Help me get Parade ready please.

[Computasaysbuy]

Cheers Fellas,

I really appreciate any of you taking the time to look through this. The last two computers I've bought through PC specialist, I didn't ask for any advice and while they've been great, they may have been better!

Monitor - I currently use Samsung U32R590 32Inch Curved UHD 4K Monitor 3840x2160 - I may move beyond 60 fps soon. For the moment I am very happy playing at 2160p / 60fps

Uses - Gaming. Some games I play like Anno, X4 and KSP are dependent on single core performance so looking for a better CPU. Having to lock TW3 to 30 fps and playing other games at medium rather than at high. For some games it makes little difference, for others it's critical.

Budget - I would like to keep it below £4000 or around £3500, but my objective in simplistic terms is to get a computer with twice or nearly twice the performance that I have now.

While it may be daft to some I prefer to stick to brands that I've used for years such as Nvidia, Intel, Samsung, Corsair etc as opposed to the equally as great AMD etc.

Bonus question, is there much of a difference between 'performance cards from asus' and the same card from 'palit zotac branded'

Case
CORSAIR iCUE 5000T RGB MID TOWER GAMING CASE
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™ i7 20-Core Processor i7-14700K (Up to 5.6GHz) 33MB Cache
Motherboard
ASUS® ROG MAXIMUS Z790 HERO (LGA1700, DDR5, PCIe 5.0, Wi-Fi 6E)
Memory (RAM)
64GB Corsair VENGEANCE RGB DDR5 6000MHz (2 x 32GB)
Graphics Card
16GB ASUS TUF GEFORCE RTX 4080 SUPER OC EDITION - HDMI, 3 x DP
1st M.2 SSD Drive
1TB SAMSUNG 990 PRO M.2, PCIe 4.0 NVMe (up to 7450MB/R, 6900MB/W)
1st M.2 SSD Drive
2TB SAMSUNG 990 PRO M.2, PCIe 4.0 NVMe (up to 7450MB/R, 6900MB/W)
1st Storage Drive
4TB SEAGATE BARRACUDA SATA-III 3.5" HDD, 6GB/s, 5400RPM, 256MB CACHE
Power Supply
CORSAIR 850W RMx SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1.5 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead, 1.0mm Core)
Processor Cooling
CORSAIR ICUE LINK H150i RGB HIGH PERFORMANCE CPU COOLER
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND
Extra Case Fans
4 x Corsair AF120 RGB ELITE PWM Fan + Controller Kit
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Card
ONBOARD LAN PORT
USB/Thunderbolt Options
MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS
Operating System
Windows 11 Home 64 Bit - inc. Single Licence
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Windows Recovery Media
Windows 10/11 Multi-Language Recovery Image - Unlimited Downloads from Online Account
Office Software
FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft 365® (Operating System Required)
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser
Microsoft® Edge
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
SCOTTISH HIGHLANDS & UK OFFSHORE ISLANDS / N IRELAND
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 5 to 7 working days
Price: £3,552.00 including VAT and Delivery
Unique URL to re-configure: https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/intel-z790-ddr5-pc/WmnPzyGbMm/

I meant to do this upgrade last year, but I picked up Warhammer and it's bled me dry for a bit.

 

[Scott]

We wouldn't recommend Intel for a build of this nature, it's very rare that we would actually recommend Intel at all at the moment. I understand the brand choice, but it's not a good choice so please don't take the below as a recommendation. It's the best I can do with the limitations of what you want me to select.

I would 100% be opting for a AMD (AM5) purchasing now for gaming over the next 10 years. You'll at least have the option of installing the latest and greatest gaming GPU in a couple of years. With Intel whatever you get today you're going to have until you bin the PC as the upgrade path is nil.

There was a weird bug with the memory selection. I wouldn't actually opt for 64GB for a gaming rig, 32GB is more than enough so it's wasted cash. But it's saying 2x16 cannot be selected, where 2x32 can. I would contact PCS about this to drop the cost a little as it's pointless.

Case
CORSAIR iCUE 5000T RGB MID TOWER GAMING CASE
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™ i7 20-Core Processor i7-14700K (Up to 5.6GHz) 33MB Cache
Motherboard
ASUS® ROG STRIX Z790-F GAMING WIFI II (LGA1700, DDR5, PCIe 5.0, Wi-Fi 7)
Memory (RAM)
64GB Corsair VENGEANCE RGB DDR5 6000MHz (2 x 32GB)
Graphics Card
16GB NVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 4080 SUPER - HDMI, DP, LHR
1st M.2 SSD Drive
512GB SOLIDIGM P44 PRO GEN 4 M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD (up to 7000MB/sR, 4700MB/sW)
1st M.2 SSD Drive
2TB SOLIDIGM P44 PRO GEN 4 M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD (up to 7000MB/sR, 6500MB/sW)
1st M.2 SSD Drive
4TB CORSAIR MP600 PRO NVMe PCIe M.2 SSD (up to 7000 MB/R, 6850 MB/W)
Power Supply
CORSAIR 1200W RMx SHIFT SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1.5 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead, 1.0mm Core)
Processor Cooling
CORSAIR ICUE LINK H150i RGB HIGH PERFORMANCE CPU COOLER
Thermal Paste
STANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING
Extra Case Fans
3 x Corsair ICUE LINK QX120 RGB PWM Fan + Controller Kit
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Card
ONBOARD LAN PORT
USB/Thunderbolt Options
MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS
Operating System
Windows 11 Home 64 Bit - inc. Single Licence
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Windows Recovery Media
Windows 10/11 Multi-Language Recovery Image - Unlimited Downloads from Online Account
Office Software
FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft 365® (Operating System Required)
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser
Microsoft® Edge
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
SCOTTISH HIGHLANDS & UK OFFSHORE ISLANDS / N IRELAND
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 5 to 7 working days
Price: £3,463.00 including VAT and Delivery
Unique URL to re-configure: https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/intel-z790-ddr5-pc/9J3GdzECT9/

