input requested Considering another PC for school

[tjjdesign]

It's getting to be that point in the middle of summer where work has accumulated enough money to consider building a PC. Fun times.

My current routine during the school year is to move my main desktop with me that I built for gaming primarily and keep it in my dorm, with my laptop going to classes with me. The only problem I have with that setup is that it makes me do three things I rather wouldn't:

• I have to move my desktop, in an ASUS Spec-Alpha (this one), into a vehicle and drive it to my school during move in. I don't like removing my main machine from my parents' place, and having to bring just my laptop with me when I go back to visit. I'd rather keep a system fully set up at home and not have to reassemble peripherals when I want a desktop experience at home.
• I have to keep a large, gamer-y looking box in a small dorm room, shared with a roommate. I trust my roommate ofc, but who knows what could happen to it. It takes up a whole lot of real estate, which I don't want it to.
• Also, since the work I'll be doing at school isn't gaming all the time, and more suited to lots of cores, and memory (virtualization and networking), my gaming machine isn't the ultimate solution. It uses an Intel i5 6600K, with only 16 gigs of RAM. My school's spec for my major prefers 32 for some assignments, and being able to run virtual machines on a machine built for it would be great. It's also not fun having to share storage from a home, gaming computer, with school assignments and virtual machine files. I'd much rather keep those tasks each on their own machines, and storage. I'd also like to have more storage for school stuff, since my storage on my home desktop is about 2.5 terabytes, and is used up mostly by games, and my school stuff I've isolated on my laptop has only 500 gigs. None of that storage is redundant either, which would suck to lose if a drive got broke while moving around.

One solution I'm thinking of is to just build a whole new computer just to have at school, with a lot of cores, RAM and storage, that's tiny and unobtrusive. I'm not super concerned about price because I've been working all summer anyway, though I'd like to be smart about buying at the right price. I know what kind of components I want, and they cost what they do. I put together a Ryzen 2600X build in a Fractal Design Nano on PCPartpicker that would do what I want it to. https://pcpartpicker.com/user/LordTonyStark/saved/YTBmqs

I'm just asking here if that would be the best solution (just building another computer), or if there could be some networking magic I could do to access more storage from school that's at my parents' house, or something. Do you think it would be better to just move my home PC into a smaller case? Would making a thunderbolt dock environment be worth it? I'm just thinking about options at this point and would appreciate some of your thoughts. Thanks!

[Firewrath9]

The 1800x is really cheap, consider getting that, ill make a list. 32 gb ram, any other limits? Whats your budget? How much storage?

[tjjdesign]

1 minute ago, Firewrath9 said:

The 1800x is really cheap, consider getting that, ill make a list. 32 gb ram, any other limits? Whats your budget?

Not super versed in how the last-gen Ryzen performed, so I assumed the latest generation was just better. Good tip

 

Budget is under $2000 for sure. I'd like to save as much as possible, but that's as much as I'm willing to spend.

I also want to make sure it's quiet, and won't crash if I leave it running for long periods of time.

[LienusLateTips]

1 minute ago, tjjdesign said:

Not super versed in how the last-gen Ryzen performed, so I assumed the latest generation was just better. Good tip

 

Budget is under $2000 for sure. I'd like to save as much as possible, but that's as much as I'm willing to spend.

I also want to make sure it's quiet, and won't crash if I leave it running for long periods of time.

It's a minimal IPC improvement. They just switched from 14nm to 12nm manufacturing.

[Firewrath9]

2 minutes ago, tjjdesign said:

Not super versed in how the last-gen Ryzen performed, so I assumed the latest generation was just better. Good tip

 

Budget is under $2000 for sure. I'd like to save as much as possible, but that's as much as I'm willing to spend.

I also want to make sure it's quiet, and won't crash if I leave it running for long periods of time.

The 1800x is similar to a 2700 non x

[tjjdesign]

Another thing I'd be interested in is integrated graphics for the AMD platform. Do the Ryzen G-series CPUs have 8-core, overclockable variants? I don't want to have to include a GPU if I don't have to.

