Few questions RE: €1,000 Gaming Build

al.

Hi all,

I was on here a few months ago looking for advice on a gaming build and got some great advice but circumstance meant I never got around to purchasing. I am now eager to buy again so I have put together the following build:

RAM: 8GB-Kit Crucial Ballistix Sport Series DDR3-1600, CL9 ready for dispatch 65,93 €

GPU: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 970 Mini, 4GB GDDR5, 2x DVI, HDMI, 3x DisplayPort
ready for dispatch 336,95 €

CPU: Intel Core i5-4460 in-a-Box
ready for dispatch 176,59 €

PSU: be quiet! SYSTEM POWER 7 600W - bulk -
ready for dispatch 68,89 €

Hard Drive 1: WD Blue 1TB SATA 6GB/s 9,5mm
ready for dispatch 63,59 €

Hard Drive 2:Samsung SSD 840 EVO Basic 250GB SATA 6Gb/s
ready for dispatch 109,99 €

Case: Antec Performance Series P100 schwarz, ohne Netzteil
ready for dispatch 68,91 €

MOBO: ASRock Z87 Pro3, Sockel 1150, ATX
ready for dispatch 82,94 €


I am looking to play the latest games in ultra resolution with good fps and no lag.

I have a few concerns about the build:
1)CPU: Should I be getting the i5 4670?
2)MOBO: Should I get a better one?
3)Are all of the components compatible and good good value for money i.e. im not overspending on anything for no added benefit e.g PSU, case etc.

ps I have not run these through Geizhals yet but will do before purchasing.

Thanks for any help/comments

Regards,

Alan.

SterlingArcher

Get a h97 motherboard.

al.

Something like this SterlingArcher:

ASRock H97 Anniversary, Sockel 1150, ATX - €77.69

SterlingArcher

al. wrote: »

Something like this SterlingArcher:

ASRock H97 Anniversary, Sockel 1150, ATX - €77.69

Yeah cool.

Can also get away with the be quiet system 7 500 for that, set up will use about 350w total . if you want will save 10 euro or just keep the six your shout.

Maybe look at the nanoxia deep silence 3 case. Is slightly cheaper.

al.

Thanks for the responses SterlingArcher, very helpful as usual. I will have a look at the cheaper PSU and case if there is no reason to have the ones i selected.

As for the Intel i5 4460 - should I look at getting the 4670 or is there no point?

Any other comments on the build much appreciated!! Looking to get this ordered ASAP if all the parts will talk to each other nicely!!

SterlingArcher

Not really much difference in the cpu. What is the price coming to after using geizhals.de and part swaps?

Dard23

al. wrote: »

Thanks for the responses SterlingArcher, very helpful as usual. I will have a look at the cheaper PSU and case if there is no reason to have the ones i selected.

As for the Intel i5 4460 - should I look at getting the 4670 or is there no point?

Any other comments on the build much appreciated!! Looking to get this ordered ASAP if all the parts will talk to each other nicely!![/
quote]

Have you searched anywhere other than hardwareversand. They are very good price wise with geizhals but you can get good bargains other places. For instance I bought a brand new asrock z97 extreme3 motherboard for 95 euro and an i5 4690k processor for 190 through adverts, also new. Got a corsair master V series for 80 euro used, like new and also a MSI r9 290 gaming oc for 240 used like new. The graphics card was brand new just damaged box. Both through Amazon.
Also do you new the 240gb ssd? 120 is more then enough for OS and your main apps. Store games, movie, music etc on the HDD. Just a thought.

Dard23

The PSU is a corsair master v650 gold rated to be precise.

al.

Ok, have run everything through geizhals and have swapped out the case and PSU and total comes to €927.35;

be quiet! SYSTEM POWER 7 500W - bulk
51,88 €

8GB-Kit Crucial Ballistix Sport Series DDR3-1600, CL9
64,98 €

Gigabyte GeForce GTX 970 Mini, 4GB GDDR5, 2x DVI, HDMI, 3x DisplayPort
329,20 €

Intel Core i5-4460 in-a-Box
174,88 €

WD Blue 1TB SATA 6GB/s 9,5mm
59,46 €

Samsung SSD 840 EVO Basic 250GB SATA 6Gb/s
108,99 €

ASRock Z87 Pro3, Sockel 1150, ATX
77,63 €

Nanoxia Deep Silence DS 3 Dark Anthracite, ohne Netzteil
60,33 €

This to me looks pretty good and happy with the price. What do you think?

al.

Dard23 wrote: »

al. wrote: »

Thanks for the responses SterlingArcher, very helpful as usual. I will have a look at the cheaper PSU and case if there is no reason to have the ones i selected.

