Project: THE CURSED BUILD

[Vidar]

So my, very soon to be 12 year old Daughter started high school in September. She has home work most nights that requires a computer and much to my dismay (absolute glee at finding a reason) I've come to the decision that the little crotch goblin is not allowed to disturb my evenings entertainment any longer. So we're going to build her first PC together! And what's more, dear readers I HAVE FULL FIANCEE APPROVAL!!!!

So, she'll be getting my 9900k, Z390 Aorus Master, 32gb of DDR4 3200Mhz Aorus Ram, 850w Seasonic Focus Gold. My 500gb Samsung 970 pro and a 1TB Samsung 860 Sata SSD; not to mention my current Lian Li uni fans. For the case and the heatsink, I've already submitted highly cheeky offers to Ocuk for some **B-Grade** stuff that she likes the look of and wants to buy with her savings (I've decided I'll be getting them for her though, for her birthday in a few days) The GPU and Monitor will be getting sorted out soon.

So this is my current system, guarded by the slightly dusty Darth Revan:-

So I'm keeping the case, water cooling gear and the 3080TI for now as I've just got EK water block and active backplate from the members market for a very reasonable price!

I also have an extremely healthy budget of up to 4k, though I'm not intending to spend that much and shouldn't need to but I now need everything else!

I've decided on AM5, as it should offer a few years of socket support at least making future upgrades that bit cheaper.

Use case is 4K gaming on at least a 34" Ultrawide at a minimum of 144Hz within another 6 months and streaming/content creation. I do not want any Gigabyte products! Yes their hardware is pretty but the software is absolute dog ****!

So where do you guys put your money?

@Space Monkey @Mcnumpty2323 @Jay85 I'm tagging you for your sage advice!

 

[Jay85]

I will take a proper look at this abit later after work. Gonna be a lucky daughter though! Lets cram a 4090 in there

 

[Vidar]

Lets cram a 4090 in there

Don't be mean to my wallet! What's it ever done to you!

 

[Mcnumpty2323]

Here's my sage advice

Sage

Expert advice from RHS on how to grow sage. Sage loves a warm, sunny and sheltered spot - and is attractive enough to be grown alongside other ornamental plants.

www.rhs.org.uk

Sorry mate couldn't resist that lol
Not had any sleep so can't think straight
At the moment

Your 3080ti should be up to the job

Guess first place to start would be decide what motherboard
Based on purely functionality?
Or aesthetics?
And lian li infinity fans for less cable management
Since going to have 9 fans

And since replacing psu
Get one that meets all the new connector standards
Platinum efficiency wouldn't hurt given electricity costs
Obviously nothing with less than 7 year warranty
Most likely 10 year

Considered whether threadripper could be an option?
Sticking with all nvme drives?
Or some sata ssds?

 

[Vidar]

Here's my sage advice

Sage

Expert advice from RHS on how to grow sage. Sage loves a warm, sunny and sheltered spot - and is attractive enough to be grown alongside other ornamental plants.

www.rhs.org.uk

Sorry mate couldn't resist that lol
Not had any sleep so can't think straight
At the moment

Your 3080ti should be up to the job

Guess first place to start would be decide what motherboard
Based on purely functionality?
Or aesthetics?
And lian li infinity fans for less cable management
Since going to have 9 fans

And since replacing psu
Get one that meets all the new connector standards
Platinum efficiency wouldn't hurt given electricity costs
Obviously nothing with less than 7 year warranty
Most likely 10 year

Considered whether threadripper could be an option?
Sticking with all nvme drives?
Or some sata ssds?

Motherboard wise there only seems to be Asus, Giga *****, Asrock and MSI.
Out of them a lot hasn't been released yet and while I'm no massive rush I am itching to get started.
I do keep looking at both the Crosshair hero and the ROG Strix E but not sure how they compare given the £120 price difference.
I guess I'm thinking the better, more feature rich board now, the longer it will last me for future upgrades.

Threadripper doesn't seem a viable option, change my mind? lol
But I do plan on sticking with just NVME drives where possible.

