First Time Custom Build. Looking for some advice on current spec.

Elith

Elith

Elith

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Joined
11 Aug 2017
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35
Hey so as i said in the title this is my first custom build and just looking for a bit of advice/feedback on what i've picked out so far.

This is going to be mainly used for 3D artwork, so Maya, Unreal/Unity, Substance Painter/Designer, Photoshop etc. will use it for gaming from time to time, but nothing too extreme on that end. Going for the 1080TI because substance is bound by graphics memory, so the more the better

CPU - Ryzen 7 1700 3.0GHz 8-Core Processor
CPU Cooler - Corsair H100i v2
Motherboard - Asus CROSSHAIR VI HERO ATX AM4 Motherboard
Memory - Corsair Vengeance LPX 32GB (2 x 16GB) DDR4-2666 Memory
Storage - Samsung 960 EVO 250GB M.2-2280 Solid State Drive
Storage - Seagate Barracuda 3TB Hard Drive
Video Card - Asus GeForce GTX 1080 Ti 11GB
Case - Corsair Carbide 400C
Power Supply - Corsair RMx 650W
Wireless Network Adapter - Asus PCE-AC56

I've priced this and it's came in around £2000. But i possibly don't need to spend that much, or there could be parts swapped out that could be of equal quality if not better for around the same price/less that i am unaware of.

Thanks in advance.
 
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If you're not considering SLI the x370 board is needless - you could save additional £100+ with a decent b350 and still get a decent clock:

My basket at Overclockers UK:


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Also, ideally you would have 3000MHz minimum memory speed to make the most of the Ryzen - it performs better with faster memory (3200MHz regarded as the sweetspot - but gains are marginal above 3000MHz)


*As an aside: I would remove the competitor's name - against forum rules.
 
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Hey Plec,

I've actually been playing around with the build since i posted this so now it's looking a bit more like this.

CPU - Ryzen 7 1700 3.0GHz 8-Core Processor
CPU Cooler - Corsair H100i v2
Motherboard - Asus STRIX B350-F (like you have suggested)
Memory - Corsair Vengeance LPX 32GB (2 x 16GB) DDR4-3000 Memory (also faster, like you suggested)
Storage - Samsung 960 EVO 250GB M.2-2280 Solid State Drive
Storage - Seagate Barracuda 3TB Hard Drive
Video Card - Asus GeForce GTX 1080 Ti 11GB
Case - Corsair Carbide 400C
Power Supply - Corsair RMx 650W
Wireless Network Adapter - Asus PCE-AC56

*Also apologies for the forum rule breaking in my original post, edited now.
 
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That's a mighty spec and in my opinion better balanced for your needs.

You could save more money by dropping the expensive M.2.

For an extra ~£35 you could get double the storage or you could save an additional £50 and get the equiavlelent storage in SATA. The M.2 speed gains are marginal - and hardly noticeable in real world usage (unless your work would really benefit from this?):

Example in prices difference:

M.2

My basket at Overclockers UK:


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SATA - 250Gb and 500Gb prices:

My basket at Overclockers UK:


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Hey again,

Glad that it's turned out alright, all that reading and listening to tech videos in the background at work may be paying off :)

To be honest you're probably right on that swap out as yeah i'm not sure i will gain much benefit from it and it's probably worth the saving.

Thanks for the help there Plec.
 
Elith said:
Thanks for the help there Plec.
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No worries.

If you're looking to save more money then the Bitfenix is a quality unit with a 7 year warranty - have listed 650W example (you can get the 750W unit for £10 more). I've also added the Superflower 650W - only slightly cheaper than the Corsair but a quality unit:

My basket at Overclockers UK:


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Elith said:
Going for the 1080TI because substance is bound by graphics memory, so the more the better
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Could you elaborate on this - as if it's not the processing power of the GPU that's needed and if you're not using 4K monitors there could be more savings to me made...
 
Thanks for the power supply ideas too, i think i'll probably stick with the Corsair one, i think they recently pushed their warranties on them out to 10 years for at least the RMx series.

Oh Substance Painter and Designer are GPU limited, they are used for texturing 3d assets in real time, so if you are doing something with a lot of smart materials or with a lot of individual layers of detail, the extra is always going to be beneficial. I know a few guys that have recently upgraded to a 1080ti and they keep commenting on how smooth the programme runs with the additional memory. I'm not sure how much smoother it is over the standard 1080, but if you are texturing something onto a 4k map I don't think the extra 3gb will hurt. i'm currently using a gtx 970 and while it's okay, but once you start to get detailed or want to work details in at a higher resolution you can feel the performance dropping away. I realise the 970 is a far cry from the 1080 but yeah.

But if you or anyone else knows different, please let me know :)
 
Elith said:
Thanks for the power supply ideas too, i think i'll probably stick with the Corsair one, i think they recently pushed their warranties on them out to 10 years for at least the RMx series.
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Can't argue with a 10 year warranty.

Elith said:
Thanks for the power supply ideas too, i think i'll probably stick with the Corsair one, i think they recently pushed their warranties on them out to 10 years for at least the RMx series.

