Advice on a good strategy/simulation build (factorio/railway empire)

Hi all, I am looking for a build £1,000 to £1,500 that will be great for intensive strategy/simulation games, especially Factorio and Civilization. Want to get the best balance, for example no point getting graphics card that is overpowered. Any advice would be awesome. I don’t need windows, also is there any point in normal hard drive?

Case
STYLISH PIANO BLACK ENIGMA CASE + 2 FRONT USB
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™ i5 Six Core Processor i5-9600K (3.7 GHz) 9 MB Cache
Motherboard
ASUS® ROG MAXIMUS XI HERO: ATX, LGA1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GBs - RGB Ready
Memory (RAM)
32GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3000MHz (2 x 16GB)
Graphics Card
6GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 1060 - DVI, HDMI, 3 x DP - GeForce GTX VR Ready!
1st Storage Drive
250GB SEAGATE BARRACUDA 2.5" SSD, (upto 560MB/sR | 530MB/sW)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM
Memory Card Reader
INTERNAL 52 IN 1 CARD READER (XD, MS, CF, SD, etc) + 1 x USB 2.0 PORT
Power Supply
CORSAIR 550W TXm SERIES™ SEMI-MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
Super Quiet Titan DragonFly Heatpipe Intel CPU Cooler
Thermal Paste
STANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Wireless/Wired Networking
10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT (Wi-Fi NOT INCLUDED)
USB/Thunderbolt Options
MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS

Price £1,373.00 including VAT and Delivery

Unique URL to re-configure : https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/intel-z370-pc/a7uY5FuCCn/

Hi,

Thank you for including the link to reconfigure the build you'd come up with. It makes it much easier to make suggested alterations. In this case I think there are quite a few to suggest. Here is what I came up with: -

Case
COOLERMASTER MASTERBOX MB600L CASE
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™ i7 Eight Core Processor i7-9700K (3.6GHz) 12MB Cache
Get Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 & More w/ select Intel CPUs!
Motherboard
ASUS® PRIME Z370-P II: ATX, LGA1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GBs
Memory (RAM)
32GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3000MHz (2 x 16GB)
Graphics Card
3GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 1060 - DVI, HDMI, 3 x DP
FREE Geforce Fortnite bundle w/ select GTX cards
1st Storage Drive
1TB SEAGATE BARRACUDA SATA-III 3.5" HDD, 6GB/s, 7200RPM, 32MB CACHE
1st M.2 SSD Drive
250GB SAMSUNG 970 EVO M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 3400MB/R, 1500MB/W)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
NOT REQUIRED
External DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
8x Slim USB 2.0 External DVD-RW
Memory Card Reader
USB 3.0 EXTERNAL SD/MICRO SD CARD READER
Power Supply
CORSAIR 550W TXm SERIES™ SEMI-MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
Super Quiet Titan DragonFly Heatpipe Intel CPU Cooler
Thermal Paste
STANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Wireless/Wired Networking
10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT (Wi-Fi NOT INCLUDED)
USB/Thunderbolt Options
MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS
Operating System
NO OPERATING SYSTEM REQUIRED
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Windows Recovery Media
NO RECOVERY MEDIA REQUIRED
Office Software
FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft® Office® 365 (Operating System Required)
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser
Google Chrome™
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
SATURDAY DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (BEFORE 12 NOON)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 5 to 7 working days
Quantity
1

Price £1,319.00 including VAT and Delivery

Unique URL to re-configure : https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/intel-z370-pc/7MZTc3rftA/

This comes in about £50 cheaper than your build but I think it will outperform yours in the all the areas you want.

Firstly, the i7 gets you two more cores, a higher single core clock speed, more cache and a host of others things. I would definitely recommend an i7 over an i5 for strategy.

The savings I made partly came from the motherboard, which will contain all sorts of features you probably wouldn't ever use; better support for multiple graphics cards, a more premium sound chip and lots of overclocking potential. If you aren't overclocking then those features will not benefit you. If you were going to overclock then you can get pre-overclocked ones from PCS.

The other saving came from the graphics card. The lesser 1060 will be ample for your needs and the price difference between the 6GB and 3GB versions is about £70.

