£2000 - MMO Gaming, Wireless, Longevity

[Fishes]

Hello PCSpecialist,

As the title sugests, I'm an MMO player (WoW, ESO, FFXIV) and my budget is around £2000, I do not require a screen, keyboard or mouse.

I've only ever owned "off-the-shelf" computers so I've never had a "100fps/ultra setting" experience and the below information might as well be in chinese for all that I understand (obtained from the "5 step jargon free configurator").

Case
THERMALTAKE VIEW 27 MID TOWER GAMING CASE
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™i7 Quad Core Processor i7-7700 (3.6GHz) 8MB Cache
Motherboard
ASUS® PRIME Z270-P: ATX, LG1151, USB 3.0, SATA 6GBs
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 2133MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
6GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 1060 - DVI, HDMI, 3 x DP - GeForce GTX VR Ready!
FREE FOR HONOR or GHOST RECON: WILDLANDS with select GTX 10 Series GPUs!
1st Hard Disk
500GB Samsung 850 EVO 2.5" SSD, SATA 6Gb/s (upto 540MB/sR | 520MB/sW)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
24x DUAL LAYER DVD WRITER ±R/±RW/RAM
Power Supply
CORSAIR 350W VS SERIES™ VS-350 POWER SUPPLY
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
Corsair H55 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
WIRELESS 802.11N 300Mbps/2.4GHz PCI-E CARD
USB 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 DVD & Licence
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Office Software
FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft® Office® 365
Anti-Virus
BullGuard™ Internet Security - Free 90 Day License inc. Gamer Mode
Browser
Microsoft® Edge (Windows 10 Only)
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 9 to 11 working days
Quantity
1

Price £1,252.00 including VAT and delivery

Unique URL to re-configure : https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/intel-z270-pc/cQY0nBp9zd/

I'm hoping £2000 is sufficient for a system that can smoothly play these games in high definition as well as last a good few years (give me a chance to save up for the next pc!).

I have been lurking around the forums and spotted a few posts by people with similar budgets:
EvilGrins
kennybuckley
Wakuda
Viper

Would any of these be perfect for me?

Also, I am concerned about the maintenance of "liquid cooling":
- How is it done?
- Would I need to send the pc off to you for that?
- I think I've read that with "Overclocking", "liquid cooling" is a must?

With regards to "Overclocking" - "Overclocked Intel® Core™i7-7700k Quad Core (4.20GHz @ up to 4.8GHz)" does this mean the GHz will be a randomly chosen number between 4.2 - 4.8?

Thanks for your time,

Fishes

 

[Rakk]

Also, I am concerned about the maintenance of "liquid cooling":

The system you have needs no maintenance as it is a closed loop, only the machines chosen from the 'Liquid Series Systems' (yours is from normal systems section) require maintenance (which PCS can do for you after 2 years).

With regards to "Overclocking" - "Overclocked Intel® Core™i7-7700k Quad Core (4.20GHz @ up to 4.8GHz)" does this mean the GHz will be a randomly chosen number between 4.2 - 4.8?

It means they will get it as close as they can to 4.8GHz whilst still keeping the machine stable.

 

[Fishes]

Thanks Rakk for clearing that up so quickly!

 

[keynes]

You could consider an overclocked system like the one below, the motherboard has built in wifi so no need for a wifi card.
Case
NZXT S340 MID TOWER GAMING CASE (BLACK/BLUE)
Overclocked CPU
Overclocked Intel® Core™i7-7700k Quad Core (4.20GHz @ up to 4.8GHz)
Motherboard
ASUS® ROG STRIX Z270E GAMING: LG1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GB, Wi-Fi - RGB Ready!
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3000MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
6GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 1060 - DVI, HDMI, 3 x DP - GeForce GTX VR Ready!
FREE FOR HONOR or GHOST RECON: WILDLANDS with select GTX 10 Series GPUs!
1st Hard Disk
2TB SATA-III 3.5" HDD, 6GB/s, 7200RPM, 64MB CACHE
M.2 SSD Drive
256GB SAMSUNG PM961 M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 2800MB/R, 1100MB/W)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
NOT REQUIRED
Power Supply
CORSAIR 650W CS SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
Noctua NH-U14S Ultra Quiet Performance CPU Cooler
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY 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 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 DVD & Licence
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Office Software
NO OFFICE SOFTWARE
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser
Firefox™
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 9 to 11 working days
Quantity
1

Price £1,460.00 including VAT and delivery

Unique URL to re-configure : https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/intel-z270-overclocked/zCf!BDTb8J/

 

[Oussebon]

For WoW, I'd strongly recommend an OCed system with the fastest RAM you can get, if it's worthin your budget and you're happy paying for the additional performance. WoW seems to be significantly reliant on a CPU's single threaded performance, and much more prone than many single player RPGs to being CPU bound.

