New PC for Gaming

[Greavous]

So im finally back again, i got my old pc from here a good 6 years ago and it was great, had to downgrade to a laptop for last 3 years but now im getting my own home i have space for a full PC. hopefully have the house by next week so ill be ordering in the next 2 weeks ish.

I generally play alot of different games such as WoW, CoD, division 2, 'flash games', Civ 6, overwatch, starcraft 2, etc, etc and im a stickler for graphics but no so much FPS (laptop struggles to do 40+ atm). im not looking into going 4K but want 1440p (more on that later). i am also doing light digital work (krita) and possibly looking into game development (basic flash type game).

I am looking at around £2k on the PC and want it to last possibly 3 years on high/ultra settings before i have to start reducing settings or upgrade.

So heres my current build:

Case
THERMALTAKE V200 TEMPERED GLASS RGB EDITION GAMING CASE
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™ i7 Six Core Processor i7-8700k (3.7GHz) 12MB Cache
Motherboard
ASUS® TUF Z370-PLUS GAMING II: ATX, LGA1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GBs - RGB Ready
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3200MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
8GB NVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 2080 - HDMI, 3x DP GeForce - RTX VR Ready!
1st Storage Drive
4TB SEAGATE BARRACUDA PRO 3.5", 7200 RPM 128MB CACHE
1st M.2 SSD Drive
250GB WD Black™ SN750 M.2 NVMe SSD (up to 3100MB/s R | 1600MB/s W)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
NOT REQUIRED
Power Supply
CORSAIR 650W TXm SERIES™ SEMI-MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
CoolerMaster Hyper 212X (120mm) Fan CPU Cooler Black Edition
Thermal Paste
COOLER MASTER MASTERGEL MAKER THERMAL COMPOUND
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
Genuine Windows 10 Home 64 Bit - inc. Single Licence [KUK-00001]
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Windows Recovery Media
Windows 10 Multi-Language Recovery Image - Unlimited Downloads from Online Account
Office Software
FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft® Office® 365 (Operating System Required)
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser
Firefox™
Keyboard & Mouse
ASUS Cerberus Keyboard & Mouse Bundle
Speakers
LOGITECH Z313 2.1 SILVER/BLACK SPEAKER SYSTEM
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
TIMED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND - MON-FRI (BEFORE 2PM)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 9 to 12 working days
Price: £2,005.00 including VAT and Delivery
Unique URL to re-configure: https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/intel-z370-pc/RDvw0RYxnC/


Reasons for things:

Case - im open to options doesnt have to be silent but dont want a jet engine, its also inside a desk so i dont need fancy RBG lights, but want good cooling. (the desk will surround the case completly with only front, back and some holes in the side of the desk i drilled).
Processor - only ever had 1 AMD based system and i only ever had problems with it so im staying with intel (im aware of the prices atm).
Mobo - open to suggestions dont need RBG or wireless.
Memory - the cost differences are so small i may aswell go best.
GFX card - was origionally going 2070 but after research and talking with friends the 2080 seems better choice for me.
Storage - internet where i live sucks so i need lots of space to store games so im not forever uninstalling and downloading.
Proc cooler - i was told this cooler was amazing so i went with it, not really interested in watercooling unless its safe and no maintenance.
Sound card + speakers - i cant wear headphones so all my quality will be from these, im open to any options or suggestions on these.
Keyboard and mouse - again just after some new equipment open to suggestions.
Delivery time - because of my work schedule this is a must.

now onto the screens, im wanting to move into 1440p and 144hz (2K?) im willing to spend up to £800 on 2 screens (same or variation) and would like some suggestions on what to pick, the MAIN thing i want is them to look similar as in the screen itself not the display so not different heights or shapes if this is possible.

my limit overall is around £3k for everything so if it needs moving around or i can save money somewhere thats great (im not fussed about saving £4 on something). Phew i think ive got all the info needed in there (ive stalked the forums enough to know).

Thanks in advance guys i know ill get the best advice here.

 

[Oussebon]

its also inside a desk

How much space is there? i.e. how big a case can you fit, and will the PC actually have airflow around it, or will it roast in its own hot air?

I'd suggest holding off until the end of the month when AMD are expected to have announced their Zen 2 CPUs, with a new gen of mobos too.

 

[Greavous]

How much space is there? i.e. how big a case can you fit, and will the PC actually have airflow around it, or will it roast in its own hot air?

I'd suggest holding off until the end of the month when AMD are expected to have announced their Zen 2 CPUs, with a new gen of mobos too.

