New build sub 2k

Richard tea · 13-11-2023 7:36am #1

1. What is your budget? €2000 including a monitor

2. What will be the main purpose of the computer? Everyday use with Gaming. I would like to future proof for gaming over the next few years.

3. Do you need a copy of Windows? I need Windows 11

4. Can you use any parts from an old computer? Not really. I might upgrade the current pc for another family member.

5. Do you need a monitor? Yes, Current monitor is a 24'' and this size seems a perfect for for my desk. I could push to 27'' if needed.

5a. If yes, what size do you need. 24''-27''

5b. If no, what resolution is your current monitor and do you plan to upgrade in the near future?

6. Do you need any of these peripherals? [Keyboard/Mouse/Wireless Card/Card Reader/Speakers/etc.] Wireless card or built into the motherboard would be useful.

7. Are you willing to try overclocking? Yes. Ive stumbled my way through it in the past

8. How can you pay? PayPal /Debit Card/ Online with card

9. When are you purchasing? Very near future. I can hang on for black Friday deals.

10. If you need help building it, where are you based? No thanks.

If it makes sense I can pick up the monitor now or black Friday deal If anyone spots a deal. Im kind of hoping on basing the build around the RTX 4070. Of course Ill take on any suggestions regarding this. I do have the Meta quest 2 that I would like to connect to the pc also at some stage.

Richard tea · 14-11-2023 12:10pm

Sorry not seeing an edit button. Just to add im open to AMD alternatives regarding the CPU and GPU.

Spear · 14-11-2023 12:54pm

Does that monitor support g-sync/freesync/VRR?

minitrue · 14-11-2023 4:50pm

At €2k you have lots of options here and really what sort of games and how much that is a focus Vs other use probably helps decide whether you just want to go a bit cheaper, go more all out on the graphics card or splurge on the cpu. And of course aesthetics are a whole other matter which could skew where you put your budget. Also you could want to more heavily invest in a quite premium monitor and dial back the PC or vice-versa.

Here's one possible way to go just to give a starting point, I'm assuming gaming is really the focus and nothing else you do is demanding:

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D 4.2 GHz 8-Core Processor (€406.50 @ Caseking)

CPU Cooler: Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE ARGB 66.17 CFM CPU Cooler (€36.99 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Motherboard: MSI B650 GAMING PLUS WIFI ATX AM5 Motherboard (€182.00 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Memory: Corsair Vengeance 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR5-6000 CL30 Memory (€133.28 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Storage: TEAMGROUP MP44L 2 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 4.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive (€97.00 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Video Card: XFX RX-79TMBABF9 Radeon RX 7900 XT 20 GB Video Card (€860.00 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Case: Phanteks Eclipse G300A (3 Fan) ATX Mid Tower Case (€77.89 @ Caseking)

Power Supply: SeaSonic FOCUS GX 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (€103.13 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Monitor: AOC Q27G2U/BK 27.0" 2560 x 1440 144 Hz Monitor (€189.90 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Total: €2086.69 accoring to PC Partpicker so wild guess €2175 by the time it gets here and pushing the budget a bit too far

First off obviously you could save a lot dropping back to the 4070 you mentioned or a 7800xt. Or you can drop the cpu down to a 7700X or 7600. Or both if you want to put money elsewhere (including your pocket)! The above is going all out on the cpu for high framerates with the best gpu you can probably realistically target. My gut instinct is you are just past the point where a Ryzen 7600(X) makes sense but the bump from 7700 to 7800X3D is hard to resist. I still really debated just suggesting a 7600 now and then down the road a 7800X3D or 8800X3D and if your mostly playing gpu heavy/cpu light games it's probably a good call. Just going with a 7700 now would wouldn't be an unreasonable way to hedge your bets.

Intel is similar enough, more power hungry but less tales of odd ram issues. Biggest difference though is no new cpus for the motherboard so it would be even more of a case of buying now whatever you might want. AM4 is certainly still the value king but when you mention the magic future proofing words I lean towards spending the bit more on AM5 instead. Moving to a 5800X3d though along with swapping the board and ram would get the above into budget (I think).

I'd have gone with a cheaper motherboard (Asrock HDV-M2) but you said you would like wifi and the big gpu likes the bigger case so atx just to avoid it looking a little off. There's not really enough money difference between this and adding a decent wifi card to the cheaper matx board for me to suggest it.

