Accepting constructive criticism for my first build

[Guest]

Noted. I may order appropriate RAM once I determine the clearance.

 

I do like the fully-modular PSUs. I'm thinking of sticking with a 750W for expansion, unless that's a stupid idea.

 

 

Fair enough.

 

I'm leaning towards the MSI GTX 980 Gaming 4G now since it's $630. As for RAM, is there any tangible difference between CL9 1600 MHz and CL10 1833 MHz?

A 750W is fine for SLI. The one I linked is fully modular and has a 10 year warranty.

 

Review - http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReviews&op=Story&reid=380

 

 

There isn't a huge difference between Ram speeds. If the 1866 kit is the same price then you might as well go with that.

[nims0c]

A 750W is fine for SLI. The one I linked is fully modular and has a 10 year warranty.

 

Review - http://www.jonnyguru.com/modules.php?name=NDReviews&op=Story&reid=380

 

 

There isn't a huge difference between Ram speeds. If the 1866 kit is the same price then you might as well go with that.

 

I'll go with that then. Thanks for the suggestion!

[Gonçalo]

You should be just fine with one 970 for 1080p gaming maxed out if you do get two however, I would put some money into more case fans to keep the air inside as cool as possible. Speacially if you are planing on keeping the CPU stock cooler.

 

As for the CPU cooler itself it will hold on just fine with the stock cooler if you are not palning to do anything crazy with it but I would still go for at least a cheap AIO water cooler with a single fan rad wich would set you back around 50$ or so wich is not that much and would exaust the hot air outside of the case instead of contributing to worm up the inside together with the GPU.

[NumLock21]

 

I'm leaning towards the MSI GTX 980 Gaming 4G now since it's $630. As for RAM, is there any tangible difference between CL9 1600 MHz and CL10 1833 MHz?

The MSI is good, picked that Gigabyte because of the Nvidia reference blower style cooler, like the one used on their GTX Titans, which blows hot air out of the case. 1866 will be slightly faster than 1600, but in real world usage you won't be able tell the difference. I've picked that so it looks good with your board and it's a few bucks more. If you're going to spend nearly $2K on this thing at least make your build look nice, otherwise just use standard non heatsink ram.

[nims0c]

You should be just fine with one 970 for 1080p gaming maxed out if you do get two however, I would put some money into more case fans to keep the air inside as cool as possible. Speacially if you are planing on keeping the CPU stock cooler.

 

As for the CPU cooler itself it will hold on just fine with the stock cooler if you are not palning to do anything crazy with it but I would still go for at least a cheap AIO water cooler with a single fan rad wich would set you back around 50$ or so wich is not that much and would exaust the hot air outside of the case instead of contributing to worm up the inside together with the GPU.

 

I'll consider the AIO water cooler. Thanks for the suggestion.

 

The MSI is good, picked that Gigabyte because of the Nvidia reference blower style cooler, like the one used on their GTX Titans, which blows hot air out of the case. 1866 will be slightly faster than 1600, but in real world usage you won't be able tell the difference. I've picked that so it looks good with your board and it's a few bucks more. If you're going to spend nearly $2K on this thing at least make your build look nice, otherwise just use standard non heatsink ram.

 

I've been looking at X99 again and used most of the parts you recommended earlier. It's starting to be more compelling because I do want a more future-proof build.

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

 

CPU: Intel Core i7-5820K 3.3GHz 6-Core Processor  ($438.95 @ Vuugo) 

CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler  ($34.99 @ Memory Express) 

Motherboard: MSI X99S SLI Plus ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard  ($239.99 @ NCIX) 

Memory: Mushkin Blackline 16GB (4 x 4GB) DDR4-2400 Memory  ($265.48 @ Newegg Canada) 

Storage: Samsung 840 EVO 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive  ($139.89 @ DirectCanada) 

Storage: Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($89.98 @ DirectCanada) 

Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 970 4GB WINDFORCE Video Card  ($423.95 @ DirectCanada) 

Case: Fractal Design Define R5 ATX Mid Tower Case  ($129.99 @ NCIX) 

Power Supply: EVGA 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($119.99 @ NCIX) 

