My First Build.. Im lost!

[George8D]

Hey peoples of linustechtips.com! For a about a year now I have been thinking about making the transition from Console gaming on the X360 and moving into the exspensive crazy world of pc... but if I am honest Im starting to feel a little lost

 

http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/user/TheGeorge8D/saved/2t17 Original*

 

http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/user/TheGeorge8D/saved/2xPK Updated*

 

http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/user/TheGeorge8D/saved/2xYC Another Update*

 

The link above is the parts I have chosen, based on various reviews I have watched from various tubers trying to get an understanding of what I should or shouldn't do.

 

Also the reasons for which I have chosen the parts I have is purely for aesthetic reasons. The NZXT Phantom 3.0 case is currently in my workshop in bits waiting for a batch of Ford Focus ST Electric Orange Pearlescent paint to be mixed.. So when i was picking these parts the questions i really asked myself was;

 

1. Is it Black, orange or Silver/Grey

2. Is it in an reasonable price range

3. has linus done a review!

 

Money really isn't a problem when it comes to finishing this build but obviously i'm not going to go silly so I have set myself a budget of £2,000 MAX including operating system/extra fans/peripherals etc which is about $3200 Dollars ish.

 

So what I am really asking here is:

 

1. What kind of performance (Guesstimated) could i expect to get

2. Are there better parts I could use over the ones I have chosen. (sticking as close as possible to the theme colours of Orange/Black/Grey)

3. Should I consider using a watercooling loop over Air Cooled and where do I begin to even price up watercooling!

 

Thank you in advance to the people that take the time to read the small essay above and post your help and guidance. It will be greatly appreciated!

 

Edit: Updated lists Bottom is most accurate. I am currently looking at custom water cooling

Edited October 9, 2013 by George8D

[Lord Pantaloons]

get a WD blue instead of a black if it's cheaper, there's no noticeable difference between the two, Win7 professional is cheaper.

[iAsuno]

get a better gpu. and maybe win8 because of new technology.

[JORDANonPC]

for gaming get a 4670k or 8350 only get 8gb of ram get a cheaper motherboard and ssd and spend the extra cash on a better gpu

[Joe3417]

get a 4670k, you dont need windows 7 ultimate, home premium is fine. Get a better gpu, maybe a r9-280x

[skullbringer]

The Intel 520 series ssds are based on a sandforce controller, which is kind of outdated at this point, not saying it wont perform good. But f.i. the new Samsung 840 Evo series are much cheaper per gigabyte and perform almost the same. The 250GB 840 evo doesnt cost much more than the 120GB 520 series. So for the better bang for the buck, Id say grab the Samsung 840 evo.

 

Also, unless you are into overclocking, I would honestly advise you to go with a Xeon e3-1230v3, instead of the 4770k. The Xeon is officially not intended for gaming, but it basiaclly it is just a 4770 without integrated graphics. As you are using a dedicated graphics card anyways, that should not matter in this case. Also you cant overclock it. Xeons are server grade, stable and efficient cpus. But this way you would not need the Z87 board. Or even if you wanted it, because of the orange looks, you could save some bucks on the cpu and maybe also on the cooler.

 

Leaving you here, I am going to hop onto PPP and try to give you a quick summary.

 

EDIT:

