Help finish my gaming build please! :)

[neillien]

So here's what I have in mind so far...

 

http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/user/neillien/saved/hCKnTW

 

My budget is around £1200 (inc. GPU), everything is changeable except the GTX 770 which I had to buy 2 months ago to replace my trusty old GTX 460 which decided to turn all my games into Tetris. Timing was terrible I know because I really want a 970 for this build but it ain't gonna happen now that I have the 770  . 

 

Anyway... here's what I would like help deciding...

 

 

- Should I get the Asus Maximus VII Hero or the Asus Z97-Pro for the motherboard?

 

- Is it crazy to use my existing (4 year old) 650 PSU in my new build and save some money on the RM750?

 

- Case? I change my mind every time I blink... my heart is sold on something by Corsair (I'm a name snob, can't help it! and I have an Asus/Corsair theme  :rolleyes: ) so I'm thinking C70 or 450D or maybe a Fractal R4 and just stick a Corsair badge on it to pretend?

 

- OS? I know Win8 is new and gives better overall gaming performance... but... I just hate it soooo much... Win7 or 8? 7 or 8? (or should I just wait for 10  :wacko: aarghhh)

 

 

Anything else in this build that you think should be changed, I'm open to suggestions or arguments for/against what I've picked.

 

Any and all comments or suggestions welcome!

 

Thanks in advance 

[watts300]

 

- Is it crazy to use my existing (4 year old) 650 PSU in my new build and save some money on the RM750?

 

Nope.  Not if it's a decent power supply. 

[Demons Wrath]

So here's what I have in mind so far...

 

http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/user/neillien/saved/hCKnTW

 

My budget is around £1200 (inc. GPU), everything is changeable except the GTX 770 which I had to buy 2 months ago to replace my trusty old GTX 460 which decided to turn all my games into Tetris. Timing was terrible I know because I really want a 970 for this build but it ain't gonna happen now that I have the 770  . 

 

Anyway... here's what I would like help deciding...

 

 

- Should I get the Asus Maximus VII Hero or the Asus Z97-Pro for the motherboard?

 

- Is it crazy to use my existing (4 year old) 650 PSU in my new build and save some money on the RM750?

 

- Case? I change my mind every time I blink... my heart is sold on something by Corsair (I'm a name snob, can't help it! and I have an Asus/Corsair theme  :rolleyes: ) so I'm thinking C70 or 450D or maybe a Fractal R4 and just stick a Corsair badge on it to pretend?

 

- OS? I know Win8 is new and gives better overall gaming performance... but... I just hate it soooo much... Win7 or 8? 7 or 8? (or should I just wait for 10  :wacko: aarghhh)

 

 

Anything else in this build that you think should be changed, I'm open to suggestions or arguments for/against what I've picked.

 

Any and all comments or suggestions welcome!

 

Thanks in advance 

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

 

CPU: Intel Core i7-4790K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor  (£249.99 @ Ebuyer) 

CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-D14 65.0 CFM CPU Cooler  (£64.78 @ CCL Computers) 

Motherboard: MSI Z97S SLI Plus ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  (£88.76 @ Scan.co.uk) 

Memory: Kingston Fury White Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1866 Memory  (£112.72 @ Amazon UK) 

Storage: Crucial MX100 256GB 2.5" Solid State Drive  (£74.39 @ Aria PC) 

Storage: Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  (£55.60 @ Aria PC) 

Video Card: Asus GeForce GTX 770 2GB DirectCU II  Video Card  (Purchased For £0.00) 

Case: Fractal Design Define R4 (Black Pearl) ATX Mid Tower Case  (£69.59 @ Aria PC) 

Power Supply: EVGA 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply  (£81.87 @ Amazon UK) 

Optical Drive: Samsung SH-224DB/BEBE DVD/CD Writer  (£10.09 @ CCL Computers) 

Operating System: Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 (OEM) (64-bit)  (£69.99 @ Ebuyer) 

Case Fan: be quiet! Pure Wings 2 61.2 CFM 140mm  Fan  (£7.26 @ Aria PC) 

Case Fan: be quiet! Pure Wings 2 61.2 CFM 140mm  Fan  (£7.26 @ Aria PC) 

Case Fan: be quiet! Pure Wings 2 61.2 CFM 140mm  Fan  (£7.26 @ Aria PC) 

Total: £899.56

Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available

Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-10-29 02:08 GMT+0000

 

Excellent price to performance build. It's going to be quiet, and perform like the clappers. I ignored your preference for Corsair and Asus because it's meaningless, spending more than you need to will net you about half a pound of pure "fuck-all". In short; don't fanboy out on brands, all it will get you is a lighter wallet.

[Mistersprinkles]

OP why are you only looking at high end boards? Do you know that a $100-$150 (*USD) board will be just fine?

[neillien]

 

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

 

[snip]

 

Excellent price to performance build. It's going to be quiet, and perform like the clappers. I ignored your preference for Corsair and Asus because it's meaningless, spending more than you need to will net you about half a pound of pure "fuck-all". In short; don't fanboy out on brands, all it will get you is a lighter wallet.

 

 

Sound advice, in my head I totally agree with the whole brand snobbery thing... I guess I was thinking that same-brand components would work better together (corsair link for example)... but I can't deny what you said makes total sense. Thanks for taking the time to put together that part list, appreciated!

 

OP why are you only looking at high end boards? Do you know that a $100-$150 (*USD) board will be just fine?

 

Well I would like some room to play around with overclocking CPU/RAM/GPU, just because well, it would be fun and I want to buy the best in my budget that gives me the option of doing this. I did have a few cheaper boards in my shortlist though... the Asus Z97-A, or the Ranger, or a few boards from MSI, the Gaming 5, 7 or G45. Would they still be as OC capable? This is the first PC I will actually build myself so I'm perhaps a bit over-cautious.

 

 

Thanks for the input so far, it all helps to clear things in my head  

[Mistersprinkles]

Sound advice, in my head I totally agree with the whole brand snobbery thing... I guess I was thinking that same-brand components would work better together (corsair link for example)... but I can't deny what you said makes total sense. Thanks for taking the time to put together that part list, appreciated!

 

 

Well I would like some room to play around with overclocking CPU/RAM/GPU, just because well, it would be fun and I want to buy the best in my budget that gives me the option of doing this. I did have a few cheaper boards in my shortlist though... the Asus Z97-A, or the Ranger, or a few boards from MSI, the Gaming 5, 7 or G45. Would they still be as OC capable? This is the first PC I will actually build myself so I'm perhaps a bit over-cautious.

 

 

Thanks for the input so far, it all helps to clear things in my head

 

Any board from $110-160 will be able to overclock (on air or water) as well as a $400 board. If you want to use liquid nitrogen for extreme overclocking, get the $400 board. Otherwise, you don't need it. I don't like cheap MSI boards. The caps they use in the power delivery section don't have that long of a lifespan compared to 10K/12K caps being used by other mfgs. My suggestion is the ASUS Z97A or the ASRock extreme 4 or 6. The EX6 is my fav "affordable" Z97 board as it has everything you need including 2 M.2 slots for a reasonable price. Basically, nobody else is offering you as much as that board is for that price on that socket.

 

I wouldn't screw with the RAM on your first system. Just get RAM that's fast (2133+) to begin with. Overclocking CPU/GPU is fine for your first time though. However, if you have an Intel CPU over 3Ghz, keep in mind that overclocking it won't produce noticeable gains in video games the way overclocking your GPU will. Overclocked Intel comes into play in extremely compute intensive tasks like transcoding, rendering, etc.