[Solved] New Build Idea - Can you help? - New-System-Build

Hey folks, this is my first time posting here, so nice to meet all of you.

Long story short: my heatsink and fan fell off due to an aging bracket clip holding it on. At this point I decided it was a great idea to upgrade my system. As far as what the system is used for, I would say that 60% of the time I am playing games, 40% of the time I am watching movies or television from the computer to my TV. Now, this isn't my first computer build, I've done three before this, but due to work and personal life I haven't been able to keep as on top of new hardware as I previously did. So here I am, asking for some opinions and suggestions.

The order of importance for me would be: performance, speed, aesthetics, etc.. Obviously I want something reliable that isn't going to fall apart in six months, but unless you go incredibly cheap that is almost a given. As far as personal preference, I like nVidia GPU's, I like Intel CPU's, and on everything else I am not incredibly particular.

I have spent about two weeks or so spending all my free time researching different aspects, and have come up with the following build. I would be grateful for any suggestions you can give me on where I might be going wrong, or any opinions regarding your experiences with the hardware here. I am on somewhat of a budget, so the absolutely top of the line stuff is a no-no. Ideally, under $200 for any individual piece is the right idea, but if it's very close to that number and very good, I am willing to listen.

TLDR: Please post any experiences with the following hardware, or any suggestions of what you would do differently.

Motherboard: MSI with 6Gb/s, USB 3.0, and two 2.0 x16 PCI-E slots if I so choose to SLI later.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813130574

Processor: Intel Core i5-2400 Sandy Bridge 3.1GHz (3.4GHz Turbo Boost) Quad Core
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6819115074

Heatsink: Noctua NH-D14
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835608018

Graphics: EVGA SuperClocked 01G-P3-1461-KR GeForce GTX 560 (Fermi) 1GB 256-bit GDDR5
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814130661

Memory: Mushkin Enhanced Silverline 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Desktop Memory Model 996770 (Now, for this I was going to go with the 1600 Radioactive stuff, but I had read a couple of places where people couldn't get the 1600 to work with my mobo. Does anyone have an experience or knowledge of this?)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820226095

Case: Antec DF-85 Black Steel / Plastic ATX Full Tower Computer Case
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6811129087
Plus, http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835185059 to put on the side mount.

I am re-using my Corsair 850W PSU as there is nothing wrong with it and it should handle the load well.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6817139009

I was thinking that with that heatsink, CPU, and case I could probably OC the processor to about 3.8 or better with out going above 70C, still haven't made up my mind if I want to do that yet or not though. The GPU seems like the best mix between price and value for around $200, and the mobo seems like a great choice with the 6Gb/s SATA and USB 3.0. I am hoping I can squeeze out high graphic settings on most of the newer games with few issues on that GPU. And in case anyone is wondering I will be using Win7 x64 Ultimate, so the RAM isn't going to waste. One question on it though, would you folks get 2x4GB dual channel, or 2 of the 2x2GB dual channels (effectively 2x dual channel - not sure if that = quad channel or what.)

Thanks in advance for anything you may offer.

Reply to Rokkman

Best answer

Quote :

Case: Antec DF-85 Black Steel / Plastic ATX Full Tower Computer Case
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6811129087
Plus, http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835185059 to put on the side mount.

Ditch the side fan - you don't need it. Most case makers include plenty to start with, you can always add more once you get the build up and running. Try the Corsair Carbide 500R - it includes all the necessary fans and has the best airflow and cable management for the money you can get. I'd heavily suggest reading these articles before splurging on a bunch of fans you don't need:

http://www.tomshardware.com/review [...] ,3053.html
http://www.tomshardware.com/review [...] ,3058.html

Quote :

I was thinking that with that heatsink, CPU, and case I could probably OC the processor to about 3.8 or better with out going above 70C, still haven't made up my mind if I want to do that yet or not though.

You can't OC a 2400 - not possible. Unlocked "K" processors are the only ones that it can be done.

Quote :

The GPU seems like the best mix between price and value for around $200, and the mobo seems like a great choice with the 6Gb/s SATA and USB 3.0. I am hoping I can squeeze out high graphic settings on most of the newer games with few issues on that GPU.

I agree with that choice and EVGA is very reliable in the support department. I'd say though go with the 560TI as it will last you a bit longer - it's only a few bucks more.

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And in case anyone is wondering I will be using Win7 x64 Ultimate, so the RAM isn't going to waste.

Do you already have a license? Windows 7 Ultimate is quite a bit expensive and you don't need it if you don't use the language packs. You can get by with Pro and still get the full use of your RAM. If you're using less than 16GB you can actually get by with Home Premium and save $100.

