New build assistance

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Hello

I've been lurking these forums over the weekend as I am looking for a complete new build, including a monitor. I do both gaming and other multi-tasking work too, but in terms of games I generally play CS:GO and Americas Army, though I would like the build to be capable of playing some newer games too.

Budget is around the £750 - £850 mark (lower the better of course) and after some research I was hoping someone can assist around the components below:

Nvidia GTX 1060 6GB (or 3GB but for an extra £50 or so I think it be worth the 6GB?)
AMD Ryzen 2600X
ASUS ROG STRIX B350 Gaming

Happyy to be shown something better with or without the above components. Also for a monitor, I was also hoping to use a nice big 27" screen for resolution but not sure if I should stick to a 24" and lower resolution instead? Would prefer the build to last me at least the next 3-4 years without having to do another substantial upgrade.

P.s. I should add the monitor cost is separate to the budget above, prepared to pay up to £200 on the monitor alone.

Thanks in advance
 
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@Rob.S

Slightly over by £10 , but gets your GTX 1060 3GB which would be Plenty ! For likes of CS:GO, Fortnite , COD etc whilst pairing it with a 144hz (don't be able to use Freesync tech - AMD only) on Samsung's Stunning Q Dot panels which are gorgeous to view !
Board is Gigabyte, if your slapping in Second Gen Ryzen and it doesn't have latest bios, you've got two options;
Apply for a loan boot kit of AMD or
Send to Gigabyte to have Bios flash - Asus don't allow you to do this nor no rep support on here.

My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £1,060.93 (includes shipping: £14.10)


Intel, will be stronger/higher FPS for gaming, specially with CPU bound games like ARMA but light be slower for heavy Multi apping

My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £1,048.96 (includes shipping: £14.10)​
 
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Hi Orbitalwalsh

Thank you for this, very useful but forgive me I have a few extra questions.

1. First of all the extra HDD is not necessary so that makes a little saving.
2. For AMD you have opted for the 2600 but not the 2600X - is there really much of a difference?
3. Regarding the GTX 1060 3GB, would it be overkill if I opted for the 6GB 1060 for the difference in price?
4. I see both builds are Micro ATX, so I am presuming there will be smaller space for and I suppose my real worry would be airflow and cable management, particularly if the PSU is not modular/semi-modular and therefore noise levels overall. I've never done a Micro ATX build before, not saying that I won't have one, but just something I thought about.
5. The monitor does look real nice I have to admit, however at the moment my gaming hours are not that great probably up to 8-10 hours in the week and maybe some more over the weekend. I tend to work from home fairly often so it will also be used as a workstation, mainly word processing but definitely use of multiple apps open at the same time.

Taking all of the above into account, would you change anything to the build you have suggested? Perhaps alternatives to the monitor, CPU, GPU etc. This build is something as a starting point really and over the next 2-3 months I could do some more upgrades if necessary.

Edit: I know these are all picked from the OCUK site, but have noticed the Samsung monitor is £50-£70 cheaper elsewhere, so I think I will source it from the cheaper supplier - assuming we work from the same budget, that leaves about £110 extra to play with.
 
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@Rob.S
2. For AMD you have opted for the 2600 but not the 2600X - is there really much of a difference?

2600x has higher single core boost but from what I've seen multicore boost is almost the same . To be honest Don't think you'll notice much, other on here might but that's some hard core gamers who'd most likely choose Intel for that purpsose .

Regarding the GTX 1060 3GB, would it be overkill if I opted for the 6GB 1060 for the difference in price

Depends on the games and your justification for price and game time. CS:GO can run on anything but games like PUBG and Assassin's Creed but as much power as you can through at it .

. I see both builds are Micro ATX, so I am presuming there will be smaller space for and I suppose my real worry would be airflow and cable management, particularly if the PSU is not modular/semi-modular and therefore noise levels overall. I've never done a Micro ATX build before, not saying that I won't have one, but just something I thought about.

The PSU is one of the best Quality units for the cheapest price. There are Budget options but the difference in components is big for the extra £25 spent :)
mATX does have a smaller footprint and with the case linked above, airflow will not be an issue :)
Worth a google to see.