Oh Substance Painter and Designer are GPU limited, they are used for texturing 3d assets in real time, so if you are doing something with a lot of smart materials or with a lot of individual layers of detail, the extra is always going to be beneficial. I know a few guys that have recently upgraded to a 1080ti and they keep commenting on how smooth the programme runs with the additional memory. I'm not sure how much smoother it is over the standard 1080, but if you are texturing something onto a 4k map I don't think the extra 3gb will hurt. i'm currently using a gtx 970 and while it's okay, but once you start to get detailed or want to work details in at a higher resolution you can feel the performance dropping away. I realise the 970 is a far cry from the 1080 but yeah.
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The standard 1080 11Gb is what i was going to recommend but your experience in this area, coupled with your colleagues hands on observations, are far more valid than my thoughts on the subject.

Best of luck with the build - it's a very enviable spec.
 
mistersprinkles said:
I've heard through the grapevine that the cheap Corsair stuff, which is Hynix IC based, is not ideal with Ryzen. You might want to consider other options. (Im talking about RAM)
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The 3200MHz kits can be difficult to get up to full speed - but the 3000MHz kits should hit 2933MHz via the XMP. I've not had any problems so far with the 4 builds i've done using Corsair LPX (using the Gigabye b350 boards).

The only caveat i will add is that the 32Gb kits may be slightly harder - but even if this was an issue further BIOS updates would hopefully address this.

The only other way is buying AM4 approved memory - and that would prove quite expensive.

@Elith - you could obviously exchange the memory if it proved problematic at very little cost - especially considering your original edited supplier...

*Additional: to increase compatibility be sure to update the BIOS as soon as you have CPU, 1 stick memory and GPU installed - via a FAT 32 formatted USB and the Asus EZ Flash utility (don't use the windows environment).
 
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Hey mistersprinkles, is this the B-Die RAM you are talking about being better, or? I've seen a few people talking about it but I wasn't really sure.

And thanks again Plec, for the heads up, i wouldn't have known to do that, will keep that in mind. And on the graphics card, the Asus choice is purely out of, i've always had Asus cards and i've always found them to be reliable so i didn't mind spending a bit more here to get that.

Cheers.
 
Elith said:
is this the B-Die RAM you are talking about being better, or?
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It is - there are also dedicated AM4 kits starting to appear - but both at a premium.

But this is more geared around 3200MHz kits as the 3000MHz are pretty much guaranteed to hit 2933MHz using 16Gb kits since the latest AGESA update. Although, I must admit that 32Gb is probably a bot more problematic - but i would certainly risk the cheaper option first as returning is a simple process...

Elith said:
And on the graphics card, the Asus choice is purely out of, i've always had Asus cards and i've always found them to be reliable so i didn't mind spending a bit more here to get that.
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The Gigabyte mention was for the motherboard - i build with them for the UK RMA and general great warranty service.

Asus make great products - but i can;t lavish any praise on their warranty service as it - well - sucks.
 
I'd be more than happy for your recommendations (as long as you don't mind taking more time) once i'd kind of finalised the build i was going to start looking into warranty stuff and then maybe reconsider if anything was a bit crap on that front.

*edit* Now started reading on Asus warranty issues and it does seem like a bit of a pain if anything does go wrong.
 
Elith said:
>snip<
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I'm out at the mo now - typing this on tiny phone in middle of street :).

Briefly: Asus make qualify products - it's only their CS I take issue with. I used to buy Asus exclusively but they stretched even my patience with warranty issues... I've not read any forum banter since to change my opinion in past years...

But, don't let my jaded experiences cloud your purchases.

I'll be back in a couple of hours and will happily link to Gigabyte alternatives if that is your want?
 
Hah sorry man, I had no idea, enjoy your time out whatever you are doing, but yeah if you have time once you are home that would be great :)
 
That's brilliant cheers, yeah i think as i said the original reason i went with Asus was out of never having an issue with them, but i've had multiple people now recommend me the Aorus version. The Gaming OC Black seems really cheap but i can't see anywhere you can actually buy it, has it just not been released in the UK yet? Or is it just sold out because it's so cheap, i do like how it has the simple black finish.

Perfect on the motherboard though, i'll possibly just switch over to that if gigabyte are better at dealing with warranty related stuff. I think everyone has horror stories about individual companies, but i'd rather be a bit safer.
 
Elith said:
That's brilliant cheers, yeah i think as i said the original reason i went with Asus was out of never having an issue with them, but i've had multiple people now recommend me the Aorus version..
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It is a great 1080Ti

Elith said:
The Gaming OC Black seems really cheap but i can't see anywhere you can actually buy it, has it just not been released in the UK yet?.
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Unfortunately, that incarnation is yet to be release - i think.

Elith said:
Perfect on the motherboard though, i'll possibly just switch over to that if gigabyte are better at dealing with warranty related stuff. I think everyone has horror stories about individual companies, but i'd rather be a bit safer.
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I've built all my builds around that Gigabyte board - but that ASUS is an equally quality board and is newer release so don't let my jaded outlook put you off your preferred choice. As mentioned it's a quality board - just the ASUS CS that bothers me.
 
Yeah totally undertsandable on experience, I've had components fail on me in the past, nothing as major the motherboard, but PSU/RAM and just replaced them off my own back but i think if i was under warranty and having a pain getting it replaced, yeah just doesn't sound like fun :)

Looks like it was released a while back so not really sure on the OC Black.

But yeah again thanks for all your help :)
 
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