 

[Computasaysbuy]

We wouldn't recommend Intel for a build of this nature, it's very rare that we would actually recommend Intel at all at the moment. I understand the brand choice, but it's not a good choice so please don't take the below as a recommendation. It's the best I can do with the limitations of what you want me to select.

I would 100% be opting for a AMD (AM5) purchasing now for gaming over the next 10 years. You'll at least have the option of installing the latest and greatest gaming GPU in a couple of years. With Intel whatever you get today you're going to have until you bin the PC as the upgrade path is nil.

There was a weird bug with the memory selection. I wouldn't actually opt for 64GB for a gaming rig, 32GB is more than enough so it's wasted cash. But it's saying 2x16 cannot be selected, where 2x32 can. I would contact PCS about this to drop the cost a little as it's pointless.

Case
CORSAIR iCUE 5000T RGB MID TOWER GAMING CASE
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™ i7 20-Core Processor i7-14700K (Up to 5.6GHz) 33MB Cache
Motherboard
ASUS® ROG STRIX Z790-F GAMING WIFI II (LGA1700, DDR5, PCIe 5.0, Wi-Fi 7)
Memory (RAM)
64GB Corsair VENGEANCE RGB DDR5 6000MHz (2 x 32GB)
Graphics Card
16GB NVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 4080 SUPER - HDMI, DP, LHR
1st M.2 SSD Drive
512GB SOLIDIGM P44 PRO GEN 4 M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD (up to 7000MB/sR, 4700MB/sW)
1st M.2 SSD Drive
2TB SOLIDIGM P44 PRO GEN 4 M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD (up to 7000MB/sR, 6500MB/sW)
1st M.2 SSD Drive
4TB CORSAIR MP600 PRO NVMe PCIe M.2 SSD (up to 7000 MB/R, 6850 MB/W)
Power Supply
CORSAIR 1200W RMx SHIFT SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1.5 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead, 1.0mm Core)
Processor Cooling
CORSAIR ICUE LINK H150i RGB HIGH PERFORMANCE CPU COOLER
Thermal Paste
STANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING
Extra Case Fans
3 x Corsair ICUE LINK QX120 RGB PWM Fan + Controller Kit
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Card
ONBOARD LAN PORT
USB/Thunderbolt Options
MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS
Operating System
Windows 11 Home 64 Bit - inc. Single Licence
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Windows Recovery Media
Windows 10/11 Multi-Language Recovery Image - Unlimited Downloads from Online Account
Office Software
FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft 365® (Operating System Required)
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser
Microsoft® Edge
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
SCOTTISH HIGHLANDS & UK OFFSHORE ISLANDS / N IRELAND
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 5 to 7 working days
Price: £3,463.00 including VAT and Delivery
Unique URL to re-configure: https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/intel-z790-ddr5-pc/9J3GdzECT9/

Dear Scott, thank you for taking the time to share your knowledge. Would you help me to understand your decisions a little more please.

I don't tend to upgrade, in a bout 5 years I will give the whole computer to nephews, as they are about to get my current one. With that in mind, is intel a bad choice because they are not any good or because they are not cost or energy efficient? I have a 9800x at the moment and with my limited knowledge / understanding this will be a significant improvement.

Motherboards are all greek to me, so any insight on that choice would be very helpful, I just picked at random. As are NVME's they were onlyt on the horizon when I bought last?

I understand that nvme are better than SSD. I chose the samsung ones as I currently have samsung SSD. FInally I think the PSU, I thought at a 1000 woppers, I was giving myself plenty of headroom, do you think I need more.

The website said

'

Maximum Required Power

544W'

Anyway thanks again pal.

 

[TonyCarter]

The PSU estimate on the configurator is the MINIMUM you'd want to be using if the components only ever drew their published watts. PSUs are at their most efficient at around the 40-60% usage - so if the config tool says your system needs 375W based on the TDPs of a RTX4080 (say 250w) + 14700K (125w) then the 544w including the other components plus 20% headroom would be about right at 550w.

However, we know some components can draw 50-100% more than their marketing claims (14700k up to 275w at full blast, 4080 Super at 340W full blast) - and there's been plenty claims about the 40-series GPUs seeing 2-3x the claimed power requirements as 'transient spikes' that last for milliseconds but can trip up some lower level/quality PSUs. So that 550w peak has already been smashed and you've got ZERO headroom...and are running in the least efficient band of your PSU.

