cancel
Showing results for 
Search instead for 
Did you mean: 

Build advice please =)

beeman007
Level 7
Hi everyone! First time on these forums so please go easy.
Im a bit of a noob so im not too sure what to do and a bit of help would be really appreciated.

Heres a bit of background:
- Id like a new build purely for gaming purposes and will hopefully last me a few years as im not one to continually upgrade
- Budget isnt an issue. Im happy to pay but within reason
- I dont know anything about o/c but i am willing to give it a go

So far, this is what i am thinking
CPU - Intel i7-4790k
MOBO - Maximus vii hero
GPU - EVGA gtx titan x
PSU - Corsair AX860w
Cooling - Not sure
Ram - 16gb but not sure what brand or speed
Case - Not sure

Questions
- can someone advise me on what type of cooling is best? Ive read things about fan and liquid. Ive also heard that some wont fit or something because of a lack of space between the ram sticks and fan or something? Ive read about the corsair liquid coolers, noctua D15 and nepton 240m but i really have no idea whats good for my situation.
- RAM - i know i want 16gb but i dont know what brand or speed is best?
- Any particular case that would go with all this?
- i wanna play on 4k so what is the best monitor for that?

Any advice would be great 😃
Thanks in advance!
4,808 Views
10 REPLIES 10

NemesisChild
Level 12
Welcome to the forum!

Why not go with the Hero VIII and the 6700k?
A popular choice for cooling is the Corsair H100i. There are no issue with memory clearance when using a liquid cooler.
Problems arise with memory clearance with most fan CPU coolers like the CM Hyper 212 EVO.
I prefer the CM HAF series cases, make sure you get a full size case. You may want to look at the Corsair case lineup.
If you're going with the Z97 platform, the 16GB (2x8GB) 2400 CL10 G.Skill TridentX is an excellent choice.
Intel i9 10850K@ 5.3GHz
ASUS ROG Strix Z490-E
Corsair H115i Pro XT
G.Skill TridentZ@ 3600MHz CL14 2x16GB
EVGA RTX 3090 Ti FWT3 Ultra
OS: WD Black SN850 1TB NVMe M.2
Storage: WD Blue SN550 2TB NVMe M.2
EVGA SuperNova 1200 P2
ASUS ROG Strix Helios GX601

Nate152
Moderator
I like this for a 4k monitor

http://www.amazon.com/BenQ-BL3201PH-Monitor-32-Inch-LED-Lit/dp/B00O1B5M9I/ref=sr_1_1/184-5930885-055...

To game at 4k with 60FPS you will need 2 or 3 titan x's and if going with 3 of them you will need to choose a motherboard that supports 3 way sli.

http://us.hardware.info/reviews/6033/nvidia-geforce-gtx-titan-x-sli--3-way-sli--4-way-sli-review-ins...!

If budget isn't an issue then go with the rampage v extreme and 5930k or ( the top dog) 5960x.

If you do decide to go 3 way sli with the titan x's you will want to liquid cool them and that means a custom water loop, here is the EKFC titan x nickel waterblock.

https://shop.ekwb.com/ek-fc-titan-x-nickel

Here is a recent build I helped one of our ROG members with, this will give you an idea.

https://rog.asus.com/forum/showthread.php?60778-The-Benefits-Of-Watercooling-the-Rampage-V-Extreme&p...

Korth
Level 14
Welcome to ROG Forums!

I think the Maximus VII Hero is a fine choice.

And the i7-4790K is absolutely the best and fastest Intel CPU a gamer could get (until Q2/2016, anyways, lol). If you're not planning on overclocking, the "non-K" i7-4790 is a little cheaper, also a little slower so not as popular.

A Titan X is a whole lot of GPU. You can get essentially identical raw fps/performance (for most games and most other things) from a 980Ti for substantially lower cost. A Titan X requires at least 16GB of main RAM for optimum operation.

