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First build: $700 budget build help. (Update: looking at GPU's, budget's blown.)
I've been watching sales and for the most part and I doubt part choices will change a great deal considering my budget restraints. I'd like to base this build around the I5 4670k. I have done some mock up builds and reading but had no intention of making a purchase without some help from more knowledgeable people than myself.
Needs to include:
Windows OEM version (I guess 8.1 pro?)
SSD or HD main drive. If SSD no smaller than 120GB.
A case: Mid or Full tower. Not going to be moving it around at all. I was looking at a Cooler Master HAF 912 or Rosewill CHALLENGER. Though I don't know that I like the psu at the bottom, dust. Not a big deal however. Build Quality is.
Memory 8GB 2x 4gb. Again, kind of stumped on this. Some ram with 4/5 eggs has people saying that the sticks didn't come at the speeds advertised but oc'ed fine. I don't intend to overclock or at least not for sometime if I do.
I5 4670k & motherboard: Motherboards have me completely confused. I don't plan on overclocking with it anytime soon. However since it's a unlock processor I would like a decent MB to pair with it just in case I decide that I'd like to in the future. I have no idea what I am looking at or what I should be looking for when it comes to motherboards.
Stuff I have that can carry over.
CX430 Around 6 months old so fairly new. Since I don't intend to overclock at all or for a good while, would this be enough? PSU's aren't expensive but I am trying to save money for better main parts and because I need to include a OS and case. I understand if this could be carried over it would definitely have to be replaced in the future if I wanted to overclock.
WD 500 GB Aged, 3 years or so with no issues. Would use it as a storage drive if the new build included a SSD and not a 1tb hd.
HD 7770 Because of my budget I am guessing I will have to carry this over if I want an I5 4670k.
I have a cd/dvd drive that can carry over which I rarely used. Not sure what brand though it should be fine.
I really do appreciate any help so Thank You again in advance.
Comments
http://pcpartpicker.com/p/1VXjB
This is my current build i just put it togeather a couple days ago runs bf4 on ultra graphics with 95 frames persecond
He has a 700 dollar budget so you link a 1000 dollar build?
Anyways, it's silly to get a cpu like that and then to stick with a 7770. Fairly certain Your gpu is just going to bottleneck. If your stuck on that cpu it would be better to wait till you can afford something like a gtx 770.
You can't reason someone out of a position they didn't reason themselves into.
This isn't the case you were looking at, but how do you feel about huge combo deals?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.1474705
The case is normally $100, but with the combo deal, it's effectively $42 before a $20 rebate. There's also a promo code on the case, but it might not be usable with the combo deal.
I'm guessing that the reason you were looking at those cases is because they're cheap and good enough (which they are), not because you thought they're super awesome cases that you'd buy on an infinite budget.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.1483417
Claimed memory speeds are the memory module manufacturer's promise that it can run at that speed. It isn't a promise that the motherboard will recognize the speed. Motherboards don't know how fast memory can run, and typically pick a conservative default so as not to crash the system, but you can change the memory clock speed to its advertised value in the BIOS.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16832416776
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820239045
That comes to $646, including shipping and before rebates. If you want to overclock, you'll want a better CPU cooler, too:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16835103065
You can reuse the stuff that you want to reuse, at least for now. But be warned that hard drives don't last forever; the usual recommendation is to replace it after five years. Also, if you want a higher power video card in the future, you might want to think about replacing the power supply at that time. But there's no need to do so yet.
On a $700 budget, if he had to make room to buy everything new, the video card he'd end up with would be somewhere around a 7770 anyway. And other parts would be markedly worse for having to make room for a new video card and so forth in the budget.
I think it makes a lot of sense to upgrade piecemeal as the original poster is planning on doing. He'd get a better computer today, and then next time he upgrades, he could plan on replacing the video card, and possibly the power supply and/or hard drive (depending on a variety of things) while keeping everything that he buys today, and have a very nice computer then.
It's not like the Radeon HD 7770 is a horribly slow video card that can't run anything. It will struggle to run some very demanding games at max settings, but it should run just about everything pretty well at high settings.
I do, however, agree with you that Geadin's random build is irrelevant to this thread.
There is no point in buying a Xeon processor for consumer use. Even if he could, it would be both slower and more expensive than what he's looking at, in addition to lacking the ability to overclock.