Dont have the exact measurements right now but the average mid tower will fit woth mabe 10mm space around it. Old pc never had any heat problems in there since i drilled the 10cm holes in the side.

Will the new AMD parts lower the price for intel?

 

[Oussebon]

Maybe. They may also straight beat Intel in performance. The motherboards will also introduce PCIe 4.0 at the consumer level.

Definitely worth waiting and seeing what we see at Computex. You'll presumably be keeping the PC for several years so a week or so seems worth it.

Maybe check the measurements when you can. I'd avoid the V200 case in general due to it seeming to not have great fairly.

 

[Greavous]

Maybe. They may also straight beat Intel in performance. The motherboards will also introduce PCIe 4.0 at the consumer level.

Definitely worth waiting and seeing what we see at Computex. You'll presumably be keeping the PC for several years so a week or so seems worth it.

Maybe check the measurements when you can. I'd avoid the V200 case in general due to it seeming to not have great fairly.

Id still be put off buying AMD just from personal experience

 

[Oussebon]

There's no reason not to consider AMD.

They are leagues away from Faildozer days.

Intel, however, have been beset by issues, with ever increasing numbers of fundamental security vulnerabilities (the patches to which reduce performance), having to make motherboards run the CPUs out of spec by default in order to deliver the kind of performance expect, supply shortages driving up prices... Intel have also been flailing around like a fish on land trying to get 10nm out since forever.

That's not to say don't buy Intel, just that with these companies, fortunes ebb and flow and at the moment AMD have the initiative in the consumer space and are on the rise. They are worth consideration and may be about to hit Intel harder than they already did with Ryzen. Their motherboards are bringing PCIe 4.0 to the masses first.

Worth waiting and seeing

 

[Greavous]

There's no reason not to consider AMD.

They are leagues away from Faildozer days.

Intel, however, have been beset by issues, with ever increasing numbers of fundamental security vulnerabilities (the patches to which reduce performance), having to make motherboards run the CPUs out of spec by default in order to deliver the kind of performance expect, supply shortages driving up prices... Intel have also been flailing around like a fish on land trying to get 10nm out since forever.

That's not to say don't buy Intel, just that with these companies, fortunes ebb and flow and at the moment AMD have the initiative in the consumer space and are on the rise. They are worth consideration and may be about to hit Intel harder than they already did with Ryzen. Their motherboards are bringing PCIe 4.0 to the masses first.

Worth waiting and seeing

i will consider it (AMD, not the waiting).

anything else worth noting? ill get back with the measurements of the desk. my friend said the keybaord & mouse and the speakers arnt very good. any other suggestions on this? and also any reccomendation on some screens.

thanks for the advice so far

 

[Oussebon]

The KB + M + speakers are fine. "Very good" is actually pretty relative. It depends what you want from the peripheraps, and how confident you are you'd enjoy benefits from "better" ones. My ~£20 Logitech K200 is very good, because it's comfortable, well laid out (the media buttons and so on), and the bottleneck to gaming success for me is skill, not the responsiveness of a keyboard, I have a G500s gaming mouse not for pro Skillz responsiveness but because it's a comfortable shape for my hand and you can adjust the weight. Still not quite as good comfort-wise as my Trust mouse I found on sale in Boots(!) for £8... :S

I generally suggest going with something more entry/mid range, for instance what you have, and then deciding whether you upgrade later on.

You could always see whether a PC store near you has any gaming mice and/or keyboards on display. If they do, these will probably be expensive Razer ones. Try them out and see whether you like a mechanical keyboard and whether you're willing to spend £150 on one. If you like it, but you're not sure about spending that much, investigate some more wallet-friendly options. There are mechanical keyboards for ~£50 plus.

The final monitor selection may want to wait until when the PC spec is being finalised to ensure costs/specs are balanced. But for things to look into in the meantime, the Dell 2716DG is one of the cheaper 1440p 144hz gsync TN panel monitors around £400. There are IPS monitors, like the expensive Asus and Acer ones (~£600-£700). But not that Gsync Compatible is a thing, also check out the Gigabyte monitor https://www.gigabyte.com/uk/Monitors/AD27QD#kf ~£530. Also the fact it's freesync + gsync compatible means if you ever upgrade to an AMD GPU in the future, you can actually still use the adaptive sync!

 

[Greavous]

How much space is there? i.e. how big a case can you fit, and will the PC actually have airflow around it, or will it roast in its own hot air?