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU Cooler:  Be Quiet DARK ROCK 2 57.9 CFM Fluid Dynamic Bearing CPU Cooler  (£48.89 @ Aria PC)
Motherboard:  Gigabyte GA-Z87X-OC ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  (£163.16 @ Amazon UK)
Memory:  G.Skill Ares Series 16GB (4 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory  (£124.99 @ Amazon UK)
Storage:  Samsung 840 EVO 250GB 2.5" Solid State Disk  (£130.54 @ Amazon UK)
Storage:  Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  (£61.86 @ Aria PC)
Video Card:  Zotac GeForce GTX 780 3GB Video Card  (£528.50 @ Ebuyer)
Case:  NZXT Phantom (Black/Orange) ATX Full Tower Case  (Purchased For £0.00)
Power Supply:  Corsair RM 750W 80 PLUS Gold Certified ATX12V / EPS12V Power Supply  (£98.95 @ Aria PC)
Operating System:  Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 (OEM) (64-bit)  (£67.19 @ Aria PC)
Monitor:  Asus VE248H 24.0" Monitor  (£150.29 @ Scan.co.uk)
Monitor:  BenQ XL2420T 120Hz 24.0" Monitor  (£284.39 @ Aria PC)
Headphones:  SteelSeries 7H 7.1 Channel Headset  (£80.00 @ Ebuyer)
Other: Logitech G710+ (£112.00)
Other: Logitech G602 (£68.00)
Other: Intel Xeon E3-1230v3 (£190.00)
Total: £2108.76
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2013-10-09 14:42 BST+0100)

 

Unfortunately PPP hasnt yet listed the new haswell xeons, so I added them manually. I filled the budget with everything you could need, I had to add keyboard and mouse manually as they were also not listed. BTW the G710+ would fit your orange black gray scheme quite nicely, the mouse is just awesome.

Also added some orange RAM. There are two displays, just because I did not know if you are either more into color accuracy (Asus, ips panel) or want to get the most fluid picture (Benq, tn panel). That is also the reason why its 100 over budget, just pick only one of them and you should be right within your limit. The cpu cooler is plenty for a Xeon and it is also black with orange accents.

The headset is one of the best gaming ones you can get and slo a recommendation by Linus, so I put it in. For the psu I chose the newer Corsair RM series, instead of the older tx series, that have been replaced recently.

Graphics card is a GTX 780, cant go better and the orange gigabyte mb is in there purely for looks.

 

Feel free to ask if you have any questions

[tristan1035]

Your ram will not fit under that cooler.

[Arti]

Hyper 212 plus instead of the havic (if you really like the look of the havic... it's your call but the 212 is a bit cheaper)

Asus Z78-A instead of the gigabyte (Believe me it will save you a lot of time with it's awesome AI suite 2 and the 4-way optimization and fan xpert 2)

Seagate barracuda or WD blue instead of the black.

Windows 8 w/start is back http://www.startisback.com/#download-tab (It's pretty much the same as windows 7 with startisback, it's faster and and gives you more fps in modern games (bf4 as an example)

Why the 4770k? Unless you have a REAL reason why you reallyy want the 4770k over the 4670k go with the 4670k to save abit of money (hyperthreading doesn't contribute to gaming in any way..)

8gb of ram instead of 16gb unless you have a reason for 16gb.. cuz if you're only doing gaming 8gb is enough.

With the money you would save by these things... get a better GPU may i suggest the 7950..

[George8D]

Thanks for the comments guys!

 

I have been thinking about upgrading the Gpu for sure. And seeing as I am well under budget about (£500, Including the peripherals) If was to say downgrade the SSD, HDD and OS. I should save a guessed £100-£200, which would leave me enough room to get a Gtx Titan but would that be worth it

 

After finding some reviews on the CPU cooler I chose I have realised that the Ram will not fit. So which should I change? Ram or Cpu Cooler. And which products on the market currently are worth investing in? (CpuCooler/Ram)

 

The only reason I went for the 4770k over the 4670k is basically because I like the have the "best" Possible parts even though yes I understand there is a slightly cheaper option and I could get very similiar performance, its just one of those things that will irritate me.

[delet my acc pls]

this and a r9-290x when it`s released http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/1MGED (oct 15)

[delet my acc pls]

Thanks for the comments guys!

