New Gaming build - advice please

dicky96

dicky96

dicky96

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Joined
15 Oct 2019
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26
Location
Living the dream in sunny Gran Canaria
Hi guys, first I'll just say hello as I am new here. So Hello to you all :)

OK so I've been looking to build a new gaming rig to replace my early generation i7. Actually I am keeping the i7 for general office / internet / work use so I will be upgrading one of my other PCs.

I have a Cooler Master type case and 850W OCZ Modular power supply and optical drives from that PC to use on the new one

Having done some reading and studying and pricing up I've kinda come to a spec that fits my budget. This is pretty high end maybe but not stupidly high spec

Bear in mind this will be used only for gaming if that makes a difference

So the spec I came up with

CPU
i7-9700K approx £320

Motherboard
Asus Maximus XI Hero Wifi
or
Gigabyte Z390 Aorus Ultra

Both are about the same price approx £250 but I can get used/refurbished Asus Maximus XI Hero for around £150

RAM
Corsair Dominator Platinum RGB DDR4-3200 2x8Gb
or
G.Skill Trident Z RGB DDR4-3600 2x8Gb

Both very similar price approx £120

SSD
Samsung 970 Evo Plus 500Gb £90
or
Crucial P1 1TB NVMe M2-2280 £117
I think that 500Gb will be enough for now as this PC is for gaming and nothing else but the Crucial P1 is only £27 more for 1TB but is the samsung faster so much that I would notice?

GPU
GTX 1080ti
or
GTX 2060 Super
or
GTX 2070 Super
even with used GTX1080ti around, the used 1080ti 11Gb and new 2060 super 8Gb are both around £450, give or take, and I can get the 2070 Super new for £499 so price is not the biggest issue here. Which GPU should I choose based on performance?


So for example 17-9700K + Asus Maximus (refurb) + Corsair Dominator + Samsung 970 Evo 500Gb + RTX 2070 Super comes in at £1187 which is about where my budget stands.

I have a big ATX case with built in temperature monitor (3 probes) and the 850W OCZ PSU so I think the above is all I need?

I may need a new CPU cooler if the big one of my old rig won't fit (probably won't) but I don't want to go overboard on expensive cooling if I can help it

Can one of you more experienced guys have a look at that spec please , see if there is anything that is mismatched (bottlenecks etc) and anything I should consider a better option in the same price range? Or anything that saves money without noticeably losing performance from the above?

Thanks
Rich
 
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Hi and Welcome!

Get a Sabrent Rocket 1TB m.2 SSD for £109.99(google it, OcUK dont stock them)

My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £1,037.05 (includes shipping: £11.10)​
​

And you will have a bit of money spare (assuming a budget of £1200) for a shiny new case!
 
OK thanks I will look at the Sabrent Rocket, I hadn't come across that one while researching a half decent gaming rig.

Yeah the budget is around £1200

Why would you recommend the Ryzen 7 over the i7-9700K? I always liked intel CPUs (call me old skool or something) and all my PCs since the 1990s have been intel apart from one, so I didn't look at the AMD to be honest. The price of both is much the same so does the Ryzen have the better performance or something? I appreciate there is a saving on the AM4 motherboard vs the ones I mentioned, but I see it only has 1x M.2 slot.

Similar with the Radeon RX 5700 XT vs the GTX1080ti/RTX2060 super/RTX 2070 super GPUs - again price is in the same ballpark, why would the RX 5700 be a better choice?. To be fair all my previous rigs did have AMD GPUs, (apart from a Win98/XP retro gaming PC with 4:3 monitor I recently built which has a Geforce 4ti 4200 which runs great and is a lot of fun :D).

You recommend the Corsair RM650 modular PSU but I already have an 850W OCZ Modular PSU to use (which was bought from OcUK by the way). Is there some problem with using my existing PSU?

Cheers
 
dicky96 said:
OK thanks I will look at the Sabrent Rocket, I hadn't come across that one while researching a half decent gaming rig.

Yeah the budget is around £1200

Why would you recommend the Ryzen 7 over the i7-9700K? I always liked intel CPUs (call me old skool or something) and all my PCs since the 1990s have been intel apart from one, so I didn't look at the AMD to be honest. The price of both is much the same so does the Ryzen have the better performance or something? I appreciate there is a saving on the AM4 motherboard vs the ones I mentioned, but I see it only has 1x M.2 slot.

