Please advise on this spec for Excel power user

[Orinoco]

Any thoughts/advice on the spec below would be very welcome! I am an excel power user and I occasionally do video editing and very occasionally play games. My previous system was a Dell which I owned for 9 years! (it was pretty high spec at the time, featuring an i7 intel chip, 8GB ram and 2TB HD storage). This new spec is basically an upgrade from what I had before. I was still happy with the performance of my Dell until the hard disks (RAID 0 configuration) died on me last week. Having suffered a hard disk failure is why I am opting for a RAID 1 (mirrored) configuration, and I am also hoping that the SSD drives will be more reliable than HDD. I also plan to add a 2TB HDD to the configuration below for less critical files.

Ignore the monitor listed as it will not be used for this desktop but for a separate CCTV system. I plan to use 2 or even 3 monitors for this desktop.

Thank you.



Case
PCS 6003B BLACK CASE
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™ i9 Eight Core Processor i9-9900K (3.6GHz) 16MB Cache

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Motherboard
ASUS® PRIME Z390-P: ATX, LGA1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GBs
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 2400MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
6GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 1660 - HDMI, DP - GeForce GTX VR Ready!
1st Storage Drive
1TB SEAGATE BARRACUDA 2.5" SSD, (upto 560MB/sR | 540MB/sW)
2nd Storage Drive
1TB SEAGATE BARRACUDA 2.5" SSD, (upto 560MB/sR | 540MB/sW)
RAID
RAID 1 (MIRRORED VOLUME - 2 x same size & model HDD / SSD)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM
Memory Card Reader
USB 3.0 EXTERNAL SD/MICRO SD CARD READER
Power Supply
CORSAIR 450W VS SERIES™ VS-450 POWER SUPPLY
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
CoolerMaster Hyper 212X (120mm) Fan CPU Cooler Black Edition
Thermal Paste
STANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING
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
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 - Supplied on DVD
Office Software
FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft® Office® 365 (Operating System Required)
Anti-Virus
BullGuard™ Internet Security - Free 90 Day License inc. Gamer Mode
Browser
Microsoft® Edge (Windows 10 Only)
Monitor
AOC 21.5" E2270SWDN LED Monitor. 1920 x 1080, 5MS
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 4 to 6 working days
Promotional Item
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Welcome Book
PCSpecialist Welcome Book - United Kingdom & Republic of Ireland
Price: £1,514.00 including VAT and Delivery

 

[neewhom]

You'll definitely benefit from upgrading the speed of your ram, i'd recommend 3200MHZ + if you can stretch your budget, excel likes fast RAM if you're running tens/hundreds of thousands of rows on a v-look up
I'd also consider a water cooler for the I9 as it's particularly hot when you're taking advantage of all of the cores, the question is whether they'd be under load for a long time, typically with excel you'll be spiking the CPU and allowing it to cool down, rather than constant load. If you are concerned about it i'd recommend the corsair 100 or 115i

 

[Orinoco]

Thanks for the advice. I will definitely go for the better RAM.

Re water cooling, perhaps I should just go for an i7 chip as that would save about £120 and I am told there is not much performance difference with an i9.

 

[neewhom]

If i were you, i'd look at the new AMD chips, you'll probably find a more favourable core numbers & speed to price ratio than Intel. Maybe see if anyone's done any benchmarks for excel use on the new AMD chips compared to the i9-9900k

I don't really know how well CoolerMaster Hyper 212X does for cooling, but I do know that the Noctua options are generally considered the best for heatsink/fan cooling

 

[Oussebon]

What's the budget?

What software do you use for video editing?

Are you using 2 or 3 monitors with this system?

 

[Orinoco]

The max budget is £1300 excluding VAT

For video editing I have been using shotcut, but video editing is perhaps 2% of my computer usage. In addition to excel and video editing I also do java coding on Android studio.

I will be using 2 monitors to begin with, but am considering adding a third monitor at a later date.

Thanks for any advice

 

[Oussebon]

An R9 3900x would offer better performance for your uses.

If the gaming is occasional and casual, a cheaper GPU is fine.

Get a faster SSD

RAID 1 makes sense where you need to make sure the system stays running with 0 downtime. But there are better ways of backing up data. Versioned, real-time backups of documents and periodic system images for an easy restore to a new drive make more sense.

RAID 1 will protect you from downtime due to hardware failure, but not downtime due to a bad Windows update, faulty driver, etc.

A better case for better airflow, CPU cooler, and better quality and more efficient PSU would be in order.

e.g.

Case
FRACTAL FOCUS G BLACK GAMING CASE (Window)
Processor (CPU)
AMD Ryzen 9 3900X 12 Core CPU (3.8GHz-4.6GHz/70MB CACHE/AM4)
Motherboard
ASUS® TUF X470-PLUS GAMING (DDR4, 6Gb/s, CrossFireX) - RGB Ready!
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3200MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
4GB AMD RADEON™ RX 570 - HDMI, DP - DX® 12
1st Storage Drive
3TB SATA-III 3.5" HDD, 6GB/s, 7200RPM, 64MB CACHE
1st M.2 SSD Drive
1TB ADATA SX6000 Pro PCIe M.2 2280 (2100 MB/R, 1500 MB/W)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM
Memory Card Reader
USB 3.0 EXTERNAL SD/MICRO SD CARD READER
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
Corsair H100x Hydro Series High Performance 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
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
BullGuard™ Internet Security - Free 90 Day License inc. Gamer Mode
Browser
Microsoft® Edge (Windows 10 Only)
Monitor
AOC 21.5" E2270SWDN LED Monitor. 1920 x 1080, 5MS
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 4 to 6 working days
Price: £1,524.00 including VAT and Delivery

Unique URL to re-configure: https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/amd-am4-gen3-pc/8ZJ80Ejbwk/

 

[Orinoco]

Thanks to both of you for your advice. I have pretty much taken it all on board.

 

[Scott]

In this case I would probably save the cash and go with the 3700X. Obviously the 3900X will crush multi-thread calculations but the 3700X isn't going to be a slouch either. I run some insanely complex formulae in work on an i3 and it fairs just fine.

The cores just doesn't justify the cost for me with this sort of number crunching.