New gaming build, €2000 budget.

Rob2D

Hi all,

I've been out of the PC game for almost a decade, but now that I'm all grown up with some money to spend I'm ready to dive back in!

I've never even attempted a build before so I've come here to seek ye're wisdom!:P

1. What is your budget? €2000 MAX

2. What will be the main purpose of the computer? Heavy gaming, storing/listening to all my music and internet obviously. Nothing major beyond that.

3. Do you need a copy of Windows? Yes, better get 8 I suppose.

4. Can you use any parts from an old computer? No

5. Do you need a monitor? Will purchase a 1440p monitor at a later date. Probably January.

5a. If yes, what size do you need. -

5b. If no, what resolution is your current monitor and do you plan to upgrade in the near future? Going to plug it into my tv for now. 42" panny 1080p

6. Do you need any of these peripherals? I'll look after a mouse and keyboard myself.

7. Are you willing to try overclocking? Sure, why not.

8. How can you pay? Whatever

9. When are you purchasing? In a month or so. No panic on me yet.

10. If you need help building it, where are you based? Clare. I'll undoubtedly need help as I haven't got a fcking clue, but I have a couple mates who have done this before.


Right, I want to future proof myself as much as possible on this build. I wanna be able to run Crysis 4 on this bloody thing when its done!:pac:

Just a couple things:

-I'd like a nice white case. I've looked at a few but the different sizes confuse me.
-Intel always seems to be the go to around here but why not AMD? Their processors seem to offer better speeds for much cheaper???
-I'd really like a SSD up in this thing. I hear great things.

Ok guys I've rambled on enough. Thanks in advance for any advice; it is much appreciated.:D

Gumbi

You can stick in a great Korean 1440p monitor into that budget without a bother man, and still have a great rig. 1500 goes a long way on a high end rig. You won't need to spend 2000 if you don't want to to have a sick rig.

Rob2D

Well I didn't say I wanted to spend 2000 haha. That's just the budget. Obviously if we could put together something outrageous and still come in under budget then that would be great!:pac:

scottd4

Completely unnecessary, but you asked for a €2000 budget and here you go. I believe it ticks all the boxes with plenty of room in the case and on the motherboard and PSU to expand in the future.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: Intel Core i5-4670K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor (Purchased For €213.00)
CPU Cooler: Corsair H110 94.0 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler (Purchased For €111.00)
Motherboard: ASRock Z87 Extreme6/ac ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (Purchased For €201.00)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance Pro 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-2133 Memory (Purchased For €92.00)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance Pro 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-2133 Memory (Purchased For €92.00)
Storage: Samsung 840 Series 250GB 2.5" Solid State Disk (Purchased For €148.00)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (Purchased For €81.00)
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 780 3GB Video Card (Purchased For €595.00)
Sound Card: Asus Xonar DX 24-bit 192 KHz Sound Card (Purchased For €70.00)
Case: Fractal Design Define R4 w/Window (White) ATX Mid Tower Case (Purchased For €101.00)
Power Supply: Corsair 860W 80 PLUS Platinum Certified ATX12V / EPS12V Power Supply (Purchased For €165.00)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 8 Full (64-bit) (Purchased For €85.00)
Total: €1954.00


You don't need the sound card as the board already has 7.1 audio.

Rob2D

scottd4 wrote: »

Completely unnecessary

Gimme a break guys, I don't know what's necessary, that's why I came here:o

Anyway, cheers for the reply Scott. Plenty of food for thought there. Its quite interesting learning about all this stuff:)

raymix

Hi, Scott's build is pretty solid, but indeed unnecessary strong.
First off there is no such thing as future proof.
Second - how far are you going to push the overclock?
Third - are you going to run with vsync on?

