New build advice. Need a critical eye.

[DarK_HawK]

Hi,

 

First, I apologize for the wall of text.

 

I’ve have been building my own PC for 25 years, but the last one was the i7-4770K platform from 10 years ago, so I’m out of the loop of how things are going. I use the PC for CAD software, some photo and video editing and gaming.

 

CPU: I’ve been comparing the i7-13700K to the 7900X.

 

The i7-13700K is slightly faster, has a more mature/stable platform, the down side is that it’s an oven and needs a substantial thermal solution. It’s slightly more expensive, and needs an additional 18USD contact frame, and an additional 10USD for a Retrofit Upgrade Kit for my Corsair AIO.

 

The 7900X is slightly slower, the platform is buggy and problematic at the moment, the upside is that it has an upgrade future for the platform (which to be honest I don’t care too much about), less heat and more efficient. And the most important thing is that it’s cheaper. Was 361USD on amazon 2 days ago. And won’t need neither a frame nor a retrofit kit.

 

So, the 7900X seems to be the way to go for now, unless prices change.

 

Motherboard: After reading here and over on reddit for a bit, the consensuses seem to be:

Avoid the ASUS board due to the latest scandal
Avoid the Gigabyte boards due to the coil whine.
Go with the B650 over X670

Which leaves the ASrock and MSI. I have nothing against ASrock, my 10-year board is an ASrock and it didn’t give me too much grief. So, the ASRock B650E PG RIPTIDE WIFI seems the logical choice, it’s the only board in this price range that has PCI5 on both the PCI and NVME slots, I know that’s not important at the moment, but it’s nice to have. It’s power delivery seems similar to that of X670E boards.

 

RAM: The cheapest 6000MHZ, preferably CL30 available that is supported by the motherboard, if there is a better criteria for choosing, please add your thoughts. I don’t know if there is a difference between SK Hynix chips vs Samsung memory chips.

 

Storage: I’m going with either the WD SN850X 1tb or the Samsung 980 Pro. The cheaper I can find at the time of buying.

 

GPU: I’m going with either the 6700XT or the 6750XT depending on the price. The 3060ti and 3070 with its 8gb is not an attractive option.

 

Case, PSU, CPU cooler: I’m keeping my 10 years old stuff. The Coolermaster HAFX case looks abysmal by today’s standards, but I like it, and it has a good airflow. With a new front 5.25” USB3.2/Type C panel it will be good enough for me.

 

The NZXT HALE 90 850 W 80+ Gold is old, but it’s still a 850W capable one, I’m planning to disassemble it sometime in the future and replace all the CAPS with new better ones as a means of prolonging its life.

 

The Corsair H100i V1 is 10 years old, but 2 years ago I disassembled it, cleaned all the gunk buildup on the plate, and changed the fluid which made its performance like a brand new one. So, I’m planning of doing the same again, if it’s thermal capacity can’t keep up with the new processor, I can always buy a new one.

 

I need a critical eye to look on these choices, so please roast my choices. Thank you in Advance.

 

PCPartPicker

 

[RONOTHAN##]

8 minutes ago, DarK_HawK said:

The i7-13700K is slightly faster, has a more mature/stable platform, the down side is that it’s an oven and needs a substantial thermal solution. It’s slightly more expensive, and needs an additional 18USD contact frame, and an additional 10USD for a Retrofit Upgrade Kit for my Corsair AIO.

I wouldn't say it needs a contact frame, it helps but it's not really necessary. It does pull a ton of power though, especially with some motherboards, so if that's a concern the 7900X would make more sense. 

 

10 minutes ago, DarK_HawK said:

So, the ASRock B650E PG RIPTIDE WIFI seems the logical choice, it’s the only board in this price range that has PCI5 on both the PCI and NVME slots, I know that’s not important at the moment, but it’s nice to have. It’s power delivery seems similar to that of X670E boards.

