My first build

Apparition · December 26, 2015

Hi everyone, recently I built a PC which was the first one I ever built. It cost $950 (USD) and I was wondering if I got a good deal, and if this PC is suitable for the newest games (Fallout 4, ect). I just wanted your feedback for how good the PC is and if I got a good deal for the money.

Thanks

Case - Corsair Carbide Series SPEC-02

Motherboard - AsRock 970 Extreme3 R2.0

CPU - AMD FX 8350 Black Edition

CPU Cooler- Corsair H55

Memory - 2 x 8GB DDR3 Ram

SSD - Samsung 250 Evo SSD

HDD - Seagate Desktop 2TB SATA

PSU - Corsair CS750M

GPU- GFORCE GTX 970 FTW Edition

Amazingasian · December 26, 2015

You could have gotten a 4690K and an R9 390 with a very good PSU for that price. AMD CPUs aren't that great. Same goes for the CSM PSU. 390s have 8GB of VRAM which will help in the future.

ApolloX75 · December 26, 2015

That H55 won't help much for an 8350, especially on such a weak motherboard. Would have been cheaper to get a simple 212 Evo. Could have gotten an i5 4460 and an H81 motherboard as well and saved another $100.

Don't get me wrong, you paid a good amount for that system, even according to PartPicker. Just don't try and overclock much on that motherboard, the VRM setup won't handle it well and your cooler won't dissipate the heat fast enough. The GTX 970 is still an excellent card, but I will concede to the coming deluge of "390 is a better choice" posts, because for upcoming titles that 8GB of VRAM will be crucial. Mind you at 1080p I haven't hit a wall with my 970 at all, and I've pushed mine to it's breaking point quite often so it's likely that even in the upcoming year or so 4GB will not be a huge limit.

HKZeroFive · December 26, 2015

You could have gotten a 4690K and an R9 390 with a very good PSU for that price. AMD CPUs aren't that great. Same goes for the CSM PSU. 390s have 8GB of VRAM which will help in the future.

Basically this:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-4690K 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor ($221.99 @ NCIX US)

CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler ($24.98 @ OutletPC)

Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z97-HD3 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($89.88 @ OutletPC)

Memory: Kingston HyperX Fury Blue 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR3-1866 Memory ($33.99 @ SuperBiiz)

Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($81.49 @ OutletPC)

Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($49.98 @ OutletPC)

Video Card: Sapphire Radeon R9 390 8GB Nitro Video Card ($325.98 @ Newegg)

Case: Corsair SPEC-02 ATX Mid Tower Case ($54.99 @ Amazon)

Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA GS 650W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($75.98 @ Newegg)

Total: $959.26

Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available

Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-12-26 02:13 EST-0500

You can overclock a much better CPU with a better GPU.

teddiejl · December 26, 2015

I am running the same gpu and cpu and I couldnt be more happy. For 1080p This is a great gaming machine for the price imo. Im not sure why ppl give amd such crap about its cpu, its a great price per performance component. For gpus I like to stick with Nvidia, they may be more expensive but it seems to be more optimized for games. I never had any issues with nvidia products. The only amd gpu I got was the 280x and I felt it wasnt as good as it should have been.