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Thread: 4-5 Year PC build

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    4-5 Year PC build

    Hi All

    I am after a bit of advice

    Basically the time has come to rebuild / Build a new computer. Basically every 4-5 years I look at replacing most of my PC.


    Currently I have

    Q9650 intel Quad processor
    Nvidia 780i SLI motherboard
    2 x GTX 260 black edition graphics cards
    4 x 2GB RAM kingston and crucial (crucial died and RMA'd back kingston was bought as replacement while I waited hense the 2 manufactures)
    2 x 1TB WD in mirror RAID config (has saved my data once )

    1000W corsair i think its the HX series PSU but i know it is a 1000W


    basically ive been trying to get my head around all the new products that have come out and after 5 hours of looking at different parts I have come up with

    Asus MAXIMUS VII HERO Z97 Socket 1150 VGA DVI HDMI 8-ch audio ATX Motherboard
    Intel Core i7 4790K 4GHz Socket 1150 8MB L3 Cache Retail Boxed Processor
    G.Skill 16GB(8GBx2) G-Skill TridentX DDR3 PC3-17000 2133mhz Cas9 1.6
    Gigabyte GTX 970 G1 Gaming 4GB GDDR5 Dual DVI HDMI DisplayPort PCI-E Graphics Card

    the case I have is a cool master HAF 932 which along with the PSU I am looking to reuse as both to me are big enough to encorporate the new build. SSD drives I have not looked at yet but I will be once I have a better idea if I have the above correct.

    basically the graphics card and CPU I am happy with. The motherboard I have chosen through a bit of research and im happy with the features of the board. can I have some advice if this one is OK or not.

    I am definatly stuck on RAM I only came accross the TridentX memory by accident and a few people said its the memory for the motherboard. I really need some advice here on this one please.

    I mainly use the PC to play games such as Battlefield, World Of Tanks, Eve Online

    anyhelp would be much appreciated

    Thanks

    Chris H

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    Re: 4-5 Year PC build

    Have you considered the Core i7 5820K??

    With the graphics card I personally think the GTX970/R9 290 will start to look a tad old hat in another year or so when 20NM hits. 28NM has been around for a very long time as nodes come.

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    Re: 4-5 Year PC build

    There's always something around the corner. Maxwell might be only 28nm but it still provided a big speed boost.

    You are clearly going for a very premium, luxury build.

    RAM is unlikely to make any real difference to gaming, I'd shop around, there's nothing special about Trident-X.

    What are your plans regarding CPU cooler?

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    Re: 4-5 Year PC build

    I have an Asus Maximus VII Ranger and must say that I have found it to be a solid performer which overclocks my i7 4790K easily using its packaged suite of software (direct from the user frienly bios or using theAsus package within windows). Also runs a R9 280x well with solid on board audio.

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    Re: 4-5 Year PC build

    Quote Originally Posted by Willzzz View Post
    There's always something around the corner. Maxwell might be only 28nm but it still provided a big speed boost.

    You are clearly going for a very premium, luxury build.

    RAM is unlikely to make any real difference to gaming, I'd shop around, there's nothing special about Trident-X.

    What are your plans regarding CPU cooler?
    Yes but the performance gain is minimal over the previous generation though. The level of performance has been there since last year,just they have dropped power consumption. If you looked at the jump from the GTX780TI to a GTX980 and remove all the hype,its smaller than the jump from the GTX480 to GTX580.

    Both AMD and Nvidia are reaching the limits of the process now,and just drawing it out until 16NM/20NM hits. Its going to be like someone getting an X1950XT/7950GT on the cusp of the 8800 series launch and so.

    If I were getting a card to last 4 to 5 years,I would not be getting any of the current ones. In fact the Geforce Titan II or R9 390X cards have more chance of lasting that amount time looking at what the rumours are indicating but will probably not be cheap/

    However,its just better to upgrade the card every two to three years.

    5 years ago we had the HD5870 1GB and GTX285 which would struggle with anything reasonably modern if you ramp up the settings.

    If the OP cannot afford another graphics card for another 5 years,I would seriouly get a Xeon E3 1230 V3,a £50 motherboard and 8GB of RAM,and put the rest into a account to buy another card with a bit extra added on in three years time. I assume they could get another £200 to £250 card then after they sell their old one.
    Last edited by CAT-THE-FIFTH; 08-11-2014 at 06:01 PM.