The value isn't good at current pricing to step up to a 7900xtx graphics card imho but if you really wanted nvidia a 4070ti is about the same price (or there's one from Amazon for about €50 less as long as you can wait until 8th December for it to arrive). For long term life that 20GB Vs 12GB wins in my book (16GB I think is the safety point due to the consoles) and it's also generally a little faster anyway.

There's an IPS LG 165Hz monitor for €239 that I'd probably go with instead but for a gaming focus it's really a questionable premium (though it also has a height adjustable stand to help lessen the pain). Obviously, particularly if you do photo/video editing, you could change the balance a lot in terms of the budget to throw money at a more premium monitor. You could also not care about high framerates for the games you play and switch to 60Hz or 75Hz (4K if you wanted) dropping back the cpu or gpu depending on what sort of games you really want to target or both if it's not 4K and not cpu heavy games.

I you dropped down cpu/gpu enough to open up the budget a premium ssd could make sense but the value of the above is much better.

The non RGB version of the cooler is more expensive right now as far as I looked or I would have picked it! Personally I'd probably spend the extra €10 to NOT have RGB! There are cheaper (and pricier) cases and power supplies out there, again I picked those as what I see as decent value from the options I could see without cutting off your nose (or fingers on a super cheap case). You could go with the single fan version of the case for €10 less and add some other fans to get rid of the RGB for not much.

Some more clues about what your priorities are and if you have that bit of wiggle room in the budget or would really prefer to get in well under budget would help people offer better suggestions. Probably you will want to end up trying to nail down the sort of monitor you want to see if you can pickup a bargain and then let that choice and what remains from your budget help guide the rest.

I'll close by saying overclocking isn't what it used to be, you can generally just make sure you have enabled any simple options (like PBO and EXPO/XMP), don't have bad cooling and leave it. The gains to be had from tinkering, exceptional cooling and throwing power at it just aren't as big any more so if you stumbled through it before you probably don't want to focus on it let alone spend the extra to give yourself the extra headroom (and the X3D chips barely have any overclocking options anyway).

Richard tea · 14-11-2023 5:49pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121366435#Comment_121366435

I'm not sure. I'll check later when I'm home. It was first released in 2014 as far as I know.

Richard tea · 14-11-2023 5:55pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121367861#Comment_121367861

Wow such good info. I'll have a better read when I'm home later tonight.

Current games are deadside, dayZ and the upcoming the day before title. I figured I don't upgrade like I planned when initially getting a system. Im more of a use it for 5/7 years then get a total new build.

Like you say 2k is not a target. If I can get a decent system with monitor that will get me at least 5 years without struggling it would be great. My current GPU is a Radeon rx4800 (I think) and it's still doing ok.

minitrue · 14-11-2023 10:51pm

"I don't upgrade" is important and valuable insight that should steer you a bit. Personally I'd take that as a hint towards better cpu (or at least not cutting it tight with the plan to upgrade) as swapping a gpu is easy compared to a cpu and you can usually keep on dropping the graphics settings to make up for an ageing gpu but once a cpu starts falling short only system surgery can help (assuming there is a cpu upgrade possible without changing the board and maybe more).

A little perversely I'd say it also throws AM4 (and Intel) back on the table as it negates the biggest advantage of AM5 which is the cpu upgrade path. There is a performance bump for AM5 but it's also less mature (memory issues for some), charges a premium and for the type of games you mention I'm not sure it's worth it (the contrast with the above paragraph though explains "perversely").

Those all look like competitive online shooter type games of sorts so I'd say forget 60/75 hz and target 120hz or higher. Given you are asking here and haven't brought it up before now my guess is the original idea of 1440p is going to be all around nicer than trying to go for something like 1080p240 or higher which is more esports/professional gamer territory and pushes you even further on the fastest cpu/ram path so less value for money imho. Sticking with 1080p and saving money is viable but you have the budget not to.

So changing the above to AM4 we'd end up very close to the 2k after swapping the monitor to the 165Hz IPS monitor and it would be inside 2k delivered if you stuck with the VA monitor. Because you said "everyday use with gaming" I'd probably lean towards the IPS. You could get a genuine HDR monitor and those sorts of games would probably enjoy it but you would be looking at more like €450 for the monitor (and that's taking a punt on an odd brand from a Chinese seller without much feedback) and stepping back the gpu and/or cpu to make it work in budget. My guess is good HDR monitors will be falling in price over the next couple of years and you are better off not skewing your budget heavily to the monitor but it's another valid option if it's what you wanted.