I am taking scott's build in mind:
If you are going to do very mild OC, you can easily cut €100 off the motherboard.
8GB of RAM is more than enough for gaming, just getting 2 sticks for now and putting them in slots 2 and 4 should save you another €92
CPU cooler is questionable thing - your own preference, over 70 euros mark, the differences are irrelevant on stock and mild OC. 212 Evo would be more than enough for the job. If you prefer closed loops, stay away from h100i, I am reading bad reviews about it, but some might disagree with me here. H80 or H80i should be more than capable of reasonable OC. This should basically save you €30-€80 depending on your choice.
250GB SSD is awesome, but it's an overkill. 120GB SSD would be more than enough for a while. Just keep static stuff like movies and downloads on your secondary HDD. This should save you another €30, which isn't that much at all.
The GPU chosen on the list is really awesome and you should probably stick with it. It is the best choice for maximum performance in terms of FPS for your needs. Although GTX 770 would save you €200 euro, the difference should be 5-15FPS at best between the two in real world. A little bigger in more GPU bound games.
Sound card - you don't need one, motherboards has surround sound integrated. If you are going for maximum sound quality, that is a whole different story. Saving €70 if going without.
860W and platinum rated PSU is total overkill for this setup. Use some online calculator to see what your actual needs should require with a little extra wattage to compensate for capacitor degradation over time. My wild guess is 650W would be more than enough for single GPU setup and the mentioned i5 overclocked. An Corsair TX650V2 or XFX 650W Core edition (750W is only extra €2 on amazon) will save you another €80.

Theoretical savings over Scott's build: ~€650

scottd4

@raymix you just beat me to posting my recommended build

CPU: Intel Core i5-4670K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor (Purchased For €213.00)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler (Purchased For €30.00)
Motherboard: ASRock Z87 Extreme4 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (Purchased For €141.00)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance Pro 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (Purchased For €74.00)
Storage: Samsung 840 Series 250GB 2.5" Solid State Disk (Purchased For €148.00)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (Purchased For €81.00)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 770 2GB Video Card (Purchased For €400.00)
Case: Fractal Design Define R4 w/Window (White) ATX Mid Tower Case (Purchased For €101.00)
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA 650W 80 PLUS Gold Certified ATX12V / EPS12V Power Supply (Purchased For €92.00)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 8 Full (64-bit) (Purchased For €85.00)
Total: €1365.00

Gumbi

The above is generally good advice. I would recommend getting a Macho 02 from Thermalright over the Hyper 212 though, Haswell runs hot, the price differenc is minimal, better performance and much quieter fan (140mm limited to 1300RPM, the Hyper 212s fans goes to 1800 or 2000 AFAIK).

scottd4

I find the Macho 02 a little on the large side which can cause problems with RAM, especially high profile RAM. Usually I swap the CM stock fan for dual silent fans (push/pull). On previous 3570K builds I have been able to get to 4.3Ghz with no issues, haven't tried this on a Haswell build yet.

Gumbi

scottd4 wrote: »

I find the Macho 02 a little on the large side which can cause problems with RAM, especially high profile RAM. Usually I swap the CM stock fan for dual silent fans (push/pull). On previous 3570K builds I have been able to get to 4.3Ghz with no issues, haven't tried this on a Haswell build yet.

You should get up to 4.5 easily on a 3570k with a Hyper 212 and stock fan (gaming loads are much less intensive than synthetic ones). Haswell, well, huperthreadind inclusive (which is a bit unfair, but I want to use hyperbole to illustrate my point), my 4770k reaches 80 degrees at 4.4ghz with a high end cooler (Dark Rock Pro 2) uner a Cinebench load. Prime/IBT loads using the AVX instruction sets are impossible to run, a ~min long run of IBT using those OC settings and only 512MB RAM and my CPU hits 95 degrees (potentially throttling).

Just get low profile RAM and you should be fine.

raymix

Got myself a pair of Crucial Sport 8GB Kit (4GBx2) low profile, because of my rather gigantic CPU fan lol. Really nice RAM for the price, not sure about OC reliability, that's something i can't learn to do - keep falling asleep when trying to read about timings.

Rob2D

Wow, thanks for all the replies guys!

However, I think I'd like to go with the FX 8350 over Intel.

Also, on my travels I discovered a post made here by BloodBath a few weeks ago on a similar 1440 build:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=85397317&postcount=9

I may steal a couple ideas from that.

raymix

8350 is a nice chip. Trying to get mine stable at 4.5Ghz currently, cheaping out on Vcore as much as I can. Popped in Planetside 2 for the alert, noticed solid 10fps increase already, plays 50-80 all on ultra, 1080p gtx670. Havent got to really big battles yet, that's where fps drops in this game below 30 on stock. Hopefully this OC will keep it above.

