First PC build in 10 years!

Vittorio · June 28, 2022

Budget (including currency): 2000 AUD

Country: Australia

Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: Web browsing, word processing/typesetting, shell scripting + programming. Very occastional video editing, Linux as OS.

Other details: Already have a be quiet! Straight Power 11 Gold Modular 650W.

Hello,

I am looking to build a new PC for the tasks above. No gaming required. I've not built a PC in a long while a do not know where to start!

I don't really need a huge amount of performance. Therefore my main requirements for this system are

having an integerated GPU (definately no nvidia GPU)
good build quality components
highly reliable components
linux compatbility

Overall iam more concerned with quality, robustness and reliability that outright performance and looks.

Would greatly appreciate any recommendations and pointers in the right direction!

Many thanks,

Vitt

RONOTHAN## · June 28, 2022

I see 3 major roadmaps for this build given the budget.

12700 and a good B660 board.
5900X and a B550 board.
5950X and a B550 board.

All three have their pros and cons. The 5950X route is the most expensive, but it is the best performing for what you're doing, plus the extra threads are very useful if you need to spin up some VMs for something. The 12700 is the next fastest option, it does have an iGPU and it's likely gonna be the cheapest. The main downside with it is that the differentiation between P cores and E cores found on it is still relatively new and the Linux schedulers, while getting better, are definitely still maturing. The 5900X is the middle man between them, it has the reliability and roughly the same multicore performance as the 12700 (the 12700 has better single thread performance though) but lacks the iGPU and is a bit more expensive than the 12700. That said, Intel iGPU drivers aren't particularly amazing, so getting a cheap AMD GPU, something along the lines of a 6400XT (used RX 550s or similar aren't a bad idea either), is not a bad idea either way. The AMD systems also do have another advantage, you can get a POST code on the motherboard (useful for troubleshooting).

I'll draw up builds given all three plans, they'll all be roughly the same except for the CPU, motherboard, and RAM. For the AMD systems you can flip the motherboards, they're just two decent options with different feature sets.

12700 system: https://au.pcpartpicker.com/list/mg2x2m

5900X system: https://au.pcpartpicker.com/list/xWWc4s

5950X system: https://au.pcpartpicker.com/list/vqDjJM

Vittorio · June 28, 2022

Thanks a lot for the reply! This is really helpful.

I will definately look into the three alternatives. The 5950X seems like an absolute beast.

You mentioned the iGPU drivers arent that amazing. I feel like i've heard the same with AMD GPUS as well. After my experiences trying to run fedora linux with 2 different Nvidia GPU has been a bit of a nightmare and really just want something that'll work out of the box (or as close to that as possible).

Just out of curisoity, any particular reason for the OLOy RAM?

RONOTHAN## · June 28, 2022

3 hours ago, Vittorio said:

You mentioned the iGPU drivers arent that amazing. I feel like i've heard the same with AMD GPUS as well. After my experiences trying to run fedora linux with 2 different Nvidia GPU has been a bit of a nightmare and really just want something that'll work out of the box (or as close to that as possible).

I've heard people say that Intel drivers are actually worse than Nvidia drivers on Linux. Nvidia drivers are just a pain to get working on Fedora, the actual quality of the drivers themselves isn't terrible.

Personally I'm on Fedora (35, haven't done the upgrade to 36 yet) on my laptop running Intel graphics. On Wayland they are pretty decent, so if you're planning on running Wayland you should be OK, but if you're going for the tried and true XOrg, you will likely want to stick with AMD.

3 hours ago, Vittorio said:

Just out of curisoity, any particular reason for the OLOy RAM?

You could afford 64GB, it was the cheapest kit of 2x32GB 3200MHz CL16 you could get.

Make sure to quote so we get a notification, you just got lucky that I came back here.

venomtail · June 28, 2022

I think be quiet! is a reputable brand. I trust it myself. The only thing you have to research yourself is the video rendering part. Most people would want to use the benefit of GPU rendering. Some software allow GPU acceleration but does it work with 6400 I have no idea. You could swap out the 5700X for a G Ryzen or an Intel non F that has an APU/iGPU that could help with acceleration instead, but again no idea about software support on windows let alone Linux. HDD for cheap video storage. Some opt to store video files on SSD's but I'm not that rich:

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5700X 3.4 GHz 8-Core Processor ($419.00 @ BPC Technology)
CPU Cooler: be quiet! Shadow Rock 3 CPU Cooler ($69.00 @ PCCaseGear)
Motherboard: MSI B550-A PRO ATX AM4 Motherboard ($155.00 @ JW Computers)
Memory: Kingston FURY Beast 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory ($169.00 @ PCCaseGear)
Storage: Gigabyte AORUS Gen4 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive ($189.00 @ Computer Alliance)
Storage: Western Digital Blue 4 TB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive ($114.34 @ Amazon Australia)
Video Card: XFX Radeon RX 6400 4 GB Speedster SWFT 105 Video Card ($249.00 @ PLE Computers)
Case: be quiet! Pure Base 500 ATX Mid Tower Case ($109.00 @ Mwave Australia)
Power Supply: be quiet! Straight Power 11 650 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (Purchased For $0.00)
Total: $1473.34
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2022-06-28 19:10 AEST+1000