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D 3.4 GHz 8-Core Processor (€335.67 @ Caseking)

CPU Cooler: Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE ARGB 66.17 CFM CPU Cooler (€36.99 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Motherboard: Gigabyte B550 AORUS ELITE AX V2 ATX AM4 Motherboard (€149.87 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Memory: Corsair Vengeance LPX 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory (€75.31 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Storage: TEAMGROUP MP44L 2 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 4.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive (€97.00 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Video Card: XFX Speedster MERC 310 Black Edition Radeon RX 7900 XT 20 GB Video Card (€875.00 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Case: Phanteks Eclipse G300A (3 Fan) ATX Mid Tower Case (€77.89 @ Caseking)

Power Supply: SeaSonic FOCUS GX 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (€103.02 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Monitor: LG UltraGear 27.0" 2560 x 1440 165 Hz Monitor (€239.00 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Total: €1989.75

Note that gpu price is buying it from Amazon themselves, there's a seller who passes the sniff test who would save you €45 but I'd personally be loathe to make that gamble for so little with nearly half your budget. And yes, I screwed up the last time and the €860 one was from that seller.

The 5800X3D is the last gen king of gaming cpus which generally still elicits the reactions of "look how good it still is" when it's benchmarked alongside the new cpus. It's overkill but I'd lean towards it and the 7900XT Vs say a 5800X and 7900XTX with the long haul in mind (and it would cost a little more), but a 5800X (or 5700X if the price gap was bigger) isn't a bad choice if you just want the money in your pocket or to spend it elsewhere but again I'd say don't scrimp back to a 6 core here even though it's probably fine for the foreseeable (like the 16GB gpu, consoles are 8 core so some developers could drop the ball on PC ports to less cores).

To give you an idea of what dialling it back for bang-per-buck but not really cutting the corners looks like (if you don't mind taking the punt on the good looking but not Amazon seller for the gpu at this price) then you could go with something like the following and then pick your poison with the monitor:

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5800X 3.8 GHz 8-Core Processor (€202.99 @ Amazon Deutschland)

CPU Cooler: Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE ARGB 66.17 CFM CPU Cooler (€36.99 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Motherboard: Gigabyte B550 AORUS ELITE AX V2 ATX AM4 Motherboard (€149.87 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Memory: Corsair Vengeance LPX 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory (€75.31 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Storage: TEAMGROUP MP44L 2 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 4.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive (€97.00 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Video Card: XFX Speedster SWFT 319 Radeon RX 6800 16 GB Video Card (€429.00 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Case: Phanteks Eclipse G300A (3 Fan) ATX Mid Tower Case (€77.89 @ Caseking)

Power Supply: SeaSonic FOCUS GX 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (€103.02 @ Amazon Deutschland)

Total: €1172.07

Obviously with that you have a mountain of cash to re-assign to monitor, aesthetics, peripherals or your pocket ;) When it's not the X3D chip I'd love to swap the ram for CL16 but the current price and bang-per-buck ethos of that build won't let me. Black Friday or just a random deal could easily put that on the table though and snap for a premium ssd and who knows what else takes your fancy. Given nothing else here is coming from Caseking it might be worth finding a different case if you went this route.

Going for something like the 5800X3D with the RX 6800 would be good if you might change the gpu in say 3 years time but wouldn't dream of changing the cpu. At 1440p ultra the 7900XT is probably 35%-40% faster than the RX6800 so it is a bit of a different league but as you can see it's also a wildly different price! The further up you push the total system price the more in makes sense and conversely the more you dial back the more extravagant the extra umph is.

For perspective the RX6800 is close to past 3x and could be 3.5x the speed of the RX480 and the 7900XTX is somewhere from 4x to getting close to 5x (depends on the games, resolutions and settings).

Oooops, I never include a copy of windows. Run it free with a watermark and trivial restrictions or pickup a cheap key unless you love MS or it's a work machine where you want to be super squeaky clean.

Richard tea · 15-11-2023 12:09am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121369354#Comment_121369354

Excellent advice Minitrue. I have to google most of that information as I dont keep up to date with the latest and greatest tech info and terminology. The Ryzen 7 5800X3D paired with the RX 7900 XT seems the best and most appropriated option for me and will safe guard me into the distant future. Ill will keep on eye on all those parts over the next few weeks looking for deals if they arise. Just to double check will the 750w ps be up to the task?

Aesthetics is not important as the pc sits under a desk. Apart from the cpu thermal paste is there anything else to purchase for during the build? cables? brackets?

minitrue · 15-11-2023 12:41am

Shouldn't need anything other than a screwdriver, even thermal paste is a luxury for just in case you have to reseat the cpu (in fact check if your chosen cooler comes with pre-applied paste or a small tube).