Similar with the Radeon RX 5700 XT vs the GTX1080ti/RTX2060 super/RTX 2070 super GPUs - again price is in the same ballpark, why would the RX 5700 be a better choice?. To be fair all my previous rigs did have AMD GPUs, (apart from a Win98/XP retro gaming PC with 4:3 monitor I recently built which has a Geforce 4ti 4200 which runs great and is a lot of fun :D).

You recommend the Corsair RM650 modular PSU but I already have an 850W OCZ Modular PSU to use (which was bought from OcUK by the way). Is there some problem with using my existing PSU?

Cheers
Click to expand...

amd drivers are causing havoc to a lot of computers.

i find the 3600 amd cpu with a rx 2070S the best option. Cost abit more but offers abit more stability .
Also its black friday in 5-6 weeks and im sure overclockers start it a week early so might be worth waiting
 
dicky96 said:
Why would you recommend the Ryzen 7 over the i7-9700K? I always liked intel CPUs (call me old skool or something) and all my PCs since the 1990s have been intel apart from one, so I didn't look at the AMD to be honest. The price of both is much the same so does the Ryzen have the better performance or something? I appreciate there is a saving on the AM4 motherboard vs the ones I mentioned, but I see it only has 1x M.2 slot.
Click to expand...
3700x is £40 cheaper is 8c/16t vs 9700k 8c/8t, 9700k has a slight lead over the 3700x but this is only at 1080p, once you go to 1440p they perform mostly the same for gaming. Going 3700x though will give you a better upgrade path and the extra threads will give you better longevity if you dont want to upgrade in a couple of years.

dicky96 said:
Similar with the Radeon RX 5700 XT vs the GTX1080ti/RTX2060 super/RTX 2070 super GPUs - again price is in the same ballpark, why would the RX 5700 be a better choice?. To be fair all my previous rigs did have AMD GPUs, (apart from a Win98/XP retro gaming PC with 4:3 monitor I recently built which has a Geforce 4ti 4200 which runs great and is a lot of fun :D).
Click to expand...
There is no point in getting a 1080ti now, its last gen and the 2070s is only about 5-10% behind it and will benefit from better support and driver optimisations from Nvidia. The reason i put in a 5700xt is that its cheaper by about £60-100 depending on model and freesync screens are cheaper as well and the 5700xt is only about 5-10% slower overall but perfectly capable of running 1440p, benchmarks for the two cards: https://www.techspot.com/review/1902-geforce-rtx-2070-super-vs-radeon-5700-xt/

dicky96 said:
You recommend the Corsair RM650 modular PSU but I already have an 850W OCZ Modular PSU to use (which was bought from OcUK by the way). Is there some problem with using my existing PSU?
Click to expand...
Not really a problem, just more of precaution, how old is your OCZ PSU and what model is it? if i was spending £1000+ plus on new hardware i would want to make sure the PSU is up to the task and within warrenty. The corsair unit i included is a good quality unit from a reputable brand and has a 10 year warrenty.
 
NovaKill4 said:
3700x is £40 cheaper is 8c/16t vs 9700k 8c/8t, 9700k has a slight lead over the 3700x but this is only at 1080p, once you go to 1440p they perform mostly the same for gaming. Going 3700x though will give you a better upgrade path and the extra threads will give you better longevity if you dont want to upgrade in a couple of years.
Click to expand...

OK thanks I'll have a think about that option. From the answers here so far it seems folks on this forum prefer AMD CPUs?

NovaKill4 said:
There is no point in getting a 1080ti now, its last gen and the 2070s is only about 5-10% behind it and will benefit from better support and driver optimisations from Nvidia. The reason i put in a 5700xt is that its cheaper by about £60-100 depending on model and freesync screens are cheaper as well and the 5700xt is only about 5-10% slower overall but perfectly capable of running 1440p, benchmarks for the two cards: https://www.techspot.com/review/1902-geforce-rtx-2070-super-vs-radeon-5700-xt/
Click to expand...
Thank you regards the 1080ti. I had come to that decision last night after reading some more comparisons. The 1080ti is just too expensive second hand compared to current generation cards. One wonders why though, you would think that auction prices would find the 'correct' market level that buyers are willing to pay..... but it seems buyers are willing to pay too much for the 1080ti for some reason. :p

Thanks for the link to the RX 5700XT comparison, I had a read of that and it has impressive performance but in the end I have decided to go with the 2070 Super as I always had Radeon cards in my previous new builds so this time I am gonna go the other way. And I can afford the extra £100. Maybe that will also pass through to resale values in the future, who knows. I did briefly look at the RTX 2080. I can afford it but it's too expensive for me to justify really. So at least I have the GPU decided now. GTX 2070 Super.