Three years ago the recommended PSU for a 30-series and i7/i9/5800x was the 850w model - and we're seeing people who didn't go that high coming back and wondering why their shiny new 40-series card isn't working properly.

So we started recommending 1000w PSUs to give more headroom for these power spikes (the higher power / quality ones can cope better). But the reasoning for the 1200W Shift version is that it's the NEW ATX3 spec, which has circuits/mitigations built in specifically for these spikes and power needs. In this new type of PSU, a 850W would be plenty as the risk has been mitigated...but PCS doesn't offer these below 1200w.

 

[Computasaysbuy]

The PSU estimate on the configurator is the MINIMUM you'd want to be using if the components only ever drew their published watts. PSUs are at their most efficient at around the 40-60% usage - so if the config tool says your system needs 375W based on the TDPs of a RTX4080 (say 250w) + 14700K (125w) then the 544w including the other components plus 20% headroom would be about right at 550w.

However, we know some components can draw 50-100% more than their marketing claims (14700k up to 275w at full blast, 4080 Super at 340W full blast) - and there's been plenty claims about the 40-series GPUs seeing 2-3x the claimed power requirements as 'transient spikes' that last for milliseconds but can trip up some lower level/quality PSUs. So that 550w peak has already been smashed and you've got ZERO headroom...and are running in the least efficient band of your PSU.

Three years ago the recommended PSU for a 30-series and i7/i9/5800x was the 850w model - and we're seeing people who didn't go that high coming back and wondering why their shiny new 40-series card isn't working properly.

So we started recommending 1000w PSUs to give more headroom for these power spikes (the higher power / quality ones can cope better). But the reasoning for the 1200W Shift version is that it's the NEW ATX3 spec, which has circuits/mitigations built in specifically for these spikes and power needs. In this new type of PSU, a 850W would be plenty as the risk has been mitigated...but PCS doesn't offer these below 1200w.

Tony that was very helpful and easy to understand, I have made the change.

Could you share any wisdom on

'

USB/Thunderbolt Options

MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS'

The case front io has~:

(1x) USB 3.1 Type C, (4x) USB 3.0, (1x) Audio in/out'

Will these all be in operable?

 

[Scott]

Dear Scott, thank you for taking the time to share your knowledge. Would you help me to understand your decisions a little more please.

I don't tend to upgrade, in a bout 5 years I will give the whole computer to nephews, as they are about to get my current one. With that in mind, is intel a bad choice because they are not any good or because they are not cost or energy efficient? I have a 9800x at the moment and with my limited knowledge / understanding this will be a significant improvement.

Motherboards are all greek to me, so any insight on that choice would be very helpful, I just picked at random. As are NVME's they were onlyt on the horizon when I bought last?

I understand that nvme are better than SSD. I chose the samsung ones as I currently have samsung SSD. FInally I think the PSU, I thought at a 1000 woppers, I was giving myself plenty of headroom, do you think I need more.

The website said

'

Maximum Required Power

544W'

Anyway thanks again pal.

So the first thing to point out is that the 9800X wasn't a great gaming CPU even when it was released. A free PC is a free PC, but the 9800X is going to become a bottleneck pretty sharpish with any cutting edge gaming, it was an HEDT processor more aimed at intense calculation than gaming.

In 5 years if you choose the Intel, it should do the job fine. The only likely place for a necessary upgrade would be the GPU. However, that's getting towards the end of it's life, after which it will be fit for the bin gaming wise (it'll still be powerful enough for any typical IT task though). With the AM5 option, the PC could have easily another 5 years in it with a CPU upgrade. I get that you may not look to upgrade the system in your time of use, but my point is that if you choose wisely now..... you can upgrade the CPU and GPU to give the PC a completely new lease of life. You get all the new technologies and performance jumps without having to build an entirely new PC, what's not to love.

If you look around the signatures of the regular contributors on here you're going to see a theme, most will include an AMD CPU of some sort with most modern purchases being AM5. This isn't a brand loyalty or anything as I think most of us have switched from Intel due to the entire debacle with them over the past 10 years. AMD have absolutely outshone them in the last 2 offerings and it's likely they will continue to do so. Without a shadow of a doubt AMD are the best choice right now, even the areas where Intel outperform AMD, it's typically slender and the down side just isn't worth it (Heat, power use, cost, no future).

Intel currently rely on that brand loyalty you speak of. They don't change their approach as their pocket isn't being hit. IMO consumers are being taken for a ride continually by Intel but they still get people buying their gear regardless. The good thing for me personally, and other likeminded people, is that with Intel still in the hunt regardless of poor product..... it keeps AMD in check with their pricing

Just need Nvidia to start feeling some pain from AMD and it'll be happy days.

With regards to the NVME, The original Samsung's were fantastic. The later ones were very poor and the most recent ones had issues that needed fixed. They're decent performers and finally the endurance is where it should be, but they are by no means the pick of the bunch. I wouldn't waste my money on them at the moment. Corsair & Solid offer the best performance/endurance/price points.