Potential Parts List for Friend's Build

[GearingMass]

Ok so my friend is looking to build a new rig around ~$1300 and I wanted some extra opinions on the rough initial parts list I put together.
This is meant to be purely for gaming.
Also, this is an intel/nvidia parts list simply because I'm not familiar enough with AMD CPU/GPU's to make informed selections. I'm welcome to Intel/Nvidia or AMD builds, however.

CPU: Intel Core i5-4690K 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor ($239.99)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler ($34.99)
Motherboard: *ASRock Fatal1ty Z97X Killer ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($152.99 @ Newegg)
Memory: *G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($83.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Samsung 840 EVO 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($139.99)
Video Card: Gigabyte GeForce GTX 770 4GB WINDFORCE Video Card ($369.99)
Case: Cooler Master HAF 922 (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case ($89.99)
Power Supply: EVGA 750W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($114.99)
Optical Drive: *Asus DRW-24B1ST/BLK/B/AS DVD/CD Writer ($19.99 @ Newegg)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 8.1 (32/64-bit) ($119.99 @ Newegg)
Case Fan: Cooler Master Megaflow 110.0 CFM 200mm Fan ($19.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $1386.89

 

[EarthDog]

I'd go 600w psu to save some cash and get a 290. No need for 750w unless this friend goes multiple gpus. Which I wouldnt suggest for a novice. Not like it's rocket science but can be more f double than its worth for most.

 

[caddi daddi]

man, that board is a bit overkill, but a very good choice, look at the extreme6 if the budget tightens.

I would like to see ram at 1866 or above also.


also, missing a large storage hdd.

 

[GearingMass]

man, that board is a bit overkill, but a very good choice, look at the extreme6 if the budget tightens.

I would like to see ram at 1866 or above also.


also, missing a large storage hdd.

Oh is the extreme 6 less expensive? I must have missed that.

1866 would be nice, but I don't think too crucial considering the minimal performance boost. Although it's not much of a cost increase either.

And yeah, I wasn't sure whether to go 128GB SSD + HDD or 256GB SSD. I figured for purely gaming, 256 would be enough to have all current/semi current games on there.
Plus, I don't understand when people say "store the games you're not playing on your HDD." But with Steam it's just as easy to erase them vs moving them to another hard drive.
So I figure take the money from the HDD & just get a higher capacity SSD.

 

[Witchdoctor]

Do you have a Micro Center near by ?

If so you can save some big dollars, coupled with a smaller sized power unit as ED states you could get him into a nice GTX780/r9 290. and still have room for a bone yard drive as caddi pointed out

if not looks reasonable to me other than the power, however I just built using that board, It is a capable board but I found it to be short of the mark in a few areas, the Extreme 6 brings a bit more to the table for around the same money

I also would not spend the cash for a gold certification , Seasonic makes a nice fully modular bronze unit on the cheap. So what if it costs him a few extra dollars a year to run it

no matter what look to save where you can, get a 780 or a 290 as they will take him farther for a gaming rig than a rebranded 680

Good luck

 

[GearingMass]

Do you have a Micro Center near by ?

If so you can save some big dollars

Unfortunately no, he's in Guam, but I appreciate all the tips!

 

[bob4933]

Military folk can get windows for pretty cheap compared to newegg. See if he can get a copy of that at his NEX and see what the prices there are first.

 

[GearingMass]

Military folk can get windows for pretty cheap compared to newegg. See if he can get a copy of that at his NEX and see what the prices there are first.

Thanks!

 

[GearingMass]

Can anyone recommend a good comparable AMD CPU & AMD-based board? I'm just not familiar enough with AMD to made a good decision.

 

[GearingMass]

Something like ASRock Fatal1ty 990FX Killer mobo + FX8320 CPU for a ~$115 savings.

