First Time Builder - Looking for Any Input

[SimplyOwnage]

Forum Virgin here!

Going to have a coworker help me put together my first custom PC and looking for any advice anyone has. I'm not an expert so even simple suggestions are appreciated.

 

AIM: I mainly want a work station that can play Starcraft 2 with decent settings and no lag/fps drops. My work does require a lot of computing power as I sometimes have data (up to 200GB) that I need to do statistical analysis on in SAS/R/Python.

Monitors: I have an older TN monitor right now but in the next year or two I'd like to get two new ones and run a dual monitor setup.

Peripherals: Run windows 7 - soon to be 10, Already have a corsair K70 and steel series mouse

Upgrade Reason: When I graduate this month I will lose access to the high powered computers we use on campus to do our data analysis so I want something at home that is capable of churning though huge amounts of data while also being able to enjoy a game now and then, with smooth game play being a priority over the highest graphics settings.

 

Here is what I'm planning to use, and also the link to pcpartpicker (https://pcpartpicker.com/list/7ZGZ9W)

CPU: i7-6700K
HSF: be quiet! PURE ROCK SLIM CPU Cooler 120W TDP - BK008
Motherboard:  GIGABYTE z170m - D3H (This is a Micro ATX form factor)
RAM: G.SKILL Ripjaws V Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) 288-Pin DDR4 SDRAM DDR4 2133 (PC4 17000) 
Hard Disk Drive: WD Cavier Blue 1TB 7200 RPM
SSD: Samgsung 850 EVO 240 GB
Video Card: GIGABYTE GeForce GTX 1050 Ti DirectX 12 GV-N105TOC-4GD 4GB 128-Bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 x16 ATX Video Cards
Case: Fractal Design Arc Mini R2
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNova 550 G2 - Fully modular

 

Picked up the CPU and MB at microcenter for ~330 on Black Friday but I don't know if this is a good MB or not for my setup, I know I need the z170 chipset but other than that I bought it b/c it was on sale.

Is my heatsink good enough if I don't overclock the CPU? Should I go for something better or would a cheap intel one do fine?

I have no clue on the video card, I just picked something out that seemed like a good deal but this may be overkill or maybe there is another card for the same price point ($150 USD) that's way better.

I'd like to keep the case small but may run into problems with the HSF being too large?

 

If anyone has any suggestions please let me know. Thank you in advance for your time and expertise, I genuinely appreciate it.

-Scott

 

[Guest]

Red RAM looks ugly to pair with imo. Get a black one

The rest looks fine. Too large is never a problem

[GermanPCBuilder]

First up hey welcome to the forum I hope you will have a good time here.

and second your build looks pretty good , but if you don't want to overclock get the non k version of the CPU if you want to overclock just keep it like that. 

Your cooler will totally do( even a little overclock won't be a problem for it).

your gpu seems a bit weak for that CPU but if you just game every now and then it will be totally fine and it will give you alle the frames you need.

if you work on large amounts of data you might want to consider buying 32GB of ram as it can speed working up quite a bit. 

For the PSU ....well I have no idea if it's good or bad but the wattage will totally do for your build. 

[dizmo]

Welcome to the forum!

Looks like a really solid build. I don't think there's anything you really need to change unless you want to swap the colors as @deXxterlab97 suggested.

What other games do you plan on playing? Might want to consider going up to a 1060 if your budget allows it.

6 minutes ago, GermanPCBuilder said:

First up hey welcome to the forum I hope you will have a good time here.

and second your build looks pretty good , but if you don't want to overclock get the non k version of the CPU if you want to overclock just keep it like that. 

Your cooler will totally do( even a little overclock won't be a problem for it).

your gpu seems a bit weak for that CPU but if you just game every now and then it will be totally fine and it will give you alle the frames you need.

if you work on large amounts of data you might want to consider buying 32GB of ram as it can speed working up quite a bit. 

For the PSU ....well I have no idea if it's good or bad but the wattage will totally do for your build. 

He already bought the CPU

32GB of RAM is useful in very, very few workloads.

 

[GermanPCBuilder]

2 minutes ago, dizmo said:

Welcome to the forum!

Looks like a really solid build. I don't think there's anything you really need to change unless you want to swap the colors as @deXxterlab97 suggested.

What other games do you plan on playing? Might want to consider going up to a 1060 if your budget allows it.

He already bought the CPU

32GB of RAM is useful in very, very few workloads.

 

Yes only in very few but if is doing these sorts of workloads then it really helps to have the extra 16gb 

[SimplyOwnage]

16 minutes ago, GermanPCBuilder said:

First up hey welcome to the forum I hope you will have a good time here.

and second your build looks pretty good , but if you don't want to overclock get the non k version of the CPU if you want to overclock just keep it like that. 

Your cooler will totally do( even a little overclock won't be a problem for it).

your gpu seems a bit weak for that CPU but if you just game every now and then it will be totally fine and it will give you alle the frames you need.

if you work on large amounts of data you might want to consider buying 32GB of ram as it can speed working up quite a bit. 

For the PSU ....well I have no idea if it's good or bad but the wattage will totally do for your build. 

The 6700k 4Ghz was actually cheaper than the i7-6700 3.4Ghz for some odd reason and the same price as the locked multiplier version.

I was debating on the 32 GB of RAM also, when I dump 100 million rows into R it really eats up RAM so that is a good suggestion.

 

15 minutes ago, dizmo said:

Welcome to the forum!

Looks like a really solid build. I don't think there's anything you really need to change unless you want to swap the colors as @deXxterlab97 suggested.

What other games do you plan on playing? Might want to consider going up to a 1060 if your budget allows it.

He already bought the CPU

32GB of RAM is useful in very, very few workloads.

 

I don't play any other games right now other than SC2 but I'd like the ability to know I can play something if I want. Is the 1060 superior only because of the clock speed? I'm not sure how to interpret the 4GB on the 1050 vs the 3GB on the 1060, too many specs and not enough knowledge for me!

[Devin92]

when you are dealing with 200GB of data at one time, i would say the more RAM you can afford the better. What is your budget? The CPU cooler is okay, as long as you are not hardcore on overclocking.

GPU is fine if you only play SC2 and have no plan to play any AAA games.

[SimplyOwnage]

3 minutes ago, Devin92 said:

when you are dealing with 200GB of data at one time, i would say the more RAM you can afford the better. What is your budget? The CPU cooler is okay, as long as you are not hardcore on overclocking.

GPU is fine if you only play SC2 and have no plan to play any AAA games.

No real budget, I have the money to spend but if I spend it I want to make sure it's useful. I think I'm going to do a 16x2 to start and if i notice I'm using a lot I'll add another 2 sticks

[dizmo]

3 hours ago, SimplyOwnage said:

The 6700k 4Ghz was actually cheaper than the i7-6700 3.4Ghz for some odd reason and the same price as the locked multiplier version.

I was debating on the 32 GB of RAM also, when I dump 100 million rows into R it really eats up RAM so that is a good suggestion.

 

I don't play any other games right now other than SC2 but I'd like the ability to know I can play something if I want. Is the 1060 superior only because of the clock speed? I'm not sure how to interpret the 4GB on the 1050 vs the 3GB on the 1060, too many specs and not enough knowledge for me!

Not really, you have to look up reviews of each card as the 1050 to 1060 is an architecture change. The clock speed matters, but not nearly as much. If you're just playing at 1080p you won't notice a real difference between 4gb and 3gb either, unless you're playing heavily modded Skyrim.