Cool'n'quiet PC, best options?

Deltanic · April 18, 2015

After I found out I cant really play GTA V at all on my current 6870 due to its low amount of VRAM, I decided to just upgrade all of my PC and get something much cooler and quieter, something that can run GTA V at high settings without trouble. So far, I've come up with the following upgrade pack:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i7-4790K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor ($279.99 @ Micro Center)

Motherboard: MSI Z97-GAMING 5 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($134.99 @ Amazon)

Video Card: Asus GeForce GTX 980 4GB STRIX Video Card ($544.99 @ SuperBiiz)

Case: be quiet! Silent Base 800 ATX Mid Tower Case ($119.99 @ NCIX US)

Total: $1079.96

Clearly, I'm reusing some old hardware from my current rig, which would be the following:

RAM: 2x4GB Corsair Vengeance (CMZ8GX3M2A1600C9)

PSU: CoolerMaster Silent Pro M600

HDD: WD Caviar Green WD20EARX

SSD: Crucial m4 256 GB

Now, my issue isn't so much about money. It's about the best cool + quiet + performance trade off I can get. For instance, I chose a 980 for maximum performance. But am I really off that much better over a 970? I looked up how much VRAM GTA V would use on ultra settings, and that goes slightly above 4GB - which bothers me considering a 970 only 3.5 GB of high speed memory. It would even max out a 980 in terms of memory, which feels, well, disappointing.. I've also heard issues with the 970 about making a lot of coil whine, which is something I really don't want in a quiet PC. What are my best options here?

As for CPU cooling, I would love to get water cooling here, and I was considering to get a CM 240M since it's pretty quiet and good performing. I've got no experience with water cooling though, so I don't know the details to look for. I also considering a fully passive cooled solution, but this is a cool and quiet PC, not just quiet. Any advice on this part?

My uses for this PC would be, obviously, gaming, specifically GTA V. No 4K, 1080p is plenty. I have a dual monitor setup, so multi-monitor gaming won't happen anytime soon. I do plan to mod that game in the future, possibly making it more demanding. So that's something to take into account. Other uses would be mostly programming, for which this system is a massive overkill. I don't do rendering or any of that heavy kind of stuff. The power of this PC should really be for gaming. Budget isn't much of an issue, as long it doesn't run into ridiculous numbers. Living in Holland, so prices would be in euro.

For anyone interested, I'm currently on a 1090t with a XFX HD6870. That CPU munches power and makes a tremendous amount of noise. Not something I like to keep for a new build.

grayblizzard · April 18, 2015

Here is a build that will beQuiet as the gpu has one fan that turns off when not needed and the extra fans are quiet as well as a water cooler cpu hope you are happy.

http://de.pcpartpicker.com/p/gZ9nJx

Vegetable · April 18, 2015

Well I'm not an expert on anything past the GPU portion of your question here, so I will provide what I can. To give you an idea of what a 970 can do, my best friend runs an fx 8350 (4.8hz) and an EVGA 970 (not overclocked), and he runs GTA V on max 1080p no drops below 50 fps. So if you're the type of person that can deal with minor fps drops (from 60-50) then I think a 970 will be fine, and you can save some cash and maybe get a brand new HDD to ensure the fastest load times.

Deltanic · April 18, 2015

Here is a build that will beQuiet as the gpu has one fan that turns off when not needed and the extra fans are quiet as well as a water cooler cpu hope you are happy.

http://de.pcpartpicker.com/p/gZ9nJx

This doesn't really answer my questions. I specifically chose the Asus Strix card for the same reason as that MSI card. Also I chose the bequiet case for obvious reasons. This is just an entirely new build, completely unrelated to anything I asked/said..

Well I'm not an expert on anything past the GPU portion of your question here, so I will provide what I can. To give you an idea of what a 970 can do, my best friend runs an fx 8350 (4.8hz) and an EVGA 970 (not overclocked), and he runs GTA V on max 1080p no drops below 50 fps. So if you're the type of person that can deal with minor fps drops (from 60-50) then I think a 970 will be fine, and you can save some cash and maybe get a brand new HDD to ensure the fastest load times.

Interesting, do you have any GPU usage stats with exact settings by any chance? Interested to see that.

As for HDD, I'm pretty statisfied with my SSD/HDD combo. Both great products. While a new 850 Pro/Evo SSD is certainly faster, I don't feel like I really need that. So I'm good on that part