Fans I'll probably end up going with the Lian Li SL120 INF's
I'm dubious about spending another £270 on them though
When the originals, have been so dire for me with poor quality wiring, LED burn in
and 2 complete fan failures and a failed hub.

PSU has me frustrated, I want a Seasonic ATX 3.0 as opposed to dropping hundreds on an obsolete unit but they don't come out until Mid December.
There's also no guaruntee that my custom cables will work with the new unit.
Don't want to be sat on my hands for a few months.
Will be going platinum or Titanium depending on cost.

 

[Mcnumpty2323]

The hero has a 5th m2 the strix has 4
May be useful if sticking with nvme drives
It also has 2 of 40Gbs usb c ports
Though you may not even have any devices could max the 20Gbs usb c ports
But it's a faster port that may be useful in the future

Yeah it's a lot of money for fans
Though had no issues with my al120
Unlike your sl120 ones
Could save money there but will have more cables to deal with

Yeah I would wait for the new psu spec though
And quite likely your custom cables might not work
Could have a different pin out on new psu

Won't make it more complicated by adding threadripper to the equation

 

[Monkey Puzzle]

Motherboard wise there only seems to be Asus, Giga *****, Asrock and MSI.
Out of them a lot hasn't been released yet and while I'm no massive rush I am itching to get started.
I do keep looking at both the Crosshair hero and the ROG Strix E but not sure how they compare given the £120 price difference.
I guess I'm thinking the better, more feature rich board now, the longer it will last me for future upgrades.

Threadripper doesn't seem a viable option, change my mind? lol
But I do plan on sticking with just NVME drives where possible.

Fans I'll probably end up going with the Lian Li SL120 INF's
I'm dubious about spending another £270 on them though
When the originals, have been so dire for me with poor quality wiring, LED burn in
and 2 complete fan failures and a failed hub.

PSU has me frustrated, I want a Seasonic ATX 3.0 as opposed to dropping hundreds on an obsolete unit but they don't come out until Mid December.
There's also no guaruntee that my custom cables will work with the new unit.
Don't want to be sat on my hands for a few months.
Will be going platinum or Titanium depending on cost.

As a heads-up, Samsung have a money-back offer on SSDs with up to £80 back per SSD. It ends on 25th October. Sadly ocuk aren't one of the participating retailers.

Picked up 2 x 2tb 980pro a few weeks ago for what will be £160 each after the money back

 

[Cenedd]

I do not want any Gigabyte products! Yes their hardware is pretty but the software is absolute dog ****!

Personally I think you'll find something to hate about all of the motherboard manufacturers. Question is do you really need any of the software? If it's a GPU you're just going to be running Nvidia drivers (or AMD) rather than the manufacturers. If it's M/B in my experience as little of it as possible is what you want to install. If you're running fan curves off the motherboard, you can set them up in the bios and not use the software. Monitoring it you can do through a number of bits of software like Aida64 or I rather like the free HWInfo. Alternatively a fan controller such as a Quadro or Octo would mean you can totally avoid the motherboard stuff and do it better (provided everything is PWM on those controllers). As for lighting, those controllers will do on or two channels respectively or if you just want lighting, the Aqua Computer Farbwerk 360 is good for four channels and (relatively) easy on the budget.
I'm not running anything by the way of motherboard manufacturer's drivers or software and haven't for years now - 99% of it is definitely worth avoiding.

 

[Vidar]

Thanks to @Monkey Puzzle that's storage taken care of. Two 2tb 980 Pro drives for £344 is a damn hefty saving (after cashback)

@Cenedd Thanks, I know you're right but truth be told I really don't want more Gigabyte stuff!

@Mcnumpty2323 will see what gets said about the new Threadripper stuff but realistically I can't see it being necessary especially as they don't tend to be brilliant for gaming.

Fortunately Seasonic are continuing with the same pinout so my cables are safe!

 

[Vidar]

So I think I've decided on some hardware.

