Gaming PC

Well was just thinking. How long are you willing to wait to put together your new machine?

Broadwell and skylake processors are both due later this year

Lastly, how much money are you willing to waste?

 

these are also a really quick and easy way to get a great gaming pc. Considering one for my living room actually.

http://www.asus.com/Microsite/rog/GR8_G20/

 

My setup is similar. However I went with 16 GB and SLI GTX 970's X 2. Really love the 5820K processor.

 

one of my best friends got a MSI GT72 20e dominator pro laptop with a GTX980M gpu...this thing is amazing.. i'm jealous as HELL on that rig.

http://www.msi.com/product/nb/GT72-2QE-Dominator-Pro.html#hero-overview

 

Not sure where this comes from. I have used AMD for years. The only reason Intel has any traction, in performance, today is because of well document anticompetitive behavior, of which AMD got a large settlement from Intel because of.

Other than graphics, because ATI was never a solid tech, AMD has made some great, low cost processors. After 20 years I have never had an issues with any of their CPUs.

 

I usually build my own non-Mac PCs. I generally buy just behind the bleeding edge of hardware. There's a good price drop, and better integration with the different items.

I hate noise, and put a lot of my energy into quiet cooling.

As I don't do fast twitch FPS, I can usually get by without a fire breathing video card that fills 8 slots. Awhile back you could stay near the front lines with a fanless card, but I don't think so now.

16 gig DDR3, 8 minimum.
256 SSD for main drive works fine. Keep your music and videos on a regular hard disk.

I have never been impressed with overclocking in terms of MMO gaming. Good for running benchmarks to boast with on your signature. I pick the quiet, yet powerful chips in the newest series of Intel. AMD is fine too, same principles.

Big fans, a case with good airflow. I am enamored with the new PSUs, modular cables, and high efficiency, quiet fans.

I run from LEDs , especially on fans. They look cool the first week, then I just get irritated by them. Don't ask me how long that one lasted.

Get a USB DVD unit, and you will only need it a couple of times. Better yet, borrow one.

Personal choice for keyboard, mouse, and monitor.

 

I got the Alienware 17 with GTX880m last year, it is heavy, but worth the tote to the beach or while traveling. It runs SOTA, LOTRO, and even some Star Citizen very nicely.

Not in the OP price range, and not very upgradable.

 

I understand some people like the cost vs performance of AMD cpus, and I am not bashing them. But based on the original post it was implied that this pc was not going to be budget system.

Also not having 'issues' is not the same as saying 'this thing rocks'. truth is, among any pc I have built, the intel ones always out perform the amd systems. so I would never suggest a power user looking for a gaming machine to buy amd.

Not hating, as I have used amd machines for games in the past. Just know that if I want top performance I will never get it from them.

 

http://hexus.net/tech/news/cpu/79645-intel-skylake-on-track-2015-release/

 

I'm not sure I want to wait until September to build my next rig. I'll have tax return money in hand in April.

The other thing is that the latest intel processors are more expensive all-around without better performance. As I showed earlier in the thread, a i7-5820k build is $260 more expensive than an i7-4790k build and yet gaming benchmarks aren't any better. In fact, the cheaper i7-4790k tests better on single-core and dual-core performance. The i7-5820k would only be better if games start using more than 2 cores. We've been hearing that soon games will make use of multiple cores for near 10 years without it really happening yet, so I'm not holding my breath.

The question you have to ask is whether you truly believe the new processors coming out in September will be similar to Haswell-E or truly revolutionary.

 

I5-2500k

old, but one of the best gaming chips ever, and since it's old, it'll be cheap.

I have one at 4.2ghz...no reason to upgrade for awhile.

also have it with a 780Ti OC. kills just about anything.

 

GIGABYTE GA-Z77X-D3H
INTEL CORE i7 3770K
NVIDIA EVGA GTX770
FRACTAL DESIGN XL R2

Sorry for the caps. I copied and pasted a few parts I recommend.

