my pc build - waste of money or not?

[Chucke1992]

Hi there!

I am building my new PC.
I decided to go with X99 platform.
So my current config is:
CPU: Intel Core i7 5960X
RAM: 16GB DDR4
CPU Cooler: Corsair Hydro h105 or h110
SSD1: Samsung 850 EVO 500 GB
SSD2: Adata SP900S3 512GB
HDD1: WD 1003FZEX
HDD2: WD 2003FZEX
Videocard: ---
PSU: FSP Aurum Pro 1200W
Case: Aerocool Strike-X ST (I've already bought it and received docking station just in case)

Remarks:
I'll overclock processor for sure - 3.0Ghz is not even serious. 3.5 - 4.0 GHz is better.

I wanted to buy Titan X (1 or 2 ) - but it's not available in my country . So now I am waiting for 980ti or 380x (depends on perforce and scalability in SLI/Crossfire because I'll buy at least 2. But I am nvidia guy though). I wanted to go with ASUS GTX 980 Poseidon (because I wanted liquid cooling for the videocard. But again - it's not available in my country ). Also if the rumors regarding 980ti being Titan X with 6GB true then It should have higher performance in SLI then one Titan X(and having less price then two titans). On the other side I am interested in stacked memory showdown.

I wanted Corsair Hydro h110i GT - it's not available in my country too. So am I either buy h105 or h110.

I am currently aiming for Kingston HyperX Predator DDR4 3000Mhz (because G.skill with 3400Mhz or 3200Mhz DDR4 is not available too). I know that DDR4 timings are bad. For now at least.

SSD I want to buy from different manufactures.

I actually rarely play games - because I prefer surfing the internet. But I'll install ENB for Skyrim
But I am a developer so I usually run multiple virtual machines and work in IDE (maybe go for 32 GB RAM), so 8 cores will find its way to be used.

So the question is - is my build waste of money or not?

 

[trents]

My first question is why are you intending to employ two SSD drives and two spinners? Most people use SSD drives to install the programs and then use the spinners for data storage. Do you have so many applications that they won't fit on one 500 gb SSD? If you want one large SSD then I would look at a RAID 0 setup using two identical 500 gb SSDs. That would give you one 1TB SSD drive and better performance in large file read and writes. In my experience, SSDs used in RAID 0 seem pretty reliable.

It also seems to me you are intending to pour a lot of money into multiple video cards yet you say you rarely play games. I would think one good video card would fill the bill for your stated purposes. And aren't there video cards geared to special purposes like what you do? Like the GL Fire series or something? Ones that are optimized or something? I'm a little out of my league here. And if you wind up not using multiple video cards then your 1200W PSU is way overkill.

Why do you want to buy SSDs from different manufactureres?

All the RAM you can install is a smart idea if you are heavy into virtual machines but may limit your overclock because of extra strain on the IMC.

 

[EarthDog]

Well...to support and add to what trents said:

1. Make sure you can acutally use those cores. That is a 80% increase in cost over a 5930K
2. I don't understand why different manufacturers SSDs either. Its not a huge deal, but... odd to me as well.
3. I assume you will do your minimal gaming at 1080p resolution? If so, multiple high cards are a monumental waste of cash. Grab a single 980 or wait for the 980ti/380x and call it day.
4. The Power Supply is overkill. The 980ti should be around 250W and the 380x... nobody knows yet. A 1KW PSU would be plenty for two of those cards and overclocking the system. I suggest the EVGA Supernova P 1000W. Its $30 cheaper and a better power supply. If you are only going one card, then a quality 650W PSU will be plenty including overclocking.
5. I wouldn't pay the premium for such fast ram. From the listed uses, it doesn't appear you will be taking advantage of it. Just grab 16/32GB of DDR4 2800Mhz and call it a day there too.

My big question though is if you are willing to wait for these GPUs on the build, it appears you are waiting to build for a couple of months?

 

[Chucke1992]

Thanks for responses.

My first question is why are you intending to employ two SSD drives and two spinners? Most people use SSD drives to install the programs and then use the spinners for data storage. Do you have so many applications that they won't fit on one 500 gb SSD? If you want one large SSD then I would look at a RAID 0 setup using two identical 500 gb SSDs. That would give you one 1TB SSD drive and better performance in large file read and writes. In my experience, SSDs used in RAID 0 seem pretty reliable.

My first SSD is for OS + HDD for its snapshots
Another SSD for games (some of the games has loading times like...well long )

It also seems to me you are intending to pour a lot of money into multiple video cards yet you say you rarely play games. I would think one good video card would fill the bill for your stated purposes. And aren't there video cards geared to special purposes like what you do? Like the GL Fire series or something? Ones that are optimized or something? I'm a little out of my league here. And if you wind up not using multiple video cards then your 1200W PSU is way overkill.

Because I am not planning to change my specs at least for next 5 years.
Even now I play BF3 on my 9800GT in 1024x768 . So I think 1080p I'll be able to handle quite well for the next couple of years.

As for GL series. I presume you are talking about ATI Fire GL - I don't know about it gaming performance but I am not a 3d modeler. Yes I like to create cubes in Maya from time to time but that's all. And I do not too much GPU computing either.

Why do you want to buy SSDs from different manufactureres?

No particular reason. I used to do it with drives - same kinds of things from different manufacturers.

All the RAM you can install is a smart idea if you are heavy into virtual machines but may limit your overclock because of extra strain on the IMC.

Could you provide more details regarding IMC?
As for RAM - it's based on my experience where I hit the top with over 8 GB of RAM some time ago....