As the motherboard supports the faster NVMe M.2 SATA modules it makes sense to get one of those. The chip I added will offer speeds around 4 times faster than the SSD from your build. Not all SSD storage is equal in terms of speed. It depends on the interface to which it connects. All SSD 'drives' still use the SATA ports and these are limited to particular speed. The NVMe M.2 SATA chips use the PCIe bus instead and it allows much faster speeds.

I did add a traditional HDD as well to provide more space. I can imagine you would use more than 250GB. Keep your OS and games on the M.2 SATA and put all your music, downloads and general stuff on the HDD. The faster read/write times of the M.2 SATA chip will massively pay dividends for strategy games.

You might not need 32GB of RAM for strategy games but as we're in budget I have left that as it was.

The case you chose is very basic and only really suitable for basic use and particularly when using on-board graphics. It wouldn't be great for keeping components cool and it would use pretty cheap fans, which would be noisier. A better case will be much quieter and have better heat management. The only limitation is that most of the better cases don't have room for internal optical drives and memory card readers. I added external ones into the build above but do you really use these things regularly?

I think this offers a much better PC for your needs.

Frank100

Wow, thank you so very much Frank100, that is amazing feedback and support, I really appreciate your advice! This is exactly the type of balancing that I was looking for to get the best possible PC build.

I've gone for a slightly different approach with some aspects.....



Case
FRACTAL DEFINE S BLACK GAMING CASE (Window)
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™ i7 Eight Core Processor i7-9700K (3.6GHz) 12MB Cache

Get Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 & More w/ select Intel CPUs!
Motherboard
ASUS® PRIME Z370-P II: ATX, LGA1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GBs
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3200MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
8GB AMD RADEON™ RX 580 - HDMI, 3 x DP - DX® 12

Up to 2 Games FREE w/ select RADEON RX GPUs!
1st Storage Drive
1TB SEAGATE BARRACUDA SATA-III 3.5" HDD, 6GB/s, 7200RPM, 32MB CACHE
1st M.2 SSD Drive
500GB WD Black™ M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD (up to 3400MB/s R | 2500MB/s W)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
NOT REQUIRED
External DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
8x Slim USB 2.0 External DVD-RW
Memory Card Reader
USB 3.0 EXTERNAL SD/MICRO SD CARD READER
Power Supply
CORSAIR 550W TXm SERIES™ SEMI-MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
Corsair H100x Hydro Cooler w/ PCS Ultra Quiet Fans
Thermal Paste
STANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Wireless/Wired Networking
10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT (Wi-Fi NOT INCLUDED)
USB/Thunderbolt Options
MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS
Operating System
NO OPERATING SYSTEM REQUIRED
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Windows Recovery Media
NO RECOVERY MEDIA REQUIRED
Office Software
FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft® Office® 365 (Operating System Required)
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser
Google Chrome™
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
SATURDAY DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (BEFORE 12 NOON)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 6 to 8 working days
Quantity
1

Price £1,350.00 including VAT and Delivery

Unique URL to re-configure : https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/intel-z370-pc/ezCfnMy8Ek/


The case - As previously stated this needs to be far better. I would go a step further and recommend the Define S. These cases are amazing, I now know first hand.
16GB of RAM is plenty, 32GB is a waste.... especially at the current prices. I've dropped to this to get some other, IMO more important, stuff in. I've also upped it to 3200hz.
I've opted for the AMD GPU option. It's easily as good a GPU with more RAM and £2 cheaper. Better option than the 1060 at the moment IMO.
I echo the storage recommendations but I've gone for a 500GB WD. They are almost as fast as the Samsungs yet a bit cheaper. You know the brand is good. I've also opted for 500GB as those simulators can take up a bit of room with addons.
For cooling I've selected the 100X. You need a decent cooler with these high end Intel chips. They do get toasty under load. I wouldn't skimp here at all.

If you want to up the motherboard a little go for the Z390 Aorus Pro. It's a great board and the sound is fantastic. Costs you though.


There's also a shout here for an AMD 2700X build btw.

@The_Scotster Thank you so very much for your reply as well, I can't believe the detail and effort you and Frank100 have included, absolutely incredible! I have pretty much ended up with exactly what @The_Scotster has recommended, I removed the accessories in the end (optical drive and media stuff) as I can see I was adding unncessacary extras and have the cables to use the ones on my existing pc if needed.