So far I'm looking at:

My basket at [url=https://www.overclockers.co.uk]OcUK:

• 1 x EK Water Blocks EK-Quantum Velocity² D-RGB CPU Water Block For AMD AM5 - Nickel + Satin Titanium (SKU: WC-AC9-EK) = £149.99
• 1 x AMD Ryzen 9 7900X Twelve Core 5.60GHz (Socket AM5) Processor - Retail (SKU: CP-3DH-AM) = £578.99
• 1 x Asus ROG Crosshair X670E Hero (Socket AM5) DDR5 ATX Motherboard (SKU: MB-6J4-AS) = £649.99

Total: £1,378.97 (includes delivery: £0.00)​

​

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I want the Trident Z Neo Ram that OCUK don't stock sadly, but I don't know which kit to get @Jay85 if you can help me out pal, shoot me a whatsapp. I don't seem to have your number anymore.

I'm just waiting for the new EK AM5 blocks to drop in a few days before I buy the majority of the stuff I need.

I also need to decide on what fans to get, if anyone can recommend something better than the new Lian Li infinity fans I'm all ears?

Also can anyone recommend something like the Satin Black Corsair Hardline tubes with an OD of 16mm?

 

[Mcnumpty2323]

Thats an expensive waterblock mate
But no visible mounting hardware does look very nice
So probably won't cool better than a block almost half the price
But for aesthetics looks like a winner

The lian li infinity still my choice
Because of less cable management
And the lighting

Phanteks would be my second choice if just for performance

Seen someone on here sand their tubes to get a satin effect
If you can't find actual satin finished ones

 

[Vidar]

Yeah, I really like the look of the EK stuff to be honest.
But I'm not seeing much else for AM5 block wise out at the moment.

 

[Mcnumpty2323]

In theory you can use an am4 block for am5
Just has to be one that doesn't use a custom backplate

 

[Craig_d1]

if mainly gaming, why not just put a 7600x for the time being..runs as well as a 5800x3d, (and reviews with a 4090 put them all fairly similar to each other) and the 7000 series vcache cpu's are meant to be out next year..save the cash and use it towards one of those and flip the 7600x..if it gives the same performance boost that the 5800x3d did to the 5800x, you'll be destroying all the current 7000 cpu's

 

[Scougar]

Just so you know... it is likely that once you start down this dark path, Discord TM will follow.

 

[Monkey Puzzle]

Yeah, I really like the look of the EK stuff to be honest.
But I'm not seeing much else for AM5 block wise out at the moment.

I decided to go for the TechN CPU block - from testing seemed to be the best vs EK blocks/Heatkiller etc.

TechN CPU Waterblock against Watercool Heatkiller IV Pro and EK Quantum Magnitude - AMD’s Zen3 may come | igor´sLAB

The new CPU waterblock from TechN (here as AM4 version for 99 Euro RRP) has to prove itself in today’s test with the quasi classic cooler in the form of the Watercool Heatkiller IV Pro AMD (from…

www.igorslab.de

It's built for AM4 but have been told should fit fine on the captive backplate on AM5 boards. Decent price at 95 euros from the techn site, and outperforms the ek block by ~3.5C from testing on a 3900 150w cpu but with lower flow. Just need a board now, and a CPU to see if it does indeed fit!

It looks fantastic and has lighting as well. The cooling fins are extremely narrow (0.15mm with 0.2mm channels - should be a high performance high restriction block)

20221102_022038_HDR~2 by Tom ., on Flickr

 

[Mcnumpty2323]

@Monkey Puzzle despite the cost of it
Think his hearts set on the ek block
Mainly for the aesthetics
No visible mounting hardware does look pretty good

And yeah am4 block in theory at least
Without a custom backplate should fit am5
Only thing is if any issues you can't just remove am5 backplate
To fit one provided with a block like you can with am4
The extra screws on am5 hold down the cpu socket I think

 

[Vidar]

Parts starting to arrive and the anticipation is starting to get to me...

Question, is it worth squeezing a 3rd rad and low profile fans in the rear chamber side intake?

 

[Monkey Puzzle]

Parts starting to arrive and the anticipation is starting to get to me...

Question, is it worth squeezing a 3rd rad and low profile fans in the rear chamber side intake?

What 's going to be cooled in the loop?

 

[Vidar]

The 7950x and my 3080ti... with how hot the cpu runs I'm just wanting to make sure the loop can handle it.