It's a solid board. I'd still personally go for something else since I don't really care about PCIe5 (A 4090 barely utilizes PCIe Gen 3 to the fullest, let alone gen 4, so in 5 years when AM5 gets deprecated it's unlikely that a GPU will make use of Gen 5), though if it's something you really want it's a very solid option. It's power delivery is worse than the X670E boards, but that's not saying a whole lot. It more comes down to the X670E boards don't need the heatsinks they're shipped with, while the B650E PG Riptide does. 

 

13 minutes ago, DarK_HawK said:

RAM: The cheapest 6000MHZ, preferably CL30 available that is supported by the motherboard, if there is a better criteria for choosing, please add your thoughts. I don’t know if there is a difference between SK Hynix chips vs Samsung memory chips.

Find an EXPO rated kit if you want it to just work, there are reports of XMP not enabling properly on AM5 boards. 6000 CL30 is a decent criteria, though the performance over the usually cheaper CL32 kits is immeasurable so throw those into the running.

 

As for SK Hynix vs. Samsung, the TL;DR is SK Hynix is better overall, Samsung does slightly better tRCD. If you're not doing manual RAM overclocking, this doesn't matter, though if you're looking for 6000 CL30/32 rated kits they're all going to be Hynix based anyway. 

 

18 minutes ago, DarK_HawK said:

GPU: I’m going with either the 6700XT or the 6750XT depending on the price. The 3060ti and 3070 with its 8gb is not an attractive option.

I would look at your specific software to see how these cards would behave. The AMD cards are great for gaming, but in a lot of workstation applications they fall flat mostly because of their lack of CUDA support though sometimes just because the developer didn't optimize for them (Adobe software, for instance, just doesn't like AMD cards). I 100% get not wanting to buy those Nvidia cards, it's just you might not really have the choice. 

 

21 minutes ago, DarK_HawK said:

The NZXT HALE 90 850 W 80+ Gold is old, but it’s still a 850W capable one, I’m planning to disassemble it sometime in the future and replace all the CAPS with new better ones as a means of prolonging its life.

This sounds like a recipe for disaster if you don't know 100% what you're doing. Best case scenario you save ~$100, worst case scenario you're out $1000 because you did something that fried your system when you hooked it up to the PSU or you kill yourself because you accidentally touch the wrong capacitor that still had some charge left in it. You should just buy a new PSU rather than attempting this, it's just not worth the risk. 

 

 

[WildDagwood]

What's your budget?

 

Also, don't disassemble your PSU under any circumstances.

[DarK_HawK]

Thank you very much for the detailed reply.

Quote

It's a solid board. I'd still personally go for something else since I don't really care about PCIe5 (A 4090 barely utilizes PCIe Gen 3 to the fullest, let alone gen 4, so in 5 years when AM5 gets deprecated it's unlikely that a GPU will make use of Gen 5), though if it's something you really want it's a very solid option. It's power delivery is worse than the X670E boards, but that's not saying a whole lot. It more comes down to the X670E boards don't need the heatsinks they're shipped with, while the B650E PG Riptide does. 

I understand your point, and I agree. What board would you personally go for in that price range? High end B650 lower X670E boards?

Quote

Find an EXPO rated kit if you want it to just work, there are reports of XMP not enabling properly on AM5 boards. 6000 CL30 is a decent criteria, though the performance over the usually cheaper CL32 kits is immeasurable so throw those into the running.

Good catch, that kit I choose was not EXPO rated.

I think this one will work:

https://www.newegg.com/g-skill-32gb/p/N82E16820374422

Right?

 

Quote

I would look at your specific software to see how these cards would behave. The AMD cards are great for gaming, but in a lot of workstation applications they fall flat mostly because of their lack of CUDA support though sometimes just because the developer didn't optimize for them (Adobe software, for instance, just doesn't like AMD cards). I 100% get not wanting to buy those Nvidia cards, it's just you might not really have the choice. 

So, we are stuck between an inadequate Nvidia cards vs not supported AMD cards. Do you think that can change in the near future? I can wait on the GPU for a bit if a better alternative is on the horizon. Though with 4060 and 7600 launches being what they are, I don’t have my hopes up.

