New Gaming PC €1500

murphzor

I made a thread here a couple of months ago asking for a build but I held back until my exams were over and the new 700 series/Haswell gear was available.

I basically want a very powerful PC able to play anything on max settings for the next few years.

I am willing to try SLI and so on.



1. What is your budget? [€1500]

2. What will be the main purpose of the computer? [Gaming/Internet/maybe some game streaming in the future] (Starcraft 2, Planetside 2, Skyrim, XCOM)

3. Do you need a copy of Windows? [No]

4. Can you use any parts from an old computer? [DVD drive]

5. Do you need a monitor? [No, currently at 1920x1080]

6. Do you need any of these peripherals? [No]

7. Are you willing to try overclocking? [Yes]

8. How can you pay? [Credit Card]

9. When are you purchasing? [Within 10 days at most]

10. If you need help building it, where are you based? [Dublin]

BloodBath

This would do nicely I think. 2 x 660's will give you around titan performance for 1/3rd of the price. Psu has enough power if you decide to go with 2 high end cards in the future. Lot's of overclocking headroom there as well and it should be pretty quiet.

Item|Price
ASRock Z87 Extreme3, Sockel 1150, ATX|€149.99
Intel Core i5-4670K Box, LGA1150|€222.00
8GB-Kit G.Skill Sniper PC3-14900U CL9-10-9-28|€61.70
2 x Gigabyte GeForce GTX 660 Windforce 2X, 2GB GDDR5, 2x DVI, HDMI, DisplayPort|€344.38
Samsung SSD 840 250GB SATA 6Gb/s|€139.99
Nanoxia Deep Silence One Dark Anthracite, ATX, ohne Netzteil|€94.35
2 x Enermax T.B.Silence 14x14cm|€17.18
be quiet! STRAIGHT POWER CM BQT E9-CM-680W 80+Gold|€123.43
Corsair Hydro Series H110|€111.05
Seagate Barracuda 7200 2000GB, SATA 6Gb/s|€80.84
Shipping|€18.99
Total|€1363.90

tuxy

How about this, you can change the case if you don't like it.

Item|Price
ASRock Z87 Pro3, Sockel 1150, ATX|€124.99
Intel Core i5-4670K Box, ohne Lüfter, LGA1150|€222.00
Gigabyte GeForce GTX 780, 3GB GDDR5, 2x DVI, HDMI, DisplayPort|€649.00
8GB G.Skill RipJaws-X PC3-12800U CL9|€60.21
be quiet! STRAIGHT POWER BQT E9-500W 80+Gold|€84.04
Nanoxia Deep Silence Two Silver, ohne Netzteil|€82.93
Samsung SSD 840 250GB SATA 6Gb/s|€139.99
Seagate Barracuda 7200 2000GB, SATA 6Gb/s|€80.84
Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO - Intel/AMD|€29.83
Shipping|€18.99
Total|€1492.82

Gumbi

Well that PC is a beast.

Most of the hardware is brand new on market. Not much point in penny-pinching at this stage, but why bit get the Tray version of the CPU and save a few quid? Or are you thinking of the warranty? How about a slightly better cooler? That would have quieter fans? HR02 macho maybe?

BloodBath

Better warranty with the box and if you sell the cpu in future but want to keep the cooler at least you have one to sell with it.

The 780 is massively overpriced imo. The 2 x 660's would outperform it for nearly half the price.

Overall the rest of the system is better as well. The Haswell's are reasonably hotter than Ivy's hence the cooler.

My build supports sli as well and has the power for it.

It's also €140 cheaper.

tuxy

BloodBath wrote: »

The 780 is massively overpriced imo. The 2 x 660's would outperform it for nearly half the price.

Depends on the game your playing. SLI is still far from perfect and still does not scale well with many games.
It gets good average FPS but when you look at min FPS it's a different story.
It uses more power. It would also make upgrading to 1440p in the future a problem with only 2GB usable video ram.
The 780 is only a fraction slower compared to the titan which is the fastest single GPU you can get right now.