As for the Intel i5 4460 - should I look at getting the 4670 or is there no point?

Any other comments on the build much appreciated!! Looking to get this ordered ASAP if all the parts will talk to each other nicely!![/
quote]

Have you searched anywhere other than hardwareversand. They are very good price wise with geizhals but you can get good bargains other places. For instance I bought a brand new asrock z97 extreme3 motherboard for 95 euro and an i5 4690k processor for 190 through adverts, also new. Got a corsair master V series for 80 euro used, like new and also a MSI r9 290 gaming oc for 240 used like new. The graphics card was brand new just damaged box. Both through Amazon.
Also do you new the 240gb ssd? 120 is more then enough for OS and your main apps. Store games, movie, music etc on the HDD. Just a thought.

I havent looked anywhere else really... I thought it would be just handy to get everything from the same place and heard hardwareversand was the cheapest. I might have a quick look on a few websites tonight to see if there are any bargains I can pick up.

I was thinking of swapping out the ssd to a 120gb but have a feeling I might regret it!1 If you look at some of the latest games they can be 30gb - 40gb and thought it would be better to have them installed on the ssd so they launch quicker but ill have a look into it.

Thanks for the advice.

SterlingArcher

al. wrote: »

Dard23 wrote: »

I havent looked anywhere else really... I thought it would be just handy to get everything from the same place and heard hardwareversand was the cheapest. I might have a quick look on a few websites tonight to see if there are any bargains I can pick up.

I was thinking of swapping out the ssd to a 120gb but have a feeling I might regret it!1 If you look at some of the latest games they can be 30gb - 40gb and thought it would be better to have them installed on the ssd so they launch quicker but ill have a look into it.

Thanks for the advice.

Keep the 250.

SterlingArcher

Keep the 250 gig ssd.

Swap the gtx 970 "mini" for the regular one.

You are putting the os on the ssd, that and steam games. 120 won't do.

al.

SterlingArcher wrote: »

Keep the 250 gig ssd.

Swap the gtx 970 "mini" for the regular one.

You are putting the os on the ssd, that and steam games. 120 won't do.

Was just gonna ask about the gtx 970 mini!! Was reading up online and it seems to be slightly overclocked and runs a bit hotter so would be happier with the normal one.

Is there any difference between the makes of gtx 970? Is the GeForce the best brand to go with? Seems to be a lot of different makes at slightly different prices!!

SterlingArcher

al. wrote: »

Was just gonna ask about the gtx 970 mini!! Was reading up online and it seems to be slightly overclocked and runs a bit hotter so would be happier with the normal one.

Is there any difference between the makes of gtx 970? Is the GeForce the best brand to go with? Seems to be a lot of different makes at slightly different prices!!

The normal size Gigabyte gtx970, in my own opinion is one of the best. Cooling and quiet also has a backplate on the card. wouldn't change it myself.


The mini does run hotter as it only has one fan, would be for a small case set up.

SterlingArcher

Al using your total 1000 budget.

if you want swap the i5, for an xeon 1231 v3. Will hit 1000. What you get is an i7 cpu.

Dard23

SterlingArcher wrote: »

Keep the 250 gig ssd.

Swap the gtx 970 "mini" for the regular one.

You are putting the os on the ssd, that and steam games. 120 won't do.

What is the advantage of putting steam games on ssd over hdd? I have my steam app on the ssd but the game library is saved to my hdd and everything is buttery smooth. A ssd is not at all required for gaming regardless of the size.

SterlingArcher

Dard23 wrote: »

What is the advantage of putting steam games on ssd over hdd? I have my steam app on the ssd but the game library is saved to my hdd and everything is buttery smooth. A ssd is not at all required for gaming regardless of the size.

Some games have actual benifits from being on an ssd. Arma3 for one.
Not saying its huge but if you have the room, do so.

Dard23

SterlingArcher wrote: »

Some games have actual benifits from being on an ssd. Arma3 for one.
Not saying its huge but if you have the room, do so.

Ok maybe you have more experience in this area. However I will say that while building my new computer I researched this a lot and found buying a larger OS for gaming was wasted money. I put that 50 quid towards a better mobo and processor.
This is a quote from a site I checked comparing the two. They used Arma 3 as the first comparison. Here it is copied. I can't post links being a new user?


In ARMA 3 we are using the brand new campaign mission released for the game, Survive - "Drawdown 2035." The game version is 1.06.112613.