It also benefits from RAM frequency more than many other games. I've personally measured upto 16% FPS increases by going from CL9 1600MHz DDR3 to CL10 2400MHz, and someone I used to discuss WoW hardware performance with measured this:


You could also go for a more upmarket motherboard, with features like USB 3.1, and built-in 867mbps wifi.

I haven't done any deep testing on ESO but from what I've seen it seems to get CPU-bound with load disproportionately on one thread.

You could also get an M.2 NVMe SSD like the PM961, which is a lot faster than the 850 Evo for about the same price per gb.

Edit: I was going to post a spec, basically along the lines of what Keynes put there, except with 3200MHz DDR4.

If you're deeply in love with the Thermaltake case and its gull window, it won't fit the Noctua cooler but will take the H100i V2. I'd also suggest a couple of extra case fans if going with the Thermaltake (regardless of what cooler you pick).

 

[Fishes]

Thank you both so much for your comments.

Building from that, I'd appreciate if you could have a look at the following:

Case
NZXT S340 MID TOWER GAMING CASE (BLACK/BLUE)
Overclocked CPU
Overclocked Intel® Core™i7-7700k Quad Core (4.20GHz @ up to 4.8GHz)
Motherboard
ASUS® ROG MAXIMUS IX FORMULA: ATX, LG1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GBs - RGB Ready!
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3200MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
8GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 1080 - DVI, HDMI, 3x DP - GeForce GTX VR Ready!
FREE FOR HONOR or GHOST RECON: WILDLANDS with select GTX 10 Series GPUs!
1st Hard Disk
2TB SATA-III 3.5" HDD, 6GB/s, 7200RPM, 64MB CACHE
M.2 SSD Drive
256GB SAMSUNG SM961 M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 3100MB/R, 1400MB/W)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
NOT REQUIRED
Power Supply
CORSAIR 650W CS SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
Noctua NH-U14S Ultra Quiet Performance CPU Cooler
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY 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 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 DVD & Licence
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Office Software
NO OFFICE SOFTWARE
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser
Firefox™
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 9 to 11 working days
Quantity
1

Price £1,884.00 including VAT and delivery

Unique URL to re-configure : https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/intel-z270-overclocked/V67ne0tGmc/

Notes:
- I upped the motherboard, ram, graphics card and M.2 SSD Drive.
- I just wanted a minimalist case, and I think the one Keynes selected houses this Noctua cooling and looks great.
- My budget I've got is £2000, so maybe I can throw in some shiny lights!
- With the new case, do I still need more fans?

EDIT
Case
CORSAIR CRYSTAL SERIES 570X RGB GAMING CASE
Overclocked CPU
Overclocked Intel® Core™i7-7700k Quad Core (4.20GHz @ up to 4.8GHz)
Motherboard
ASUS® ROG MAXIMUS IX FORMULA: ATX, LG1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GBs - RGB Ready!
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3200MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
8GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 1080 - DVI, HDMI, 3x DP - GeForce GTX VR Ready!
FREE FOR HONOR or GHOST RECON: WILDLANDS with select GTX 10 Series GPUs!
1st Hard Disk
2TB SATA-III 3.5" HDD, 6GB/s, 7200RPM, 64MB CACHE
M.2 SSD Drive
256GB SAMSUNG SM961 M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 3100MB/R, 1400MB/W)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
NOT REQUIRED
Power Supply
CORSAIR 650W CS SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
Noctua NH-U14S Ultra Quiet Performance CPU Cooler
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY 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 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 DVD & Licence
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Office Software
NO OFFICE SOFTWARE
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser
Firefox™
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 9 to 11 working days
Quantity
1

Price £2,000.00 including VAT and delivery

Unique URL to re-configure : https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/intel-z270-overclocked/PqZwMBFdDM/

Just changed to a tower that includes lights, and is on the dot at £2000

Would appreciate some feedback.