BloodBath

It scales well with the vast majority of games. Slightly worse frame latency would be the only down side. It won't be noticeable for the majority of games.

The power consumption of 2 x 660's is around the same as a single 780. There's not much in it. You could run 2 of them overclocked with the processor overclocked on a 450-500w psu if you wanted.

He's playing at 1080p and made no mention of 1440p.

He also mentioned he was willing to try sli. Imo a 780 is a total waste of money.

murphzor

Both very nice builds. I am leaning towards Bloodbath mainly because of the price but I've not made up my mind yet.

I suppose it's mainly a matter of SLI and how good and reliable it really is, I've read good and bad.

Serephucus

It's actually not the case at all. The minimum framerate thing is a stigma back from the earlier days of SLI/CF. That's a common misconception.

http://www.vortez.net/articles_pages/nvidia_geforce_gtx_titan_sli,17.html

Not many reviewers look into minimum FPS with SLI reviews (which is unfortunate) so it was difficult to find one applicable. (Hence the GK110 GPUs vs. GK104) but you get the idea.

I ran SLI 580s myself a while back, and it was excellent with everything I tried. No driver bugs, no stuttering (that I could notice) and great scaling over all.

BloodBath

Here's a good test showing 660ti sli scaling and frame latency. It's pretty solid with very few noticeable spikes. This test is also 2 months old so it may have improved even more since then.

http://www.pcper.com/reviews/Graphics-Cards/Frame-Rating-GeForce-GTX-660-Ti-and-Radeon-HD-7950

tuxy

Serephucus wrote: »

I ran SLI 580s myself a while back, and it was excellent with everything I tried. No driver bugs, no stuttering (that I could notice) and great scaling over all.

Micro stutter will always be there with a multi gpu setup that uses the cards to draw alternative frames.
It's also different for everyone a bit like how some people will immediately notice the difference between monitors with high hz and low hz while other people can not tell the difference.
I have seen people with the exact same setups talk about it. Some of them notice it and it drives them nuts while others think it looks perfect. If you slow it right down just about everyone can see it. So it is really there and just a matter of a difference in perception.

Once the OP is fully aware of the disadvantages of SLI then the 660 SLI setup could offer great value.

CRM Ireland

I dont think there would be any problem running out of memory if he decided to go 1440p in the future. Which is something you should be doing now, rather than continue at 1080p. The difference is huge!

Im using 2 GTX580's in SLI and they are only the 1.5GB versions. Ive not hit a wall due to memory yet. In fact, Ive got 3 Dell U2711s and I play iRacing at 7680x1440 and Im still just under 60FPS.

Dont fall for all the marketing garbage hardware manufacturers spout to try and shift units. People read on forums that its important and then pass this information on as if they have first hand experience of it, when probably 99% of the time they are just repeating what they read.

I wouldnt get a 780, not unless you could afford to get two of them, or intend to get another in the future. Its not very cost effective.

BloodBath

You could save about another €150 on that build with a few changes if you wanted to go cheaper again without losing any performance.

A noctua NH D14 or be-quiet dark rock pro 2 cooler wouldn't be far off the performance of the H110.

You could drop the ssd or hdd sizes down a bit if you don't need the space.

You could go with a 500w psu if you don't think you will go with 2 high end cards in future.

murphzor

I'm still leaning towards your suggestion Bloodbath but before I make any decision let me ask: What is your opinion on getting a 770 with your build and then adding another a year or two down the line?

tuxy

If you really want bang for buck you could get a 7950

An overclocked 7950 would be very close to a gtx 770 in performance and cost about €280.
You could then sell that card in the future and get what ever offers good value at the time. You will end up spending much less this way while still maintaining a very high end system.

BloodBath

I still think dual 660's are the way to go at the moment. It's still somewhere around 780 - titan performance for a lot lot less. The frame latency is perfect for most games with only a little spiking in certain games.

If I was buying atm that's what I'd go for anyway.

murphzor

Ok I've pretty much decided to go with your build BloodBath. The only change I've made is that I'm going for the Dark Rock Pro 2 instead of the H110. I think space won't be any problem, that's one big looking cooler!