Well...to support and add to what trents said:

1. Make sure you can acutally use those cores. That is a 80% increase in cost over a 5930K
2. I don't understand why different manufacturers SSDs either. Its not a huge deal, but... odd to me as well.
3. I assume you will do your minimal gaming at 1080p resolution? If so, multiple high cards are a monumental waste of cash. Grab a single 980 or wait for the 980ti/380x and call it day.
4. The Power Supply is overkill. The 980ti should be around 250W and the 380x... nobody knows yet. A 1KW PSU would be plenty for two of those cards and overclocking the system. I suggest the EVGA Supernova P 1000W. Its $30 cheaper and a better power supply. If you are only going one card, then a quality 650W PSU will be plenty including overclocking.
5. I wouldn't pay the premium for such fast ram. From the listed uses, it doesn't appear you will be taking advantage of it. Just grab 16/32GB of DDR4 2800Mhz and call it a day there too.

My big question though is if you are willing to wait for these GPUs on the build, it appears you are waiting to build for a couple of months?

1) Yup. I was hesistating regarding 5930K or 5960 but decided to stick with more cores.
2) Different parts will work different. I wanted at first to buy just 2 x 850 Evo.
3) Well not much gaming. I am playing C&C Generals and DA:O from time to time But it's good to know that I am able to run new games in ultra settings. Complexes
4) Yes. I thought so too. But then I thought about X-Way SLI (because dat Titan X scaling) and decided to stick with it.
5) Yes. It bothers me too that timing are quite bad. Maybe I indeed should go with less frequency...

Well...The third or fourth month already. My money is ready. I was on a verge to buy 980 x2 but then Titan X happened.

 

[EarthDog]

2. They do work different. So why not get two known great drives instead of one?
3. Yeah, you can run it at 1080p with ONE 980... Don't have a complex that costs you loads of cash.
4. Not smart, going SLI/CFx ,monetarily speaking considering you are playing at 1080p. Single Titan X is massive overkill. 980 is overkill for 1080p.
5. I wouldn't worry about the timings friend... I mean get the lowest within reason, but, its not everything.

Well...The third or fourth month already. My money is ready. I was on a verge to buy 980 x2 but then Titan X happened.

Ok... so, I will ask again... when do you plan on buying this machine?

 

[Chucke1992]

Ok... so, I will ask again... when do you plan on buying this machine?

As soon as 980ti or 380x is out now and will be available in my country. It should appear faster than titan because there is no market for titan cause it's too expensive.
I mean - I would have bought in June (after June salary) if I have titan x in my country.

Single Titan X is massive overkill. 980 is overkill for 1080p.

For now. But future games will require more resources...
Well when I was buying my old machine [core 2 duo, 4 GB DDR2(or 3. all I remember is that frequency was 800 Mhz), 9800gt (was just out. there were reviews of 9600gt) -> it was an upgrade from P4 2.8Ghz, 1 GB RAM, 6600gt 256 (first videocard was nvidia 5200) ] it was decent for its time. I remember 8800GTX was considered as a monster or something like this) and I was able to run crysis on max in my 1024x768 resolution. Even now I think it perfectly capable to handle 768 resolution. So the more powerful platform now - the more powerful platform it will remain.
I of course is perfectly able to upgrade computer parts every one-two month now because I have no private life and decent salary .
I understand that I can buy just 780ti or 290x and it should be enought.

Anyway I am hesitating....

Maybe I should go for
CPU: i7 5930K
Videocard: 290x or GTX 970
and buy it now...(I wanna leave PSU as is )
P.S. I don't know whether it will be capable to handle GTA 5 on ultra or Skyrim + ENB.
I finished GTA 5 on xbox 360 long time ago so I'll play it just for lulz on PC (aiming using mouse will be gorgeous)

 

[EarthDog]

Future games do require more resources...true. But having 2 cards that are 3-5 years old, you may miss out on additional features that the newer cards have, or more power efficiency. Not to mention, with a single card, you save a ton of cash out of the gate and maybe in 3 years, buy another with the latest tech in it. That keeps you closer to the front of the curve than blowing your wad up front and having to deal with multi GPU issues.

I'm not saying go last gen NVIDIA. Just saying go SINGLE CARD of the latest, then get another when you NEED it or get another single card. There is no reason for you to have two high end cards at 1080p (IMO). Its your money, but you can reach your goals and spend a ton less.

I also think the 5930K is more reasonable of a purchase as well unless you know you are going to utilize the 8 cores enough to warrant spending that extra ~$400. Most dont, but you know your usage model better than I do.

You can keep the PSU, but the one I listed is higher quality and cheaper. You don't remotely need 1.2KW of power. Really, you shouldn't be choosing a PSU until you know what hardware you will have anyway... again, you can save more cash that way too.

 

[Chucke1992]

But if to go with 5930k then I can as well go with 5820k because the only differences as far as I remember are number of PCIe lines.
Then I can go with less frequent DDR4 and radeon 290X (or even GTX 970) - And upgrade it after two-three years....All start to build another platform (because x99 is a deadend with 5820, 5930, 5960)
That way I can buy it all...next month.

 

[EarthDog]

And some clockspeed.

Since you have the cash, I would go for a 980 over a 290x. Outside of 4K resolutions its much faster and uses a lot less power.

 

[Bishoff]

This would be one of those rare cases I would say go for the 970 since he's at 1080p. 970 runs GTA 5 with all it' s vram hogging well (3.5gb)

 

[trents]

IMC=Integrated Memory Controller. Built into the CPU these days. Higher amounts and more sticks of RAM tax it more.

 

[Chucke1992]

I decided to go with
GTX 980
i7 5820k [no reason to pay for 5930k more because of pcie lines and clock speed can be adjusted via overclocking. rampage V and water cooling are not just for show]

And the last thing to change - is RAM. I've chosen hyperX predator because I liked radiators and frequency. But there is no reason to go for higher frequencies now as far as I understand.
So I can go either for Kingston HyperX predator 2800 or even 2666