 

Rig I just built,


CARE1: * Cooler Master Thermal Fusion 400 Extreme Performance CPU - Thermal Compound Optimized for Thermal Dissipation
CAS: * Cooler Master Cosmos SE w/ USB 3.0, Carrying Handles, Full Side Panel Window
CD: LG 16X Internal Blu-ray Burner, BD-RE, DVD+RW Combo Drive
COOLANT: Standard Coolant
CPU: Intel(R) Core™ i7-5820K Six-Core 3.30GHz 15MB Intel Smart Cache LGA2011-V3
CS_FAN: Enermax TB Silence UCTB14 140mm Performance Cooling with Low Noise Profile Fan
FAN: Asetek 550LC 120mm Liquid Cooling CPU Cooler - Extreme Cooling Performance (Single Standard 120MM Fan)
FLASHMEDIA: INTERNAL 12in1 Flash Media Reader/Writer [+10] (BLACK COLOR)
HDD: 128GB SanDisk SSD + 1TB SATA III Hard Drive Combo (Single Drive)
IUSB: Built-in USB 2.0 Ports
KEYBOARD: Logitech G510S Black USB Wired Gaming Keyboard
MEMORY: 16GB (4GBx4) DDR4/2400MHz Quad Channel Memory (GSKILL Ripjaws 4)
MOTHERBOARD: MSI X99S GAMING 7 ATX w/Killer GbLAN, 4x Gen3 PCIe x16, 2 PCIe x1, 1x M.2, 8x SATA 6Gb/s
MOUSE: Genius GX-Gaming Gila Black 12 Buttons USB Wired 8200 dpi MMO/RTS Professional Gaming Mouse
OS: Microsoft(R) Windows 8.1 Pro (64-bit Edition)
OVERCLOCK: No Overclocking
POWERSUPPLY: 750 Watts - EVGA SuperNOVA 750B1 80 Plus Bronze Modular Power Supply
VIDEO: AMD Radeon R9 290X 4GB GDDR5 PCIe 3.0 x16 Video Card (Single Card)
VIDEOCAMERA1: Genius WideCam F100 Ultra Wide Angle 1080p Webcam

 

Are you concerned with cost or not?
I'm using an i7 920 right now, so yes, skylake is worth waiting for. But for gaming the video card is much more important and the CPU just has to be powerful enough to not bottleneck the programming. So buying an "E" is just throwing away money.
I'm not putting together a budget system but I am going to spend my money wisely.
"E" series really aren't for gamers, they're more for the overclocking eleet and my current build was the last time I'm going to put ay effort into OCing.

 

I can see the desire to create a super fast super powerful system. Overclocking was really useful 15 to 20 years ago, but these days it is like supping up a sports car (considering the sports cars these days already have more horse power than we need). These high end systems need special cooling systems and should be monitored.... and overclocking can make the system unstable.

It actually makes better sense to just get the high end middle of the road system that can play everything, and know that it will run stable for 3 years till you upgrade again (because you didn't break the bank 3 years earlier). Surely a high end middle of the road system would be just as good if not better than a supped up computer from 3 years ago. See what I'm getting at? A year goes by so fast. By the time the games come out that will play that actually tax your system, then your system will be efficient but if you count depreciation you still paid to much. So if you never utilize the full resources of the computer then you technically wasted money.

Keep this in mind. It is always fun to have the "super" computer, but in 3 years it will be the middle of the road "super" computer.

 

For a gaming rig, I think focusing on the video card is the main concern. I have an older PC which is probably around 4-5 years old. I spent more money on the video card than the rest of the PC combined, and I can play anything released today with everything on high. Granted I only play at 1080p since I console and pc game on the same monitor, but I have never felt the need to upgrade. Its getting to the point that I think I could get some better fps with a new video card, but thats only because I just got an Xbox One which seems to be pretty well with that.