Looking at the performance between both data drives, performance seems to be exactly the same between the two. The minimum framerate of 10 FPS is where the game auto-saves. Looking at other minimum FPS points along the graph, we see that the minimum framerates are the same between both data drives. The maximum framerate is only 1 FPS apart, within the margin for error. The average framerate is also only .2 FPS difference, within the margin for error.

We also noticed that the framerate is the same consistency between both hard drives. We never saw nor felt that one hard drive was "smoother" than the other while playing.

We also checked out the showcases and experienced the same performance as well. Every way you look at it, there is no gameplay performance difference in ARMA 3 between the HDD and SSD

Dard23

Meant ssd for my os sorry.

Dard23

The website is hardocp.com

SterlingArcher

Dard23 wrote: »

Ok maybe you have more experience in this area. However I will say that while building my new computer I researched this a lot and found buying a larger OS for gaming was wasted money. I put that 50 quid towards a better mobo and processor.
This is a quote from a site I checked comparing the two. They used Arma 3 as the first comparison. Here it is copied. I can't post links being a new user?


In ARMA 3 we are using the brand new campaign mission released for the game, Survive - "Drawdown 2035." The game version is 1.06.112613.

Looking at the performance between both data drives, performance seems to be exactly the same between the two. The minimum framerate of 10 FPS is where the game auto-saves. Looking at other minimum FPS points along the graph, we see that the minimum framerates are the same between both data drives. The maximum framerate is only 1 FPS apart, within the margin for error. The average framerate is also only .2 FPS difference, within the margin for error.

We also noticed that the framerate is the same consistency between both hard drives. We never saw nor felt that one hard drive was "smoother" than the other while playing.

We also checked out the showcases and experienced the same performance as well. Every way you look at it, there is no gameplay performance difference in ARMA 3 between the HDD and SSD

I was not running my own tests, it was suggested by an arma3 Dev.it wont help fps, running arma3 on an ssd helps texture streaming. It will help load times of games again, not all.

Al was going to downsize his ssd, personally I wouldn't. He has the budget. For a tighter budget and making a compromise in a significant other part I would have said yeah cut to 120.

Dard23

SterlingArcher wrote: »

I was not running my own tests, it was suggested by an arma3 Dev.it wont help fps, running arma3 on an ssd helps texture streaming. It will help load times of games again, not all.

Al was going to downsize his ssd, personally I wouldn't. He has the budget. For a tighter budget and making a compromise in a significant other day part I would have said yeah cut to 120.

Ok fair enough. Would you not think stretching to a 4690k would be a good idea though looking at his mobo?

SterlingArcher

Dard23 wrote: »

Ok fair enough. Would you not think stretching to a 4690k would be a good idea though looking at his mobo?

Are you talking about the original z87 mobo. He swapped to a h97.

There was no template but going off the build he laid out, I figured overclocking was not his bag. Which would make the k pointless. Is why I suggested going to the h97.

Dard23

SterlingArcher wrote: »

Are you talking about the original z87 mobo. He swapped to a h97.

There was no template but going off the build he laid out, I figured overclocking was not his bag. Which would make the k pointless. Is why I suggested going to the h97.

Ah ok, see he switched there. Fair enough as long as he's happy that's all that matters

SterlingArcher

Dard23 wrote: »

Ah ok, see he switched there. Fair enough as long as he's happy that's all that matters

To be honest I never asked if overclocking was something al would be interested in.

Overclocking:
You could as Dard said go that route. Get the i5 4690k 217. Will need an upgrade the mobo to a z97 and add a cooler. Will be just over the 1k budget, but you can drop to 120 ssd to bring it in line.

Get the i7 will bring you to 1k budet.

Or keep it as is. 3 options there. Hopefully someone else will throw 2 cents in.always nice to get another opinion.

al.

SterlingArcher wrote: »

Al using your total 1000 budget.

if you want swap the i5, for an xeon 1231 v3. Will hit 1000. What you get is an i7 cpu.

Is it worth getting a better CPU or are you getting into diminishing returns by upgrading to the i7?

If the i5 will struggle in any way with playing games on ultra then I will definitely upgrade but I dont want to upgrade just to use up the budget.

Would you consider it a good use of the remaining budget over upgrading anything else?

Dard23

SterlingArcher wrote: »

To be honest I never asked if overclocking was something al would be interested in.

Overclocking:
You could as Dard said go that route. Get the i5 4690k 217. Will need an upgrade the mobo to a z97 and add a cooler. Will be just over the 1k budget, but you can drop to 120 ssd to bring it in line.

Get the i7 will bring you to 1k budet.

Or keep it as is. 3 options there. Hopefully someone else will throw 2 cents in.always nice to get another opinion.

