Planning on building a gaming PC - Have I chosen the right components?

zed77ultra · Mar 24, 2014

Hi,
I am planning on building a gaming PC for <£800. I think I might have decided in the specs, but I would like other people's opinions on things like Will the components I have chosen work together? What games will it be able to play and at what settings/FPS? Is there a way I could improve it but keep it under £800?

Here are the specs:
Processor: AMD FX8350
Motherboard: Asus M5A97 R2.0
HDD: WD 1TB 3.5 inch
RAM: Kingston Technology 8 GB 2400 MHz CL11 (2x4GB)
PSU: Corsair Builder Series CXM 600W
Graphics Card: EVGA Nvidia GeForce GTX 770 4GB GDDR5
Case: Zalman Z11 (This case comes with fans so no need to buy any of them.)
Wireless Card: Asus PCE-N15
DVD Drive: Samsung 24x Retail

Everything on that list adds up to £783.

Thanks!

One quick update: I do not want an AMD GPU, nor do I plan on overclocking anything

IDontUnderstand · Mar 24, 2014

Change to FX-8320, it's the same thing but clocked lower.
Get a CPU cooler as FX chips tend to run hot.
Change RAM to cheaper 1600 CL9 or 8.
Change PSU to XFX/Antec/Corsair TX/Corsair HX.

Swartz55 · Mar 24, 2014

What games do you plan on playing? And I would swap out the PSU for one by SeaSonic-- the Builder series isn't the best PSU, and SeaSonic is a good brand. I would find you an exact model, but it'd be in USD because I'm in the 'Merica's.

numanator · Mar 24, 2014

This is what I would recommend

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: AMD FX-8320 3.5GHz 8-Core Processor (£105.59 @ Aria PC)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler (£25.45 @ Scan.co.uk)
Motherboard: Asus M5A99FX PRO R2.0 ATX AM3+ Motherboard (£99.99 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: G.Skill Ares Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (£61.85 @ Ebuyer)
Storage: Crucial M500 120GB 2.5" Solid State Disk (£52.98 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£42.99 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 770 2GB Video Card (£257.00 @ Ebuyer)
Case: Zalman Z11 ATX Mid Tower Case (£49.16 @ Dabs)
Power Supply: XFX 650W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply (£63.73 @ Aria PC)
Total: £758.74
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-03-24 17:48 GMT+0000)

-Fx 8320 is the same as fx8350 but the 8350 has a stock overclock, you can overclock the 8320 to the same speed.
-Slightly better motherboard
-Added SSD for faster boot up and applications
-Dual channel ram runs faster than a single ram stick
-Better quality PSU but not modular
-gtx 770 2gb, 4gb is only needed if you plan to SLI or have a multi monitor setup. I am assuming no SLI since the motherboard you chose does not support it (the one in my build does) If you want the 770 4gb it is better to save up a bit more and get the gtx 780 for a bit more

-didnt include the dvd or wifi card in the build

Rami Zerker Reini · Mar 24, 2014

That rig will play all of the newest games and it shouldn't have a problem.

1TB is enough for gaming so is 8GB of RAM, If I may suggest buy two 4GB ram sticks because 2 x 4GB is a little (REALLY LITTLE) better/faster then 1 x 8GB.

Meaby I'm being dumb but I'd go for a 650w 80+ Bronze PSU instead of a 600w to be safe (Corsair is ok, Fractal Design and Seasonic would be awesome.

Wisecracker · Mar 24, 2014

If you buy an FX-6300 and an Asus M5A97 (not LE), you have entered R9 290 territory with the same budget

Yowsa !

With your current build, choosing the Sapphire Dual-X AMD Radeon R9 280X OC at £222 brings the Samsung 840 EVO 120GB into play for around £805 total.

That'll work

edit: :lol:
I inter-mixed your build with numanator -- I've confused myself!

sora · Mar 25, 2014

Wisecracker :

The 770 is a bit cheaper though and will provide pretty much the same performance.

Swartz55 · Mar 25, 2014

sora :

Wisecracker :

The 770 is a bit cheaper though and will provide pretty much the same performance.

Your name is awesome.

zed77ultra · Mar 27, 2014

numanator :

I do want to get 4GB graphics card as I plan on playing games that are not yet released on ultra settings like watch dogs and I have heard that you need 4GB of vram to do so. I do not plan on getting anything better than a GTX 770 as it will go over my budget by quite a bit. The memory I have chosen is 2x4gb sticks I guess I should have mentioned that in the description for it. Another thing I should have mentioned is that I am new to a lot of this stuff as my friend just built a gaming PC of his own and he gave me inspiration. I am not as nooby as some people but there is still a lot of stuff I don't understand.

IDontUnderstand · Mar 27, 2014

VRAM only affects performance when playing games at higher resolutions, such as 3 x 1080p or 2 x 1440p or 4k. If neither one of them is going to be your resolution, then 2 GB is sufficient.

zed77ultra · Mar 27, 2014

IDontUnderstand :

Wow that's a relief; I thought I was gonna have to get a 4gb graphics card but 1920x1080 will for sure be the highest resolution I play games on. I do plan on getting games that have not yet been released, on ultra settings, so are you sure i will be ok for that with only 2gb?

IDontUnderstand · Mar 27, 2014

Yes.