This guy gives some good ideas for builds.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9PzS1bDotak
Most of the time your advice on these forums is baffling at best. I really just dont understand where this stuff comes from o.O
@ OP Your PSU is OK for now, but do not overclock or upgrade a video card without getting a better PSU. If you plan on upgrading piece by piece then be on the lookout for a good PSU sale this holiday season. Newegg will often have great deals around this time of year.
I bought two seasonic 550w gold rated PSUs last year for around $50 each after rebates.
Quizzical spot on as to your assessments of why I choose stuff like the cases. Honestly I put 0 research into them other than fan count and how many eggs. I'm ok huge deals as long as it can fit the budget. I was looking at the super combo's on New Egg but something always seemed off about the I5 ones? I have a small bit of play but not a whole lot. As in I'll go on and pick up the cpu cooler but won't count that one piece towards my budget.
Quizzical / Jdnewell. Fully understand that the psu isn't enough for oc'ing or a graphics card upgrade. A little surprised you two think it'll be fine running a ssd, hd, cd drive, ram and cpu. Guessing it must be right there at the limit.
Correct about why I was looking at the cases. Cheap, lots of eggs, came with fans (stupid). I was doing mockup builds with a Capstone psu you posted in another build thread awhile ago. So I just picked ones in that range to fit the budget. I don't care what one looks like to be truthful. I will be the only one to see it.
Will that motherboard be a good choice or just picked it cause of the current deal? I was looking at the cons for it and seems that it was small stuff but nothing alarming. Looks good to me and cheaper than what I had done some mockup builds with. Surprised.
Are there any smalls that I should purchase along with what you posted. Thermal paste, cable packs. I noticed you left a bit of room for stuff like that I assume?
Anyone concerned with me carrying over a 7770 with this I5. I can upgrade it and a psu later on. I honestly didn't think I would be fine with reusing the current psu. My biggest concern is that I do not want to compromise on cpu, mb, ram, ect. I want stuff that's oc'able as well as what's consider the gaming processor for my price range.
Thank you again.
Edit: Just for the sake of getting an idea. What would be a decent gpu and psu to pair with this. Not top end, something around $150-$200 for the gpu.
Your power supply is rated at 384 W on the +12 V rail. Corsair is a reputable manufacturer, so that's probably a good gauge on what it can deliver safely.
My rough approximation of how much of a power supply you need is to take (TDP of video card) + (TDP of processor) + 100 W, and say, you need something rated at more than that on the +12 V rail. The 100 W accounts for everything that will draw power from the PSU except for the video card and processor, and tends to be a generous overestimate. Realistically, if you assume 10 W for a hard drive, 5 W for an SSD, 1 W for a keyboard or mouse, and 5 W for a case fan, then you're probably greatly overestimating all of those--and some will use other rails rather than the +12 V, anyway. Rather than counting 1 W here, 2 W there, it's easier to just say 100 W for everything else, unless you want to do something really outlandish like having 8 hard drives.
In your case, you'd be looking at 84 W for the CPU and 100 W for the video card, so you want a power supply rated at at least 84 + 100 + 100 = 284 W on the +12 V rail. 384 W is plenty there. But if you overclock much, you can go way over the rated TDPs. If you want to stick a Radeon R9 290X or GeForce GTX 780 Ti in there with a TDP of around 300 W, you could easily overwhelm the power supply. But for your current configuration, I wouldn't worry about it.
As for the motherboard, I started by saying, that looks like it should be good enough and it's cheap, then went fishing for combo deals that involved it. The motherboard can probably handle a moderate overclock, especially if you're not using the integrated graphics. If you have ideas about pushing the CPU to 4.7 GHz and seeing if you can fry anything, that's not the motherboard to get. But at stock speeds or a modest overclock (e.g., 4 GHz), it should be fine. It's got four memory slots, plenty of ports for whatever you're likely to want, and plenty of PCI Express slots. It only has one slot suitable for a video card, so CrossFire/SLI would be out--but there's rarely any good reason to look at CrossFire or SLI unless you're looking to spend $600+ on video cards alone, and I didn't think it was worth paying an extra $20 for a feature you wouldn't use anyway.
For the case, the Rosewill Challenger makes sense for a budget gaming system when it's cheap. It's built to be suitable for budget gaming systems such as what you're building, and I've recommended it in some such builds elsewhere. But if the combo deal makes it so that you can get a nicer case for cheaper, then why not? New Egg has some huge combo deal discounts on a number of Thermaltake cases at the moment, so it looks like they're trying to get rid of them.