Best to choose RAM which is QVL-tested for your mobo. Realistically, you could get by well enough with 8GB total RAM but it'll slow some things (and some gaming) down a bit, 16GB doesn't cost too much more but is much better (for heavy games) overall, while 32GB or more is basically an overkill waste of money (for gaming) unless you plan to load it up with the Asus RAMDisk software. It's best to buy a single 4x4GB or 2x8GB dual-channel DDR3 kit and avoid mixing and matching multiple (even identical) kits. Your mobo claims to support up to DDR3-3200 (with an epic-overclocked processor part, anyways), but I think DDR3-1866/2133/2400 is more realistic and costs less and has faster timings/latencies significant enough to make a little difference in real-world (and gaming) performance, why pay more for big speed increases you probably can't make any use of, and why not pay less for little speed increases you can? This G.Skill kit seems like a fine choice. Corsair memory is overwhelmingly popular and actually tends to be very good, but I think it's priced far too high when there's faster alternatives to choose from.

You could probably get buy with a 750W PSU, but that phat GPU might be happier with 900W+. I wouldn't personally buy a Corsair PSU, seen them fail too often and been underspec too often to trust themis as a PSU brand. This Rosewill Photon 850W Gold PSU is currently a great deal, an EVGA SuperNova 900W+ Gold/Platinum PSU (with its unbeatable 10-year warranty) would be even better, if/when you can find one on sale.

The PC case/chassis is basically a personal preference. I prefer understated, sleek, elegant cases (like my Obsidian 750D). Other people prefer garish and aggressively-sculpted gaming beasts. Most gamers want pretty windows which showcase astonishing LED arrays, I prefer a solid metal box which offers "proper" EM shielding. Anything which fits your motherboard/PSU form factors and CPU cooler and GPU card length which has sufficient drive bays will do. Cooler Master HAFs (with their inevitable military-themed mods) and Cosmos Cruisers (with their inevitable automotive-themed mods) seem very popular at local LAN events. If you genuinely don't care then just pick up whatever's on sale - chances are if the inside is painted black then it's got all the other "enthusiast-grade" amenities like rubber grommets and semi-modular drive bays and little anchor points and cable channels and extra-sized cutouts and all the rest. "Tool less" means "convenient" but, to me, also tends to mean cheap plastic screws and parts instead of nice durable metal ones.

All-In-One (AIO) or Closed-Loop-Cooler (CLC) is the same thing, and the Corsair h100i (or it's beefier siblings) is probably the most popular cooler you'll see in gaming rigs these days. There are quite a few (non-Corsair) AIO options which are better, in my opinion. If you don't want to worry about the (largely exaggerated but still not-impossible) risk of liquid spilling onto your CPU/mobo then go for a large-air cooler - but you'd need a truly massive beast like the Noctua NH-D15 to get comparable cooling efficiency. The only things better are custom watercooling - which is a rewarding but very involved pastime - and exotic subzero cooling (phase-change refrigeration, TECs, LN2, etc) - which is best left, IMO, to crazy extremists willing to burn money for record-breaking overclocks, lol.
"All opinions are not equal. Some are a very great deal more robust, sophisticated and well supported in logic and argument than others." - Douglas Adams

[/Korth]

Vlada011
Level 10
As people tell you Hero 8 look nice.
You will get more with Skylake platform, I mean if you decide to stay on Z platform no reason to buy something else than newest.
Maybe Intel didn't improve CPU performance, but at least all his i7 models are enough for any graphic card...
With Z170 you will get some advantages on other fields, DDR4, PCH have far more lines and some device could work on full speed only on Gen 3 x8.
Z170 chipset could provide that and you will have two PCI-E slots x16 Gen 3.0, lanes by CPU only for one or two graphic cards.
GSkill and CORSAIR launch some nice version of Dual Channel DDR4, Trident Z, Ripjaws V, etc... You should evolve on DDR4.
On CPU field you will get nothing compare to i7-4790K but at least you will have new platform and compatible maybe with Skylake revision, same in14nm.