I'd be perfectly happy with 750W there (at least a good/real 750W not a dirt cheap 750W). pcpartpickers calls a build like that 525W so there's a solid chunk spare. 120W X3D and 315W 7900XT is 435W nominally and both figures are about right for average draw under full load though the 7900xt could have a transient spike to more like 400W so still genuinely within 750W with all the other devices (and a good power supply won't trip at 751W and will handle a spike). Throw in the fact it's virtually impossible to get everything chewing full power unless it's a stress test.

If the budget is there and price is right a bigger PSU might have it's fan spin a fraction slower and if you want to try and overclock the card you could manage to make it draw some more (though I really doubt you could get it to do enough to trouble the power supply).

I have been called out before for not being excessively cautious enough in overpowering power supplies but unless I knew I was planning to put in some more power hungry cards, leds, fans and wire up lots of maximum draw usb devices I'd be fine with what I said.

Spear · 15-11-2023 10:54am

In terms of cables, screws, brackets, the case will normally includes a little box/bag with all that's needed. Even the cooler should have pre-applied thermal paste, and on the quality cooler, it'll also be good quality paste too. Should just a screwdriver is an absolute requirement.

Richard tea · 15-11-2023 12:01pm

Quick one Guys. I have never ordered multiple items from amazon.de before. Will i be charged X amount per item or if all items are in the basket its one delivery price? Basically could I be charged 10 euro ball park per item delivered?

Spear · 15-11-2023 12:03pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121370668#Comment_121370668

You'll be given options usually, to possibly split or combine the delivery if need be (availability issues etc). Otherwise the default is a single box. That's assuming they're all from Amazon direct. If any come from third party vendors selling via Amazon, they'll ship separately.

Richard tea · 15-11-2023 12:23pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121370673#Comment_121370673

Perfect thanks

K.O.Kiki · 15-11-2023 4:09pm

Talking of HDR IPS monitors, I got my Dell-Alienware AW2723DF (1440p 240Hz HDR600) for €460 in July.

And all I did was catch it on sale, and apply a Dell Advantage coupon.

Richard tea · 15-11-2023 5:40pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121371838#Comment_121371838

I did spot a Dell on hot deals UK a few days ago. To be used with a Groupon voucher and Dell discount code. Seemed a good deal

Longing · 15-11-2023 6:12pm

Another excellent IPS monitor LG Electronics 32 inch P850-B a bit cheaper it runs a Nano IPS that help increase color accuracy and gamut coverage with exceptionally low response time the colors and brightness are truly breath taking.

In July also I was going to get the Dell mentioned above put it was out of my price range. I got the LG on offer for 330 sterling in Currys in NI. I worked across the border so had not to change from euro. But I see its on Amason Germany for €388 LG Electronics 32GP850-B 80 cm UltraGear Gaming Monitor (HDR10, Nano IPS Panel with 1ms , AMD FreeSync), Black: Amazon.de: Electronics & Photo

minitrue · 15-11-2023 6:38pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121371838#Comment_121371838

The bargain side is absolutely spot on. A monitor is somewhere you can have a very big swing from "normal price" to "deal price" if you can strike at the right time.

On the HDR side I've bought into the narrative that seems to be everywhere I've run into any discussions on it that you really currently want sane local dimming (or OLED) and 1000 nits or more peak brightness e.g. displayhdr 1000 or better. I'm not saying anything less should be ignored but I wouldn't spend more than a trivial amount extra on the HDR aspect for anything less and really I'd ignore the HDR aspect there and only let it settle an "all else equal" debate.

The whacky monitor (KTC M27T20 https://www.amazon.de/dp/B0C6ZXDSTN) I spotted has a €100 Amazon "voucher" to make it the €450 instead of listed €550. It's a wild leap into the unknown but given the prices of the alternatives it's not utterly preposterous, though I just spotted a Cooler Master GP27Q for €560 from Amazon uk which would at least be less of a gamble (and the gambler could still try one from the warehouse from about €490).

In terms of the OP and the thread I was kinda just throwing out there that a particularly nice monitor wasn't out of the question with their budget and if that appealed to them black Friday could provide the sort of deal that helps get it over the line.

Richard tea · 15-11-2023 11:47pm

Ill look into the above mentioned monitors. See if a deal pops up.

The GPU has dropped to E829 which is good. The ssd and power supply are not sold by Amazon and its looking like E20 delivery added also. Could anyone suggest a SSD 2TB and power supply that ships from amazon.de?