If you wanted to upgrade your video card, a Radeon R9 270X would double your current GPU performance for about $200. I wouldn't go below that, as if you get something only a little faster than your current card, it's not enough of an upgrade to justify the cost.
But depending on what games you play, you might well be happy with the 7770 for a few more years, and then when it comes time to upgrade, have your choice of much faster and more efficient cards than are available today. Also note that three years from now, you might well be able to get a card that doubles the performance of the 7770 without using more power, so even then, a power supply upgrade wouldn't be necessary.
If you wanted a new power supply, this would be pretty nice:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817182068
That's rated at 546 W on the +12 V rail. But I don't see any dire need to upgrade your power supply just yet, especially when you only want to spend $700 today.
-----
A motherboard will come with some cables, and likely all of the cables you need. A CPU cooler will come with thermal paste.
Everything looks good to me. I see some lower eggs and get a little worried. But understand DOA stuff happens which lowers egg counts. Definitely won't ever try an oc just to see how far I can push it. I guess this was me wanting one last confirmation before pulling the trigger.
Might have some questions as to setup after I put it together. Will wait to see if the manuals or now that I know the specific parts I can search for those answers first. I'll definitely update this post regardless after everything is said and done. I forgot that I can cannibalize cables if needed and noticed the thermal paste question was stupid since the cooler came with it.
The only reasons to go Intel are.
1 your building an uber pc with a bigger budget, in which case high end i7 all the way.
2 youre really worried about upgrading your cpu later, the next range of AMD chips will use a new socket. that said Intel could change their socket too.
3 you are often playing an older game that is highly single threaded - e.g. eq2
Yes I see your point and understand it. I don't want to compromise this time. I rather buy it bit by bit. I could have went for a 3rd gen I5 and saved a little money. But then it's a 3rd gen I5 and not current which has small gains over the 3rd gen. I could have got an non unlocked version. Though having the setup and option to oc for minimal costs if I decide to later on is an option I'd like to have. Doing it this way I can buy core parts and essentially be there and have a working decent pc and with one more medium purchase have an excellent pc. Been eyeballing stuff for a good while and just rdy to pull the trigger. Was tired of waiting and and prices often didn't change by that much. Extremely surprised by how much the one combo shaved off that Quizzical posted.
So it's not so much that I am worried about having a socket that I can upgrade with rather than having a cpu that I won't have to upgrade for sometime (hopefully). I don't go through pc's very fast.
In the end and soonish I'll probably end up going with the gpu and psu. When I do I will post and make sure the ones pointed out would still be good choices in that range.
Summary. I'll see how it performs before I decide how soon I want to upgrade psu and gpu.
That's what I would recommend. If you find that you're happy with the performance of the old video card, then there's no need to replace it until you decide that you need something faster.
It is your money and your computer, so as along as you are happy that is all that matters. I
would agree that you could get a piledriver cpu and mobo for much cheaper and then you would have enough to upgrade the gpu. Don't quite see the point of getting a nice i5 only to have it bottleneck with your gpu. Granted you can upgrade your gpu later, but then you end up needing to upgrade the cpu maybe a year after that and it seems like you are always playing catch up trying to get your computer to balance.
You can't reason someone out of a position they didn't reason themselves into.
Quiz already pointed why what I am doing isn't that bad of an option for me. "If I compromised on the CPU I would still end up with something equivalent to a 7770 as a graphics card combined with a worse cpu." I've been window shopping for awhile and put a lot of thought into how I want to go about this as well as asked for broad advice in pm's awhile back on my options. "Should I upgrade to a I5 1st gen or go on and get a 3rd or 4th gen". Prices are all the same basically but performance increases each generation so why would I go with a 1st gen that costs the same as a 4th genand take a chance on not being happy with the purchase.
I want this system to last a minimum of 3 years. Hopefully I can get 4 or 5 good years out of it. So it's pretty obvious I will be upgrading the gpu and psu. When however is up in the air until i put it together and see if a 7770 will suit my needs for half a year, year or if I want to replace it right away. A lot of games I play are more cpu bound than gpu. I don't know if that's realistic or not (how long I want it to last). Also why I wanted an unlocked cpu.
Why wouldn't I be happy with what's considered one of the go to processors for gaming? If I decide I need a gpu when it's all put together. I'll post here asking for advice and get one. I'm sure I'll post anyways just to update and maybe have some questions answered as this will be my first real build and having to toy around with the bios alot. Everything prior for me has been pre-builts.