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One question on it though, would you folks get 2x4GB dual channel, or 2 of the 2x2GB dual channels (effectively 2x dual channel - not sure if that = quad channel or what.)

No - go with the 2 x 4GB - it will be plenty. Triple is only used on X58 (outgoing) and quad is only used on X79 (expensive).

Quote :

I am re-using my Corsair 850W PSU as there is nothing wrong with it and it should handle the load well.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6817139009

Good PSU. It would definitely be wise to reuse it.

Quote :

Memory: Mushkin Enhanced Silverline 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Desktop Memory Model 996770 (Now, for this I was going to go with the 1600 Radioactive stuff, but I had read a couple of places where people couldn't get the 1600 to work with my mobo. Does anyone have an experience or knowledge of this?)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820226095

Never been a big fan of "vanity" PC parts like the radioactive RAM or the tall Corsair Vengenace RAM - it's all just for show and you don't really need it. You can get by with regular Corsair XMS3 RAM and that will handle just fine. When you get your motherboard the support site will tell you what RAM is compatible and what isn't - for SB general guidelines are 1600MHz, 1.5V, timing 9-9-9-24.

Quote :

Motherboard: MSI with 6Gb/s, USB 3.0, and two 2.0 x16 PCI-E slots if I so choose to SLI later.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813130574

Heatsink: Noctua NH-D14
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835608018

Not a big fan of MSI motherboards - if you're going with such high end stuff I'd actually recommend my board which is the Gigabyte Z68XP-UD3P.

And I've actually come to really dislike huge multi-layered heat sinks like the D14 - when I converted my system to AM3 last week I actually found that the size of my fan made some things on my motherboard hard to reach and difficult to work with. I'm planning to actually ditch the fan in favor of a Corsair H100 - that will make things a lot easier. If you want to stick with Noctua try the NH-U9B, or maybe the Hyper 212 Evo, or maybe EVGA's super cooler.

What's your max budget? I can probably suggest a more balanced build if I had that.

Message edited by g-unit1111 on 12-14-2011 at 01:03:06 AM

Reply to g-unit1111

What you have will work, but I would make some trade-offs.

The 2400 is fine, but since you can't overclock it to any meaningful extent. You can only do fsb overclocking which is good for 5% max. I do not see the need for a top of the line noctua cooler. The stock cooler would be fine.

But, the P67 motherboard will allow overclocking of a 2500K, and I suggest you get one. Yes, it will be $30 more, but you will be going from a 3.1 cpu to a 3.3 cpu with the option to do a conservative overclock to 4.0 or higher.

If the $30 is an important consideration, you would be better off trading the noctua cooler for a Xigmatek gaia, or cm hyper212 which cost only $30 or so and will still do the cooling job well.

As to ram speed, the sandy bridge cpu's are insensitive to ram speed. The difference between slow and fast ram is only 1-3% in real app speed.
Regardless, I would suggest this G.skil DDR3-1600 8gb kit which will cost less.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820231428

If you have two sticks, you get dual channel. No more regardless. No such thing as quad channel on a P67 chipset.

Message edited by geofelt on 12-14-2011 at 12:50:22 AM

------------------------------ 3570K@4.3/Asus P8P67-M Pro/EVGA GTX680/Samsung 305T(x2)/Silverstone TJ-08E/Intel 520 180gb
Reply to geofelt

Quote :

But, the P67 motherboard will allow overclocking of a 2500K, and I suggest you get one. Yes, it will be $30 more, but you will be going from a 3.1 cpu to a 3.3 cpu with the option to do a conservative overclock to 4.0 or higher.

Personally I like the Z68 better but they'll both give you pretty good results.

Quote :

If the $30 is an important consideration, you would be better off trading the noctua cooler for a Xigmatek gaia, or cm hyper212 which cost only $30 or so and will still do the cooling job well.

I do not like the Gaia - it has way too many loose parts, unclear instructions and really horrible thermal paste. I had one and it nearly fried my old build. I'd recommend the Hyper 212 or the Noctua NH-U9B. But the large 140mm coolers are absolutely ridiculous and I've found them to be quite difficult to work with, especially when I installed my new board last week.

Quote :

As to ram speed, the sandy bridge cpu's are insensitive to ram speed. The difference between slow and fast ram is only 1-3% in real app speed.
Regardless, I would suggest this G.skil DDR3-1600 8gb kit which will cost less.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820231428

I've noticed that too. You can run the RAM at the factory-set speeds and timings by enabling it in the motherboard's BIOS but anything beyond that will totally screw up your build.

