High End Gaming PC

tok9

I posted a thread here not too long ago about possibly building/buying a secondary PC. However I didn't put too much time into it in the end as my move to Canada progressed pretty well. So I'll be working remotely for a bit and will definitely be building the PC once I find a place to live. I've asked some friends for help and right now this is the build I'm looking at. I was just interested in any opinions on it.

PCPartPicker list

CPU: AMD - Ryzen 7 1700X 3.4GHz 8-Core Processor ($449.99 @ Amazon Canada)
CPU Cooler: Corsair - H60 54.0 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler ($69.99 @ Memory Express)
Motherboard: Asus - PRIME B350-PLUS ATX AM4 Motherboard ($112.50 @ Vuugo)
Memory: G.Skill - Ripjaws 4 Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-3000 Memory ($159.99 @ Memeory Express)
Storage: Crucial - MX300 275GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($112.12 @ Direct Canada)
Storage: Seagate - Barracuda 3TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($94.25 @ Shop RBC)
Video Card: Asus - GeForce GTX 1080 8GB ROG STRIX Video Card ($714.50 @ Vuugo)
Case: Corsair - Carbide Clear 600C ATX Full Tower Case (£166.99 @ PC Canada)
Power Supply: EVGA - SuperNOVA G2 650W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($109.99 @ NCIX)
OS: Microsoft - Windows 10 Home OEM 64-bit ($113.50 @ DirectCanada)

Total: $2103.82

Also, I haven't picked one yet but I plan on getting a 1440p 144hz monitor.

So that's the bulk of it. As I mentioned I'm basically just interested to hear what people think. If one thing is unnecessary, paying too much for another thing without getting the benefits, wait for something to come out, etc. Any feedback is much appreciated.

K.O.Kiki

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: AMD - Ryzen 7 1700 3.0GHz 8-Core Processor ($373.95 @ shopRBC)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master - MasterLiquid 240 66.7 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler ($89.99 @ Amazon Canada)
Motherboard: Asus - PRIME B350-PLUS ATX AM4 Motherboard ($117.99 @ PC Canada)
Memory: G.Skill - Ripjaws 4 Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-3000 Memory ($159.99 @ Memory Express)
Storage: Crucial - MX300 275GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($112.12 @ DirectCanada)
Storage: Seagate - Barracuda 3TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($94.25 @ shopRBC)
Video Card: Gigabyte - GeForce GTX 1080 8GB G1 Gaming Video Card ($664.99 @ Newegg Canada)
Case: Corsair - Carbide 400C ATX Mid Tower Case ($104.72 @ DirectCanada)
Power Supply: SeaSonic - 650W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply ($99.98 @ NCIX)
Operating System: Microsoft - Windows 10 Home OEM 64-bit ($113.50 @ DirectCanada)
Total: $1931.48
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2017-09-27 07:29 EDT-0400

No need to pay the premium for 1700X, they don't clock higher than the 1700.
EVGA G2 is produced by Seasonic, but you can get a Seasonic semi-modular for less (up to you if you want modular power cable).
$50 difference between Gigabyte G1 Gaming & Asus Strix.
Savings can go towards a nice 240mm rad.
Corsair 600C offers no benefits over 400C other than being bigger externally, and inverted motherboard layout.

tok9

Thanks Kiki.

These all sounds like great sensible changes. Thanks for letting me know on Ryzen. You're right, doesn't seem worth that extra cash at all when you can overclock to the same speed.

Just wondering what you meant about the modular power cables? I don't really know much on that.

And when you mention "a nice 240mm rad", is that regarding the CPU cooler?

Lu Tze

If you are planning to go with a 144hz monitor, you may be better off with Intel.

K.O.Kiki

tok9 wrote: »

Thanks Kiki.

These all sounds like great, sensible changes. Thanks for letting me know on Ryzen, you're right. Doesn't seem worth that extra cash at all when you can overclock to the same speed.

Just wondering what you meant about the modular power cables? I don't really know much on that.

And when you mention "a nice 240mm rad", is that regarding the CPU cooler?

