Bananamuffin

Your current set up looks more than capable, like the others say it might be good to wait for Zen 2. However, if youre expecting to have a windfall again by the end of the summer (you said you would get a monitor in the summer if you spend the money now) I would tbh get the monitor and new HDD now and then get zen 2 at the end of the summer when it's been out for a month or two and you have a good idea of what you'll gain from it

you say you want to achieve 1440p (if in budget i guess?) but the monitor you've chosen is 1080p. I would definitely recommend you check out both Linus' budget build guide (December i think, did 3 builds in one vid for $500-1500 range). If you want a 1440p build I would expect to pay £1000+ (including monitor, mouse keyboard) and would probably use an rtx 2060. Ryzen is almost certainly a better bet than intel on a budget, you don't pay extra for overclocking and unless you're playing in the big leagues the few fps difference between intel and AMD in single threaded performance really won't have an impact on you. The money you then save can go towards a better gpu/ssd/80+ bronze/gold/whatever psu. On the other hand, if you want 1080p 144hz like your build indicates, go with a 1660ti or rx 580/590 and use the money you saved on the GPU to get extra things which may make life better. 2 SSd's one for boot and one for games, or a mechanical keyboard or extra fans or RGB (if thats what you're into). IMO 144hz stable 1080p will deliver a better experience than 1440p at 60/70fps, but it depends what you play. I enjoy shooters, if story games is your thing then 1440p 60 fps will be gorgeous.

sorry my reply is so late, probably should have realised time difference for US/UK would mean late replies if any :/ Vega is 100% cheaper in the UK and comes with nice freebies (3 free games), the main problem is that the price difference would be nullified by the fact that I would need a new PSU. That is of course assuming I stick with my 500w one for a 1070ti, which is possible but not ideal. I have no particular preference for either tbh, ive only ever owned nvidia but in regards to CPUs im an AMD fanboy. I assume that even with certain games favouring nvidia tech, i wont have difficulty achieving 60fps Ultra on a 1080p monitor with either card. Really the question is whether Navi will be announced properly in early Jan as expected or if it will be q2/q3 in which case I might as well buy now. I posted mainly because a lot of reviews and buyers guides are from earlier in the year when prices were impacting decisions a lot --> as theyve normalised now I was hoping to get arguments from both sides to see what the general consensus is :)

I have a 1080p Freesync with a range of 40ish to 72hz

the strix comes with a higher clock out of the box, but clock isn't always the whole story. Either way I was more concerned with the value between the two

I had no idea that the strix one was just Asus tax :0 thank you for pointing that out

I'm thinking about upgrading my GPU towards the end of Jan 2019 and I'm trying to decide between 1070ti and Vega 56. Currently Vega 56 is @ £360 for strix edition. Cheapest 1070ti is @ £370/80 but the more appealing/beefier versions are @£409 ish. Either one I pick I'm going to need a new PSU, currently got a 500w 80+ gold by Silverstone (I believe). 1070ti would just get by on it but it's cutting it too close for my liking. PSU will be an additional ~£70-80 Pros for 1070ti: it is undoubtedly faster Cons for 1070ti: it'll cost £400 +PSU Pros for Vega: it's cheaper, comes with 3 free games, freesync Cons: it's not as powerful Either card will be paired with a ryzen 1600x @4ghz and 16gb ram @3000mhz I have a 1080p freesync panel but range only goes up to 72hz Which should I pick? I could get away with not getting a new PSU for the 1070ti but I will have no choice with Vega. Currently all Vega reviews are back dated for when the Vega was completely overpriced due to mining. Sorry if formatting is horrible; on Mobile. Thanks!

Got the iPad

So I'm hoping to get some advice on choosing a tablet as a Christmas gift for my partner. She runs a small business and a tablet would be quite beneficial to her. It will be mainly used for expenses, emails, forms and general admin work; which means I need something that won't be slow in app usage over the course of a few hours. I had a brief look around and it seems the best would be the iPad 9.7 @£300. Does anyone have any other suggestions? Budget is slightly flexible if it's worth it, but around the £300 mark would be best. Thanks

thanks for the continued effort I'll give that a shot and pray it works

Alright, I appreciate all the help guys, but I think at this point i'll probably tinker around a bit maybe reinstall windows but probably just invest in a new ssd

will try and restart into just normal windows. wish me luck

it was quite a while and its a bit late now. In hindsight I should have more patience. but no I did not update anything, just used the advanced optimisation. Now sat in safe mode with networking, it was very slow to get into windows but write speeds are still sat above 400mbs

Well.... New problem, it gets stuck on the motherboard logo with the spinning windows loading wheel Just waiting to get into safe mode with networking. Posting from mobile now

That adata software seems to have been a success, will reboot in just a sec to see if full success and then post results