NovaKill4 said:
Not really a problem, just more of precaution, how old is your OCZ PSU and what model is it? if i was spending £1000+ plus on new hardware i would want to make sure the PSU is up to the task and within warrenty. The corsair unit i included is a good quality unit from a reputable brand and has a 10 year warrenty.
Click to expand...

Fair comment. I have that PC at home, I'll take a look and post the model.


best regards
Rich
 
Not sure of the age of that PSU as I bought it from overclockers to replace the original PSU that was in that rig and one day it wouldn't turn on. However it has never once given me a problem or any instability so I think I will keep it for now. Nice to hear OcUK sold me good quality, as usual.

I've priced up some of the components on my list at OcUK and they have some of those exact items in stock at better prices than I could find on ebay (motherboard and Graphics card)

Also I emailed Overclockers because though I am from Stoke-on-Trent and bought from the shop many times in the past, I now live in Gran Canaria since 2016. As an upshot of that I asked about VAT and I can mail order and I don't have to pay VAT :)

So that brings the 2070S down to £391.66 and the Asus Maximus XI Hero down to £216.66 new (compared to £149 refurbished)

I can get the i7-9700K cheaper here in Gran Canaria 330 euros = approx £300 but I may get better price from a UK supplier minus VAT if I ask around. OcUK was more expensive on the CPU even VAT free.

I can probably get the DDR4 and SDD without VAT as well from ebay if I ask. OcUK don't stock the models I picked. Do they have anything the same or better performance / similar price as these?

Corsair Dominator Platinum RGB DDR4-3200 2x8Gb or G.Skill Trident Z RGB DDR4-3600 2x8Gb - Both very similar price approx £120 on ebay
Samsung 970 Evo Plus 500Gb (£90) or Crucial P1 1TB NVMe M2-2280 (£117) on ebay

However this also means an RTX 2080S from OcUK would set me back £566 so that is getting within my budget.

I also read that buying a £250 Z390 motherboard will not give me any more FPS than buying a sub £100 Z390 motherboard (less the VAT) such as the Asus Prime Z390-P. Is that correct?
If so am I better going for the cheaper motherboard and spending the remainder on the RTX2080 Super instead of the RTX2070 Super - because the total cost would be about the same?

For example this thread from Asus ROG forum
https://rog.asus.com/forum/showthread.php?105789-ASUS-ROG-Maximus-XI-Hero-Z390-OR-ASUS-Prime-Z390-P

doesn't appear to give any one good reason why the Maximus XI Hero performs any better than the Prime Z390-P.... but then goes on to claim the Maximus XI hero is the obvious better choice. Hmmmmm. Why?

Thanks for the continued advice - much appreciated.
Rich
 
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Hmm no answers to that question?
Would the Asus Maximus XI Hero give me any noticeable gaming performance increase over the Asus Prime Z390-P? The description of both on OcUK shop site reads basically the same apart from an extra PCIe slot and a couple more SATA ports. Do they both support overclocking?

Second - what cooler would be a good choice for the i7-9700K? Obviously as it is a 'K' CPU I wanna try overclocking it. The more components I can buy from OcUK the better really as it keeps postage costs down

Cheers
 
Not sure of the age of that PSU as I bought it from overclockers to replace the original PSU that was in that rig and one day it wouldn't turn on. However it has never once given me a problem or any instability so I think I will keep it for now. Nice to hear OcUK sold me good quality, as usual.
Click to expand...

If you're unsure on its age, It's probably a good idea to look into replacing it then

I've priced up some of the components on my list at OcUK and they have some of those exact items in stock at better prices than I could find on ebay (motherboard and Graphics card)
Click to expand...

I would avoid them to be honest, there are other vendors with deals but we can only suggest from the OcUK perspective

Also I emailed Overclockers because though I am from Stoke-on-Trent and bought from the shop many times in the past, I now live in Gran Canaria since 2016. As an upshot of that I asked about VAT and I can mail order and I don't have to pay VAT :)

So that brings the 2070S down to £391.66 and the Asus Maximus XI Hero down to £216.66 new (compared to £149 refurbished)

I can get the i7-9700K cheaper here in Gran Canaria 330 euros = approx £300 but I may get better price from a UK supplier minus VAT if I ask around. OcUK was more expensive on the CPU even VAT free.

I can probably get the DDR4 and SDD without VAT as well from ebay if I ask. OcUK don't stock the models I picked. Do they have anything the same or better performance / similar price as these?