 

I have been thinking about upgrading the Gpu for sure. And seeing as I am well under budget about (£500, Including the peripherals) If was to say downgrade the SSD, HDD and OS. I should save a guessed £100-£200, which would leave me enough room to get a Gtx Titan but would that be worth it

 

After finding some reviews on the CPU cooler I chose I have realised that the Ram will not fit. So which should I change? Ram or Cpu Cooler. And which products on the market currently are worth investing in? (CpuCooler/Ram)

 

The only reason I went for the 4770k over the 4670k is basically because I like the have the "best" Possible parts even though yes I understand there is a slightly cheaper option and I could get very similiar performance, its just one of those things that will irritate me.

for a gpu either get a r9-290 or a r9-290x it will have great performance and since it is using the GCN architecture the mantle api will work with it (amd have made a piece of software that makes their hardware much better in most games for example bf4 and a buttload of others)

 

and please do not get a titan a 290x will be better, especially with mantle

[delet my acc pls]

Thanks for the comments guys!

 

I have been thinking about upgrading the Gpu for sure. And seeing as I am well under budget about (£500, Including the peripherals) If was to say downgrade the SSD, HDD and OS. I should save a guessed £100-£200, which would leave me enough room to get a Gtx Titan but would that be worth it

 

After finding some reviews on the CPU cooler I chose I have realised that the Ram will not fit. So which should I change? Ram or Cpu Cooler. And which products on the market currently are worth investing in? (CpuCooler/Ram)

 

The only reason I went for the 4770k over the 4670k is basically because I like the have the "best" Possible parts even though yes I understand there is a slightly cheaper option and I could get very similiar performance, its just one of those things that will irritate me.

linus explaining mantle much better than me http://youtu.be/hZQANNndqOA?t=4m46s

[George8D]

linus explaining mantle much better than me http://youtu.be/hZQANNndqOA?t=4m46s

 I took your link for example and made some slight changes

http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/user/TheGeorge8D/saved/2xPK

 

I chose the 16gb instead of the 8gb for ram on this list only because the slots are there (im a pain i know)

 

And i only put the titan in there just for the time being its so pretty :wub: but I shall wait until the 290x is released

 

Ive also switched to W8 because of the fact I can still get the W7 Feel with the advantages of W8 (apparently)

 

And again took on board what has been said regarding SSD/HDD and the CPU Block.

 

I am willing to go over budget with things such as the GPU and Cooling, So where do I begin to price up a Watercooling loop? 

[defunkt]

If it's just for gaming then get an FX 8350 and 8gb of ram. Don't get a caviar black drive, get a blue or a seagate barracuda 2tb. You can then get a better graphics card. Maybe one of AMD's new cards or a 780 or something.

[delet my acc pls]

 I took your link for example and made some slight changes

http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/user/TheGeorge8D/saved/2xPK

 

I chose the 16gb instead of the 8gb for ram on this list only because the slots are there (im a pain i know)

 

And i only put the titan in there just for the time being its so pretty :wub: but I shall wait until the 290x is released

 

Ive also switched to W8 because of the fact I can still get the W7 Feel with the advantages of W8 (apparently)

 

And again took on board what has been said regarding SSD/HDD and the CPU Block.

 

I am willing to go over budget with things such as the GPU and Cooling, So where do I begin to price up a Watercooling loop? 

a wc loop costs like 400 so if you do one you might have to go over budget. and temp replace the titan with 780, the r9-290x will cost like that (probably a little bit less) P.S they look the same

[George8D]

a wc loop costs like 400 so if you do one you might have to go over budget. and temp replace the titan with 780, the r9-290x will cost like that (probably a little bit less) P.S they look the same

Downgraded the Titan to the 780 with the intention of installing a WC Loop. and to keep it under budget (ish) I will sacrifice a new Roccat Kone XTD and carry on with my Roccat Kone+ and cheap it out with a £10 Keyboard. and I could make do with my current 27" Samsung Monitor. 

But with watercooling, where should I begin to look to assemble one and what parts would I need? 

[Rekhyt]

First of all, welcome to the heavenly world of PC gaming, you did the right thing, brother.