Im just adding the items to the basket to track the prices over the next week or so. These parts are based off the AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D 3.4 GHz 8-Core Processor build Minitrue suggested earlier.

minitrue · 16-11-2023 1:15am

Ah sorry, I do usually try to only post actual Amazon prices unless I call them out, not sure about the SSD but I see now Amazon won't deliver it until January! SSDs are very commonly on sale for Black Friday. Premium SSDs like the 980 Pro, 990 Pro, MP600 Pros, Sabrent Rocket 4s, Seagate Firecuda 530 or Western Digital Black 850X could appear at an irresistible price. Dropping to a 1TB one of those, or going with something like a Crucial P5 Plus or P3 Plus or ... well options abound and if you go 1TB or just cheap now adding another one later is maybe easy enough for you to bother ;)

From Amazon UK the following is cheap right now.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0BQJ2KLSQ

The €829 gpu isn't from Amazon, it's from NR INFO who look ok maybe but not that much feedback really, pretty sure I swapped in the Amazon price and mentioned that.

Some other pretty premium PSUs delivered by Amazon and not outlandishly priced right now and you might get lucky and catch them a bit cheaper when you are ordering.

https://www.amazon.de/dp/B0BT2YZGZK

https://www.amazon.de/dp/B08X1V6G2M

https://www.amazon.de/dp/B0BVL17341

https://www.amazon.de/dp/B01N2M8T1V

Not quite as premium but still fine and a little cheaper right now:

https://www.amazon.de/dp/B0BYSRDKWZ

Super cheap right now, non-modular but again fine so if I was buying tonight for a build where the non-modular wouldn't bother me and budget was any kind of an issue I'd be tempted.

https://www.amazon.de/dp/B093GZHVT3

Richard tea · 16-11-2023 1:27pm

If I got a decent deal on some parts would it be worth while going for the AMD 5 setup. The price difference is not massively different.

minitrue · 16-11-2023 3:42pm

I think it's really about the flexibility in your budget and just what sort of prices you end up striking on. As you say the premium for AM5 now isn't likely to be very big in the overall picture of a build like this.

If you can afford it without cutting back on the gpu I don't think there is a wrong answer. If you were prone to upgrade I'd have suggested making AM5 fit even if that meant going with the 6 core 7600 cpu but as you aren't prone to upgrade I think it's just about how your feeling about the impact of it all to your wallet.

Hopefully someone others chime in with opinions to help you decide what you want to target or else as I said earlier it might just come down to seeing how much ends up going on whatever monitor you pick and then deciding if adding everything else up AM5 is just breaking the bank or you're ready to spend the extra bit.

Richard tea · 17-11-2023 11:35pm

Any thoughts on these Dell deals

https://www.dell.com/en-ie/shop/alienware-27-gaming-monitor-aw2724dm/apd/210-bhtl/monitors-monitor-accessories

minitrue · 18-11-2023 3:58pm

I'm not much of a monitor person but I don't find those Dell's very interesting. For €370 it's basically the same specs as the €239 one from Amazon. At the cheaper end there's now https://www.amazon.de/dp/B0BF5ZTQSD (Samsung G5) which is the same €189 as the other VA but it's curved if that's something that tempts you.

Things I spotted on Amazon Germany black friday deals which might interest/help you:

PSUs: Corsair RMe and RMX 750W and 850W from the 750W RMe for €95 to the 850W RMx for €120. RMe is very good, RMx is top tier.

SSDs: €84 for the 2TB Crucial P3 Plus is nice and cheap and €120 for a WD SN850X looks the best price I spotted of the premium ones.

Boards: MSI PRO B650-S Wifi is €165 for an AM5 board with wifi, I don't see reviews of it but I'd presume it's fine. B550M Mortar Wifi for AM4 is €110, micro-atx but you've basically said you don't care how it looks cause it's under the desk ;) It has a couple of weeks delivery date but that's a great price for it.

CPU: €399 for a 7800X3D from Amazon but it will take a couple of weeks also. Nothing special in terms of price but it could help you control the shipping costs.

RAM: €72 for the DDR4 3600CL18 ram is a tiny drop.

GPU: €845 from Amazon themselves for a Sapphire 7900xt.

Richard tea · 18-11-2023 4:41pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121384498#Comment_121384498

Adding stuff to the basket. I might just hit the order button as prices might just rise.

Richard tea · 28-11-2023 8:33pm

sorted

New build sub 2k

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