It's only good if you inted to overclock it. Runs rather cool on idle and games, but really hot while stress testing, way more than expected.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/m1otvtyd01cvfo9/shot_130724_021915.jpg

Gumbi

raymix wrote: »

8350 is a nice chip. Trying to get mine stable at 4.5Ghz currently, cheaping out on Vcore as much as I can. Popped in Planetside 2 for the alert, noticed solid 10fps increase already, plays 50-80 all on ultra, 1080p gtx670. Havent got to really big battles yet, that's where fps drops in this game below 30 on stock. Hopefully this OC will keep it above.

It's only good if you inted to overclock it. Runs rather cool on idle and games, but really hot while stress testing, way more than expected.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/m1otvtyd01cvfo9/shot_130724_021915.jpg

Games won't come close to stressing it as much as synthetic stress tests. I have a very high tolerance for stress test temps as such. My IvyBridge would reach 90 degrees at 4.6ghz after stressing it for some time in IBT, which doesn't bother me at all, as games ha it at 75 MAX thereafter - many games under 70.

BloodBath

That 1440p build I did was just an ott build. You won't need 16gb of ram or a ht processor for gaming. You have the budget to get a 1440p monitor and a powerful pc now. Why put off the 1440p purchase until January?

raymix

@gumbi: Max temps in screenshot are achieved in AMD Overdrive stability test. I just stopped the test and jumped in the game to gain easy cert points.

Rob2D

BloodBath wrote: »

That 1440p build I did was just an ott build. You won't need 16gb of ram or a ht processor for gaming. You have the budget to get a 1440p monitor and a powerful pc now. Why put off the 1440p purchase until January?

Well I figured they'd be pricey but if you guys say I can have both within budget then I'll certainly take a look! Cheers.

Oh and one more thing BloodBath. Would you still recommend those graphics cards you mentioned? The two of them are cheaper than the geforce that was mentioned here earlier.

scottd4

I tend to go for single GPU setup over multi GPU, its really a personal preference, both cards have enough VRAM to support 1440p comfortably.

The HD7950 had driver issues especially with Xfire (2 or more GPU's), mainly sorted now. The gtx 780 exhausts heat out the back of the case whereas the 2 hd7950's will not, will require good airflow to keep case cool. Havent looked at the wattage requirements but i believe the 2x hd7950's will require a bigger PSU which will add to the overall cost of the build.

Gumbi

A quality 650w unit should do 7950s, but 700 plus to be safe.

AFAIK, higher ASIC cards are a lot more efficient than lower ASIC scoring cards, meaning lower stock voltages, and consequently (my assumption) lower power draw. This, I think, is evidenced by many older 7950s (reference cards etc, with the stock voyage of 1.25) were throttling at stock under some loads, and people started making mods to raise the TDP.

My stock voltage is extremely low (1.012v for 950mhz, 1000mhz is stable at that voltage, 1200mhz is stable at 1.112v), and so I can leave my power limit at plus 10% and not throttle at that high overclock.

Again, a fair bit if this is speculation, and I thought if just throw it into the mix when the topic of power draw if Xfire 7950s came up

BloodBath

Oh and one more thing BloodBath. Would you still recommend those graphics cards you mentioned? The two of them are cheaper than the geforce that was mentioned here earlier.

It's a close call between a pair of 7950's and a pair of 760gtx. SLI has been more reliable in the past. At the moment the extra 1gb of memory on the 7950 will make no difference without mods but it may do in future. Pro's and cons with both. It remains to be seen how much the driver revision will improve crossfire but in the early tests on the 7990 they seem to have sorted it. There is also the possibility of better optimisations for games on amd graphics cards with next gen consoles using amd hardware.

As for the processor an 8350 is a great processor for sure but there are issues. While it is close in multi thread performance to the 3770k or the 4770k it lags behind in a lot of cpu limited games that don't use many cores as the intel per core performance is reasonably higher. There are quite a few of these games. Future titles are less likely to have these issues but it's worth considering especially with a budget like that. Personally I think the xeon 1230v2 is a better option than the 8350. You could get about 20% more cpu performance out of an overclocked 4770k though but that would cost €150-€180 more than the 8350 or xeon factoring in the more expensive board and cpu cooler. The boards for the 4770k also feature more sata-600 ports, which are only really use for ssds and better onboard sound. It's up to you if that's worth the extra costs.

Rob2D

Hey guys, I'm back.

So I more or less have my crazy build sorted on hwvs right now, hovering around €1650.