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    Re: 4-5 Year PC build

    Then you'd have no card..

    The performance gain may be minimal, but the price/performance ratio has got a lot better.
    The value of the 970 over last gen cards is a massive step forwards.
    We have a card that outperforms Titan for a third of the price.

    You can wait, but what if the shrink doesn't bring the improvements you expect?
    When Intel shrank Sandy Bridge it wasn't a massive success.

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    Re: 4-5 Year PC build

    Quote Originally Posted by Willzzz View Post
    Then you'd have no card..

    The performance gain may be minimal, but the price/performance ratio has got a lot better.
    The value of the 970 over last gen cards is a massive step forwards.
    We have a card that outperforms Titan for a third of the price.

    You can wait, but what if the shrink doesn't bring the improvements you expect?
    When Intel shrank Sandy Bridge it wasn't a massive success.
    The GTX970 is not really a massive increase in price/performance in any way. It drops power consumption but people are running R9 290,GTX780 and Geforce Titan cards off 450W/460W PSUs perfectly fine. Last year you could get GTX780 and R9 290 cards for under £300 with games and certainly you could do this year for months. I should know since I pointed people to those deals.

    Both the R9 290 and GTX780 outperformed/matched Titan too a few months after it is was launched,and after a year(well more than that) on a mature process node,a slight performance increase and a power consumption drop is expected. Most GTX970 cards reviewed are pre-overclocked ones compared to reference GTX780 and R9 290 cards with lower clockspeeds,unlike most of the ones you could buy which had better coolers and higher actually clockspeeds.

    The GTX970/GTX980 hype levels are close to that of an Apple launch IMHO. Very nice cards,but not a 8800GTX moment,let alone a 8800GT one.

    Plus 4 to 5 years??

    The OP is better served getting a Xeon E3 1230,£50 Z87 motherboard and 8GB of RAM and putting the money saved in a deposit account and buying another new new card in two to three years time,instead of keeping a new one for 5 years.

    They are going to be far more limited by a GTX970 in three years which will look crap than a slightly slower Core i7.

    By then the GTX1170 will probably be 70% faster and have a better DX12 implementation.
    Last edited by CAT-THE-FIFTH; 08-11-2014 at 06:22 PM. Reason: Clarified what I was saying.

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    Re: 4-5 Year PC build

    Biggest wins would be sticking a big SSD in there for the OS/games and maybe bumping the graphics card up to new gen. Motherboard/CPU/RAM won't get you anywhere near the same benefit IMO.

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    Re: 4-5 Year PC build

    I totally agree that from a value perspective he should save on the CPU/mobo.
    But I just don't see waiting for the next gen GPUs to be reasonable.

    You can get a 970 for £250 with a free game, lower power consumption and will run quiet and cool.

    Talking of PSU, he should try and sell his current unit and get a lower wattage modern replacement.

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    Re: 4-5 Year PC build

    Quote Originally Posted by Willzzz View Post
    I totally agree that from a value perspective he should save on the CPU/mobo.
    But I just don't see waiting for the next gen GPUs to be reasonable.

    You can get a 970 for £250 with a free game, lower power consumption and will run quiet and cool.

    Talking of PSU, he should try and sell his current unit and get a lower wattage modern replacement.
    I was talking from the case if he expected it to last 4 to 5 years - I would expect the 16NM/20NM ones to have a far greater chance of that.

    OTH,if he were to save on his CPU and motherboard,he could put away enough money(plus the sale of his card in two to three years time) to get GTX1170(or whatever its called or the AMD equivalent) to replace what he gets now.

    If he wants to overclock even the Core i5 4690K over the Xeon E3 1230 V3. In terms of upgrades I actually needed,I found I tend to actually spend more on graphics cards than CPUs.

    That way he would have a more viable gaming build.

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    Re: 4-5 Year PC build

    Well he is still running GTX 260s.

    Newer products will almost certainly last longer, but you can't wait for ever.

    Because of these difficult decisions I agree he should spend less on the CPU. Even a mid range CPU should last 4-5 years easily, whereas even a top end GPU will get leapfrogged before long.