Just so he knows I got the 4690k for 190 brand new through a guy on adverts. I would happily put you in touch with him if you want or whoever. He day very good and I had it within four days. I know he was getting a few. If you check Adverts yourself he's Prob still selling them.

Dard23

al. wrote: »

Is it worth getting a better CPU or are you getting into diminishing returns by upgrading to the i7?

If the i5 will struggle in any way with playing games on ultra then I will definitely upgrade but I dont want to upgrade just to use up the budget.

Would you consider it a good use of the remaining budget over upgrading anything else?

Mainly the 4690k gives you headroom to overclock in the future. As your hardware gets older you could sli the 970 and then overclock your cpu and would give it brand new life. That's my plan anyway.

al.

Dard23 wrote: »

Ok maybe you have more experience in this area. However I will say that while building my new computer I researched this a lot and found buying a larger OS for gaming was wasted money. I put that 50 quid towards a better mobo and processor.
This is a quote from a site I checked comparing the two. They used Arma 3 as the first comparison. Here it is copied. I can't post links being a new user?


In ARMA 3 we are using the brand new campaign mission released for the game, Survive - "Drawdown 2035." The game version is 1.06.112613.

Looking at the performance between both data drives, performance seems to be exactly the same between the two. The minimum framerate of 10 FPS is where the game auto-saves. Looking at other minimum FPS points along the graph, we see that the minimum framerates are the same between both data drives. The maximum framerate is only 1 FPS apart, within the margin for error. The average framerate is also only .2 FPS difference, within the margin for error.

We also noticed that the framerate is the same consistency between both hard drives. We never saw nor felt that one hard drive was "smoother" than the other while playing.

We also checked out the showcases and experienced the same performance as well. Every way you look at it, there is no gameplay performance difference in ARMA 3 between the HDD and SSD

TBH im not really gonna be playing multiplayer online games on it that much - it will be more for playing single player offline games so will that reduce the need for 250gb ssd?

Would it be worth saving €50 on that and upgrading to something else??

Dard23

I don't believe the i7 is at all needed for gaming. An overclocked i5 is well powerful to keep your games running long into the future.

al.

SterlingArcher wrote: »

To be honest I never asked if overclocking was something al would be interested in.

Overclocking:
You could as Dard said go that route. Get the i5 4690k 217. Will need an upgrade the mobo to a z97 and add a cooler. Will be just over the 1k budget, but you can drop to 120 ssd to bring it in line.

Get the i7 will bring you to 1k budet.

Or keep it as is. 3 options there. Hopefully someone else will throw 2 cents in.always nice to get another opinion.

Thanks for the input - im not really too keen on overclocking and i think the setup i have will keep me going for a few years - down the road when its starting to slow I can think about changing a few parts but for now im not worried about it

al.

Dard23 wrote: »

Just so he knows I got the 4690k for 190 brand new through a guy on adverts. I would happily put you in touch with him if you want or whoever. He day very good and I had it within four days. I know he was getting a few. If you check Adverts yourself he's Prob still selling them.

Cheers Dard, I'll have a look tonight and if I cant see him ill get his details off ya. Thanks for the help, much appreciated.

Dard23

al. wrote: »

Thanks for the input - im not really too keen on overclocking and i think the setup i have will keep me going for a few years - down the road when its starting to slow I can think about changing a few parts but for now im not worried about it

Very good, it's still a lovely pc with one of the best Gpu's you can get. All the best!

Dard23

Dard23 wrote: »

Very good, it's still a lovely pc with one of the best Gpu's you can get. All the best!

Oh one last thing, just make sure the gigabyte 970 fits your case, I believe they are quite long.

SterlingArcher

al. wrote: »

Thanks for the input - im not really too keen on overclocking and i think the setup i have will keep me going for a few years - down the road when its starting to slow I can think about changing a few parts but for now im not worried about it

Cool you will be gaming on very high / ultra at 1080p on your set up as is.

SterlingArcher

Dard23 wrote: »

Oh one last thing, just make sure the gigabyte 970 fits your case, I believe they are quite long.

Already checked does, and also has a removable drive cage.

Steviemoyne

120GB fills up really fast. Majority of it goes towards the OS and then the rest towards a few high capacity games or programs (20-30GB each).

I'll update with proper numbers when I get home. I went with a 120GB ssd and a 2GB HDD setup and only manage 1 or 2 games (20-30GB each) on the ssd.

Rule out putting any games that you plan to mod if you're going with a 120GB ssd, for example skyrim. With GTA V and The Witcher 3 coming out I'd stick with the 250GB for a bit of breathing room in my opinion.