 

Quote

This sounds like a recipe for disaster if you don't know 100% what you're doing. Best case scenario you save ~$100, worst case scenario you're out $1000 because you did something that fried your system when you hooked it up to the PSU or you kill yourself because you accidentally touch the wrong capacitor that still had some charge left in it. You should just buy a new PSU rather than attempting this, it's just not worth the risk.

Thanks for your concern, but I know exactly what I’m doing when it comes to repairing electronics. Not that my current PSU needs a repair. I will not even change those CAPs until it starts shutting down randomly, which to be honest I don’t think it will. I first need to know the exact sizes of the CAPs since every series have several sizes for the same value. The UCC KMQ series in my PSU is a Japanese made quality caps, the main smoothing CAP is 400V 390uF. This value has like 7 different sizes. Sorry about the rant. But it’s doable for me.

[DarK_HawK]

43 minutes ago, WildDagwood said:

What's your budget?

 

Also, don't disassemble your PSU under any circumstances.

Around 1000-1200 USD.

[Why_Me]

1 hour ago, DarK_HawK said:

CPU: I’ve been comparing the i7-13700K to the 7900X.

The i7-13700K is slightly faster, has a more mature/stable platform, the down side is that it’s an oven and needs a substantial thermal solution. It’s slightly more expensive, and needs an additional 18USD contact frame, and an additional 10USD for a Retrofit Upgrade Kit for my Corsair AIO.

Problem solved. The 7XX series boards have strengthened backplates so no need for that contact frame.  Want to avoid the extra heat that comes with the 13700K while receiving similar results ... here ya go. 

 

https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/sku/230490/intel-core-i713700-processor-30m-cache-up-to-5-20-ghz/specifications.html  

Processor Base Power: 65W
Maximum Turbo Power: 219W   

 

https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/sku/230500/intel-core-i713700k-processor-30m-cache-up-to-5-40-ghz/specifications.html  

Processor Base Power: 125W
Maximum Turbo Power: 253W    

 

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: *Intel Core i7-13700 2.1 GHz 16-Core Processor  ($349.99 @ Best Buy) 
Motherboard: *MSI B760 GAMING PLUS WIFI ATX LGA1700 Motherboard  ($164.99 @ Amazon) 
Total: $514.98
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
*Lowest price parts chosen from parametric criteria
Generated by PCPartPicker 2023-06-10 18:34 EDT-0400   

 

https://www.msi.com/Motherboard/B760-GAMING-PLUS-WIFI

[Why_Me]

btw if you don't need integrated graphics then save a few dollars with this cpu.

 

https://pcpartpicker.com/product/xz8bt6/intel-core-i7-13700f-21-ghz-16-core-processor-bx8071513700f  

Intel Core i7-13700F $329.99

[RONOTHAN##]

Just now, DarK_HawK said:

I understand your point, and I agree. What board would you personally go for in that price range? High end B650 lower X670E boards?

The ASRock B650 Pro RS, MSI B650 Tomahawk, ASRock B650 LiveMixer, and MSI X670-P Pro would be towards the top of the list depending on the features you need. 

 

4 minutes ago, DarK_HawK said:

Good catch, that kit I choose was not EXPO rated.

 

I think this one will work:

 

https://www.newegg.com/g-skill-32gb/p/N82E16820374422

 

Right?

Yeah, that's a decent option. If you want to save $20, there's also this Flare X5 kit: https://pcpartpicker.com/product/cnbTwP/gskill-flare-x5-32-gb-2-x-16-gb-ddr5-6000-cl32-memory-f5-6000j3238f16gx2-fx5

 

6 minutes ago, DarK_HawK said:

So, we are stuck between an inadequate Nvidia cards vs not supported AMD cards. Do you think that can change in the near future? I can wait on the GPU for a bit if a better alternative is on the horizon. Though with 4060 and 7600 launches being what they are, I don’t have my hopes up.