Corsair Dominator Platinum RGB DDR4-3200 2x8Gb or G.Skill Trident Z RGB DDR4-3600 2x8Gb - Both very similar price approx £120 on ebay
Samsung 970 Evo Plus 500Gb (£90) or Crucial P1 1TB NVMe M2-2280 (£117) on ebay
Click to expand...

CPU/Mobo & Ram isn't that expensive here, if you get something within the budget. SSD you should look for the sabrent rocket ssd, great little drive for the price, but OcUK don't stock them unfortunatley

However this also means an RTX 2080S from OcUK would set me back £566 so that is getting within my budget.

I also read that buying a £250 Z390 motherboard will not give me any more FPS than buying a sub £100 Z390 motherboard (less the VAT) such as the Asus Prime Z390-P. Is that correct?
If so am I better going for the cheaper motherboard and spending the remainder on the RTX2080 Super instead of the RTX2070 Super - because the total cost would be about the same?

doesn't appear to give any one good reason why the Maximus XI Hero performs any better than the Prime Z390-P.... but then goes on to claim the Maximus XI hero is the obvious better choice. Hmmmmm. Why?

Would the Asus Maximus XI Hero give me any noticeable gaming performance increase over the Asus Prime Z390-P? The description of both on OcUK shop site reads basically the same apart from an extra PCIe slot and a couple more SATA ports. Do they both support overclocking?

Second - what cooler would be a good choice for the i7-9700K? Obviously as it is a 'K' CPU I wanna try overclocking it. The more components I can buy from OcUK the better really as it keeps postage costs down
Click to expand...

Motherboards need to be taken with a pinch of salt. If you want all the bells and whistles then you'd be paying more. If you just want something that serves your purpose, then a £120-£150 board will suffice. Most of the boards you get, which are compatible with the 'K' series CPUs support overclocking, no issues there.

Something like the below would work really well. As pointed out above, grab a Subarent Rocket SSD elsewhere as OcUK don't stock them. The reason for suggesting AMD over Intel is your budget. It would need to be a little more to cover the build. At this price point, where everything is required, the 3600/3600x is a great choice and will not let you down.

My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £1,399.49 (includes shipping: £12.60)​
​
 
snips86x said:
I would avoid them to be honest, there are other vendors with deals but we can only suggest from the OcUK perspective
Click to expand...

I think you misread what I posted - I already said that OcUK were cheaper than I could find the motherboard + RTX2080s elsewhere on ebay ;)

OK, thanks to all the help and advice, I'm getting there.

Sorry I don't know how to make those fancy shopping basket lists you post, but here goes. All from OcUK except the SSD
CPU - i7-9700K = £349.99

Motherboard - Asus Prime Z390-P = £114.95

Memory - DDR4 - what's the fastest that motherboard would support? OcUK have this for example. Do I gain performance using that 4133MHz on this motheboard and CPU combo? Or should I get some cheaper 3600MHz
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/team...4133mhz-dual-channel-kit-black-my-099-tg.html = £169.99

SSD : Sabrent Rocket M.2.2280 512Gb £62.99 on ebay

GPU -KFA2 RTX2080 Super £679.99

Total Less VAT = £1148 (plus shipping of the components from OcUK which isn't too expensive)

That's nicely in budget :D Can I build anything faster than that for the price?

I have a suitable case and 850W Modular PSU. SO all I need now is a decent cooler. Anything available for £60 or less that would do the job and allow me to overclock the i7-9700K?
 
Sorry my mistake. Not that anyone wouldn't have heard of that site before, and I didn't name the vendor. They would be a competitor. So really ebay is just a method to search for sellers of a particular item, not a seller, yep?

If I said SSD : Sabrent Rocket M.2.2280 512Gb £62.99 on google would that be a competitor? Because i can also find lots of seller that way too.

Also if OcUK does not stock an item anyway then how can anyone who does stock that item be considered a competitor?

But back on topic - what cooler (from OcUK) should I put on the above rig?
 
You have zero upgrade path if you go with a 9700K. The only thing better would be a 9900K but that would be a bad idea in a board like the Asus Z390-P.

If it was me I would take a 3700X and B450 Tomahawk MAX any day of the week over an overpriced Intel build. You get a £50 saving and also AMD is doing a promotion where you can choose a free game (Borderlands 3 or The Outer Worlds).

https://www.amd.com/en/gaming/raise-the-game
 
OK thanks for the info. TBH although I have upgraded my PCs in the past (since I first got a 486 DX in the mid 90s) I always went for the latest motherboards and CPUs when i did the upgrade. I don't think i ever just fitted a faster CPU to my existing Rig. I have done upgrades on my existing rig such as when Voodoo 2 came out of course.
 
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