New PC, looking for advice on spec

[Spider95]

Hi all,

Finally time for a new PC, my current 10 year old PC has done very well but am starting to get more and more BSoDs (one per day at least) and other issues that make me suspect the mobo is finally on the way out. I've been saving up for a while now so have the funds to go for it as well.

Main uses for the PC are gaming, watching TV/movies/streams (often also while gaming), photo editing along with all the usual day to day stuff emails, word processing, spreadsheets etc. Other things:
- Needs to not be too bulky and heavy as I sometimes transport it in the car (maybe once every couple of months).
- Needs to be wifi enabled as wired connection not feasible.
- Personally I’m not interested in glass windows or RGB.
- I would like the PC to be reasonably quiet for general operation.

I’m not planning on building myself (although I am actually an Engineer me and hardware do not always get on well together!), hoping to get it as a custom 3XS system from Scan (previous PC was 3XS from Scan).

I am aware that what I’ve specced below is probably way over what I need day-to-day but I want this system to last me a good long while (last 2 PCs both lasted 10 years or more) hence a lot of this is trying to futureproof things as far as is possible. I tend to like to spend a good amount of money on something and then not have to get a new version for as long as possible!

My current thoughts on spec:

CPU: AMD Ryzen 9 3900X
Mobo: X570 Gigabyte Aorus Master
Case: be quiet! Pure Base 500, black
Cooling: H115i RGB Pro XT (if go for front radiator, or smaller H100i if went top - not sure what is best see notes below)
RAM: 32Gb (2x16) Corsair Vengance LPX (not sure if I have to be careful about exact tpye to be 'best' compatible with the 3900X?)
GPU: MSI NVIDIA Geforce RTX 2060 Super 8Gb Gaming X Turing. This is the component I’m least decided on, have picked the MSI one for now as has the 0dB which I like and reviews said was not too bad for noise when loaded.
PSU: Corsair RMx 850W 80 plus Gold full modular (750W might be sufficient but thought 850W would be better for future proofing, say better GPU in future, more drives etc.)
Drive: O/S + applications&games: 2Tb Samsung 970 EVO plus, SSD PCIe M.2
Drive: Data: 4Tb Seagate barracuda
Drive: Backup/archive: 6Tb Seagate barracuda (really just to hold a differential Acronis back-up of O/S and data drive)

Ideally I would have liked to have an optical drive, but cases with this option are generally too large or of older design, so I would plan on buying a separate external USB 3.0 bluray/DVD player/burner.

Haven’t put in a dedicated soundcard as I’m assuming what you get on mobo’s these days is sufficient?

I know it seems like a lot of storage but I have a lot of documents and photos and those will grow over the years (in current PC have 500Gb system drive, ~1.5Tb data/applications and a 4Tb backup drive plus material only on external HDDs as running out of space).

Cooling.
I’m not planning on overclocking the CPU (in the past that has just caused me more hassle in the long run).
Preference is liquid cooling – have had a liquid cooler (Corsair H50) in current PC that is still going ok.
My worry with an air cooler is that it’d be a big block of metal stressing the motherboard when I’m transporting the PC about.

Current thought would be to have the 280mm H115i mounted at the front on the case.
Not sure if I should just go with the stock Corsair fans on this, or get quieter ones?
And/or get more fans so it’s a push/pull config? (I know the pure base 500 case isn’t the best for airflow compared to other cases so maybe needs more fans?)
Case comes with 2 pure wing 140mm fans so would leave one at the rear. Other one maybe have as an extra intake or exhaust at the top?

Other option would be to go for the smaller 240mm H100i and have as a top mounted exhaust? While perhaps getting another 140mm fan so have 2 at the front and the one at the rear.

I’m really not sure what is the ‘better’ set-up with the cooling!

Any comments or observations from anyone on any of the above would be appreciated as it’s been a while since I had to spec a PC and things have changed quite a bit in the last 10 years!

Thanks,

(\(\;;/)/)

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

You are overspending on parts for zero reason,and in the end it makes little sense to do so. The fact is making a more cost effective build now,would actually mean you can upgrade the system more often.