As ye said I can now look into a monitor. I did a little bit of searching and the QX2710 seems to be the best deal right now:



http://www.ebay.ie/itm/QNIX-QX2710-LED-Evolution-ll-Glossy-27-2560x1440-SAMSUNG-PLS-27-PC-Monitor-/130913259255?pt=Computer_Monitors&hash=item1e7b09cef7

Does that sound about right?

Rob2D

In the interest of saving myself a few quid more, what would you guys think of a pair of crossfired Powercolor Devil 7870's???? Would they still be up to the job of 1440 do you think?




http://www.hitechlegion.com/reviews/graphics/35958-pc-7870-d?showall=&start=8

http://www.overclockersclub.com/reviews/powercolor_devil_hd_7870/14.htm

I realise I may be sacrificing some performance over a 7950 but by God I'd gain some style points. I'm quite interested in these as a personal touch to the build:D.

Gumbi

Their RRP is 260 dollars right? Way overpriced.

They are cool, yes, but 7950s will outperform by a noticeable amount for about he same price.

BloodBath

Go with a pair of 760gtx if you want to save some.

Not too sure how you are spending 1650 on the build before the monitor. Can you throw up what you're going with?

Rob2D

Aw, that's what I thought:(

Rob2D

BloodBath wrote: »

Go with a pair of 760gtx if you want to save some.

Not too sure how you are spending 1650 on the build before the monitor. Can you throw up what you're going with?

Oh its because I currently have the 4770k in there. I was indeed tempted by the Xeon you mentioned but I'm thinking more towards overclocking and the future. In a couple years time will I be happier I went 4770 or 1230v2?

I could also save by halving the ram to 8gb and getting a sensible case. But I really like the CM storm stryker and trying to get a good single stick of 8gb ram is tough. They seem to only want to sell you the better stuff in 16. But I suppose that's the point.

BloodBath

You don't get a single 8gb stick.

You get 2 x 4gb which leaves you with room to expand to 16gb which you will probably never need to do with that pc anyway.

Rob2D

BloodBath wrote: »

You don't get a single 8gb stick.

You get 2 x 4gb which leaves you with room to expand to 16gb which you will probably never need to do with that pc anyway.

Oh OK. So, maybe this then?

http://www.hardwareversand.de/2133+Low+Voltage/66743/8GB-Kit+G.Skill+Sniper+PC3-17066U+CL9.article

BloodBath

You're not gonna get any gains in games using such high speed ram. Most lower speed ram will overclock to these levels anyway. Those ram prices keep on climbing though so there's not much to be saved. It's nuts.

That's good ram anyway.

Rob2D

OK, so here's what I've got:

(my God these tables are hard work. How do ye type these things up every day?:pac:)

HWVS
Item|Price

Intel Core i7-4770K Box, LGA1150|296,14
MSI Z87-G45 Gaming, ATX, Sockel 1150|131,68
8GB-Kit G.Skill Sniper PC3-17066U CL9|73,53
CM Storm Stryker Big-Tower|135,50
MS Windows 8 64bit (SB-Version) Englisch|86,98
Seagate Barracuda 7200 1000GB, SATA 6Gb/s|53,99
Corsair Professional Series HX750 80PLUS Gold 750W|111,61
LiteOn iHAS124-04 schwarz SATA|15,11
Kingston HyperX 3K 120GB SSD SATA 6Gb's|89,74
Corsair Hydro Series H100i|96,03
LogiLink Wireless LAN 300 Mbps PCI Karte 802.11n 2T2R|13,94
Total|€1,104.25

AMAZON
Item|Price

Perixx MX-2000 Mouse|27.77
Perixx PX-2000 Keyboard|38.19
Perixx DX-1000L, Gaming Mouse Pad|9.25
Total|€75.21

EBAY
Item|Price

QX2710 LED Evolution ll [Glossy] 27" 2560x1440 |241.22
Total|€241.22

Overall Total €1420.68

That HWVS price is from using the discount trick and does not include shipping because I don't know what the deal with that is yet.

As ye're keen eyes will no doubt have seen, I am in fact missing a graphics card. I just can't decide. Me choosing a graphics card is a bit like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQEm_TitwDk

BloodBath

We don't type the tables up. There's a script in the stickys that you can use to auto make a table from your hwvs basket.