The Seasonic's motherboard cable is hardwired; all other cables are modular.
On the EVGA, every cable is removable (modular).

Yes, 240mm = 2x120mm CPU water cooler.

Lu Tze wrote: »

If you are planning to go with a 144hz monitor, you may be better off with Intel.

Eh. Ryzen's 1% / 0.1% lows are better, I'd take that for smoothness any day.

Lu Tze

K.O.Kiki wrote: »

The Seasonic's motherboard cable is hardwired; all other cables are modular.
On the EVGA, every cable is removable (modular).

Yes, 240mm = 2x120mm CPU water cooler.


Eh. Ryzen's 1% / 0.1% lows are better, I'd take that for smoothness any day.

I didn't realise that, I thought the general conclusion on the initial ryzen release that there was no point going Intel except for the 7700k for high frame rate monitors

tok9

Any recommendations on a monitor guys? Is going for a 1440p 144hz monitor the right kinda specs to go with for this kinda build?

Grahamer666

Definitely don't go for a 1080p if you're using those high end components. 1440 or 4k should be your target.

K.O.Kiki

Grahamer666 wrote: »

Definitely don't go for a 1080p if you're using those high end components. 1440 or 4k should be your target.

You could go 1080p @ 240Hz (though 1440p @ 165Hz is also a thing).

tok9

I have to say, I'm finding these 8th gen Intel chips very interesting. Going to try and read up a bit more on the i5-8600k & i7-8700k

TerrorFirmer

They're very solid. If building a high-end gaming rig now, they're the best choice, though realistically if only using a 60hz monitor it's not really going to make any difference between Ryzen and Intel and you could pump the saved cash towards a GTX1080Ti.

But if going 1440p 144hz, I'd say Coffee Lake i7 and GTX1080 is good, though a 1080Ti even better

tok9

1440p 144hz is definitely the plan. It's a bit of a sickener that you have to buy one of these new motherboards with coffee lake. It basically adds another $200-300 to my build price switching from Ryzen.

From the little I saw, the i5-8400 was really holding it's own so I'm curious to see what the i5-8600k can do in a few more comparison pieces.

The i7 does seem like the obvious choice for a high end rig.

Probably going to wait till around Black Friday/Cyber Monday to start building it. More than likely that'll be the time when I actually can start building so hopefully that'll help save a few bucks.

Alpha8

Coffee Lake build

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel - Core i5-8600K 3.6GHz 6-Core Processor ($319.53 @ shopRBC)
CPU Cooler: Deepcool - CAPTAIN 240 EX 153.0 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler ($104.99 @ Newegg Canada)
Motherboard: Asus - TUF Z370 Pro Gaming ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($199.99 @ Memory Express)
Memory: Team - T-Force / Night Hawk 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-3200 Memory ($174.99 @ Newegg Canada)
Storage: Crucial - BX300 240GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($107.99 @ Amazon Canada)
Storage: Seagate - Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($77.05 @ Vuugo)
Video Card: MSI - GeForce GTX 1080 8GB DUKE OC Video Card ($659.99 @ Newegg Canada)
Case: Corsair - Carbide 400C ATX Mid Tower Case ($119.00 @ Vuugo)
Power Supply: SeaSonic - FOCUS Plus Gold 650W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($119.99 @ Newegg Canada)
Operating System: Microsoft - Windows 10 Home OEM 64-bit ($114.25 @ Vuugo)
Total: $1997.77
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2017-10-06 10:09 EDT-0400

Grahamer666

Had that case before. It's a pain in the ass to build in.

K.O.Kiki

Alpha8 wrote: »

Coffee Lake build

This is assuming you can actually find them in stock.

Alpha8

K.O.Kiki wrote: »

This is assuming you can actually find them in stock.

Wow, CPU has gone OOS. It was in-stock earlier.

K.O.Kiki

Alpha8 wrote: »

Wow, CPU has gone OOS. It was in-stock earlier.

Yup. It smells like a paper launch to undermime Ryzen.

Gehad_JoyRider

K.O.Kiki wrote: »

Yup. It smells like a paper launch to undermime Ryzen.