Motherboard=waste of money
GPU=new ones coming out in a few months time,so I would not buy one now. Also the RTX2060 Super is overpriced. RTX2070 cards were cheaper before the current problems. Just use your old one.
PSU=Unless you intend to run high end GPUs,500~600W is fine.An 850W PSU won't be efficient at lower loads,but the RMx series looks a safe choice.
Coolers= be careful with your choices,QC/QA seems to have gotten worse on the newer liquid coolers with more examples of failure. Corsair is probably one of the better brands though IMHO.
SSD=Samsung are utterly overpriced,and are not worth the money IMHO.
CPU=Zen3 is coming out at the end of year,so might worth seeing how it pans out.

If you don't want the system to be bulky either go mini-ITX or mATX. There are also compact full ATX cases such as the Riotoro CR1080:
https://www.tomshardware.com/uk/revi...case,4759.html

CPU and motherboard

AWD-IT do some great value bundle deals. They sell the Ryzen 9 3900 non-X for £325ish which is around £75 cheaper than what they charge for the Ryzen 9 3900X. They are almost the same in WRT to performance:
https://www.tomshardware.com/uk/revi...eview-eco-mode

MSI Mag B550 Tomahawk bundle:
https://www.awd-it.co.uk/msi-mag-b55...ocket-am4.html

Around £505. The MSI Mag X570 bundle would cost £30 more,but the motherboard is out of stock.

If you mATX,the MSI Mag B550 Mortar Wifi bundle costs around £494:
https://www.awd-it.co.uk/msi-mag-b55...ocket-am4.html

RAM

I would go for 3600MHZ C18 or C16 RAM. Ideally you want RAM kits using Samsung B-die or Crucial E-die.

Corsair uses a lottery of memory chips,although they do "AMD optimised" kits:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Corsair-Ven.../dp/B082DGZJ9C

When Hexus reviewed them 2 years ago,they had Samsung B-die but I cannot be certain what chips they use now. However,these kits definitely have Micron E-die:
https://uk.crucial.com/memory/ddr4/bl2k16g36c16u4b

SSD

The 2TB Adata SX8200 PRO would do the job IMHO:
https://www.cclonline.com/product/29...Drive/SSD1066/

The WD SN750 is also cheaper than the Samsung 970 EVO,and has UK based RMA:
https://www.cclonline.com/product/27...Drive/SSD0988/

However,the Adata SX8200 PRO costs significantly less!

[DanceswithUnix]

SSD=Samsung are utterly overpriced,and are not worth the money IMHO.

I use them for high end work machines, they have good IOPS and a reputation for reliability which matters if you are caning it hard for days on end.

Machines where downtime isn't so important, I use something cheaper. I certainly wouldn't store games on one.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I use them for high end work machines, they have good IOPS and a reputation for reliability which matters if you are caning it hard for days on end.

Machines where downtime isn't so important, I use something cheaper. I certainly wouldn't store games on one.

Personally I wouldn't still get them,as they massively overhyped for the price,and some of their cheaper drives are made with cheap NAND,and use cheap parts. I would avoid a number of them like the plague.They are increasing coasting on their good name,with some really rubbish recent releases. They also have gotten greedier and greedier,and prices have been going up at a higher rate than competitors. Then they position drives with worse performance at more mainstream price points.

Their OVO line is rubbish,their 860 EVO SATA line is overpriced,and the 970 EVO line is incredibly overpriced for the performance.





That is the original SX8200 against the original 970 EVO. Who makes a drive with such a small SLC cache??

The newer SX8200 PRO,is even better off.





The EVO Plus,is improved,but the WD drives are still cheaper,and the Adata SX8200 PRO is almost half price.

If I was that worried about a mission critical system,I wouldn't buy an EVO at all,when there are commercial drives you can get which are more tuned to reliability.

I have not recommended any Samsung consumer drive in the last 4~5 years as they are overpriced. Companies such as WD are cheaper and have UK based RMA too. Crucial has excellent reliability and is cheaper. Known people using Crucial drives with some bioinformatics workloads which have been hammered and they are still fine. Not known a failure with any of them.