I'd go for a pair of these. The price/performance ratio is great and it has one of the best coolers. They will match your msi board quite nicely too.

Good choice of mouse.

I'd probably grab a mechanical keyboard with your budget.

I'd also probably go for the 250gb samsung 840 ssd with your budget.

The H100i is a good cooler but with such a big case you could easily fit a Be-quiet dark rock pro 2 in there which performs around the same as the H100i and costs €35-€40 less.

You should add extra case fans as well. The h100i wouldn't be bad choice I guess as it is essentially adding 2 exhaust fans to the top but it already comes with a 200mm fan installed there. Check how many fan spaces are free in the case and fill them up.

Rob2D

BloodBath wrote: »

We don't type the tables up. There's a script in the stickys that you can use to auto make a table from your hwvs basket.

:eek::(

BloodBath wrote: »

I'd probably grab a mechanical keyboard with your budget.

Initially I was like: "a what now?":pac:

Upon closer inspection I have found out what a mechanical keyboard is. Funnily enough I have experience with some of these switches in my fightstick. For that, I like the red switches.

BloodBath wrote: »

You should add extra case fans as well. The h100i wouldn't be bad choice I guess as it is essentially adding 2 exhaust fans to the top but it already comes with a 200mm fan installed there. Check how many fan spaces are free in the case and fill them up.

Ah yes I believe there's space down the bottom for two more. Fans slipped my mind. I'll look into it.

I reckon I'll stick with the h100i. Looks a lot nicer than a big lump of a heat sink.

BloodBath wrote: »

I'd also probably go for the 250gb samsung 840 ssd with your budget.

Is it really worth the extra 50?

BloodBath

For double the space I think it is. If you want room to install some games on the ssd.

You could get a discount on your order by following these steps.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056907965

Rob2D

BloodBath wrote: »

For double the space I think it is. If you want room to install some games on the ssd.

You could get a discount on your order by following these steps.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056907965

I know, I did. My table includes that discount.:pac:

And fcuk me these mechanical keyboards are expensive.

Rob2D

Updated build:

Decided to leave the mechanical keyboard as they're pretty pricey and I still have to get a headset too.

HWVS
Item|Price

Intel Core i7-4770K Box, LGA1150|296,14
MSI Z87-G45 Gaming, ATX, Sockel 1150|131,68
8GB-Kit G.Skill Sniper PC3-17066U CL9|73,53
CM Storm Stryker Big-Tower|135,50
MS Windows 8 64bit (SB-Version) Englisch|86,98
Seagate Barracuda 7200 1000GB, SATA 6Gb/s|53,99
Corsair Professional Series HX750 80PLUS Gold 750W|111,61
LiteOn iHAS124-04 schwarz SATA|15,11
Samsung SSD 840 250GB SATA 6Gb/s|140.32
Corsair Hydro Series H100i|96,03
LogiLink Wireless LAN 300 Mbps PCI Karte 802.11n 2T2R|13,94
BitFenix Spectre 120mm Lüfter - all white QTY 2|11.78
MSI N760 TwinFrozr 2GD5/OC, 2GB DDR5 QTY 2|463.68
Delivery|18.99
Total|€1649.28

AMAZON
Item|Price

Perixx MX-2000 Mouse|27.77
Perixx PX-2000 Keyboard|38.19
Perixx DX-1000L, Gaming Mouse Pad|9.25
Official Xbox 360 Common Controller for Windows|22.86
Total|€98.07

EBAY
Item|Price

QX2710 LED Evolution ll [Glossy] 27" 2560x1440 |241.22
Total|€241.22

Overall Total €1988.57

Whew, that's a sobering figure:p

Are there any little things I missed, like cables or something?

Serephucus

Haven't read through the thread, but is there a reason you've gone for the 4770 vs. the 4670? Could save yourself ~€100 there.

Rob2D

Serephucus wrote: »

Haven't read through the thread, but is there a reason you've gone for the 4770 vs. the 4670? Could save yourself ~€100 there.

Thought it might serve me better in the long run. I thought about getting the Xeon 1230v2 that bloodbath suggested, but I want to try my hand at this overclocking business!:pac:

BloodBath

Looks great. You will need 1 more sata cable. Make sure the cards come with an sli bridge or else you will need to buy one.

If you have 360 or ps3 pads at home you can use them on pc with the right wireless adaptor.