At the same time, I wonder if the Nano's price might drop even more.</wishfulthinking>

I mean, Kaby Lake is still rumored for H2 2016, I believe.. But it's not going to be much different from the current Sky Lake stuff.

Would consider overclocking if you get a K processor. I know you're worried about cpu life span, and extra wattage.. But I would bet the 6600k can do the 4.0ghz on stock voltage. You're going to need an aftermarket cooler for either K processor, so might as well take advantage of the OC'ing. Highly overclocked Sandy Bridge processors, and even 1st gen i7's, are still kicking, as seen in this thread.

 

[Windam]

Alright guys, last question. ASUS H170 PRO GAMING or Z170-M Plus for an i5 6600/6600K? Not sure how to OC, but if it can give me an extra year or two, I wouldn't mind spending the extra and learning how to do it. I wouldn't be doing anything extreme since I only have a CM Hyper 212.

 

[ISee]

This is a great thread, the links in the OP are really useful.

It's my daughter's birthday in April and she wants a PC for playing games with her friends. I've tried using the parts picker but aside from the CPU & HDD I really don't know what I'm doing (eg. what CPU cooling to get??) Can anybody offer some friendly advice?

She mainly plays three games - Minecraft, Marvel Heroes & Sims 3. She currently plays on a non gaming laptop which really struggles (10 fps on lowest setting lol). I'm looking for something that will play those games comfortably - nothing high end but good enough to run them looking half decent with a stable framerate. A little bit of future proofing is desireable but not essential. The budget is around £300. Help me GAF, please

£300 is a tight budget I hope you have a spare windows key/copy lying around or you'll have to add another ~ £60 for windows 8.1.
This system for £306 is definitely capable of running games for your daughter in full HD on high settings and high frame rates.
I thought about cutting out the GPU and going for a APU solution (A10 7870k) but honestly it's not worth it as you'd 'just' safe around £30 and performance would be significantly worse.

PCPartPicker part list: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/HLbDBm
Price breakdown by merchant: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/HLbDBm/by_merchant/

CPU: Intel Pentium G3258 3.2GHz Dual-Core Processor (£51.99 @ Ebuyer)
Motherboard: ASRock H81 Pro BTC ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£49.20 @ More Computers)
Memory: Crucial 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (£29.99 @ Ebuyer)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 500GB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£33.98 @ Novatech)
Video Card: PowerColor Radeon R7 250X 2GB Video Card (£70.80 @ More Computers)
Case: Thermaltake Versa H25 ATX Mid Tower Case (£29.49 @ Ebuyer)
Power Supply: EVGA 430W 80+ Certified ATX Power Supply (£31.98 @ Ebuyer)
Optical Drive: Samsung SH-118CB/BEBE DVD/CD Drive (£8.75 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £306.18
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-02-02 14:33 GMT+0000

First, thank you
So whatever i'll decide to pick between a 980Ti and a Titan the best thing I can do now is to wait for new info about the next releas, 4-6 month

The 980Ti should be able to power through all games on very high/high settings during this console generation. So if you want to improve your gaming experience now, well go for the 980Ti it's not going to be a bad performing card in 6 months. BUT if you aim for the very best and you plan to upgrade to 4k in the near future then wait for high end pascal cards.

 

[e90Mark]

Alright guys, last question. ASUS H170 PRO GAMING or Z170-M Plus for an i5 6600/6600K? Not sure how to OC, but if it can give me an extra year or two, I wouldn't mind spending the extra and learning how to do it. I wouldn't be doing anything extreme since I only have a CM Hyper 212.

Grab the z170 board with the 6600k. Software tools make it easy to "auto oc", but learning how to do it in the bios is usually just as easy as upping the multiplier for a modest overclock.

Overclocking will definitely expand the time you can sit on that processor. At least the year or two that you're asking for.

 

[Mattdaddy]

You can get that EXACT (same manufacturer and everything) GPU $40 cheaper on sale right now on newegg
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127833&cm_re=MSI_970-_-14-127-833-_-Product

Also that SSD is ridiculous. If it's a must have for you ok but I tend to recommend a smaller (120-240GB) SSD for the OS and then a 500GB-1TB HDD for game installs since the price per GB is considerably cheaper. You would save about $150 and get the same boot times with this setup.

CPU is good but 1 generation out of date and doesn't support DDR4 RAM so when you upgrade in the future it's worth noting you will have to completely swap out your RAM and won't be able to carry it over. Both the RAM and CPU though are cheaper than their skylake equivalents if price is important.

Is Gold rating on your PSU important? It means it's more efficient (less wasted electricity) but if you drop down to a bronze you could save $20-$30

Great info thanks for the advice.

The video card is actually from newegg, I'm wondering if the price didn't update cause it was in my wish list.... Hmm anyway thanks for the heads up!!

And yeah I figured thy ssd was overkill lol. Honestly, I just thought it would be nice to have everything on one drive instead of two. Would there be any cons to this? Not sure if the juice would be worth the squeeze on price.

As for the cpu being a generation behind, yeah mostly just wanted to save some dough. How big would the performance gap be for gaming?

Thanks again!

 

[Dragon1893]

I'm seeing several sites mention that the i3-6100 is the best choice for a work PC right now. Can anyone share some thoughts on this?
I feel like an i5 would be overkill and this i3 seems to have an integrated graphics chips that is decent enough for me not to need a dedicated gpu.

 

[Vestal]

You can buy decent microservers for like £100. I have one running at home doing what you want to do and it works fine.

Have a link to one around that price range? Just curious on specs/price etc.

 

[Windam]

Grab the z170 board with the 6600k. Software tools make it easy to "auto oc", but learning how to do it in the bios is usually just as easy as upping the multiplier for a modest overclock.

Overclocking will definitely expand the time you can sit on that processor. At least the year or two that you're asking for.

Thanks! Think I'll go with the MSI Z170A PC Mate since it's $15 cheaper and reviews indicate that it's a quality board for the price.

 

[shiftplusone]

I currently have:

Core i5 2500k @ 4.3
16GB ram
980Ti


My PC is single purposed for video games. I don't do any video stuff at all


I keep seeing that MAYBE sandylake can be a worthwhile upgrade now based on use case but also have read that the 2500k is still a monster and I'm fine

I had a 670 and 8 gb ram and was told to upgrade those instead when skylake first launched.

the upgrade path to a 6600k or 6700k is about 600-950 depending on what I want to recycle from my current PC (video card at minimum, then case/drives, etc)

I'm not really noticing any performance issues in what I play, but i'm getting into VR this gen and my CPU is technically below spec for the rift (my 3dmark score blows the 9000 minimum out of the water though)

Should I even bother to upgrade?

 

[Dragon1893]

Posting again for the new page:

I'm seeing several sites mention that the i3-6100 is the best choice for a work PC right now. Can anyone share some thoughts on this?
I feel like an i5 would be overkill and this i3 seems to have an integrated graphics chips that is decent enough for me not to need a dedicated gpu.

Just 3mb of cache is bothering me though.