[DanceswithUnix]

That is the original SX8200 against the original 970 EVO. Who makes a drive with such a small SLC cache??

Interesting graphs; the Samsung has an average write speed of 663MB/s vs the ADATA on 506MB/s.

Then the ADATA Pro 1TB only manages 1782MB/s vs the little 970 Pro which manages 2091MB/s despite its disadvantage of being half the size.

Sorry mate, you aren't selling me on the ADATA there, I think you need to choose your graphs better

Generally I only look at 1TB+ benchmarks, who buys a 512GB SSD if they care about performance?? Partly because you want as many flash channels as possible so you can have lots of pages open for simultaneous parallel access (small drives generally have fewer chips soldered on not smaller ones), partly because you want to give the garbage collection lots of elbow room to recover faster and harvest spare pages, and if you are using an MLC/QLC drive then the SLC cache is a percentage of the total size, sometimes a percentage of the unused space.

If I'm buying a small 250 or 500GB SSD, it will be some cheap client machine that I don't much care about. Last time I used WD Blue NVMe, they've been pretty good so far, but I generally choose whatever is good value. I have even used Adata (shock!)

[MrJim]

I use them for high end work machines, they have good IOPS and a reputation for reliability which matters if you are caning it hard for days on end.

Machines where downtime isn't so important, I use something cheaper. I certainly wouldn't store games on one.

Agree with this. I get quite a few power-cuts where I live, and not having a UPS, unexpected shutdowns happen very occasionally. In my experience Samsung SSDs never miss a beat after such an occurrence, whereas a WD Black SSD corrupted my Windows installation. Bad luck maybe, but I have found Samsung SSDs to be pretty resilient & reliable.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Interesting graphs; the Samsung has an average write speed of 663MB/s vs the ADATA on 506MB/s.

Then the ADATA Pro 1TB only manages 1782MB/s vs the little 970 Pro which manages 2091MB/s despite its disadvantage of being half the size.

Sorry mate, you aren't selling me on the ADATA there, I think you need to choose your graphs better

Generally I only look at 1TB+ benchmarks, who buys a 512GB SSD if they care about performance?? Partly because you want as many flash channels as possible so you can have lots of pages open for simultaneous parallel access (small drives generally have fewer chips soldered on not smaller ones), partly because you want to give the garbage collection lots of elbow room to recover faster and harvest spare pages, and if you are using an MLC/QLC drive then the SLC cache is a percentage of the total size, sometimes a percentage of the unused space.

If I'm buying a small 250 or 500GB SSD, it will be some cheap client machine that I don't much care about. Last time I used WD Blue NVMe, they've been pretty good so far, but I generally choose whatever is good value. I have even used Adata (shock!)

I love how you could not read the graphs and ended up proving my point.The 970 PRO 1TB costs £304. You seemed to have not realised the OP was looking at the EVO. The 970 EVO Plus 2TB is £400. The Adata SX8200 2TB costs £230.

The Adata for the first 150GB written was at 1700MB/S,and the 970 EVO exhausted its SLC cache at 22GB and hit 600MB/S,so again proving the point,the 970 EVO has a more small SLC cache.Unlike you,I actually bothered to do some research,instead of worrying about brands. For most use cases,the SX8200 was faster than the 970 EVO.

Also you should try and keep upto date when making recommendations. Prices change and new models come out.

I also find it very weird,that instead of trying to help the OP,you are trying to justify a £400 SSD,when their own GPU is barely £400.

Agree with this. I get quite a few power-cuts where I live, and not having a UPS, unexpected shutdowns happen very occasionally. In my experience Samsung SSDs never miss a beat after such an occurrence, whereas a WD Black SSD corrupted my Windows installation. Bad luck maybe, but I have found Samsung SSDs to be pretty resilient & reliable.

Mine had no problems and neither did any of the Crucial drives. In my experience having me and my mates with at least 20 WD and Crucial drives and they have been fine. If you had done your research Crucial was amongst the first companies to actually include power protection on their consumer SATA SSDs,years ago! SSDs such as the Crucial M550 had it.

I find it utterly weird none of you actually want to comment on helping the OP,but instead made this into "must justify a Samsung SSD is not overpriced" kind of thread.