Here is my version for cheaper and better.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: AMD FX-8320 3.5GHz 8-Core Processor (£105.59 @ Aria PC)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler (£25.45 @ Scan.co.uk)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3 ATX AM3+ Motherboard (£89.99 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (£59.68 @ Ebuyer)
Storage: Crucial M500 120GB 2.5" Solid State Disk (£52.98 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£35.99 @ Aria PC)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 770 2GB Video Card (£249.99 @ Dabs)
Case: Zalman Z11 Plus ATX Mid Tower Case (£47.95 @ Amazon UK)
Power Supply: SeaSonic S12II 620W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply (£59.35 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £726.97
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-03-27 19:47 GMT+0000)

zed77ultra · Mar 27, 2014

IDontUnderstand :

Yes.

Here is my version for cheaper and better.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: AMD FX-8320 3.5GHz 8-Core Processor (£105.59 @ Aria PC)
CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler (£25.45 @ Scan.co.uk)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3 ATX AM3+ Motherboard (£89.99 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (£59.68 @ Ebuyer)
Storage: Crucial M500 120GB 2.5" Solid State Disk (£52.98 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£35.99 @ Aria PC)
Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 770 2GB Video Card (£249.99 @ Dabs)
Case: Zalman Z11 Plus ATX Mid Tower Case (£47.95 @ Amazon UK)
Power Supply: SeaSonic S12II 620W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply (£59.35 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £726.97
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
(Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-03-27 19:47 GMT+0000)

The ram I chose is 2400 mhz and the ram you chose is 1600mhz. Doesn't this mean that the one I chose is faster? (I am new to this kind of thing.)

numanator · Mar 27, 2014

The ram speed is important but equally important is the CAS Latency or CL

Note: the following is a simplification

If you check out the CAS Latency wiki it has some pretty good info : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CAS_latency

Basically if you look at the chart there you can figure out that CL 11 ram at 2000 would have a lag time of 11 nano seconds (ns) and CL 9 ram at 1600 would have a lag time of 11.25 ns.

Frankly this difference is pretty negligible.

Also, doing some rough calcs for 2400Mhz ram at CL 11 you come up with 9.2 ns vs 11.25 ns with CL 9 1600 Mhz

So yes the ram you chose is faster, but is the 2 ns worth the extra cost? That is up to you.

Also, I believe the ram you chose is 1.65v ram so I am not sure if it is supported by the mobo and cpu (I know for a fact that you want 1.5v for the intel cpus).

IDontUnderstand · Mar 27, 2014

Indeed, RAM speed and frequency impacts APU's performance the most, but not much outside of that.

AMD doesn't care what voltage your RAM is, as long as it's not some crazy voltage.

numanator · Mar 27, 2014

IDontUnderstand :

Good to know about the AMD ram

zed77ultra · Mar 28, 2014

So does everyone think that I should go for IDontUnderstand's build?

zed77ultra · Mar 28, 2014

I think that I will be able to afford a 240GB SSD as it is only £30 more than a 120GB SSD. http://www.amazon.co.uk/Crucial-CT240M500SSD1-2-5-inch-240GB-Internal/dp/B00BQ8RM1A/ref=pd_sim_computers_6?ie=UTF8&refRID=0G41JT0MHWDD2TSAJCQ7

Rami Zerker Reini · Mar 28, 2014

IDontUnderstand :

FX-8320 is 12% worse than the FX-8350.

numanator · Mar 28, 2014

Rami Zerker Reini :

Right. Because the 8350 is a 8320 with a stock overclock...

That overclock can be easily achieved however at extreme OC settings the 8350 will come out on top. I did read somewhere that the 8350 can more consistently get a higher OC than the 8320 but the performance difference is usually not worth the price difference.

Edit: Some comparisons for those interested:

http://www.cpu-world.com/Compare/308/AMD_FX-Series_FX-8320_vs_AMD_FX-Series_FX-8350.html

http://www.overclock.net/t/1428859/a-comparison-8320-vs-8350

zed77ultra · Mar 28, 2014

numanator :

Rami Zerker Reini :

Right. Because the 8350 is a 8320 with a stock overclock...

That overclock can be easily achieved however at extreme OC settings the 8350 will come out on top. I did read somewhere that the 8350 can more consistently get a higher OC than the 8320 but the performance difference is usually not worth the price difference.

Edit: Some comparisons for those interested:

http://www.cpu-world.com/Compare/308/AMD_FX-Series_FX-8320_vs_AMD_FX-Series_FX-8350.html

http://www.overclock.net/t/1428859/a-comparison-8320-vs-8350

But the CPU cooler costs £25 and the FX 8350 is £35 more than the FX 8320 but my friend got it and it comes with its own cooler, so would I be better off just paying the extra tenner for the 8350?

numanator · Mar 28, 2014

Both the 8320 and 8350 run pretty hot so it is recommended to grab a cpu cooler anyways for either one. Honestly it is a personal choice. If you don't plan to OC the cpu then go with the 8350, else you can save a $30 to put towards a cooler to OC the 8320.

Rami Zerker Reini · Mar 28, 2014

You should never use a stock cooler unless if you can't afford an aftermarket one at the moment. They do the job barely, aftermarket coolers are the best :3

zed77ultra · Mar 28, 2014

Rami Zerker Reini :

does this look any good?
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Titan-Universal-CPU-Cooler-PWM/dp/B004FPQNRK/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1396034116&sr=8-2&keywords=aftermarket+cpu+cooler

Rami Zerker Reini · Mar 28, 2014

zed77ultra :

I thing the CPU would demolish that CPU cooler, I recommend this.

-
http://www.amazon.co.uk/noctua-NH-U12S/dp/B00C76RL5M/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1396034545&sr=8-1&keywords=noctua+NH-U12S
-

Believe me, It's worth it.

Planning on building a gaming PC - Have I chosen the right components?

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