Since we hit Pentium CPU most CPU speed boosts are not really noticable to the average person. You are talking milliseconds and most of what you judge is what is on the screen which is mostly handled by the GPU.

I would not wait for a CPU or even get the latest out today. I would pick a solid one at a good price and put the extra money into your video card and motherboard (so you have the proper connection for your video card).

 

For the budget you're talking, you could build or buy just about anything. The machine I currently use is a home built machine with an AMD FX8350 processor with 32GB Ram and Nvidia GTX660 video card. I don't SSD drives and the video card is good, but toward the lower end. It also has liquid cooling on the processor itself. It runs SotA without any issues. I have the graphic settings turned all the way up and use a Samsung 27 inch monitor as the display. It also runs Windows 7 Professional. Besides SotA I play Dirt 2/3 Assetto Corsa, Grid Autosport, etc. I don't play First Person Shooters like Battlefield or Call of Duty so the card is perfectly fine for me. If I were a more serious gamer, I would move up in the video card category, but still stick with Nvidia. They have some great features like Shadowplay for recording gameplay, integration to Twitch and even some new Twitch like features of their own. Yeah, contradiction with AMD proc and Nvidia graphics, but oh well.

I know SSD is all the rage these days, and launching games from there can certainly increase speed. I don't have one in this machine, but my load times are quite manageable.

You could easily build the above for well under your budget. Will it last through the whole dev cycle of SotA? Not sure. Unless the graphics go off the charts I think it will. And at that point, I would spend $300-400 to upgrade the video card and everything should be fine.

I would also get a min of 16GB ram, but both my machines have 32GB. Usually there is a premium to make that jump in retailer built systems, but not if you make your own. This may spark debate, but I would rather have more ram than an SSD, but if your budget allows, get both.

 

I do the same thing. I hate ATI but love AMD. It was the worse sale in history. However, I have never had an issue running the AMD and Nvidia together. You might have an issue with SLI vs Crossfire, but I always felt you got more bang out of your buck by getting just one really good video card.

I just recently got an SSD and I would definately recommend it. The speed increase, even against a super fast SATA, is noticable. I had always avoided them because of cost and recoverability (platters can be revived from almost anything where as when SSD dies it dies). However, cost is decent these days if you don't need a huge drive. If 500 gb is good I would go SSD, but if you want more than get a traditional one because from there the SSD costs outpace the value.

 

As many others have mentioned, building your own PC can be very cost efficient. I use PCPartPicker.com because the site checks for compatibility issues and makes the building process fun and easy! The site also offers price comparisons of many online vendors when purchasing. The downside to building your own PC is the lack of a system-encompassing manufacturer warranty. Instead of being able to call a support line or schedule a support technician to visit, each one of the components one uses during a build will have its own warranty which will need to be managed by the PC owner.
A couple years ago, I had an $800 budget and I was able to build a beefy PC within a nice solid steel case. I was able to stay within my budget yet build a powerful computer by sacrificing optical drives and hard drive storage and spending that chunk of my budget on better motherboard, cpu, and memory. If you choose a motherboard which has room for CPU upgrades, memory upgrades, and GPU upgrades then the PC you build can remain cutting-edge for years.
I don't recommend that everyone build their own PC. In fact, in many cases the major PC manufacturers like Dell and HP sell their consumer-grade PCs at a loss, so building to these specs isn't quite as cost effective and purchasing from a manufacturer is recommended. Plus most PC manufacturers offer simple options for repairs if something breaks. However, if someone is even slightly technically-inclined then I highly recommend building their own computer. A PC builder will ultimately save money, learn something, and enjoy a sense of accomplishment after the build is complete. First things first, establish your budget. Simply trade off nicer components in areas which you care less about (no optical drives - usb is fine, reuse your old monitor, smaller hard drives) for beefier components in core systems (motherboard, cpu, memory, gpu). Happy building!

 

I{ have heard many good things about the 770 gtx.