Even the SN750 was closer to £300 for the 2TB version a while back.Even at £365 its overpriced,but at least RMA is local.

Anything much over £150/TB for a PCI-E 3.0 drive is pushing into PCI-E 4.0 drive territory. Samsung is having a laugh.

[DanceswithUnix]

Also you should try and keep upto date when making recommendations. Prices change and new models come out.

I do. I buy them regularly, and check prices and benchmarks before I do so. I was reacting to your saying the Samsung is overpriced, and for many uses I agree (as I said, I wouldn't store games on them and it sounds like the OP might want to look elsewhere).

BUT

Your blanket comment that they are overpriced isn't fair. Your graphs to show that Adata are the slower option back up that it should be cheaper. If a drive fails, the downtime is *very* expensive so for professional use I edge towards Intel and Samsung as the brands with the best reliability image.

I really like to buy SSDs from a company where they actually make the flash. Tighter coupled engineering should make for a better drive. There aren't many of those though, given there aren't many companies that own semiconductor fabs.

Anyway, I've made my pitch. If you really care about the extra performance or want the reliability reputation, Samsung might be worth a look.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I do. I buy them regularly, and check prices and benchmarks before I do so. I was reacting to your saying the Samsung is overpriced, and for many uses I agree (as I said, I wouldn't store games on them and it sounds like the OP might want to look elsewhere).

BUT

Your blanket comment that they are overpriced isn't fair. Your graphs to show that Adata are the slower option back up that it should be cheaper. If a drive fails, the downtime is *very* expensive so for professional use I edge towards Intel and Samsung as the brands with the best reliability image.

I really like to buy SSDs from a company where they actually make the flash. Tighter coupled engineering should make for a better drive. There aren't many of those though, given there aren't many companies that own semiconductor fabs.

Anyway, I've made my pitch. If you really care about the extra performance or want the reliability reputation, Samsung might be worth a look.

If you are that concerned about downtime,you wouldn't a consumer grade SSD,you would spend the money on the commercial grades ones,which are geared towards reliability. You would be having daily drive backups,or mirroring the drives. All you are doing is trying to "scare" the OP into buying an overpriced Samsung SSD,which is when you consider their CPU is £400,their GPU is £400.

Also what is the OP doing:

" Main uses for the PC are gaming, watching TV/movies/streams (often also while gaming), photo editing along with all the usual day to day stuff emails, word processing, spreadsheets etc."

Did you even bother to read the use case scenario??

You seem to to have some massive thing for Samsung SSDs,even to the extent of trying to sell a small SLC cache as a good thing. So an 970 EVO which throttles down to SATA speeds after 22GB is better than an SSD which does so after 150GB?? So basically an SSD which is slower for 95% of file copies. Micron makes its own flash. WD makes its own flash and controllers.

No PCI-E 3.0 SSD should be over £150/TB unless its MLC.

[Helios451]

Hi Spider95,

I have the same board with a Ryzen 9 3900 and can confirm that it's solid and has good built-in wi-fi (I also work where a wired connection isn't possible). The sound is good, too.

Most compatible RAM is 3600 MHz, as that aligns with frequency of the AMD 'Infinity Fabric', which I understand is essentially the Front Side Bus, handling data between the RAM and the CPU.

As for cooling, I've got a be quiet! Dark Pro 4 CPU fan, which is really quiet and effective. I've also got the be quiet! Pure Base 500 and it's great for back to front ventilation, directly through the CPU fan. I've added another fan at the front to direct a stream of air to the GPU. So far my CPU sits between 35 and 40 degrees unless I'm doing a benchmark, when it might hit 70 or so. GPU doesn't go over 70, as well.

[MrJim]

Mine had no problems and neither did any of the Crucial drives. In my experience having me and my mates with at least 20 WD and Crucial drives and they have been fine. If you had done your research Crucial was amongst the first companies to actually include power protection on their consumer SATA SSDs,years ago! SSDs such as the Crucial M550 had it.

I find it utterly weird none of you actually want to comment on helping the OP,but instead made this into "must justify a Samsung SSD is not overpriced" kind of thread.