    Spend less on the CPU, buy whichever GPU is best value and then re-evaluate your system in 3 years or so.
    If the performance is lacking the savings will let you upgrade sooner.

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    Re: 4-5 Year PC build

    Quote Originally Posted by razman927 View Post
    Intel Core i7 4790K 4GHz Socket 1150 8MB L3 Cache Retail Boxed Processor

    Is this purely for gaming or do you intend to do video editing etc..? If it is just for gaming then I would suggest going for the i5 over the i7 as the only main difference is the Hyper Threading.
    Case:Coolermaster HAF X 942 - Motherboard:AsRock z68 Extreme4 Gen3
    CPU:i5 2500k @ 4.8 ghz - Cooler:Corsair H100
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    Re: 4-5 Year PC build

    Four or five years between CPU upgrades is fine, especially as the pace of process technology is slowing down. For gaming though, I personally update the GPU every three years or so, depending on the games I'm playing & the resolution I'm gaming at. I fairly recently made the jump to 1440p, which is what really necessitated my recent GPU upgrade. I dare say in a few years time when 4K monitors are a bit more affordable, I'll upgrade my GPU once again.

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    Re: 4-5 Year PC build

    Thanks for the reply’s I am certainly taking note of what is said

    Obviously what I am trying to achieve is another PC build that would hopefully last another 4-5 years with out changing the main components which is where i am now. The PC is now struggling with maintaining 30-40 FPS on the games that i play on lowest settings available. When I have looked at what is happening the processor seems to be more struggling with trying to keep up with the games hence why i think its time for an upgrade.

    The system I currently have is completely stock with no overclocking that I am aware of. I certainly left all the options in the BIOS such as voltages and clock speeds set to auto or default. Current temps idle at around 40C across the 4 cores and peeks out at 65C to 70C under full load.

    The new Build I was looking to use the stock CPU cooler and run stock speeds. I haven’t had that great of success with overclocking PC's so I tend to steer away from this hence the stock components and speeds. I can use other coolers and parts no problem im not trying to be cheap or cut corners its just its somthing ive tried in the past with little success.

    Obviously I’m not trying to say money isn’t a problem but I tried to do what I did last time and look at the latest processors and compared prices and select one that seemed good value for money at the time. Things seem to have become a little more complicated since I built this PC. The choice was 2 or 4 core with what speed the CPU was lol. Same with the memory just looked at what was the fastest available for the motherboard on the specs and go with that unless it was overpriced.

    Obviously I can look at buying a second card to SLI in the future or again look at what graphics cards are available.

    CAT-THE-FIFTH Thanks mate I did not see that processor when I was looking. See again based on the above I would consider that as a possible upgrade based on price and speed but I would not consider the next one up the 5930K at £439.40 compared to £295.99 for the 5820K for what looks like a small speed boost and the cost involved.

    I have no problem with dropping the specs of the processor to an i5 instead of an i7. I only went for the i7 as well the name suggested and the way I understood it to me it was newer tech. Again GPU I had a look at the card and the gigabyte G1 came out as a good card but I will keep looking in to others. The RAM I really seemed to get lost in a sea of either what I would consider way overpriced or I don’t really know what would be best.

    Am I looking at this a completely wrong way or am I on the right track of thought ?????

    If you want I could start right from the beginning and ask what would be a decent spec system build that would ideally last around the same length of time with a budget of around £1000 off the bat.


    I really appreciate the help I do openly admit I get confused looking at all this im trying to make the right decisions . I think building the PC is the easy part lol

    Thanks

    Chris H

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    Re: 4-5 Year PC build

    Personally I'd spend less and then upgrade sooner if needed.

    Your CPU and Mobo currently cost £400, you could spend half that and not notice any decrease in performance.
    The more expensive CPU might last longer, but it's a tricky business predicting the future.
    For gaming the GPU is way more important than the CPU.

    A lot does depend on whether you do want to overclock or not, if you aren't overclocking then you don't want to be messing around with K processors and expensive motherboards.
    It's relatively trivial to get a modest overclock, but again this is unlikely to impact gaming much or to ensure the PC lasts much longer.

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