Thanks,

Fishes

 

[Fishes]

Could someone tell me, with regards to my intended use, what is the difference and which would be more suitable:

Hard Disks:
2TB 3.5" SATA-III 6GB/s vs 2TB SEAGATE FIRECUDA SSHD

M.2 SSD Drives:
256GB SAMSUNG PM961 M.2 vs 256GB SAMSUNG SM961 M.2

Really appreciate the help and info.

Thanks,

Fishes

 

[keynes]

SM961 are slightly faster and slightly more expensive but you are unlikely to notice the difference unless benchmarking. The firecuda is a hybrid drive which is more suitable if you don't have an SSD as a primary drive. Since you have an SSD a standard HDD will be fine.

 

[Oussebon]

- With the new case, do I still need more fans?

The S340's default fan configuration ought to be fine.

With the "CORSAIR CRYSTAL SERIES 570X" I would add in 1 extra case fan, personally. Not because the default cooling is bad, but because the case doesn't have a rear extractor fan by default. An extra cooling fan is only £5 and would just help exhaust the hot air from the case a touch better.

Motherboard
ASUS® ROG MAXIMUS IX FORMULA: ATX, LG1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GBs - RGB Ready!

When I said a more upmarket mobo I think the FORMULA is a bit too upmarket. The FORMULA is over £100 more than the HERO, which itself is excessive for most gamers. Those two are more geared to extreme overclocking (with support for things like liquid nitrogen CPU cooling), rather than the fairly middle-of-the-road overclocking offered by PCS.

You could happily stick to the Z270E mobo as proposed by Keynes, which is £150 cheaper than the FORMULA. The Z270E is plenty expensive already and has a rich feature set.

M.2 SSD Drives:
256GB SAMSUNG PM961 M.2 vs 256GB SAMSUNG SM961 M.2

The SM is faster. For a price difference of £20 and since it's where your OS and favourite games will go, you may as well get the SM961 with this kind of budget.

Hard Disks:
2TB 3.5" SATA-III 6GB/s vs 2TB SEAGATE FIRECUDA SSHD

The Firecuda is an SSHD which means it's an HDD with a small bit of flash memory that it can cache things to so that they load faster. It does this with an algorithm, you have no control over the process, so you're reliant on the drive being smart enough to learn what it needs to cache. It might potentially have an advantage for gaming if you load the same game over and over as it would learn that you keep loading the game. However, if you're loading the same game over and over, you should probably have put it on the SSD to begin with, because that will be faster anyway. It's about £35 more than a regular HDD, and that's £35 you could be putting towards buying another SSD.
On balance, I wouldn't say it's worth it.

 

[Fishes]

You guys are top notch! Thanks for getting back so quick!

- Should the 2 M.2 SSD Drives be the same?

I'm assuming it all depends on whether you "gotta go fast" or not. As this setup is purely for gaming, does the OS SSD need to be that fast?

Thanks,

Fishes

 

[Oussebon]

It doesn't need to be. Obviously it doesn't even need to be on an SSD. But if you're only buying one M.2 SSD and it's going to be where your OS, your browser, and all the stuff you'll use constantly will live, it could be worth the extra £20 in the overall scheme of your budget.

 

[Fishes]

Alrighty, this is what I got:

Case
CORSAIR CRYSTAL SERIES 570X RGB GAMING CASE
Overclocked CPU
Overclocked Intel® Core™i7-7700k Quad Core (4.20GHz @ up to 4.8GHz)
Motherboard
ASUS® ROG STRIX Z270E GAMING: LG1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GB, Wi-Fi - RGB Ready!
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3200MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
8GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 1080 - DVI, HDMI, 3x DP - GeForce GTX VR Ready!
FREE FOR HONOR or GHOST RECON: WILDLANDS with select GTX 10 Series GPUs!
1st Hard Disk
2TB SATA-III 3.5" HDD, 6GB/s, 7200RPM, 64MB CACHE
M.2 SSD Drive
256GB SAMSUNG SM961 M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 3100MB/R, 1400MB/W)
2nd M.2 SSD Drive
256GB SAMSUNG SM961 M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 3100MB/R, 1400MB/W)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
NOT REQUIRED
Power Supply
CORSAIR 850W RMx SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
Noctua NH-U14S Ultra Quiet Performance CPU Cooler
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND
Extra Case Fans
1x 120mm Black Case Fan (configured to extract from rear/roof)
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 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 DVD & Licence
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Office Software
NO OFFICE SOFTWARE
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser
Firefox™
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 8 to 10 working days
Quantity
1