I'd suggest holding off until the end of the month when AMD are expected to have announced their Zen 2 CPUs, with a new gen of mobos too.

H/W/D 50.8cm/36.8cm/58.5cm is the area the tower will sit.

 

[Oussebon]

The Meshify C

https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/misc/case_images.php?view=11319

could be a good candidate.

Though specific comments - e.g. whether an AIO water cooler is sensible, and if so whether you should ask PCS to position it at the front so it gets more air than it might if it's up top with ~6cm of clearance, are probably best left

 

[Greavous]

The Meshify C

https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/misc/case_images.php?view=11319

could be a good candidate.

Though specific comments - e.g. whether an AIO water cooler is sensible, and if so whether you should ask PCS to position it at the front so it gets more air than it might if it's up top with ~6cm of clearance, are probably best left

Since i wont be overclocking. Will i need a watercooler or would the fan be suffocient

 

[Oussebon]

Again, it really would make sense to wait for the Zen 2 news.

No point planning out a detailed 9700k build if Zen 2 turns out to be better / better value / drop the prices of Intel and make a 9900k affordable / etc

And if it does turn out Zen 2 is a better choice for performance / performance vs price, I've no idea what kind of cooling requirements it will have.

Also note that even without overclocking, CPUs and motherboards do use various 'tricks' to boost themselves, depending on things like temps.

 

[Greavous]

Again, it really would make sense to wait for the Zen 2 news.

No point planning out a detailed 9700k build if Zen 2 turns out to be better / better value / drop the prices of Intel and make a 9900k affordable / etc

And if it does turn out Zen 2 is a better choice for performance / performance vs price, I've no idea what kind of cooling requirements it will have.

Also note that even without overclocking, CPUs and motherboards do use various 'tricks' to boost themselves, depending on things like temps.

the only main problem im seeing now is: the new zen 2 is amazing > i should get zen 2 > zen wont be on pcspecialist for 2 months
we get the keys on the 30th
id rather not wait (4 years of waiting for a desktop intensifies!)

 

[Oussebon]

Well, it could be Zen 2 doesn't hit the shelves for 3 months. Or it could hit the shelves imminently.

May as well wait a few days to find out if it's available soon and then make a decision

I was kind of hoping to wait for Navi but in the end decided stuff it and got an RTX 2060. Figured I'll get a few months' use of it before Navi which justifies the purchase. Need to decide my next AAA title to throw at it...

 

[Greavous]

Well, it could be Zen 2 doesn't hit the shelves for 3 months. Or it could hit the shelves imminently.

May as well wait a few days to find out if it's available soon and then make a decision

I was kind of hoping to wait for Navi but in the end decided stuff it and got an RTX 2060. Figured I'll get a few months' use of it before Navi which justifies the purchase. Need to decide my next AAA title to throw at it...

i dont have the money for another week anyway so i have to wait and see, currently with changing my build to AMD it only saves me £100 so hopefully it drops alot with the release. still cant decide which screens to get i did find that dell one for £385 on amazon just need a second "similar looking" screen

 

[Oussebon]

I'll take the bait, despite advising to hold off

I assume it only saved £100 because you went with an R7 CPU instead of an R5. There's little difference between R7 and R5 for gaming.

Difference should be more like £250+

PCSPECIALIST - Top Spec Custom PCs & Laptops Built to Order

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The Z370 TUF is a fairly 'basic' Z370 mobo; doesn't offer many features. So B450 is fairly analogous. A mobo like the X470 ultra gaming has a lot more features than the TUF and is still only ~£30 more than the B450. The Intel equivalent would be the AORUS Pro, ~£40 more than the TUF

An R7 isn't really a good buy for gaming.

2600x and 2700x are neck and neck with a ~£150 price difference. Difference between an 8700k and R5 2600x is at 1440p is ~4%.

* - see other post

But the ~£250 savings near enough buy you an RTX 2080 ti (build above goes to £2059 with one).

So if one is happy to pay a premium for Intel for marginal performance gains, one should definitely be happy to buy a Ryzen R5 and an RTX 2080 ti for near enough the same price for far bigger performance gains.

So arguably Ryzen offers better performance than Intel since it's so much cheaper, with so little performance loss, that it lets you buy a way better GPU.

