New gaming/workstation

LineConsole

Hi folks,

I’ve been mulling over my first build in around 7 or 8 years. I live in the UK so plenty of delivery options. I'm currently running an Intel Core i5 3350P 3.10Ghz with 16 GB DDR3 and an Asus GTX 750Ti GPU. I expect anything I buy at this stage to be a massive upgrade in fairness.

I like to play games, mainly single player games like Tomb Raider, Doom, Bethesda RPG’s and the like. I don’t do esports. I used to play a bit of Dayz/ARMA 3 or similar online and would like to take that up those sort of games again.

I also work from home and this is will be my main work computer. I work in a tech role. Most of my work is terminal or browser based as well as the usual Excel, Teams, Zoom and all that lark.

My old intel i5 core 2 is starting to struggle with running these all at the same time especially when I’m screen sharing, having lots of tabs open in the browser etc. Which is what prompted this build.

For the Budget I’m aiming around 1600-1700 pounds. RGB wise a little is nice but nothing too flashy.

It’s shaping up to be -

Case - Corsair 4000D Airflow, Black, Mid-Tower w/ Tempered Glass Window.

Case Fans - Corsair ML140 PRO RGB 140mm 2 Fan + Lighting Node PRO Pack for the front. (Swapping these for 3x120mm Noctua's thanks K.O.Kiki)


CPU - AMD Ryzen 5800x or 5900x (fairly close in pricing)

Cooler - aoi Corsair 240mm H100i RGB PRO XT (radiator to go on the top of the case)

Motherboard - ASUS ROG STRIX B550-F GAMING (or similar)

RAM - tbc, Toss up between 3600Mhz CL16 vs 4000Mhz CL18. Will be 4x8GB.

Thermal paste - Arctic MX-4 Enthusiast Performance.

GPU - tbc waiting for the new Radeons to compare against Nvidia. Could be a 6800x or a 3070, or maybe even a 3080 if budget can stretch.

PSU - Corsair 750 Watt RM750x Fully Modular 80+ Gold ATX.

Storage - I have a decent Samsung EVO SSD and a 2 TB storage HDD I intend to move from my old PC. Adding a new M.2 such as the Samsung 970 EVO 1TB M.2 PCIe NVMe then figure out how to migrate my C: drive to the M.2.

Monitor - Already bought LG 27GL850-B 144Hz 1440P gaming monitor with Freesync/G-sync


Any ideas/thoughts on this so far?

Any RAM recommendations? Seems very difficult to find lower CAS RAM outside the USA. Don’t really want to order from Newegg in case I get hit with extra tax. Aslo don’t want to pay through the nose for very minor gains.

Squidgy Black

LineConsole wrote: »

Hi folks,

I’ve been mulling over my first build in around 7 or 8 years. I live in the UK so plenty of delivery options.

I like to play games, mainly single player games like Tomb Raider, Doom, Bethesda RPG’s and the like. I don’t do esports. I used to play a bit of Dayz/ARMA 3 or similar online and would like to take that up those sort of games again.

I also work from home and this is will be my main work computer. I work in a tech role. Most of my work is terminal or browser based as well as the usual Excel, Teams, Zoom and all that lark.

My old intel i5 core 2 is starting to struggle with running these all at the same time especially when I’m screen sharing, having lots of tabs open in the browser etc. Which is what prompted this build.

For the Budget I’m aiming around 1600-1700 pounds. RGB wise a little is nice but nothing too flashy.

It’s shaping up to be -

Case - Corsair 4000D Airflow, Black, Mid-Tower w/ Tempered Glass Window.

Case Fans - Corsair ML140 PRO RGB 140mm 2 Fan + Lighting Node PRO Pack for the front.


CPU - AMD Ryzen 5800x or 5900x (fairly close in pricing)

Cooler - aoi Corsair 240mm H100i RGB PRO XT (radiator to go on the top of the case)

Motherboard - ASUS ROG STRIX B550-F GAMING (or similar)

RAM - tbc, Toss up between 3600Mhz CL16 vs 4000Mhz CL18. Will be 4x8GB.