Even the SN750 was closer to £300 for the 2TB version a while back.Even at £365 its overpriced,but at least RMA is local.

Anything much over £150/TB for a PCI-E 3.0 drive is pushing into PCI-E 4.0 drive territory. Samsung is having a laugh.

Wow, you really do have a problem with anyone who expresses an opinion that diverges in the slightest from your own, don't you? I wasn't trying to make this into a "justify a Samsung is not overpriced kind of thread". I didn't actually comment on Samsung's pricing. I agree they are expensive, and that there are plenty of cheaper options if you can't afford, or don't want pay their prices. I was simply stating my experience of having owned a few Samsung SSDs, as did you regarding WD drives. Ultimately it's OP to decide what he chooses to buy.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Wow, you really do have a problem with anyone who expresses an opinion that diverges in the slightest from your own, don't you? I wasn't trying to make this into a "justify a Samsung is not overpriced kind of thread". I didn't actually comment on Samsung's pricing. I agree they are expensive, and that there are plenty of cheaper options if you can't afford, or don't want pay their prices. I was simply stating my experience of having owned a few Samsung SSDs, as did you regarding WD drives. Ultimately it's OP to decide what he chooses to buy.

You both had a problem when I pointed Samsung was overpriced. If you dodn't have problem with anyone who expresses an opinion that diverges in the slightest from your own,you wouldn't be responding,right??

What?? So now you have a problem when I pointed out Crucial had power protection for years?? You did know that right??

https://bit-tech.net/reviews/tech/st...12gb-review/1/

Look at the the thread title,none of you are interesting in offering the OP some feedback on any part of the build outside the SSD. But both of you felt the need to get involved because I said they were overpriced.....which they are in the UK. Which can be observed by looking at price/TB compared to other reputable brands.

Oh! Noes! Somewhat said it was overpriced - just like I said the motherboard was overpriced for the purpose of usage. Why don't you moan at me for saying that too.

Which they are,if you looking at performance and price/TB. Instead BOTH of you started making subjective comments about how Samsung was more reliable,etc. Do you think I haven't been long enough to see people start putting "doubt" in other's minds??

Remember,you are spending someone else's money and someone who has not built a PC for years. They themselves are not sure of what they want to get,which is quite clear on what they have listed.Also,dunno what weird game you are playing - I always go for the cheaper option. I am not here to justify people spend £100s more on PCs that they don't need.

But apparently on Hexus £200 extra for an SSD is fine,when it costs more than their graphics card. Now the poor OP,will feel scared buying any other brand. Good one. They might as well buy the Samsung now.

Some of you are acting like Samsung never had SSD problems at all.

[Helios451]

Excuse me, Cat, but can I respectfully suggest we re-orientate to answering the OP's questions, please?

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Excuse me, Cat, but can I respectfully suggest we re-orientate to answering the OP's questions, please?

Well respectively you should ask the other two also,as they have basically tried to imply any SSD brand apart from Samsung isn't reliable. I don't understand what their problem is with saying Samsung is overpriced,which seems to be them implyng everything else is "less reliable",which I have a problem with. They seemingly ignore Samsung also have bugs too. Even the SN750 2TB was £300ish a few days ago. So that is anything between £90~£160 cheaper not going for Samsung.This is enough to get a RTX2070 Super.

You can even get a 2TB PCI-E 4.0 SSD for less money(or similar) than a 970 EVO(Corsair MP600,Gigabyte Aorus,Seagate FireCuda 520,etc). It is overpriced.

Even if you look at the reviews,the MSI Tomahawks have really overbuilt VRMs,especially in a stock configuration. The X570 is mostly advantageous if you have multiple PCI-E 4.0 NVME SSDs,as that is where X570 scores over B550. But some of the B550 motherboards have better VRMs than X570 motherboards.

[Spider95]

Thanks all so far for your replies, lots of interesting info to have a look at and digest.

You are overspending on parts for zero reason,and in the end it makes little sense to do so. The fact is making a more cost effective build now,would actually mean you can upgrade the system more often.