More or less. There is software that works great on AMD cards as well (Davinci Resolve, for instance, loves AMD cards), if you happen to use some of that you're golden with a 6700 XT. It's just that if you're using Blender, SolidWorks, and a lot of other software it can be a massive problem. Used Nvidia cards are still an option though, you might be able to get something like a 2080 Ti or a 3090 Ti instead, then you get the massive amount of VRAM, CUDA support, and the pricing isn't too bad. 

[Somerandomtechyboi]

https://pcpartpicker.com/list/VQsWVw

Just some optimizations ig

 

gen5 is kinda useless atm so why bother, just get a cheaper board

 

2tb gen4 instead of a 1tb gen4

 

6800xt instead of a 6750xt although i would reccomend buying a used 6900xt instead since they are around 500$ used on ebay

 

 

23 minutes ago, DarK_HawK said:

Thanks for your concern, but I know exactly what I’m doing when it comes to repairing electronics. Not that my current PSU needs a repair. I will not even change those CAPs until it starts shutting down randomly, which to be honest I don’t think it will. I first need to know the exact sizes of the CAPs since every series have several sizes for the same value. The UCC KMQ series in my PSU is a Japanese made quality caps, the main smoothing CAP is 400V 390uF. This value has like 7 different sizes. Sorry about the rant. But it’s doable for me.

Make sure to proceed with caution and properly discharge the thing and some other safety precautions, maybe stuff like isolating yourself from ground by sitting on an electrical insulator like cardboard, use some electrically insulating gloves, etc.

 

i wouldnt reccomend dissasembling a psu but ive done that a few times myself with like no safety precautions other than making sure the things discharged, usually just for cleaning

[DarK_HawK]

45 minutes ago, Why_Me said:

Problem solved. The 7XX series boards have strengthened backplates so no need for that contact frame.  Want to avoid the extra heat that comes with the 13700K while receiving similar results ... here ya go. 

 

https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/sku/230490/intel-core-i713700-processor-30m-cache-up-to-5-20-ghz/specifications.html  

Processor Base Power: 65W
Maximum Turbo Power: 219W   

 

https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/sku/230500/intel-core-i713700k-processor-30m-cache-up-to-5-40-ghz/specifications.html  

Processor Base Power: 125W
Maximum Turbo Power: 253W    

 

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: *Intel Core i7-13700 2.1 GHz 16-Core Processor  ($349.99 @ Best Buy) 
Motherboard: *MSI B760 GAMING PLUS WIFI ATX LGA1700 Motherboard  ($164.99 @ Amazon) 
Total: $514.98
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
*Lowest price parts chosen from parametric criteria
Generated by PCPartPicker 2023-06-10 18:34 EDT-0400   

 

https://www.msi.com/Motherboard/B760-GAMING-PLUS-WIFI

I'm buying those parts from Canada, and amazon.ca is very limited in regards to the variety of intel SKUs it carries. So I'm more or less stuck with the 7900X since I can get it for around 375USD if I'm lucky. Otherwise an i7-13700F seems very attractive.

[DarK_HawK]

45 minutes ago, RONOTHAN## said:

The ASRock B650 Pro RS, MSI B650 Tomahawk, ASRock B650 LiveMixer, and MSI X670-P Pro would be towards the top of the list depending on the features you need.

Would you please explain your thought process when choosing those boards.

Quote

Yeah, that's a decent option. If you want to save $20, there's also this Flare X5 kit: https://pcpartpicker.com/product/cnbTwP/gskill-flare-x5-32-gb-2-x-16-gb-ddr5-6000-cl32-memory-f5-6000j3238f16gx2-fx5

I will do that. Thank you.

It's not listed on the Memory QVL for the ASRock, but I'm sure it will work.

 

Quote

More or less. There is software that works great on AMD cards as well (Davinci Resolve, for instance, loves AMD cards), if you happen to use some of that you're golden with a 6700 XT. It's just that if you're using Blender, SolidWorks, and a lot of other software it can be a massive problem. Used Nvidia cards are still an option though, you might be able to get something like a 2080 Ti or a 3090 Ti instead, then you get the massive amount of VRAM, CUDA support, and the pricing isn't too bad. 