(If I have to get a GPU, I wouldn't skimp out and get a cheap one just for desktop stuff. I'm greedy and would get an OK GPU that would play some games, too)

[Firewrath9]

PCPartPicker part list: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/3R78jy
Price breakdown by merchant: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/3R78jy/by_merchant/

CPU: AMD - Ryzen 7 1800X 3.6GHz 8-Core Processor  ($239.89 @ OutletPC) 
CPU Cooler: be quiet! - Dark Rock 4 CPU Cooler  ($67.99 @ SuperBiiz) 
Motherboard: ASRock - X370 Gaming-ITX/ac Mini ITX AM4 Motherboard  ($148.19 @ Amazon) 
Memory: Patriot - Viper Elite 16GB (1 x 16GB) DDR4-2666 Memory  ($147.99 @ Amazon) 
Memory: Patriot - Viper Elite 16GB (1 x 16GB) DDR4-2666 Memory  ($147.99 @ Amazon) 
Storage: Western Digital - Black NVMe 1TB M.2-2280 Solid State Drive  ($329.99 @ Amazon) 
Storage: Western Digital - Black 4TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($182.89 @ OutletPC) 
Storage: Western Digital - Black 4TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  ($182.89 @ OutletPC) 
Video Card: Gigabyte - Radeon RX 580 8GB Gaming 8G Video Card  ($259.99 @ Amazon) 
Case: Fractal Design - Define Nano S Mini ITX Desktop Case  ($59.99 @ SuperBiiz) 
Power Supply: Corsair - TXM Gold 550W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply  ($54.99 @ Newegg) 
Total: $1822.79
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2018-07-17 00:18 EDT-0400

 

 

 

 

note 360$ is 2 4tb high performance wd black hdds. You can remove them and get a 1080ti if you want

[Firewrath9]

2 minutes ago, tjjdesign said:

Another thing I'd be interested in is integrated graphics for the AMD platform. Do the Ryzen G-series CPUs have 8-core, overclockable variants? I don't want to have to include a GPU if I don't have to.

(If I have to get a GPU, I wouldn't skimp out and get a cheap one just for desktop stuff. I'm greedy and would get an OK GPU that would play some games, too)

 No, unless you are considering a intel NUC, which is a tiny tiny tiny pc.

[Firewrath9]

More budget friendly

https://pcpartpicker.com/list/GCNc4q

only 1400$

[LienusLateTips]

14 minutes ago, Firewrath9 said:

 

note 360$ is 2 4tb high performance wd black hdds. You can remove them and get a 1080ti if you want

Loud and no difference over something like Toshiba X300.

[Firewrath9]

https://pcpartpicker.com/list/Cs9rmq

black theme except for mobo  

[tjjdesign]

17 hours ago, Firewrath9 said:

https://pcpartpicker.com/list/Cs9rmq

black theme except for mobo  

I had to deal with gamery red LEDs shining out all over my room at night bugging everyone, so a new build would need to have NO side panel whatsoever. I've seen the cost impact of choosing RBG/color schemes, so it'll be nice to ditch that mentality totally.
Also lol, even the drives are black

17 hours ago, LienusLateTips said:

Loud and no difference over something like Toshiba X300.

This. The drives don't need to be "gaming optimized" (if that ever even matters, lol) since its meant for backups mainly and just needs to run RAID smoothly and reliably.

[LienusLateTips]

52 minutes ago, tjjdesign said:

I had to deal with gamery red LEDs shining out all over my room at night bugging everyone, so a new build would need to have NO side panel whatsoever. I've seen the cost impact of choosing RBG/color schemes, so it'll be nice to ditch that mentality totally.
Also lol, even the drives are black

Go for something like the Define C as a case then. It's a case that's both budget friendly and really nice to work in, and premium feeling. O have one myself, but I have the side panel window version. The no window version has noise dampening instead of the window.

[Firewrath9]

If you just want drives that will run raid very smoothly, consider NAS drives, as they are design for 24/7 operation.

[LienusLateTips]

1 hour ago, Firewrath9 said:

If you just want drives that will run raid very smoothly, consider NAS drives, as they are design for 24/7 operation.

And slow...

[Firewrath9]

1 minute ago, LienusLateTips said:

And slow...

Raid 10, my wd red pros are actually quite fast.