Motherboard=waste of money
GPU=new ones coming out in a few months time,so I would not buy one now. Also the RTX2060 Super is overpriced. RTX2070 cards were cheaper before the current problems. Just use your old one.
PSU=Unless you intend to run high end GPUs,500~600W is fine.An 850W PSU won't be efficient at lower loads,but the RMx series looks a safe choice.
Coolers= be careful with your choices,QC/QA seems to have gotten worse on the newer liquid coolers with more examples of failure. Corsair is probably one of the better brands though IMHO.
SSD=Samsung are utterly overpriced,and are not worth the money IMHO.
CPU=Zen3 is coming out at the end of year,so might worth seeing how it pans out.
If you don't want the system to be bulky either go mini-ITX or mATX.

Thanks CAT-THE-FIFTH, I do get your point here about cost effective now and upgrade the system more often - however I don't want to have to upgrade the system more often, I would prefer to pay more to have a really good solid base system (CPU, mobo, power, cooling and case) that will last me a good long time (yes I know that components may only have a particular life, that is a risk) - and only have to think about upgrades for more 'simple' replacements: RAM, GPU, Hard drives. Because that is the level I am comfortable with in terms of what I'm happy to fiddle about with inside the case. I'm going to be getting Scan (hopefully) to build the system for me, I'm not doing it myself (I am in no way interested in building a PC) - so want everything to be in there from the get-go so is all covered by the 3XS warranty (although I will maybe speak to them about possibility of reuse graphics card). Is this a cost effective approach? Maybe not in the long run - but that's only one part of the equation I'm considering. Not the approach everyone would take I know, but personally it's what I prefer to do.

Have not looked at all your links yet but thank you very much for all the info and suggestions.

Re GPU & CPU: I'm not sure I can wait until the end of the year, or indeed a few months - as I fear my current system is on its last legs. However good to know these are what to watch out for that are 'coming soon'.
Mobo: Part of the reasons for this one was it has PCIe 4, wifi and also a good number of USB ports and got good reviews. Expensive, yes: But seemed like a mobo that would last me a good long time and cover a lot of bases in the future - which is one of my higher priorities.
PSU: If I do go with the spec I plan then 750W I think is the minimum based on the values I put into a power calc (I forget which one) plus leaving a reasonable overhead so PSU is not too fully loaded plus future proofing in case in the future I went with a more power hungry graphics card. However if I end up going for a lesser spec then I'll need to redo the calcs and yes go lower.
SSDs: I see there is a lot of discussion on this in other posts here! I have not read the detail so cannot comment on this yet (other than saying I currently have a Samsung 850 EVO SSD I've been quite happy with). I'm still trying to decide what is best here for O/S applications and games. Possibly might consider smaller M.2 for the system and then get an SSD for game/apps - but then losing speed advantage of the M.2
Cooling: Yes I'm in a quandary about this. My big concerns with air coolers are having big lump of metal stressing the mobo, and also noise. However liquid coolers are not without risk!

Good point about considering smaller mobos and/or more compact cases & so less heavy/bulky. I'd kind of picked ATX because that is what I'm used to. I suspect smaller cases may mean smaller fans (noisier), not so good airflow and less space for drives etc. However I will go back and look at that in case I'm missing something!

Cheers,

(\(\;;/)/)

[Spider95]

Hi Spider95,

I have the same board with a Ryzen 9 3900 and can confirm that it's solid and has good built-in wi-fi (I also work where a wired connection isn't possible). The sound is good, too.

Most compatible RAM is 3600 MHz, as that aligns with frequency of the AMD 'Infinity Fabric', which I understand is essentially the Front Side Bus, handling data between the RAM and the CPU.

As for cooling, I've got a be quiet! Dark Pro 4 CPU fan, which is really quiet and effective. I've also got the be quiet! Pure Base 500 and it's great for back to front ventilation, directly through the CPU fan. I've added another fan at the front to direct a stream of air to the GPU. So far my CPU sits between 35 and 40 degrees unless I'm doing a benchmark, when it might hit 70 or so. GPU doesn't go over 70, as well.

Thanks Helios451 - I think I did bother you on your own build thread about this as well a week or two back!

(\(\;;/)/)