 

[bob4933]

Stability would be key for him. If he has to rma parts, it could get ugly real fast. Stick with the intel, the fx chips are too finicky and you really need a badass motherboard. That's a fine combo though if he's ok with that setup, just may be worth the little bit extra coinage

 

[GearingMass]

Stability would be key for him. If he has to rma parts, it could get ugly real fast. Stick with the intel, the fx chips are too finicky and you really need a badass motherboard. That's a fine combo though if he's ok with that setup, just may be worth the little bit extra coinage

I agree, DOA/RMA is where it would get nasty, so it's best to try and minimize that.
With the intel build, though, it'll probably necessitate the gtx 770 instead of the R9 290.

 

[Theocnoob]

I agree. Go Intel. They're so easy to overclock, run cooler, draw less power. There's no reason to go AMD at this budget level IMO. I feel that AMD is best for budget builds, where you only have $110 for a CPU and $85 for a mobo.

I would steer you towards a 4690K and an ASRock Extreme6 Mobo. It has TWO full length M.2 slots, which no board in it's price bracket (or most beyond it) has. One of these slots is M.2 ULTRA. The theoretical speeds on those SSDs are like 1.5GB/s. Tasty stuff. You also get 12 phase VRM. It's the best board for around $150.

Also, due to negligence on my part I've ended up with (on my main desktop), a 150GB Velociraptor HDD and a 120GB Intel SSD. That's 270GB, roughly the amount of space on your proposed 256GB Samsung SSD. It fills up. I install my games, download a few things, and next thing you know, there's no room at the inn.

I strongly suggest a 256GB SSD as well as a 1TB Western Digital Blue or Black hard drive. Blacks are a little faster and have a longer warranty.

One thing- If this were me, getting a PC on deployment, vacation, my second house, etc, I'd want it to be portable. I'd want it so that I could easily pick it up and bring it home with me when my time abroad was over.

To this end, I would suggest that you scrap the ATX idea alltogether and look at an ITX build. Have you looked at the EVGA Hadron? It's the size of a gaming console, but thicker. You can fit a GTX 770 and a 4690K in there and you can fit a CPU cooler that will cool similarly to a Hyper 212 for similar OC results. And, he can pick it up under his arm, or throw it in a suitcase, and bring it home with him. All you lose by going small is some expansion slots. You had no expansion cards besides a GPU anyways, so why get a big, mostly empty box? JM2C.

 

[GearingMass]

I strongly suggest a 256GB SSD as well as a 1TB Western Digital Blue or Black hard drive. Blacks are a little faster and have a longer warranty.

One thing- If this were me, getting a PC on deployment, vacation, my second house, etc, I'd want it to be portable. I'd want it so that I could easily pick it up and bring it home with me when my time abroad was over.

To this end, I would suggest that you scrap the ATX idea alltogether and look at an ITX build. Have you looked at the EVGA Hadron? It's the size of a gaming console, but thicker. You can fit a GTX 770 and a 4690K in there and you can fit a CPU cooler that will cool similarly to a Hyper 212 for similar OC results. And, he can pick it up under his arm, or throw it in a suitcase, and bring it home with him. JM2C.

Do you have any advice as far as HDD selection goes? I've seen WD blacks with roughly the same storage space range from <100 to 250 bucks and I don't understand the difference. Although for $100 you can just jump to the 500GB SSD, so it's have to be something good with 300+ GB for $80 or less or I can't see justification for not just jumping SSD capacities.

And I actually hadn't really thought of that. The smaller case, etc would help save on shipping costs for sure. What kind of CPU cooler can you throw into a hadron?
I'm also not familiar with ITX mobos, so if you have any advice on that...

 

[bob4933]

They are usually there for a few years ocnoob. Navy boys typically don't "fly home" much either. But as you say, different strokes. If he needs portability, he should just get a gaming laptop.

 

[johan851]

Look at the MX100 SSDs instead of the 840 EVO. It'll perform the same or better, and it's cheaper too.

http://anandtech.com/show/8066/crucial-mx100-256gb-512gb-review/4

Is your friend going to be overclocking?

 

[GearingMass]

They are usually there for a few years ocnoob. Navy boys typically don't "fly home" much either. But as you say, different strokes. If he needs portability, he should just get a gaming laptop.

laptop = company builds it = ripoff

Look at the MX100 SSDs instead of the 840 EVO. It'll perform the same or better, and it's cheaper too.

http://anandtech.com/show/8066/crucial-mx100-256gb-512gb-review/4

Is your friend going to be overclocking?

