Little advice please!

[matlew]

Hey all. I'd like some opinions on the following build please.

The last time I went AMD was back in the early to mid nineties and it was a train wreck of a PC, but I'm well aware times change and I feel like giving them a try with both CPU and GPU. Trying to stick to a budget, hence the cheap CPU, but if I have read right the 3600X has a slightly better cooling fan than the standard 3600. I think a RX580 would in fact do me for what I have in mind, so I'm unsure about the RX5700 and whether it would be bottle-necked by the CPU anyway. I don't want to skimp on the motherboard, and have considered 16gm of RAM, but that feels like a pretty unnecessary downgrade.

The big question is case and cooling, I really don't know what to pick for that and can be a little flexible if anyone has solid suggestions there please. I might go 750W on the powersupply if I go with the RX5700, and 650W if the RX580 as I prefer to be comfortably over the minimum.

All thoughts welcome and thanks for any input!

Case CORSAIR 275R AIRFLOW TEMPERED GLASS GAMING CASE
Processor (CPU) AMD Ryzen 5 3600X Six Core CPU (3.8GHz-4.4GHz/36MB CACHE/AM4)
Motherboard ASUS® TUF X570-PLUS GAMING (USB 3.2 Gen 2, PCIe 4.0, CrossFireX) - RGB

Ready!

Memory (RAM) 32GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3000MHz (2 x 16GB)
Graphics Card 8GB AMD RADEONTM RX 5700 - HDMI, DP - DX® 12
1st Storage Drive 250GB SEAGATE BARRACUDA 2.5" SSD, (upto 560MB/sR | 530MB/sW)
2nd Storage Drive 1TB SEAGATE BARRACUDA SATA-III 3.5" HDD, 6GB/s, 7200RPM, 64MB CACHE
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive NOT REQUIRED
Power Supply CORSAIR 650W TXm SERIESTM SEMI-MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable 1 x 1 Metre European Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling STANDARD AMD CPU COOLER
Thermal Paste STANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING
Extra Case Fans 1x 120mm Black Case Fan (configured to extract from rear/roof)
Sound Card ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Wireless/Wired Networking WIRELESS 802.11N 300Mbps/2.4GHz PCI-E CARD
USB/Thunderbolt Options MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS
Operating System Windows 10 Home 64 Bit - inc. Single Licence
Operating System Language United Kingdom - English Language
Windows Recovery Media Windows 10 Multi-Language Recovery Image - Unlimited Downloads from Online

 

[Oussebon]

What's the budget, what price does that come to, and what are you using it for?

Gaming? if so, what monitor are you gaming on? non-gaming uses? what software?

 

[matlew]

That works out to 15, 851 Swedish Kronor er....£1,290. With the RX580 that gets down to £1,101 which is a bit more on par with what I want to spend to be honest. But around that ballpark for the budget, certainly no more.

Gaming yes, but I'm not a must for ultra high detail, beyond that as a basic study desktop also, nothing too fancy software wise, no video editing or art processing.

Been trying to research monitors on a budget too and have gotten to the AOC 24G2U, which supports AMD Freesync (hate tearing) and seems good for the money.

Thanks!

 

[matlew]

Oh yes, and I'm not clear on modern HDD's either really. Is an M2 that much better than a SATA SSD? Should I be looking at two SSD's? One for OS and one for everything else?

Oh and last question (maybe), is it worth trying to afford a separate soundcard? Onboards tend to creak a little if the rest of the system is under stress?

Again, thanks!

 

[Stephen M]

M2 SSDs are excellent and much faster, a good set up is a smaller M2, about 256GB for the OS and main games and then a larger HDD for storage. That will save a bit of money as HDDs are still a bit cheaper than SSDs.

Most onboard sound cards are pretty good now and getting a separate one could be a waste of money. A better option would be to get a decent set of 5.1 speakers and run them from the onboard card.

 

[matlew]

Thanks Stephen.

Any thoughts on the case too please?