Planning Investment In A Beast & Need Advice!

Davo64

Member
Hi all! I've been looking into upgrading to a new PC, and I've been working on designing a build. I'm pretty new to this so I'm looking for advice & thoughts

When designing this I started with the 'Minecraft RTX Pro' setup and built from there. I'm planning this as a long-term investment while I'm at a point in my life where I can afford it.

Budget: Flexible for cost-justified improvements, I'll say £3,500 is probably stretching it
Uses: - Gaming (my main game these days is Minecraft but it's not the only one I play)
- Image processing (high-quality photography, I regularly edit large images in Photoshop which is a huge RAM hog and slow on my current laptop)
- (Some) video editing, including up to 4K
- Possible streaming & VR in the future
Monitors: Included in the spec but will list here separately too, using a dual-monitor setup at work has made me want that for myself, so I was thinking a 4k60hz monitor primarily for photography and a 1440p144hz monitor primarily for gaming with those higher framerates

Spec + Thoughts On Each Part:
Case

COOLERMASTER MASTERBOX TD500 MESH ARGB GAMING CASE Was looking at the Corsair iCUE 5000X, but it appears to be out of stock at the moment. This one looks suitable for the build, though idk if it'll be worth throwing some more money in for the 5000X. I do like its potential for extra cooling options.
Processor (CPU)
AMD Ryzen 9 5950X 16 Core CPU (3.4GHz-4.9GHz/72MB CACHE/AM4) Not sure if overkill but certainly very powerful for multithreaded CPU-based processes and handling as many tasks as I'll need
Motherboard
GIGABYTE X570S UD: ATX (USB 3.2 Gen 1, PCIe 4.0) - ARGB Ready! One of the areas I don't know a lot about, mostly chosen based on the buyer's guide and original spec
Memory (RAM)
64GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3200MHz (4 x 16GB) A lot of RAM for sure but Photoshop in particular eats it like crazy. Comparatively the extra 32GB add surprisingly little to the price for a big jump.
Graphics Card
8GB NVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 3070 Ti - HDMI, DP, LHR Reading the GPU guide leads me to believe this might be a good choice for my setup, though I'm still not 100% sure if it's over or underkill haha. Using two monitors probably increases the requirements but then wouldn't only one be doing intensive work at a time?
Graphics Card Support Bracket
PCS ARGB GRAPHICS CARD SUPPORT BRACKET Looking at other threads these seem like a good idea to avoid the GPU sagging, which for a minimal increase in price seems more than worth it


(Continued below, looks like the site doesn't like my verbose posts haha)
 

Davo64

Member
1st M.2 SSD Drive
1TB SEAGATE FIRECUDA 530 GEN 4 PCIe NVMe (up to 7300MB/R, 6000MB/W) I see other threads suggesting getting a second SSD, so one can be for the OS while the other is used for applications. I might consider it but how large should I be looking? If I'm using one for the OS does it need to be as large? Anyway the high speed & large size of this one are definitely very appealing given the power of running applications from SSDs
1st Storage Drive
8TB SEAGATE IRONWOLF PRO 3.5", 7200 RPM 256MB CACHE I eat memory for breakfast so a large storage drive is a must for me. I already have two 8TB external hub drives and it'd be good for me to have that kind of storage internally too. I've wondered about the value of having a 2nd drive in RAID 1 to provide a layer of safety against drive failures, though I'll have to back files up externally as well anyway for safety.
Memory Card Reader
USB 3.0 EXTERNAL SD/MICRO SD CARD READER Useful thing to have and very cheap
Power Supply
CORSAIR 650W TXm SERIES™ SEMI-MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET The site reckons this is the correct size for the build, though I'm not sure if there are any advantages to going over
Power Cable
1 x 1.5 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
PCS FrostFlow 240 Series ARGB High Performance Liquid Cooler (AMD) Higher TDP than the CPU but I think it's good to have some headroom on that?
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND Probably not necessary but for £9 I might as well take the improvement I think
LED Lighting
2x 50cm ARGB LED Strip
Extra Case Fans
1x 120mm Thermaltake TOUGHFAN 12 Case Fan Unsure if necessary but adds redundancy and more ventilation is always a plus, especially when it comes at a low price
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD) Going beyond standard on this only seems necessary for pro audiophiles, which isn't really me
Network Card
10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT
Wireless Network Card
WIRELESS 802.11N 300Mbps/2.4GHz PCI-E CARD Not sure if this is needed with this motherboard or not
USB/Thunderbolt Options
2 PORT (1 x TYPE A, 1 x TYPE C) USB 3.1 PCI-E CARD + STANDARD USB PORTS Having extra drives seems handy for futureproof practicality as I may end up connecting more devices over time
Operating System
Windows 11 Home 64 Bit - inc. Single Licence [KUK-00003] Unsure whether to go for Win10 or the less familiar but likely longer-lived Win11
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
 

Davo64

Member
Windows Recovery Media
Windows 10/11 Multi-Language Recovery Image - Unlimited Downloads from Online Account
Office Software
Microsoft® Office Home & Student 2021 (1 Digital License) Includes everything I need from Office
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser
Google Chrome™
Monitor
AOC U2879VF 28" 4K Monitor - 3480 x 2160, 1MS, HDMI, DVI, DP
Monitor
MSI 27" Optix G27CQ4 - 2560 x 1440, 1MS, 165Hz 144Hz would be fine, this just seemed to be my best option in the right size to match as closely as possible with the other monitor
Keyboard & Mouse
Razer® Cynosa V2 Gaming Keyboard
Cable Management
PCS 1.5M Zip Cable Tidy - Professional Cable Management Worth having as I'm messy enough haha
Warranty
3 Year Standard Warranty (1 Month Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 4 to 7 working days
Price: £3,250.00 including VAT and Delivery


All feedback is welcome! I can see myself agonising over details & research for a while, but some expert guidance on what I may have missed will certainly help the process :) I guess the biggest questions I have are around:
• Does that GPU choice sound good?
• Does that CPU choice sound overkill?
• Does the dual-monitor setup sound like a good idea?
• Are there any obvious gaps or mistakes in my choices?
 

Davo64

Member
Thank you kindly for your responses and apologies for the delay in replying myself! I think waiting for the new gen stuff may be a good idea, plus it gives more time to think. I wonder if maybe I should go for a non-photographic 4k monitor for now as a single-monitor setup and get the 2nd photographic one at a later time? I suppose it depends on whether the higher refresh rate is preferable to a larger screen. I'm used to 60hz already so I guess I may not miss the extra frames haha
 
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