New build advice

neo-omega · 26 Nov 2022 at 00:11

Hi there,

I am very close to pulling the trigger on a big upgrade. I feel that my PC no longer does what I'd want it to do and so I am really feeling the upgrade itch. I'm taking advantage of some deals on AMD chips and have come up with the below. I'd be really grateful if people could give it a once over and let me know if there's anything that I could change/improve. This will be used for gaming and media consumption only and no productivity. I went for the 7950x as I was already planning to get the 7900x and as it stands (current prices) the 7950x is £40 more than the 7900x at full MSRP.

I will in time replace my GPU with a 4080 or a 7900 XTX and I am going to air cooling (hence the NH-D15).

Again, advice gratefully received!

My basket at OcUK:

1 x AMD Ryzen 9 7950X Sixteen Core 5.70GHz (Socket AM5) Processor - Retail (SKU: CP-3DE-AM) = £589.99
1 x Asus ROG Crosshair X670E Hero (Socket AM5) DDR5 ATX Motherboard (SKU: MB-6J4-AS) = £649.99
1 x Corsair Vengeance EXPO 32GB (2X16GB) DDR5 PC5-48000C36 6000MHz Dual Channel Kit - Black (CMK32GX5M2D6000Z36) (SKU: MY-4DF-CS) = £230.00
1 x Samsung 980 Pro 1TB M.2 2280 PCI-e 4.0 x4 NVMe Solid State Drive (SKU: HD-248-SA) = £128.98
1 x Noctua NH-D15 Chromax Pure Black CPU Cooler with Dual 140m Fans (SKU: HS-03M-NC) = £110.00

Total: £1,720.06 (includes delivery: £11.10)

Tetras · 26 Nov 2022 at 00:41

For games and no productivity, this is what I would change:

AMD Ryzen 7 7700X Eight Core 5.40GHz (Socket AM5) Processor - Retail - £359.99
Asus TUF Gaming B650-Plus WIFI (Socket AM5) DDR5 ATX Motherboard - £242.99
TeamGroup Vulcan EXPO 32GB (2X16GB) DDR5 PC5-48000C38 6000MHz Dual Channel Kit - Black (FLABD532G6000HC38ADC01) - £179.99
WD Black SN850X 1TB SSD M.2 2280 NVME PCI-E Gen4 Solid State Drive (WDS100T2X0E) - £89.98
Noctua NH-D15 Chromax Pure Black CPU Cooler with Dual 140m Fans - £110.00

Grand Total: £993.44

The 7700X is the optimal AM5 CPU for gaming, in my opinion and you know that when the X3D releases you'll want one, so I doubt those cores will get much chew on between now and then.
I haven't seen many reviews, but the AM5 motherboards all look mega over-engineered to me, like even a B650 board is comparable (or better) than many X570 motherboards.
I'd take the SN850X over the 980 Pro when it is £40 odd cheaper.

neo-omega · 26 Nov 2022 at 11:08

Thank you very much for the advice. That seems like a really great saving for what is essentially the same performance. I guess I got caught up in "bigger number must be better" when in fact I really probably don't need all the bells and whistles of the spec above. I've made some tweaks and I am about 90% of the way to pulling the trigger on the below. I think I'll stick with the 1080 for now and then see how the 7900xt/xtx compare to the 4080 before getting the GPU upgraded.

I decided to go for X670E as it'll be hopefully quite future-proof for future AM5 chips and gfx cards.

Also, I guess given that I am gaming and not doing productivity there's little need for me to keep watercooling (I'm always worried about what if the pump fails and I think it's quite a big expense and complexity for not a significant improvement).

My basket at OcUK:

1 x Noctua NH-D15 Chromax Pure Black CPU Cooler with Dual 140m Fans (SKU: HS-03M-NC) = £109.99
1 x WD Black SN850X 1TB SSD M.2 2280 NVME PCI-E Gen4 Solid State Drive (WDS100T2X0E) (SKU: HD-590-WD) = £89.99
1 x Asus TUF Gaming X670E-Plus (Socket AM5) DDR5 ATX Motherboard (SKU: MB-6JA-AS) = £329.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan EXPO 32GB (2X16GB) DDR5 PC5-48000C38 6000MHz Dual Channel Kit - Black (FLABD532G6000HC38ADC01) (SKU: MY-0B2-TG) = £179.99
1 x AMD Ryzen 7 7700X Eight Core 5.40GHz (Socket AM5) Processor - Retail (SKU: CP-3DF-AM) = £359.98

Total: £1,081.04 (includes delivery: £11.10)

Tetras · 26 Nov 2022 at 13:59

neo-omega said:
Thank you very much for the advice. That seems like a really great saving for what is essentially the same performance. I guess I got caught up in "bigger number must be better" when in fact I really probably don't need all the bells and whistles of the spec above. I've made some tweaks and I am about 90% of the way to pulling the trigger on the below. I think I'll stick with the 1080 for now and then see how the 7900xt/xtx compare to the 4080 before getting the GPU upgraded.

Looks like a solid build and the money saved can almost buy you your new graphics card

theforce · 27 Nov 2022 at 00:19

Tetras said:
Looks like a solid build and the money saved can almost buy you your new graphics card

£640 can indeed buy you a decent upgrade from an Nvidia 1080. The Gigabyte RTX 3070Ti is available for £620

boabs · 9 Dec 2022 at 15:38

very nice and powerful.