Wireless Network Adapter: Asus PCE-AC66 802.11b/g/n/ac PCI-Express x1 Wi-Fi Adapter  ($79.88 @ Canada Computers) 

Total: $1963.09

[NumLock21]

Whether you want to get Z97 or X99 depends on what you think it's right for you

Here is another X99 build, this one with a Asus X99 Pro that has built in wifi and BT. I've change the ram from Mushkin to G.Skill because not sure if Mushkin supports Intel XMP, can't find it on their site. To be on the safe side get the G.Skill cause at least they have Intel XMP support.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i7-5820K 3.3GHz 6-Core Processor  ($444.98 @ Newegg Canada)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler  ($34.99 @ Memory Express)
Motherboard: Asus X99-PRO ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard  ($369.99 @ Memory Express)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws Series 16GB (4 x 4GB) DDR4-2400 Memory  ($279.98 @ Newegg Canada)
Storage: Samsung 840 EVO 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive  ($139.89 @ DirectCanada)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($89.98 @ DirectCanada)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 970 4GB ACX 2.0 Video Card  ($384.95 @ Vuugo)
Case: Fractal Design Define R5 ATX Mid Tower Case  ($129.99 @ NCIX)
Power Supply: EVGA 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($119.99 @ NCIX)
Total: $1974.74
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-01-14 00:25 EST-0500

[nims0c]

Whether you want to get Z97 or X99 depends on what you think it's right for you

Here is another X99 build, this one with a Asus X99 Pro that has built in wifi and BT. I've change the ram from Mushkin to G.Skill because not sure if Mushkin supports Intel XMP, can't find it on their site. To be on the safe side get the G.Skill cause at least they have Intel XMP support.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Build

 

I like this build. I think I'll go with it. Thanks a lot for all your help!

[GuruMeditationError]

I changed my build based on feedback. 4690K with a single GTX 980 STRIX instead. The list is below (it's missing a Hyper 212 EVO for $35 that I'm gonna get as well). Does this change your suggestions?

 

I'd say that should probably be good, but watch the temps. You can always fit higher efficiency fans later on if the heat's really a problem.

 

The main problem I could see with the original build was the open heatsinks on the graphics cards, but if you could fit 970 with extractor heatsinks rather than open heatsinks it might be enough to offset that but then the fans could potentially be quite noisy.

 

The thing is, my experience is limited as I've only ever SLI'd cards with open heatsinks that were known to run hot and I ended up having to fit after-market closed-loop GPU water coolers. 

 

To be honest I'd still advise starting a separate thread in the cooling section of the forum just to work out the details of the heat management for the build. You'll probably be able to get better advice there.

 

Edit: Just saw this...

 

 

It will work just fine. The Maxwell cards don't run that hot to start with. Also people are running SLI in cases like the H440 without issue.

 

The Asus board also has decent slot spacing.

 

 

Thinking back I did have tremendous heat problems that were solved by re-applying thermal paste to one of the cards I'd just picked up on eBay. They might have run okay at stock temps after that but I think I might have jumped straight to over-clocking with the closed-loop water cooling solutions. Also, the cards I had were Gigabytes "Super Overclocked" versions of chip that ran pretty hot to begin with. 

[mushies1337]

http://ca.pcpartpicker.com/p/vQTJP6

 

UPDATED:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

 

CPU: Intel Core i5-4690K 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor  ($256.89 @ DirectCanada) 

CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler  ($34.99 @ Memory Express) 

Motherboard: Asus Z97-PRO(Wi-Fi ac) ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  ($233.98 @ Newegg Canada) 

Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1866 Memory  ($157.99 @ Memory Express) 

Storage: Samsung 840 EVO 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive  ($139.89 @ DirectCanada) 

Storage: Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($89.98 @ DirectCanada) 

Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 980 4GB Twin Frozr Video Card  ($629.98 @ Newegg Canada) 

Case: Fractal Design Define R5 ATX Mid Tower Case  ($129.99 @ NCIX) 

Power Supply: EVGA 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($119.99 @ NCIX) 

Total: $1793.68

 

My budget is about 2000 CAD (excluding monitor and peripherals).