 

Now here's a shot at it:

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

 

CPU:  Intel Core i5-4670K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor  (£167.99 @ Aria PC) 

CPU Cooler:  Corsair H100i 77.0 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler  (£83.80 @ Amazon UK) 

Motherboard:  Gigabyte GA-Z87X-OC ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  (£163.16 @ Amazon UK) 

Memory:  G.Skill Ares Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1333 Memory  (£89.99 @ Amazon UK) 

Storage:  Samsung 840 EVO 250GB 2.5" Solid State Disk  (£145.97 @ Dabs) 

Storage:  Seagate Barracuda 3TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  (£87.12 @ CCL Computers) 

Video Card:  MSI GeForce GTX 780 3GB Video Card  (£499.99 @ Dabs) 

Power Supply:  Corsair RM 750W 80 PLUS Gold Certified ATX12V / EPS12V Power Supply  (£98.95 @ Aria PC) 

Operating System:  Microsoft Windows 8 (OEM) (64-bit)  (£69.00 @ Aria PC) 

Monitor:  Asus PB278Q 27.0" Monitor  (£425.00 @ Amazon UK) 

Total: £1830.97

 

I put a h100i in there, it makes it easy to install any ram, looks better, and is much easier to install than an air cooler (and performs better of course), orange memory, a GTX 780 (you don't want a titan) and an RM power supply; So all that should be nice and quiet.

 

I also picked a "2k" monitor; you really won't regret this if you get it. high resolutions are one of the best advantages of PC gaming over consoles, and the 780 is plenty powerful enough to handle it. Couple hundred pounds left for the peripherals you need, too.

 

Also, windows 8. Don't begin you PC experience with an outdated OS. Install StartIsBack to get rid of the metro interface, and enjoy all the optimisations and longer support

 

About the 4670k vs. 4770k part: You have to think about enjoyment per pound. I understand it's tempting to go with the higest end parts everywhere, but you literally never will be able to tell the difference once it's under the hood. So you get very little enjoyment from that extra money.

 

Spending it on a neat graphics card or nice peripherals that you'll see and use all the time, that maximizes your enjoyment per pound, so think hard about it.

 

 

[KamiKatze]

this and a r9-290x when it`s released http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/1MGED (oct 15)

 

^winwinwinwin.

[George8D]

The Intel 520 series ssds are based on a sandforce controller, which is kind of outdated at this point, not saying it wont perform good. But f.i. the new Samsung 840 Evo series are much cheaper per gigabyte and perform almost the same. The 250GB 840 evo doesnt cost much more than the 120GB 520 series. So for the better bang for the buck, Id say grab the Samsung 840 evo.

 

Also, unless you are into overclocking, I would honestly advise you to go with a Xeon e3-1230v3, instead of the 4770k. The Xeon is officially not intended for gaming, but it basiaclly it is just a 4770 without integrated graphics. As you are using a dedicated graphics card anyways, that should not matter in this case. Also you cant overclock it. Xeons are server grade, stable and efficient cpus. But this way you would not need the Z87 board. Or even if you wanted it, because of the orange looks, you could save some bucks on the cpu and maybe also on the cooler.

 

Leaving you here, I am going to hop onto PPP and try to give you a quick summary.

 

EDIT:

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU Cooler:  Be Quiet DARK ROCK 2 57.9 CFM Fluid Dynamic Bearing CPU Cooler  (£48.89 @ Aria PC)

Motherboard:  Gigabyte GA-Z87X-OC ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  (£163.16 @ Amazon UK)

Memory:  G.Skill Ares Series 16GB (4 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory  (£124.99 @ Amazon UK)

Storage:  Samsung 840 EVO 250GB 2.5" Solid State Disk  (£130.54 @ Amazon UK)

Storage:  Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  (£61.86 @ Aria PC)

Video Card:  Zotac GeForce GTX 780 3GB Video Card  (£528.50 @ Ebuyer)

Case:  NZXT Phantom (Black/Orange) ATX Full Tower Case  (Purchased For £0.00)