Kind of glad I went on and purchased as this morning seems Quiz picked out a pretty awesome deal with the case. My only concern is fatty (my cat) is going to have to find a new spot to sleep because of the top vent. Teaching her that might be a huge issue. :P The case I have is cheap junk and has to be replaced. If I didn't save money on the case and waited further down the road it would be something else but essentially end up with the same core parts. In other words "I was ready to buy this morning."
If I were doing this with an I7 "that" would be stupid because I wouldn't have a working system for awhile. I do appreciate all insight given and I am extremely thankful for all input and help. I just don't see how you think what I am doing is dumb. I would essentially have the same gpu not much of an upgrade for a worse cpu with doing what you suggest.
I want this system to last a minimum of 3 years. Hopefully I can get 4 or 5 good years out of it. So it's pretty obvious I will be upgrading the GPU and psu. When however is up in the air until i put it together and see if it suits my needs. A lot of games I play are more cpu bound than gpu.
While an FX-6300 is competitive with a Core i5-4670K in programs that scale well to six cores, in order for a six core processor to only be competitive with a quad core when using all six cores, each core must be substantially slower. In programs that don't scale past four cores, the Core i5-4670K wins handily.
On the one hand, you could argue that an FX-6300 is good enough for nearly everything. You could further make the case that if an FX-6300 isn't good enough, the company seriously botched the game engine. But some companies do that, and do you really want to run the risk you'll really want to play a game, but be unable to run it smoothly?
To a considerable degree, it's a question of the budget. If you're trying to build a gaming rig on a tight budget, then yes, an FX-6300 offers you a capable CPU at an affordable price. But if you've got the budget for a faster processor, why not get it?
Incidentally, Kaveri will shake things up in about two months, and that will narrow the gap in single-threaded performance considerably. But that won't go to more than four cores, and probably still won't catch a Core i5-4670K in per-core performance.
You can count on it. I am exited. Don't expect anything to technical from me. But I'll post my thoughts and questions, If I have any. Overly excited
Like I said been window shopping for awhile. Guessing fri-sat parts will be here. New Egg has a warehouse in my area so could be sooner. Though I opted for free shipping to save money. So who knows. With my luck though I have something doa.
Had you told me the way I was going about this was stupid I wouldn't have done it. You have a great post history in this section of helping people and giving information. I just don't get how some people see this as bad. I am getting a good cpu. A decent mb which can do what I will use it for. Ram's a little sketchy. Don't want to deal with having to RMA it if doa. But can use current modules until that gets sorted if it is (pretty sure). Would have to check the labels.
I guess I am gambling on most games not running on 6 cores for awhile. I think for the most part that isn't a big gamble. It's just at the point I have been waiting and waiting, looking and looking. Always going to be something new around the corner. I was ready and tired of waiting and watching and money was available.
I think it's very important to distinguish between a game that can scale to many cores versus one that actually needs many cores to perform well. Quite a few games today will use eight cores if you have them, but will still run well on a relatively fast dual core processor. Scaling to eight cores is likely to become somewhat more common since both the Xbox One and the PlayStation 4 will have eight core processors. But both a Core i5-4670K and an FX-6300 are much faster than the CPU in either console, even in programs that scale flawlessly to eight cores.
I think that it will be a long, long time before game designers are comfortable with assuming that everyone has so much CPU power that even a Core i5-3570K isn't enough. Intel currently restricts 6+ core CPUs to the $500+ market, and will continue to do so for quite some time. Meanwhile, AMD is moving away from 6- and 8-core desktop processors entirely, as they haven't announced any plans to put upcoming Steamroller cores into a CPU with more than four cores, and Kaveri is only about two months away.
And that's just in desktops; game designers would like for their games to run well on higher end gaming laptops, too. And there, the next laptop CPU with more than four cores will be the first. (There have been a few strange laptops that put a 130 W server CPU into a laptop, but let's ignore those.) I don't see any plausible reason to believe that we'll have laptop chips with more than four cores before 2015, and it might not happen even then. And once we do get them, it will still be some years before they're ubiquitous enough for game designers to comfortably assume that everyone has them.
So how soon will that Core i5-4670K be regarded as too slow for some games, outside of badly coded games that manage to run poorly on everything? Probably not before 2020.
My mistake thank you for correcting me. It's why I don't post here often and just read.
I'm not saying what you are doing is dumb. I was simply pointing out other options that you had. If you had wanted to upgrade everything in one go you probably could have done so by swapping CPUs. Just trying to help you out with most bang for buck on your budget.
You can't reason someone out of a position they didn't reason themselves into.