 

This computer will be for gaming (CS:GO plus the latest and greatest AAA titles; not necessarily max settings). No 3D work, but I went with an i7 because I want it to be future-proof and I don't want any lag when I have a bunch of streams and other tabs open. I don't plan to overclock at first so I hope the stock cooler is sufficient. Also, I will more than likely start off with one GTX 970 and see how it performs. Is adding a second just a matter of popping it in the PCI slot and adding the SLI bridge?

 

Will I need more than the 2 included case fans for this build?

 

I will be running 1 monitor for the foreseeable future. I'm leaning towards the BenQ XL2420Z (1080p).

 

I've omitted peripherals because I think they're personal choices.

 

Thanks for your help!

are you interested in X99? you can get a pretty beast X99 machine for 2k

[mushies1337]

take a look at this:

PCPartPicker part list: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/pbYLYJ

Price breakdown by merchant: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/pbYLYJ/by_merchant/

 

CPU: Intel Core i7-5820K 3.3GHz 6-Core Processor  ($299.99 @ Micro Center) 

CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-U12S 55.0 CFM CPU Cooler  ($61.98 @ OutletPC) 

Motherboard: Asus X99-A ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard  ($249.99 @ NCIX US) 

Memory: Crucial Ballistix Sport 16GB (4 x 4GB) DDR4-2400 Memory  ($239.99 @ Newegg) 

Storage: Intel 730 Series 240GB 2.5" Solid State Drive  ($160.98 @ Newegg) 

Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($53.97 @ OutletPC) 

Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 980 4GB ACX 2.0 Video Card  ($549.99 @ Newegg) 

Case: Fractal Design Define R5 ATX Mid Tower Case  ($114.99 @ SuperBiiz) 

Power Supply: Corsair CX 500W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($34.99 @ Newegg) 

Operating System: Microsoft Windows 8.1 (OEM) (64-bit)  ($89.98 @ OutletPC) 

Total: $1834.85

Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available

Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-01-15 21:06 EST-0500

[nims0c]

are you interested in X99? you can get a pretty beast X99 machine for 2k

 

 

take a look at this:

PCPartPicker part list: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/pbYLYJ

Price breakdown by merchant: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/pbYLYJ/by_merchant/

 

CPU: Intel Core i7-5820K 3.3GHz 6-Core Processor  ($299.99 @ Micro Center) 

CPU Cooler: Noctua NH-U12S 55.0 CFM CPU Cooler  ($61.98 @ OutletPC) 

Motherboard: Asus X99-A ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard  ($249.99 @ NCIX US) 

Memory: Crucial Ballistix Sport 16GB (4 x 4GB) DDR4-2400 Memory  ($239.99 @ Newegg) 

Storage: Intel 730 Series 240GB 2.5" Solid State Drive  ($160.98 @ Newegg) 

Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($53.97 @ OutletPC) 

Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 980 4GB ACX 2.0 Video Card  ($549.99 @ Newegg) 

Case: Fractal Design Define R5 ATX Mid Tower Case  ($114.99 @ SuperBiiz) 

Power Supply: Corsair CX 500W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($34.99 @ Newegg) 

Operating System: Microsoft Windows 8.1 (OEM) (64-bit)  ($89.98 @ OutletPC) 

Total: $1834.85

Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available

Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-01-15 21:06 EST-0500

 

 

I live in Canada so that is more like $2.2k. Anyway, I forgot to update the OP. I am going with the following:

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

 

CPU: Intel Core i7-5820K 3.3GHz 6-Core Processor  ($444.98 @ Newegg Canada) 

CPU Cooler: Corsair H60 54.0 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler  ($59.98 @ DirectCanada) 

Motherboard: Asus X99-PRO ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard  ($379.99 @ Memory Express) 

Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws Series 16GB (4 x 4GB) DDR4-2400 Memory  ($274.99 @ Newegg Canada) 

Storage: Samsung 840 EVO 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive  ($138.98 @ DirectCanada) 

Storage: Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($89.98 @ DirectCanada) 

Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 970 4GB WINDFORCE Video Card  ($423.95 @ DirectCanada) 

Case: Fractal Design Define R5 ATX Mid Tower Case  ($129.99 @ NCIX) 

Power Supply: EVGA 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($119.99 @ NCIX) 

Total: $2042.83