Price £2,008.00 including VAT and delivery

Unique URL to re-configure : https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/intel-z270-overclocked/mVJcj3evFW/

Notes
- Power Supply: I had selected the 850w it's like twice what I actually need but had read in a previous thread that it has other benefits that might jusitfy the purchase, some clarity on this would be great.
- With regards to the 2 M.2 SSD Drives:
Is it worth having both exactly the same (256GB SAMSUNG SM961 M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 3100MB/R, 1400MB/W)) or is it better/more efficient to have the 1st M.2 SSD Drive the 128GB SAMSUNG SM961 M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 3100MB/R, 700MB/W) to house the OS and the 2nd 512GB SAMSUNG 960 PRO M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 3500MB/R, 2100MB/W) for the games?

I do not mind if it's £100 or so above budget

Thanks so much for answering all these questions, just want to make sure I'm not getting anything unnecessary that could be better used to future proofing.

Fishes

 

[Oussebon]

- Power Supply: I had selected the 850w it's like twice what I actually need but had read in a previous thread that it has other benefits that might jusitfy the purchase, some clarity on this would be great.

The RM850x is better build quality than the CS650, and is quieter (indeed it will often be silent, my RM850i cools itself under gaming load without ever needing to switch on its fan). It's not a bad thing to spend £40 on.

- With regards to the 2 M.2 SSD Drives:
Is it worth having both exactly the same (128GB SAMSUNG SM961 M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 3100MB/R, 700MB/W)) or is it better/more efficient to have the 1st M.2 SSD Drive the 126GB SM961 to house the OS and the 2nd 512GB SAMSUNG 960 PRO M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 3500MB/R, 2100MB/W) for the games?

I would say the best option would be to stick to a single 500gb 960 Evo. It's the same price as 2 SM961s, and saves you the bother of managing games across steam libraries on yet another drive. Plus it leaves your 2nd M.2 slot free so you can add another M.2 SSD in the future if you want.

The larger drives are also a bit faster than the smaller ones, so I wouldn't generally recommend getting a smaller, slightly slower drive for the OS, and a larger, slightly faster drive for games.

The 960 Pro is £100 more than the Evo. That's probably where I'd draw the line on £ vs performance.

I'd probably have suggested the 960 Evo before if I'd seen it was there.

 

[Fishes]

Hi there, just wanted to ask you guys about extra lighting, how might it be setup inside the machine depending on whether I got 1 or 2 50cm RGB LED Strips.

Anyway, the final machine:

Case
CORSAIR CRYSTAL SERIES 570X RGB GAMING CASE
Overclocked CPU
Overclocked Intel® Core™i7-7700k Quad Core (4.20GHz @ up to 4.8GHz)
Motherboard
ASUS® ROG STRIX Z270E GAMING: LG1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GB, Wi-Fi - RGB Ready!
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3200MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
8GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 1080 - DVI, HDMI, 3x DP - GeForce GTX VR Ready!
1st Hard Disk
2TB SATA-III 3.5" HDD, 6GB/s, 7200RPM, 64MB CACHE
M.2 SSD Drive
500GB SAMSUNG 960 EVO M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 3200MB/R, 1900MB/W)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
NOT REQUIRED
Power Supply
CORSAIR 850W RMx SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
Noctua NH-U14S Ultra Quiet Performance CPU Cooler
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND
LED Lighting
2x 50cm RGB LED Strip
Extra Case Fans
1x 120mm Black Case Fan (configured to extract from rear/roof)
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 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 DVD & Licence
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Office Software
NO OFFICE SOFTWARE
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser
Firefox™
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 8 to 10 working days
Quantity
1

Price £2,022.00 including VAT and delivery

Unique URL to re-configure : https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/intel-z270-overclocked/eD7aV9EQm9/

 

[Oussebon]

I'm not sure. You could phone PCS and ask if nobody else has a 570x with 2 strips.

I imagine they'd put the LEDs around the side of the case, something like:


Though given that your case is glass on the side and front they might always pop one strip in at the front e.g.

Maybe not, though, since the case has RGB LED fans anyway. It might be a bit unbalanced.

50 cms isn't all that long, so there'd easily be room for both strips to go at the side panel, which is what I'd guess they'll do.

Do post some pics when you get the system though, I imagine it would look pretty neat