Zen 2 is unlikely to be as cheap as that ofc. They usually release the top stuff first, and the X570 mobos are offering PCIe 4.0 (we've already seen M.2 SSDs with 5000 MB/s speeds teased - not to mention bandwidth allowing more M.2 SSDs / GPUs etc to run together). But since the gaming performance differences are already pretty tiny at higher resolutions, it's hard to see Intel as being recommendable for all but the most niche scenarios once Zen 2 appears.

It's already very hard to recommend Intel for anyone shy of a £3000 budget (where you're already buying a 2080 ti with money to spare).

 

[Oussebon]

Mr Forum is doing its thing where it doesn't allow the editing in of images

 

[Oussebon]

What monitors are you looking at? What's that Dell?

 

[Greavous]

firstly i didnt realise there was any bait? just trying to get as much info as possible the security risks and lowered performance are putting me off intel abit. but thanks for all the info it is much appreciated, i was aiming for "whats the best i can buy now" so i have it ready then when the zen 2 releases and then i can go "how long do i need to wait and whats the performance increase/cost" so if its not what i want i can just smash the order button .

the monitor was the Dell 2716DG you mentioned but im struggling to find a 27" screen that looks the same as the other but a 1080p version is only a 24". i had a look at the acer gaming screens but they are more expensive and i dont think massivly better (could be wrong). i ay jsut buy 2x the dell screens for easyness and asthetics.

i took your advice and removed the M+K and speakers ill find some other ones and made a AMD build with what you said.

Case
FRACTAL MESHIFY C BLACK GAMING CASE (Window)
Processor (CPU)
AMD Ryzen 5 2600X Six Core CPU (3.6GHz-4.25GHz/19MB CACHE/AM4)

World War Z & Division 2: Gold Edition FREE w/ select AMD Ryzen CPUs!
Motherboard
Gigabyte X470 AORUS Ultra Gaming: ATX, USB 3.1, SATA 6GBs - RGB Ready
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 2933MHz ~ (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
11GB NVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 2080 Ti - HDMI, 3x DP GeForce - RTX VR Ready!
1st Storage Drive
4TB SEAGATE BARRACUDA PRO 3.5", 7200 RPM 128MB CACHE
1st M.2 SSD Drive
250GB WD Black™ SN750 M.2 NVMe SSD (up to 3100MB/s R | 1600MB/s W)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
NOT REQUIRED
Power Supply
CORSAIR 650W TXm SERIES™ SEMI-MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
CoolerMaster Hyper 212X (120mm) Fan CPU Cooler Black Edition
Thermal Paste
COOLER MASTER MASTERGEL MAKER THERMAL COMPOUND
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
Genuine Windows 10 Home 64 Bit - inc. Single Licence [KK3-00002]
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Windows Recovery Media
Windows 10 Multi-Language Recovery Image - Unlimited Downloads from Online Account
Office Software
FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft® Office® 365 (Operating System Required)
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser
Firefox™
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
TIMED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND - MON-FRI (BEFORE 2PM)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 8 to 11 working days
Price: £2,015.00 including VAT and Delivery
Unique URL to re-configure: https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/amd-am4-pc/9rCt5PAGhN/

 

[Oussebon]

I didn't mean bait as in you were trolling or anything. More that I'd been trying to resist speculating on builds before next week but the thing you said about AMD being only £100 cheaper surprised me, compelled me to spec a build up to check it out, and once I'd done that I might as well post it...

If you get a Dell S2716DG (or something of that nature) for your main monitor, don't get a 1080p monitor for your 2nd screen.

You want them to be the same size, which is understandable. A 1080p monitor next to a 1440p monitor (especially if they're both 27") will make you really feel the lower res on the 1080p one. Also 27" 1080p monitors can be ~£160 or so, which is not much cheaper than a basic 1440p 27" monitor anyway, which start around £200.

I wouldn't suggest buying 2 S2716DGs; they're £400 or so, meaning you're paying £200 over a more budget model and it's not like you need gsync .

I'm not sure which sites you've been looking at, but I found Amazon was not very helpful for finding monitors. Other sites that focus specifically on hardware and tel you filter by resolution are better for shopping ideas. Looking at PCS's, the B2791QSU-B1 has a pretty neutral aesthetic (I briefly had one of its IPS cousins, and the monitor design was lovely, I just happened to have a bad panel - but I can recommend the design). Height adjustable stand, which will help line it up with your main monitor. I had it next to an AOC AGON AG271QG (which was also faulty ) and the Iiyama's pretty neutral design helped it fit in well next to the much more distinctive-looking AOC's gamer aesthetic. Though thta's subjective ofc, I can only give my opinion on that.