Thats exactly what it is they've no stock any where and they've put the best foot forward.

So my question is what have AMD got coming?

Interesting times as a 1700X user get the 1700 there so good.

Take jays 2 cents.

The over clock on the the 8700k but he left everything stock on the amd rig.

Which I think is intels terms for the video why would you compare a stock cpu to an overclocked one.

Why would you he only compare single Core performance?

None of this makea any sense'-

I think intels up to the same old tricks.

TerrorFirmer

Unless I'm watching the wrong video he's comparing both at stock. It even says 'stock' during the video.

The difference is that the base and boost clocks of the 8700K are literally 1Ghz faster than the 1700X, but there's no overclocking involved.

He later compares both overclocked but the first half is stock clocks.

The 8700K is just a better CPU, it makes perfect sense I think you're looking for some sort of conspiracy where none exists!

tok9

Long time no post in here guys. Just wanted to update that your advise and tips did not go unnoticed. I've moved and Black Friday/ Cyber Monday has passed.

I'll be hectic over the next few days as I'm moving into a permanent apartment and right now the vast majority of my parts are being posted there.

Anyway, I did decide to go all out and buy for a coffee lake build, in the end these are all the parts and things I've purchased (bar the HDD & Windows Key) along with buying a webcam and Yeti (Good deals)

While the price isn't accurate, it did cost a lot. Including taxes, it's around the $3,400 mark but that is what I budgeted around in the end. I think it's a bit of an awful time to build really but I've delayed this for about 5 years now due to several reasons. Looking forward to getting everything and showing ye the setup after.

Let me know if ye have any thoughts.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel - Core i7-8700K 3.7GHz 6-Core Processor ($489.99 @ Memory Express)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master - MasterLiquid 240 66.7 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler ($89.99 @ Newegg Canada)
Motherboard: Asus - Prime Z370-A ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($215.99 @ PC Canada)
Memory: Corsair - Vengeance LPX 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-3200 Memory ($264.99 @ Amazon Canada)
Storage: Samsung - 850 EVO-Series 500GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($179.99 @ Memory Express)
Storage: Seagate - Barracuda 3TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($96.25 @ shopRBC)
Video Card: Gigabyte - GeForce GTX 1080 8GB G1 Gaming Video Card ($724.00 @ Vuugo)
Case: Corsair - Carbide 400C ATX Mid Tower Case ($99.99 @ Amazon Canada)
Power Supply: Corsair - RMx 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($139.99 @ Memory Express)
Operating System: Microsoft - Windows 10 Home OEM 64-bit ($116.75 @ Vuugo)
Monitor: Dell - S2716DG 27.0" 2560x1440 144Hz Monitor ($719.99 @ Amazon Canada)
Monitor: Dell - SE2717H 27.0" 1920x1080 75Hz Monitor ($249.99 @ Newegg Canada)
Speakers: Logitech - Z533 60W 2.1ch Speakers ($114.99 @ PC Canada)
Total: $3502.90
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2017-11-28 20:13 EST-0500

K.O.Kiki

Dunno why you went for an AIO liquid cooler; sure just stick it outside & keep the moose away! :pac:

If you want to pretty-up the cables in future without buying PSU-specific cables, look for "sleeved cable extensions"

tok9

Bit delayed in this but I did get all my parts back around the start of this month and finished building my PC I think today last week. Since then, I tweaked it a bit as I felt like I had some CPU temp issues and there was a noise coming from the cooler that wasn't really loud but I wanted to resolve it. So today I sorted that all out and think I'm all done. I'll say that it is a bit daunting building for the first time. Just because there are so many wires to connect between the motherboard and PSU to other things but it's worth it.

I think my biggest issue was with the cooler and CPU as I just never felt very comfortable with the screws that I had to use to keep the cooler in place. That said, they seem to be totally fine and the cooler is locked in.

Some advise, definitely read the motherboard manual to see if there are any recommendations on setups like where the RAM and GPU should go, and what way the CPU will go into that board. And don't be afraid to ask dumb questions.

Here's just a picture of the build and there's another picture of the full setup. Very very happy to have it done and it's been running great for games and work.