I looked at the used market in Canada for the 2080 TI, 3090 Ti and 3090 Ti. Prices are bad compared to new ones. I think I'm stuck with AMD since I don't think I can justify an 8Gb card new since I don't buy GPUs everyday, I'm still running my 10 years old GTX 970.

[Why_Me]

6 minutes ago, DarK_HawK said:

Would you please explain your thought process when choosing those boards.

I will do that. Thank you.

It's not listed on the Memory QVL for the ASRock, but I'm sure it will work.

 

I looked at the used market in Canada for the 2080 TI, 3090 Ti and 3090 Ti. Prices are bad compared to new ones. I think I'm stuck with AMD since I don't think I can justify an 8Gb card new since I don't buy GPUs everyday, I'm still running my 10 years old GTX 970.

What's your resolution?

[DarK_HawK]

1 minute ago, Why_Me said:

What's your resolution?

Currently 2x1080p 60HZ monitors. But this system is built for two 2K 144HZ monitors.

[RONOTHAN##]

9 minutes ago, DarK_HawK said:

Would you please explain your thought process when choosing those boards.

The B650 Pro RS is the cheapest 8 layer board you can find in the US, so it should offer good memory support and the feature set is good enough. The B650 Tomahawk is similar but comes with WiFi, and while it is a 6 layer board there are people out there who have gotten it clocked very high with memory so that shouldn't matter that much. The B650 LiveMixer gives a very useful PCIe layout since it comes with 3 Gen 4 PCIe as well as a ton of rear USB ports (plus it looks funky). The X670-P Pro is the only board with 6 SATA ports if you run a ton of SATA drives, along with a pretty good SATA layout and some other extra features. If I were to take one of them, it would probably be the Pro RS or the X670-P Pro, but all of them have reasons to go for and are all within ~$30 of each other. You can't go wrong with any of them. 

 

19 minutes ago, DarK_HawK said:

It's not listed on the Memory QVL for the ASRock, but I'm sure it will work.

If it makes you feel better, it's on the QVL from G.Skill:

https://www.gskill.com/qvl/165/396/1661410273/F5-6000J3238F16GX2-FX5-QVL

 

20 minutes ago, DarK_HawK said:

I looked at the used market in Canada for the 2080 TI, 3090 Ti and 3090 Ti. Prices are bad compared to new ones. I think I'm stuck with AMD since I don't think I can justify an 8Gb card new since I don't buy GPUs everyday, I'm still running my 10 years old GTX 970.

Just make sure to look that your software will actually run on AMD cards. Not all CAD software is the same (it's not an area I follow a ton so I'm not great with how each specific software behaves off the top of my head), some likes it, some doesn't but is functional, others won't even run. You might have to go for an 8GB card unless you can swap software to one that does fine with AMD cards. 

[DarK_HawK]

15 hours ago, RONOTHAN## said:

The B650 Pro RS is the cheapest 8 layer board you can find in the US, so it should offer good memory support and the feature set is good enough. The B650 Tomahawk is similar but comes with WiFi, and while it is a 6 layer board there are people out there who have gotten it clocked very high with memory so that shouldn't matter that much. The B650 LiveMixer gives a very useful PCIe layout since it comes with 3 Gen 4 PCIe as well as a ton of rear USB ports (plus it looks funky). The X670-P Pro is the only board with 6 SATA ports if you run a ton of SATA drives, along with a pretty good SATA layout and some other extra features. If I were to take one of them, it would probably be the Pro RS or the X670-P Pro, but all of them have reasons to go for and are all within ~$30 of each other. You can't go wrong with any of them. 

 

If it makes you feel better, it's on the QVL from G.Skill:

https://www.gskill.com/qvl/165/396/1661410273/F5-6000J3238F16GX2-FX5-QVL

 

Just make sure to look that your software will actually run on AMD cards. Not all CAD software is the same (it's not an area I follow a ton so I'm not great with how each specific software behaves off the top of my head), some likes it, some doesn't but is functional, others won't even run. You might have to go for an 8GB card unless you can swap software to one that does fine with AMD cards. 