I'll look into that.
Probably not, and if so, minimally.

 

[Theocnoob]

Do you have any advice as far as HDD selection goes? I've seen WD blacks with roughly the same storage space range from <100 to 250 bucks and I don't understand the difference. Although for $100 you can just jump to the 500GB SSD, so it's have to be something good with 300+ GB for $80 or less or I can't see justification for not just jumping SSD capacities.

And I actually hadn't really thought of that. The smaller case, etc would help save on shipping costs for sure. What kind of CPU cooler can you throw into a hadron?
I'm also not familiar with ITX mobos, so if you have any advice on that...

EVGA makes their own "ITX cooler". It's a little tower cooler just like a Hyper 212. The best ebthusiast grade ITX boards have been by ASUS for the last couple of gens (obviously that's my opinion and not a fact). Look at the ASUS Z97 I Plus

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813132122&cm_re=z97_itx-_-13-132-122-_-Product

The EVGA Hadron comes with a gold rated 500W PSU (enough to power a GTX 780) so you don't need to worry about anything there. If your friend wants an optical drive you can buy a slimline slot loading optical drive. EVGA makes a quality unit for $50 but of course much cheaper units can be found.

Another case you might want to take a look at is the Silverstone FT03 mini. Roughly the same volume and mass of a Hadron. It's a few years old, whereas the Hadron is very recent, but it's a beautiful case. No cool side window like the Hadron though.

Ask your friend how he feels about going small. He will lose 0% power while reducing volume to 1/4-1/3 of what a normal tower would be. Explain that he can't add a soundcard, wireless card (if he wants it, get a board with it built-in), or go Crossfire or SLI. That's it though in therms of compromises.

As far as HDD selection, I can't tell you why there are 20 different WD blacks and some cost 3 billion dollars. I have no idea. If you want to avoid confusion grab a 1TB WD Caviar Blue. Good drive. I like the idea of getting mass storage. I know you want FAST storage, but bulk, CHEAP storage is a good thing to have too. I like having 1,256GB more than having 500GB, even if some of it is pokey.

laptop = company builds it = ripoff

I like you already

 

[GearingMass]

EVGA makes their own "ITX cooler". It's a little tower cooler just like a Hyper 212. The best ebthusiast grade ITX boards have been by ASUS for the last couple of gens (obviously that's my opinion and not a fact). Look at the ASUS Z97 I Plus

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813132122&cm_re=z97_itx-_-13-132-122-_-Product

The EVGA Hadron comes with a gold rated 500W PSU (enough to power a GTX 780) so you don't need to worry about anything there. If your friend wants an optical drive you can buy a slimline slot loading optical drive. EVGA makes a quality unit for $50 but of course much cheaper units can be found.

Another case you might want to take a look at is the Silverstone FT03 mini. Roughly the same volume and mass of a Hadron. It's a few years old, whereas the Hadron is very recent, but it's a beautiful case. No cool side window like the Hadron though.

Ask your friend how he feels about going small. He will lose 0% power while reducing volume to 1/4-1/3 of what a normal tower would be. Explain that he can't add a soundcard, wireless card (if he wants it, get a board with it built-in), or go Crossfire or SLI. That's it though in therms of compromises.

As far as HDD selection, I can't tell you why there are 20 different WD blacks and some cost 3 billion dollars. I have no idea. If you want to avoid confusion grab a 1TB WD Caviar Blue. Good drive. I like the idea of getting mass storage. I know you want FAST storage, but bulk, CHEAP storage is a good thing to have too. I like having 1,256GB more than having 500GB, even if some of it is pokey.

Sounds like small is the way to go! No real drawbacks for what he's looking for, and the decreased weight will save a lot on shipping.

I like you already

 

[Theocnoob]

Just one question- do you have small hands? They'll come in handy for a small build if you do. Otherwise, just expect to be squeezing your pudgy digits into tight spaces. Still possible to do with big hands.