Quote :

I was thinking that with that heatsink, CPU, and case I could probably OC the processor to about 3.8 or better with out going above 70C, still haven't made up my mind if I want to do that yet or not though.

One thing I wanted to add is that the case is never a factor in what your OC loads will be. Your motherboard and PSU will be but your case definitely won't.

Message edited by g-unit1111 on 12-14-2011 at 01:08:18 AM

Reply to g-unit1111

Alright guys, thanks for the inputs. I have decided to go with the 2500K model processor as well as the 560 Ti model EVGA GPU. I am going to do some looking into that Corsair case a bit later and decide if I'd rather it or the Antec. Can either of you give me the pro's/con's of the Z68 vs. my original P67? After looking at the Z68 from ASRock it looks to be the better board, supporting 3.0 PCI-E x16, 6Gb/s SATA, USB 3.0 and anything the P67 has. But like I said, I am not up on current hardware, so perhaps I am missing something?

I don't exactly have a total budget, I am buying the parts over the course of several months, which is why I say "around" $200 for each part because that's what I can afford each month. Obviously if something is so incredibly stellar that you absolutely must have it, then perhaps I could contemplate saving for it, but to me spending $200 on a processor that is very good is much better than spending $350 on a processor that is "top of the line" because the gain is for the most part very unnoticeable if you aren't nearing max load of your processor (or GPU or w/e) a lot.

As far as the heatsink, I just wanted the absolute best to keep my core temps very very low, I like to be safe when overclocking. I have seen them installed and will actually invade your #1 RAM slot if you have tall RAM. But I don't plan on having to change it or anything like that, so once I install it that's it, I don't need to work with it or around it any more other than to blow off the little dusties.

And lastly I know the case isn't a factor in your OC loads, that isn't what I meant. What I meant is that the Antec case has very good air flow and should keep the ambient temperatures down in the case, allowing the heatsink to dissipate the heat more quickly, allowing for the overclock. However, like I said, I will be looking into that Corsair case also, bad part is I will have to replace those nasty blue lights, not a big fan of blue LED's. Thank you for your responses and any more in the future. =)

Reply to Rokkman

Quote :

And lastly I know the case isn't a factor in your OC loads, that isn't what I meant. What I meant is that the Antec case has very good air flow and should keep the ambient temperatures down in the case, allowing the heatsink to dissipate the heat more quickly, allowing for the overclock. However, like I said, I will be looking into that Corsair case also, bad part is I will have to replace those nasty blue lights, not a big fan of blue LED's. Thank you for your responses and any more in the future. =)

Antec cases have good airflow and include plenty of fans but they have no cable management. I ditched my 900 and upgraded to the Graphite 600T for that very reason.

Quote :

Alright guys, thanks for the inputs. I have decided to go with the 2500K model processor as well as the 560 Ti model EVGA GPU. I am going to do some looking into that Corsair case a bit later and decide if I'd rather it or the Antec. Can either of you give me the pro's/con's of the Z68 vs. my original P67? After looking at the Z68 from ASRock it looks to be the better board, supporting 3.0 PCI-E x16, 6Gb/s SATA, USB 3.0 and anything the P67 has. But like I said, I am not up on current hardware, so perhaps I am missing something?

Z68 enables the smart SSD caching feature which the P67 doesn't have. P67 will be better for overclocking, however.

Quote :

As far as the heatsink, I just wanted the absolute best to keep my core temps very very low, I like to be safe when overclocking. I have seen them installed and will actually invade your #1 RAM slot if you have tall RAM. But I don't plan on having to change it or anything like that, so once I install it that's it, I don't need to work with it or around it any more other than to blow off the little dusties.

Yes - I absolute try to avoid tall RAM whenever I can possibly help it. You can get low temps with a lesser heat sink, like I said installing these things is a huge pain and I think I'll refrain from purchasing them again from now on. That's just my personal preference.

Message quoted 1 times

Reply to g-unit1111

g-unit1111 wrote :

Z68 enables the smart SSD caching feature which the P67 doesn't have. P67 will be better for overclocking, however.

So grab the P67 if I plan on overclocking? Does it make that much difference? Is there a better model than the P67 for around the same price/lower price that would be better for overclocking? You said you weren't a fan of MSI boards, what would you recommend for OCing since the Z68 is < the MSI board?