Power Supply:  Corsair RM 750W 80 PLUS Gold Certified ATX12V / EPS12V Power Supply  (£98.95 @ Aria PC)

Operating System:  Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 (OEM) (64-bit)  (£67.19 @ Aria PC)

Monitor:  Asus VE248H 24.0" Monitor  (£150.29 @ Scan.co.uk)

Monitor:  BenQ XL2420T 120Hz 24.0" Monitor  (£284.39 @ Aria PC)

Headphones:  SteelSeries 7H 7.1 Channel Headset  (£80.00 @ Ebuyer)

Other: Logitech G710+ (£112.00)

Other: Logitech G602 (£68.00)

Other: Intel Xeon E3-1230v3 (£190.00)

Total: £2108.76

(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)

(Generated by PCPartPicker 2013-10-09 14:42 BST+0100)

 

Unfortunately PPP hasnt yet listed the new haswell xeons, so I added them manually. I filled the budget with everything you could need, I had to add keyboard and mouse manually as they were also not listed. BTW the G710+ would fit your orange black gray scheme quite nicely, the mouse is just awesome.

Also added some orange RAM. There are two displays, just because I did not know if you are either more into color accuracy (Asus, ips panel) or want to get the most fluid picture (Benq, tn panel). That is also the reason why its 100 over budget, just pick only one of them and you should be right within your limit. The cpu cooler is plenty for a Xeon and it is also black with orange accents.

The headset is one of the best gaming ones you can get and slo a recommendation by Linus, so I put it in. For the psu I chose the newer Corsair RM series, instead of the older tx series, that have been replaced recently.

Graphics card is a GTX 780, cant go better and the orange gigabyte mb is in there purely for looks.

 

Feel free to ask if you have any questions

 

 

 

First of all, welcome to the heavenly world of PC gaming, you did the right thing, brother.

 

Now here's a shot at it:

 

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

 

CPU:  Intel Core i5-4670K 3.4GHz Quad-Core Processor  (£167.99 @ Aria PC) 

CPU Cooler:  Corsair H100i 77.0 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler  (£83.80 @ Amazon UK) 

Motherboard:  Gigabyte GA-Z87X-OC ATX LGA1150 Motherboard  (£163.16 @ Amazon UK) 

Memory:  G.Skill Ares Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR3-1333 Memory  (£89.99 @ Amazon UK) 

Storage:  Samsung 840 EVO 250GB 2.5" Solid State Disk  (£145.97 @ Dabs) 

Storage:  Seagate Barracuda 3TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  (£87.12 @ CCL Computers) 

Video Card:  MSI GeForce GTX 780 3GB Video Card  (£499.99 @ Dabs) 

Power Supply:  Corsair RM 750W 80 PLUS Gold Certified ATX12V / EPS12V Power Supply  (£98.95 @ Aria PC) 

Operating System:  Microsoft Windows 8 (OEM) (64-bit)  (£69.00 @ Aria PC) 

Monitor:  Asus PB278Q 27.0" Monitor  (£425.00 @ Amazon UK) 

Total: £1830.97

 

I put a h100i in there, it makes it easy to install any ram, looks better, and is much easier to install than an air cooler (and performs better of course), orange memory, a GTX 780 (you don't want a titan) and an RM power supply; So all that should be nice and quiet.

 

I also picked a "2k" monitor; you really won't regret this if you get it. high resolutions are one of the best advantages of PC gaming over consoles, and the 780 is plenty powerful enough to handle it. Couple hundred pounds left for the peripherals you need, too.

 

Also, windows 8. Don't begin you PC experience with an outdated OS. Install StartIsBack to get rid of the metro interface, and enjoy all the optimisations and longer support

 

About the 4670k vs. 4770k part: You have to think about enjoyment per pound. I understand it's tempting to go with the higest end parts everywhere, but you literally never will be able to tell the difference once it's under the hood. So you get very little enjoyment from that extra money.