Dard23

al. wrote: »

Cheers Dard, I'll have a look tonight and if I cant see him ill get his details off ya. Thanks for the help, much appreciated.

I believe his user name is Levitronix.

al.

SterlingArcher wrote: »

Already checked does, and also has a removable drive cage.

Fair play to ya!! Haha... hadnt even considered it!! Thanks a lot!

SterlingArcher

al. wrote: »

Fair play to ya!! Haha... hadnt even considered it!! Thanks a lot!

Haha al, I'm not going to be telling you to swap cases and get this and that without knowing this ****.

Although your face when you did try to put your gpu in, would be priceless. the tears that followed then would make it just plain uncomfortable.

al.

Steviemoyne wrote: »

120GB fills up really fast. Majority of it goes towards the OS and then the rest towards a few high capacity games or programs (20-30GB each).

I'll update with proper numbers when I get home. I went with a 120GB ssd and a 2GB HDD setup and only manage 1 or 2 games (20-30GB each) on the ssd.

Rule out putting any games that you plan to mod if you're going with a 120GB ssd, for example skyrim. With GTA V and The Witcher 3 coming out I'd stick with the 250GB for a bit of breathing room in my opinion.

Yeah would be looking at putting GTA V and Skyrim on it. Am gonna stick with it i think... I know ill regret it if I reduce it!! Will it speed up the load times of these games though?

SterlingArcher

al. wrote: »

Yeah would be looking at putting GTA V and Skyrim on it. Am gonna stick with it i think... I know ill regret it if I reduce it!! Will it speed up the load times of these games though?

Yes, personally I'd keep.

al.

Dard23 wrote: »

Just so he knows I got the 4690k for 190 brand new through a guy on adverts. I would happily put you in touch with him if you want or whoever. He day very good and I had it within four days. I know he was getting a few. If you check Adverts yourself he's Prob still selling them.

Hey Dard, I didnt see any i5's on adverts... I think ill just go with what I have, it may be possible to source some parts cheaper elsewhere but for the convenience of ordering them all together from the same place im just gonna stick with hardwareversand.

Thanks everyone for the input, ill put my order in this week and let you know how it goes!

al.

Just logged in to order and seen this:

Seagate Barracuda 7200 1000GB, SATA 6Gb/s - €49.68

Should I swap out the one I have or is it a much better one? (I thought they were all pretty much the same)

WD Blue 1TB SATA 6GB/s 9,5mm - €63.59

al.

Grrrr.... just realised I have to put everything through Geizhals.de again!!

SterlingArcher

al. wrote: »

Just logged in to order and seen this:

Seagate Barracuda 7200 1000GB, SATA 6Gb/s - €49.68

Should I swap out the one I have or is it a much better one? (I thought they were all pretty much the same)

WD Blue 1TB SATA 6GB/s 9,5mm - €63.59

Al I'm still seeing wd blue 1tb 49? Using geizhals.de.

You are picking the "mobile one" scroll down more.

Dard23

al. wrote: »

Hey Dard, I didnt see any i5's on adverts... I think ill just go with what I have, it may be possible to source some parts cheaper elsewhere but for the convenience of ordering them all together from the same place im just gonna stick with hardwareversand.

Thanks everyone for the input, ill put my order in this week and let you know how it goes!

Maybe he sold them all by now or is waiting for another batch. Yeah it's easier to order it all together, hassle free.

al.

SterlingArcher wrote: »

Al I'm still seeing wd blue 1tb 49? Using geizhals.de.

You are picking the "mobile one" scroll down more.

Oh right, I have this one:

http://www.hardwareversand.de/en/S-ATA600/79474/WD+Blue+1TB+SATA+6GB+s+9%2C5mm.article

When i put it through geizhals it comes down to about €59 - am I selecting the wrong one?

SterlingArcher

al. wrote: »

Oh right, I have this one:

http://www.hardwareversand.de/en/S-ATA600/79474/WD+Blue+1TB+SATA+6GB+s+9%2C5mm.article

When i put it through geizhals it comes down to about €59 - am I selecting the wrong one?

Yes, you need to get the regular western digital blue 1 tb . It will not have mobile in it. Is 49. 80

al.

SterlingArcher wrote: »

Yes, you need to get the regular western digital blue 1 tb . It will not have mobile in it. Is 49. 80

Yeah looked it up, thanks for that.... just placed order there!!:):):)

SterlingArcher

al. wrote: »

Yeah looked it up, thanks for that.... just placed order there!!:):):)

Al may want to hold off on the card.