Vlada011
Level 10
Maybe this pictures help you... Hero VIII is nicer and finer somehow... Proper motherboard for Z chipset.
I mean Extreme is better but it's really pity to invest so much in Z platform near X99 and Rampage.
But Hero and Gene are fine. Weird... ASUS miss Maximus VII Extreme???

Hero VII
51052

Hero VIII SATA Express, USB 3.1 A+C, ready for Intel 750 SSD. DDR4,
51053

I would not think even seconds, because CPU price is almost same as previous generation.

Chino
Level 15
Taken into consideration of what you mentioned in your first post, this is what I would get.

CPU: Intel Core i7-6700K 4.0GHz Quad-Core Processor ($359.99 @ NCIX US)
CPU Cooler: Corsair H100i GTX 70.7 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler ($109.99 @ Micro Center)
Motherboard: Asus MAXIMUS VIII HERO ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($239.00 @ Amazon)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws V Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) DDR4-2400 Memory ($114.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Samsung 850 EVO-Series 1TB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($357.99 @ Amazon)
Video Card: Asus GeForce GTX 980 Ti 6GB STRIX Video Card ($739.00 @ Amazon)
Case: Corsair 450D ATX Mid Tower Case ($99.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: SeaSonic 1050W 80+ Platinum Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($196.98 @ Newegg)
Monitor: Asus PB287Q 60Hz 28.0" Monitor ($551.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Total: $2769.92
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-08-13 13:45 EDT-0400

Korth
Level 14
Chino's suggested build is pretty solid.

I would put two 500GB Samsung 850 EVO SSDs ($178 each on newegg.com) in a striped RAID, same capacity, about the same cost, nearly double the speed. I would avoid the Corsair 450D unless the plan is to add more fans (and more cost and more noise) to increase internal airflow. I think the Cooler Master Silencio 652S ($120 at newegg.com) looks and sounds much better than any Corsair Carbide/Obsidian, and I've been very pleasantly surprised by the "it came out of nowhere" quality of the XFX Type-01 Bravo case (about $100, but hard to find).

But again, you're the one who will have to live with your PC chassis every day so pick something which calls out to your personal tastes. Horizontal cases and "cube cases" and all sorts of bizarre small-form-factor and alternate-concept cases are all coming back in style (again), so no need to constrain yourself to a plain old tower if that's not really your thing - just make sure your case has a compatible form factor and enough physical space to fit all your parts.

You're already planning on running something like a 980Ti or TitanX so pay no heed to the processor's integrated graphics - the iGPU won't ever be used (unless all your GPU cards or PCIe slots completely die and you need some way to see your BIOS display), it won't even be a helpful slave to offload any secondary GPU processing, it's basically a complete waste of real estate on your processor die.

This is an excellently helpful little website.
"All opinions are not equal. Some are a very great deal more robust, sophisticated and well supported in logic and argument than others." - Douglas Adams

[/Korth]

beeman007
Level 7
Thanks so much for everybodys input. Ive def got some stuff to go and have a think about!

The reason i thought id go with z97 is the fact that ive read a few articles about how although the x99 is better and newer and all that, the slight better-ness of it and price, isnt really worth it so thats why i didnt consider anything else. But there were some mentions about diff boards in the replies here so i might have to do a little more research.

Chino, my question to your suggested build - regarding the PSU, how come so much watts? Is 1050w overkill? Or is it just a matter of well why not because its good value sorta thing?

Thanks Korth for that website - thats pretty handy!

I only considered titan x over the 980ti because of the prices. Here in Australia, i can get a titan x for $1520 while the 980ti is around $1100. I know i dont know much about all this stuff hence why im here but it doesnt seem to make sense that the 6gb is at that price vs the 12gb. Ive read that games dont utilise the extra gb atm anyway but thats not the point.

Chino
Level 15
With a single GTX 980Ti, you should be able to get around 30-40FPS at Ultra settings at 4K resolution depending on the game. But eventually you will need more firepower for future games or when you decide you want more FPS. Thus I suggested you grab a 1050W in case you want to add another GTX 980Ti down the road.