Tad over but you've got EVERYTHING :)

6 cores and 12 threads
16GB of ram - might be overkill but depends on how much workload your doing and some recent AAA titles like more ram then 8GB
1x 144hx monitor for gaming which will make CS:GO fly ! And 1 X normal 1080p for dual screen workstation - every office I've been two pretty much uses dual screen for multiple programs
Gtx 1060 6GB, more power the .3GB version

My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £1,073.73 (includes shipping: £15.90)


Have your cake and eating it !
Also Ryzen platform will be a longer lasting platform , 2 more CPU generations will come out for that socket on the board, means in a few years time, you can upgrade CPU if you need the power

To save costs, 8GB of ram and Dual standard 1080p 60hz monitors and game off just one or even both of them if you wish :) but for office work , two screens is golden​
 
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Soldato
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Looking at your requirements, with an £850 maximum budget I'd say you can achieve a system capable of doing everything you want, however, I'd be tempted to upgrade your monitor budget, why you ask? Have you tried adding an extra two inches to a monitor after you bought it, or squishing more pixels into it, it's bloody hard :D You want to get the best monitor you can afford, as it's the part of the system you will be looking at 100% of the time no matter what task you are doing, it's the single most important purchase that won't be swapped out like a graphics card or RAM would be.

I'd break the system into a separate purchase, and decide what sort of monitor you want, colour accurate IPS, VA Gaming 144Hz, Ultrawide, 27" 1440P, etc. You need more specifics, I am unable to recommend a monitor since "nice big 27"" doesn't give any real details about the monitors capabilities, other than the physical screen size. :)
 
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That looks pretty good to me, work are going through a refresh at the moment upgrading monitors so I am going to see if they will give me an extra monitor for home (HP 23" ones) which should save me that extra costs. If that's the case, using your latest basket of goodies I could for an extra £5 by sourcing the monitor elsewhere get the 27" version of the Samsung curve monitor. Good idea, or bad?

@Journey quite frankly I think it was more the size of the screen than the actual capabilities! I'm not particularly clued up on the monitor side of things and I am not a hardcore gamer either so what might matter to most gamers, probably doesn't matter too much to me.
 
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@Journey think the budget is £850+£200 for monitor :D

Yeah I know the monitor is separate, but £200 doesn't get you a great monitor it gets you an average one at 27", however as you can see below, the £850 is almost gone if you go with the OP's original requests.

My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £732.06 (includes shipping: £11.10)​

Personally an extra £50 for the 2600X over the 2600 makes no sense, since the cooler provided isn't worth that premium, rather than buying a better tower style one for £20-30, and have much cooler temps and better all core boost. I wouldn't use a £107 B350 board either, just paying ASUS tax, I'd get something cheaper in the ATX form factor, since that the OP seems to be wanting that, maybe the Gigabyte Gaming-3, or the ASRock Pro-4 one at £72.

So, £720 or there about with no case, or PSU, or SSD, with £130 left. hmmmm
 
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@Journey quite frankly I think it was more the size of the screen than the actual capabilities! I'm not particularly clued up on the monitor side of things and I am not a hardcore gamer either so what might matter to most gamers, probably doesn't matter too much to me.

Yes, I know I was asking what was important to you in the monitor. I have fully calibrated colour accurate screens as I do photo/video work, but they are pants for gaming, at least on my top end system. If I were gaming, I'd choose something complete different. Hence the question. :)
 
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(Gaming purposes )the larger the screen and lower the resolution , the larger the Pixels will appear on screen meaning settings for Filtering have to be turned on or higher then normal .
27" 1080p doesn't look pretty without any Filtering settings, and then you start to hammer the performance of the card just to smooth out edges that wouldn't be there on a 23-25" screen .

27-32" screens are perfect for 1440p . if you can get a second monitor for free then awesome! cash saved and work productivity goes up! use 3 in work currently with CAD, database, Chrome spreedsheets and Geomap programs . couldn't live at work with a single screen :D
 
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@Journey, I'm open to all suggestions obviously I have seen a fair few reviews for the 2600X but little on the 2600 so just presumed the 2600X was the one to go for. However, if there isn't much difference and I make a saving I am happy to go with the 2600.

@orbitalwalsh - thank you for that, let's just stick to the 24" version I think. My field of expertise is law, so I do have 2 monitors at work since it makes drafting contracts and comparisons so much easier than flicking between word docs! Certainly makes a difference and I agree going back to one monitor would be difficult for me unless the screen size justifies it.