Thermal paste - Arctic MX-4 Enthusiast Performance.

GPU - tbc waiting for the new Radeons to compare against Nvidia. Could be a 6800x or a 3070, or maybe even a 3080 if budget can stretch.

PSU - Corsair 750 Watt RM750x Fully Modular 80+ Gold ATX.

Storage - I have a decent Samsung EVO SSD and a 2 TB storage HDD I intend to move from my old PC. Adding a new M.2 such as the Samsung 970 EVO 1TB M.2 PCIe NVMe then figure out how to migrate my C: drive to the M.2.


Any ideas/thoughts on this so far?

Any RAM recommendations? Seems very difficult to find lower CAS RAM outside the USA. Don’t really want to order from Newegg in case I get hit with extra tax. Aslo don’t want to pay through the nose for very minor gains.

Only thing I'd change there would be to go for 2x16gb sticks and leave yourself open to easier upgrade if you ever do need to expand on the RAM, which I doubt you would but still.

Other question would be what kind of monitor do you have, and what's your target resolution and frame rate? The 5800x and 5900x may be complete overkill depending on your use case, the 5600x might be the better purchase if you're not going to get the full use out of the more expensive CPUs.

JoyPad

LineConsole wrote: »

Don’t really want to order from Newegg in case I get hit with extra tax.

Newegg has a UK website now, with UK prices and tax.

ahnowbrowncow

JoyPad wrote: »

Newegg has a UK website now, with UK prices and tax.

It says it's unavailable in the EU.

LineConsole

Squidgy Black wrote: »

Only thing I'd change there would be to go for 2x16gb sticks and leave yourself open to easier upgrade if you ever do need to expand on the RAM, which I doubt you would but still.

Other question would be what kind of monitor do you have, and what's your target resolution and frame rate? The 5800x and 5900x may be complete overkill depending on your use case, the 5600x might be the better purchase if you're not going to get the full use out of the more expensive CPUs.

Hi, thanks for the response. I was going for the 4x8 sticks as I watched a video demonstrating how this configuration was faster for these Zen 3 CPU's to access the RAM than 2x16. It was mentioned in the AMD Zen 3 thread (I can't share YouTube links because I'm new.) I can't see myself needing 64Gb in the next 5 years (But who knows?).

I forgot to mention the monitor. I bought the LG 27GL850-B 144Hz 1440P gaming monitor with Freesync/G-sync compatible. So 1440P up to 144Hz is what I'm aiming for.

I was considering the 5600x, not sure if 6 cores would show much performance difference when it comes to multitasking for my Job.\

Happy to save money on things like that and put that cash into the GPU or RAM.

LineConsole

ahnowbrowncow wrote: »

It says it's unavailable in the EU.

I'm in the UK so I guess I'm out of the EU now, or will be from Jan 1st.

K.O.Kiki

I would advise away from Corsair ML fans, they're not quiet at idle compared to Scythe/Noctua/Be quiet/Arctic & could drive you bonkers when working all day.

Also very important to note with the 4000D: the front fan mounts are designed for 120mm - GamersNexus noted 1 of their cases had issues when mounting 140mm front fans https://youtu.be/IYsOmJ9X7Ow?t=292

Ryzen 5600X honestly sounds fine for your use cases, and it doesn't require much cooling (even this would be slight overkill):

https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/V7Bv3Z

LineConsole

K.O.Kiki wrote: »

I would advise away from Corsair ML fans, they're not quiet at idle compared to Scythe/Noctua/Be quiet/Arctic & could drive you bonkers when working all day.

Also very important to note with the 4000D: the front fan mounts are designed for 120mm - GamersNexus noted 1 of their cases had issues when mounting 140mm front fans https://youtu.be/IYsOmJ9X7Ow?t=292

Ryzen 5600X honestly sounds fine for your use cases, and it doesn't require much cooling (even this would be slight overkill):

https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/V7Bv3Z

Thanks for the tip on the 4000D! I'll change that to 3 120mm's. I do like Noctuas fans. I had them in my basket and changed them out for the Corsairs for no real reasons other than looks.