Message quoted 1 times

Reply to Rokkman

1) P67 vs. Z68. Each can oc a "K" to about the same sane limit, and will be upgradeable to ivy bridge. The Z68 allows you to also use the integrated graphics of sandy bridge, and use smart cache. Also, if you do rendering, look into the "quick sync" capability of the Z68. Since the price difference tends to be minimal, I would favor the more modern Z68. I see no negatives.

2) Get the case you really love. Cases are a personal thing, and you will be looking at it for a long time. To my mind, if a case has two 120mm intake fans or equivalent, it will have sufficient cooling for any single card gaming system, and most likely for even cf/sli. Larger is not necessarily better unless you will have a large number of hard drives.

3) 1.5v ram does not need heat spreaders for cooling, it is mostly for marketing and record seeking overclockers. If you have any doubts about height impacting a cpu cooler, get low profile ram. 1.5v, ddr3, 1600 should not be expensive.

4) Noctua makes some of the best and quietest fans around. They put them on their coolers which are great, but a bit spendy. Still, sandy bridge runs cool, and no heroic cooling is really needed for sane overclocks.

Message quoted 1 times

------------------------------ 3570K@4.3/Asus P8P67-M Pro/EVGA GTX680/Samsung 305T(x2)/Silverstone TJ-08E/Intel 520 180gb
Reply to geofelt

geofelt wrote :

1) P67 vs. Z68. Each can oc a "K" to about the same sane limit, and will be upgradeable to ivy bridge. The Z68 allows you to also use the integrated graphics of sandy bridge, and use smart cache. Also, if you do rendering, look into the "quick sync" capability of the Z68. Since the price difference tends to be minimal, I would favor the more modern Z68. I see no negatives.

2) Get the case you really love. Cases are a personal thing, and you will be looking at it for a long time. To my mind, if a case has two 120mm intake fans or equivalent, it will have sufficient cooling for any single card gaming system, and most likely for even cf/sli. Larger is not necessarily better unless you will have a large number of hard drives.

3) 1.5v ram does not need heat spreaders for cooling, it is mostly for marketing and record seeking overclockers. If you have any doubts about height impacting a cpu cooler, get low profile ram. 1.5v, ddr3, 1600 should not be expensive.

4) Noctua makes some of the best and quietest fans around. They put them on their coolers which are great, but a bit spendy. Still, sandy bridge runs cool, and no heroic cooling is really needed for sane overclocks.

Thank you, that helps quite a bit. I think I am going to go with the Z68 and 2500K, using mushkin 1600 RAM. As far as the case that makes sense. I will have 4 drives in total, plus a DVD Burner, which is one reason I am going with the Antec, another is I can't stand blue/green LED's, I like red, orange and yellow which is why I favour the Antec aesthetically. I may end up stepping down my heatsink, it will be one of the last pieces I buy so I will have some time to deliberate it. Thanks for your inputs. =)

Reply to Rokkman

Rokkman wrote :

So grab the P67 if I plan on overclocking? Does it make that much difference? Is there a better model than the P67 for around the same price/lower price that would be better for overclocking? You said you weren't a fan of MSI boards, what would you recommend for OCing since the Z68 is < the MSI board?

Either one will be good for OC'ing. I own two Gigabyte boards and they're both excellent. The one I use for my Z68 build is the Z68XP-UD3P.

Quote :

3) 1.5v ram does not need heat spreaders for cooling, it is mostly for marketing and record seeking overclockers. If you have any doubts about height impacting a cpu cooler, get low profile ram. 1.5v, ddr3, 1600 should not be expensive.

????????

Where did you get that information from? I've never seen that anywhere.

Quote :

2) Get the case you really love. Cases are a personal thing, and you will be looking at it for a long time. To my mind, if a case has two 120mm intake fans or equivalent, it will have sufficient cooling for any single card gaming system, and most likely for even cf/sli. Larger is not necessarily better unless you will have a large number of hard drives.

I definitely agree with this. Cases are a personal preference thing. What you need to look for is looks (obviously), cable management, the way the air flows, and how many fans it includes.

Reply to g-unit1111

Can you folks help me with one more thing?

It seems the current trend to use your SSD to boot and any "important" files, then the HDD for your other content. My question is, what qualifies as "important" files? Obviously the OS stuff goes in here, and any programs you use regularly (Mozilla, Word, etc..). But what about your games for instance? I am building this rig for gaming and watching movies/TV. Do my games need to be on the SSD? Does it really help or hurt to put these there?

Basically, I have the idea down, I am just wondering why people do this. Obviously your "day to day" applications are much faster, and your boot times are outstanding, but if you mostly use it to play games and watch things, is it worth buying?