Anyway, it looks like you have given me what I need - your last basket minus the monitors at a total of £778.85 and I buy the monitor Samsung Curve monitor separate at £200 so a total cost of £978.85.

Two final points, the 450 watt PSU will be able to cope with those components including the revised 6GB 1060? Secondly, you mentioned about obtaining a "loan boot kit" from AMD or sending to Gigabyte to flash - is this straightforward and what would you recommend? I take it there are compatibility issues with the new Ryzen CPUs?
 
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Two final points, the 450 watt PSU will be able to cope with those components including the revised 6GB 1060? Secondly, you mentioned about obtaining a "loan boot kit" from AMD or sending to Gigabyte to flash - is this straightforward and what would you recommend? I take it there are compatibility issues with the new Ryzen CPUs?

These 1st gen boards have been out a lot longer then 2nd gen cpus- some may have been sat in a shops/distributors house for a long time waiting for people to buy them so they might not of been shipped recently with the latest bios to support 2nd Gen CPUs .
Anther thread on here, dad was overseeing his son do his first PC build and again, used the Gaming 3 board with Ryzen 2600 and didn't work so they have contacted Gigabyte UK asking to have board flashed and Rep is in the loop

https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/threads/new-build.18817705/page-3

AMD did supply Kits for their APU chips which launched just before and all you need to do was supply receipt and they would loan a cheap CPU for you to Update the BIOS yourself . Though not sure on time frame and T&Cs. Believe they are doing the same for people how wish to buy Latest Gen CPU with older gen boards to keep costs down .
Least with the above board vendor you've got two methods of cover to get the Chip working on 1st gen Board . Think you have to pay postage to and from Gigabyte though - least its North of london though and not overseas
Believe they are shipped with stickers say if they'll work with latest gen CPUs
 
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You can also just ask OCUK to make sure the board is flashed, and save loads of hassle, since it's the least they can do given you are spending with them. A quick call after you order should be able to get it sorted.
 
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You can also just ask OCUK to make sure the board is flashed, and save loads of hassle, since it's the least they can do given you are spending with them. A quick call after you order should be able to get it sorted.

I think @trigg_27 tried asking OCUK on the phone to see about getting a board with ryzen 2000 series sticker or getting OCUK to flash it but no luck :(

think somone is stick out to collect parts without notes and thats it - lucky draw
 
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I think @trigg_27 tried asking OCUK on the phone to see about getting a board with ryzen 2000 series sticker or getting OCUK to flash it but no luck :(

think somone is stick out to collect parts without notes and thats it - lucky draw

If that's the case, I'd be buying the parts somewhere else, for less cost otherwise you are paying more for less. It's a real shame if they can't even offer that basic service.
 
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If that's the case, I'd be buying the parts somewhere else, for less cost otherwise you are paying more for less. It's a real shame if they can't even offer that basic service.

could be wrong and they might but seems thats what they got told :(
as you say def worth asking ! might get lucky or a change of doing it . guessing sales person covering themselves if a person picking just grabs a board without a sticker on
 
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could be wrong and they might but seems thats what they got told :(
as you say def worth asking ! might get lucky or a change of doing it . guessing sales person covering themselves if a person picking just grabs a board without a sticker on

Well I'd say given how important it is, they could use it as a selling point - rather than having to buy something, then wait heck knows how long to be able to use it. I'd be well miffed if they couldn't arrange something so simple, and the whole lot would end up getting shipped back.
 
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Great, thanks guys. I will give them a quick call prior to placing an order, if they aren't prepared to do it then I might call other suppliers to see if they are willing instead. If nobody's willing then I don't think it matters whichever way I go.
 
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If you basically only play CS:GO then the 3GB 1060 should work fine, but for other games it will struggle.

It's a shame the RX 570/580 are so badly priced, as they would be a better pairing with those 144hz FreeSync screens.​
 
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Soldato
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as @southernorth said, 3GB is golden for CS:GO and nvidia compression tech for their VRAM is very impressive and handles most gains at 1080p high settings fine, just the score count is less then 6GB verison which is a shame

puts it slightly more then GTX 1060 6GB version and would offer a lot better and smoother gameplay for sure ! just a shame the cheapest card which is a Gigabyte is out of stock as that matches the MSI 1060 6GB pricing - though these cards should be £200 mark in the first place

My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £1,087.94 (includes shipping: £14.10)​

a good quality like the above would be under 65-70% load which is fine :)
 
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