 

Spending it on a neat graphics card or nice peripherals that you'll see and use all the time, that maximizes your enjoyment per pound, so think hard about it.

 

 

Ive taken what you both have said on board with graphics card (780)

I was considering using the H100 until i started to read on various forums that it doesn't natively fit my case . and would it be better long term to sacrifice the Peripherals for a wc loop and then at a slower pace obtaining said peripherals?

[Rekhyt]

Ive taken what you both have said on board with graphics card (780)

I was considering using the H100 until i started to read on various forums that it doesn't natively fit my case . and would it be better long term to sacrifice the Peripherals for a wc loop and then at a slower pace obtaining said peripherals?

 

 

I would do the opposite. Start with the neat peripherals, and save up later to upgrade to a custom loop. By then you'll know if you really want it, and you'll be more aware of the watercooling market if you stick around on the forum and all. It just makes more sense that way.

 

Free society however  , so for a custom loop you'll need:

• A reservoir
• A pump
• A waterblock for your CPU and graphics card
• Radiators (one is enough if you just cool the CPU)
• Tubing to connect it all
• Fittings
• Time

The thing is, if you have to ask (and there's nothing wrong with that), maybe it's good to wait a bit, watch some build logs and videos to get a little more familiar with it. And in the mean time, enjoy a fully decked out gaming PC.

 

Now if you want it, and you're willing to go over budget, we're happy to help of course. But you should still watch videos. Then more videos.

 

EDIT: That case is kind of terrible for watercooling. The specifications on their website actually read "watercooling: no" so you'll probably have to upgrade that too. Which is nice because you can get a much better looking one now  . With h100i support!

[George8D]

I would do the opposite. Start with the neat peripherals, and save up later to upgrade to a custom loop. By then you'll know if you really want it, and you'll be more aware of the watercooling market if you stick around on the forum and all. It just makes more sense that way.

 

Free society however  , so for a custom loop you'll need:

• A reservoir
• A pump
• A waterblock for your CPU and graphics card
• Radiators (one is enough if you just cool the CPU)
• Tubing to connect it all
• Fittings
• Time

The thing is, if you have to ask (and there's nothing wrong with that), maybe it's good to wait a bit, watch some build logs and videos to get a little more familiar with it. And in the mean time, enjoy a fully decked out gaming PC.

 

Now if you want it, and you're willing to go over budget, we're happy to help of course. But you should still watch videos. Then more videos.

I Think I might just go balls deep and go for the watercooling system, will look a tonne better if i could get Orange coolant  :rolleyes:

This project isn't realistically going to happen until november at least. Need to finish my Volkswagen MK1 Caddy first 

Phones about to die from using the personal hotspot! so once i get home later tonight or sneak off the the coffee house I will price up a WC Loop to share with you guys

[delet my acc pls]

Downgraded the Titan to the 780 with the intention of installing a WC Loop. and to keep it under budget (ish) I will sacrifice a new Roccat Kone XTD and carry on with my Roccat Kone+ and cheap it out with a £10 Keyboard. and I could make do with my current 27" Samsung Monitor. 

But with watercooling, where should I begin to look to assemble one and what parts would I need?

Ask @Ghost

[Ghost]

Ask @Ghost

A good place to start would be the watercooling 101 and FAQ at the top of the watercooling section.

[Kiwiandapple]

The only reason I went for the 4770k over the 4670k is basically because I like the have the "best" Possible parts even though yes I understand there is a slightly cheaper option and I could get very similiar performance, its just one of those things that will irritate me.

 

It's not better if you only game on that PC, it is better when you USE the cpu what it's made for. Video editing, rendering. I don't know why people think the i7 is better for gaming... it's such a shame. 

[George8D]

It's not better if you only game on that PC, it is better when you USE the cpu what it's made for. Video editing, rendering. I don't know why people think the i7 is better for gaming... it's such a shame. 

 

It will be something I am going to consider getting back into