Message quoted 1 times

Reply to Rokkman

"Where did you get that information from? I've never seen that anywhere. "

I had a problem with some G.skil ram that might be too tall. I opened a dialog with a G.skil tech. He gave me the info on how tall the spreaders were, and said they could be removed without harm, but it would void my warranty. Actually, if you touch the ram while running, they really do not get hot. If you are overclocking the ram to the limit, that might change. In a backup pc, I have some kingston cheap ram that did not even come with heat spreaders. Some time ago, all ram came that way

I love the SSD, once you use one, you will never go back.

You can get the os and not much else on 40gb, 60gb lets you install a few apps. 80gb will be a handful of games.
My 120gb SSD has 85gb used with the os, 6-8 games and 4gb of photos.
When/if it fills up, I will get a second, or use it in a laptop, and replace it with 160gb or 240gb.
It is a perfectly good option to add a hard drive, particularly if you need to store videos which take up a huge amount of space.
There is much hype with SSD benchmarks. Fast sequential reads and high IOPS seem to be the performance metrics.
Unfortunately, that is not what we normally do. The OS does mainly small random reads and writes. It does so at relatively low queue
lengths.
The actual drive response times are what matters, and those response times do not differ much among all SSD's.
The SSD gives you much better response times compared to even the fastest hard drives.

Newer drives tout the benefits of 6gb sata, and they do show up well in synthetic benchmarks.
But how many apps do you run that do sequential processing?. If it is enough to make a difference, you probably
can't afford the price for the capacity you need.

As to which brand, I think the safe choice today is Intel. They have had much lower return rates in the past:
http://www.behardware.com/articles [...] rates.html

My take is, get the capacity you need and don't look back. A SSD makes everything feel so much quicker.
Look at the Intel 320 series today.
In a year, expect the prices per gb to be much lower.

------------------------------ 3570K@4.3/Asus P8P67-M Pro/EVGA GTX680/Samsung 305T(x2)/Silverstone TJ-08E/Intel 520 180gb
Reply to geofelt

Rokkman wrote :

Can you folks help me with one more thing?

It seems the current trend to use your SSD to boot and any "important" files, then the HDD for your other content. My question is, what qualifies as "important" files? Obviously the OS stuff goes in here, and any programs you use regularly (Mozilla, Word, etc..). But what about your games for instance? I am building this rig for gaming and watching movies/TV. Do my games need to be on the SSD? Does it really help or hurt to put these there?

Basically, I have the idea down, I am just wondering why people do this. Obviously your "day to day" applications are much faster, and your boot times are outstanding, but if you mostly use it to play games and watch things, is it worth buying?

Yes that's the basic idea of SSD. I used to be a naysayer until I got mine and now I have two and they're absolutely amazing drives (although I refuse to get one for my laptop until 512 / 750GB drives come way down in price and are better available... I may go the Seagate Momentus route for that ). What you have to keep in mind with an SSD is that the drives will only perform a limited number of read/write cycles during the course of the drives' lifespan. So you want to store as much as your OS and main programs on one drive, use the larger files for everything else. In my setup I have my SSD (Intel 320) and two Western Digital drives - one I devote to movies/TV shows/music and the other I devote to my Steam drive. It works quite well that way.

Quote :

I had a problem with some G.skil ram that might be too tall. I opened a dialog with a G.skil tech. He gave me the info on how tall the spreaders were, and said they could be removed without harm, but it would void my warranty. Actually, if you touch the ram while running, they really do not get hot. If you are overclocking the ram to the limit, that might change. In a backup pc, I have some kingston cheap ram that did not even come with heat spreaders. Some time ago, all ram came that way

Wow that's interesting. I didn't know that you could remove those. Guess you learn something new every day. :lol:

Quote :

There is much hype with SSD benchmarks. Fast sequential reads and high IOPS seem to be the performance metrics.
Unfortunately, that is not what we normally do. The OS does mainly small random reads and writes. It does so at relatively low queue
lengths.

I agree with this but the thing with SSD benchmarks is I *NEVER* trust those types of benchmarks where they just test a bunch of drives at once because you never know what types of other hardware they test the drives with, and you also don't know what test parameters they used to achieve those benchmarks. They could have the fastest drives on the market but when you pair it with slow equipment you're gonna get mixed results every time.

Message edited by g-unit1111 on 12-14-2011 at 06:15:02 AM

Reply to g-unit1111

Best answer selected by Rokkman.

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[Solved] New Build Idea - Can you help?

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