JoyPad

ahnowbrowncow wrote: »

It says it's unavailable in the EU.

Yeah, it's a UK exclusive site, and you're in Ireland.
If you have a UK VPN, it works. The OP is in UK.

LineConsole

There is one other use case I didn't mention, I play guitar and sometimes record into Reaper (a DAW). This can be quite processer hungry especially when multitracking with lots of mixing/effects. This is more of a hobby than anything else so I don't need the absolute best. I'd rather have a great gaming machine, smooth work station and acceptable DAW performance.

BloodBath

LineConsole wrote: »

Hi, thanks for the response. I was going for the 4x8 sticks as I watched a video demonstrating how this configuration was faster for these Zen 3 CPU's to access the RAM than 2x16. It was mentioned in the AMD Zen 3 thread (I can't share YouTube links because I'm new.) I can't see myself needing 64Gb in the next 5 years (But who knows?).

I forgot to mention the monitor. I bought the LG 27GL850-B 144Hz 1440P gaming monitor with Freesync/G-sync compatible. So 1440P up to 144Hz is what I'm aiming for.

I was considering the 5600x, not sure if 6 cores would show much performance difference when it comes to multitasking for my Job.\

Happy to save money on things like that and put that cash into the GPU or RAM.

It's not faster than 2x 16 from what I've seen. 2 x 16 had the best results. It seems 32gb is the sweet spot more so than how many sticks of ram you use.

Samuel T. Cogley

BloodBath wrote: »

It's not faster than 2x 16 from what I've seen. 2 x 16 had the best results. It seems 32gb is the sweet spot more so than how many sticks of ram you use.

Jury is out, Gamersnexus is the source, Hardware Unboxed did a sort of follow up but I've not watched the whole thing yet. It is faster... in certain situations.

BloodBath

Seems to be very little between any of them.

Their own video isn't exactly conclusive either as they are also using different speeds and timings between sets as well.

LineConsole

I’ve bit the bullet and ordered some parts. Not expecting them anytime soon but figured I might as well get in the queue for the AMD Ryzen CPU.

My selection has changed based on what was available on the shop I used. I did splash some extra cash then I intended but I’m ok with that.

Fractal Design Meshify S2 Midi Tower Case - Blackout Light Tempered Glass

Corsair RMx Series RMx750 750W '80 Plus Gold' Modular Power Supply

Asus ROG Strix B550-E Gaming (AMD AM4) B550 ATX Motherboard

Thermal Grizzly Kryonaut High Performance Thermal Paste - 1 Gramm

AMD Ryzen 7 5800X Eight Core 4.7GHz (Socket AM4) Processor - Retail

Corsair Hydro Series iCUE H115i Elite CAPELLIX RGB Performance Liquid CPU Cooler - 280mm

32 GB Corsair Ballistix 3600 Mhz 4x8 CAS 16 RGB RAM

I didn’t order any extra fans just yet as I’ve heard good things about the stock fans in this case. Also no graphics card selection yet, looking forward to seeing AMD’s offering in a week. My old GTX 750 ti will have to make do for a while.

Does anyone know, if I take my SSD Drive with windows and install in this machine should it just boot up? Obviously I’ll need to add a load of drivers but is the windows install type bound to the CPU type in anyway?

JoyPad

LineConsole wrote: »

Does anyone know, if I take my SSD Drive with windows and install in this machine should it just boot up? Obviously I’ll need to add a load of drivers but is the windows install type bound to the CPU type in anyway?

The Windows installation should work, but the license will most likely not.

Read this article to be prepared.

BTW, with so many hardware changes, you're better off doing a clean install, if you can.

LineConsole

JoyPad wrote: »

The Windows installation should work, but the license will most likely not.

Read this article to be prepared.

BTW, with so many hardware changes, you're better off doing a clean install, if you can.

Thanks, that’s a useful link bookmarked for future reference.