Thank you RONOTHAN for your help.

 

I will go with the MSI X670-P PRO WiFi, will be my first MSI board.

If you have the time, and for educational purposes, why would you choose the MSI X670-P PRO WiFi over the ASRock B650E PG RIPTIDE WIFI.

Both are 8 layers boards, both have 14 power phases, PCI layout is similar but the MSI is a little better, both have the same number of M.2 slots and PCIe 5.0 support for the M.2, 6vs4 sata connections in favor of the MSI. The USB layout is nicer for me on the ASRock since I like more USB2.0 A vs newer faster slots in the back panel.

In short what are the criteria I missed when comparing those 2 boards that will tip the scales towards the MSI more?

 

One other thing. This is my first AMD CPU and GPU. There is something nagging at the back of my head about the stability and longevity of my choices. The Intel i7-4770K and Nvidia GTX 970 has been rock solid for me for 10 years now. Do I expect the same from AMD about stability and longevity?

Once up and running, will an AMD system behave the same as an Intel system, no quirks, endless tinkering to fix things and that sort of thing?

What about AMD drivers for the GPUs, are they stable, or like some people say that the drivers are buggy and fixes takes months and almost years to get fixed?

 

If you think I'm overthinking things here, you are right, and the reason is, there has been a currency devaluation where I live, and it will be very hard for me to get a second shot at this build.

[RONOTHAN##]

15 minutes ago, DarK_HawK said:

In short what are the criteria I missed when comparing those 2 boards that will tip the scales towards the MSI more?

The MSI is $10 cheaper right now (or at least was when I wrote up that shortlist, haven't checked pricing since). You can't go wrong with the PG Riptide either, it's still a decent enough board, though I would argue that unless you actually have a need for PCIe Gen 5 on the primary PCIe slot, you might as well save your money and get the Pro RS instead as it's the same exact board, just without PCIe Gen 5 and a different coat of paint. 

 

17 minutes ago, DarK_HawK said:

Do I expect the same from AMD about stability and longevity?

My main system has been AMD for the CPU for the last ~7 years, and with the exception of the initial Ryzen launch (I bought a 1700 a month after release, and there were a lot of issues with that setup for the first ~6 months) it's been perfectly reliable all that time. I have friends with Ryzen 7000 series systems, both of them are pretty happy with it. As for longevity, I've never had a Ryzen CPU die on me, and with what I know of silicon it usually needs to be killed to die. 

 

23 minutes ago, DarK_HawK said:

Once up and running, will an AMD system behave the same as an Intel system, no quirks, endless tinkering to fix things and that sort of thing?

I've done more tinkering to get Intel systems to work than I have AMD systems. There are a couple BIOS settings that can occasionally cause issues on AMD (mainly fast boot and memory context restore in my experience), though the same thing is present on Intel systems and in my experience can cause the same issues. If you put me in front of either platform and didn't let me go into the BIOS (AMD BIOSes are layed out a little differently than Intel, not enough that you can't find your way around but enough that you can figure it out pretty quickly if you know what to look for), didn't let me open up System Info or any other tool to view the processor, and just told me to use the system for a while, I couldn't tell you whether the CPU was Intel or AMD. The differences really don't start to come out until you start trying to do tweaking and other system optimizations, in that regard they are very different, but if you're just planning on leaving it at stock and enabling EXPO/XMP they're really similar. 

 

28 minutes ago, DarK_HawK said:

What about AMD drivers for the GPUs, are they stable, or like some people say that the drivers are buggy and fixes takes months and almost years to get fixed?

They are still a little worse than Nvidia's though at least with my experience daily-ing a 6900 XT, they're still more than adequate. A bug pops up every once in a while, but as long as you're sticking to the recommended driver releases and not the optional releases (AMD has two different driver releases, they should be called Stable and Beta rather than Recommended and Optional like they call it) you're usually fine. Granted, I don't use my card for any sort of professional work, so I can't comment on how they behave in more workstation tasks like you said you were going to be doing.