New Build time

Associate
Joined
23 Sep 2008
Posts
492
Location
Sunbury-on-Thames
Hi There,

So my PC is 5 years old, specs are as below:

Asus Z97 Micro ATX
Intel Core i7 4790K @4GHZ
MSI R9 290X 8GB Graphics card
16GB Ram
Various SSD's + a 4TB disk for data

Currently plugged into a Samsung 4K tv.

Budget 4K Max

been out of the PC build game for a while, since I built my last machine specced up above.

Requirements:

Quality gaming experience but also used for work
Needs to drive 2 or 3 monitors ideally one 4K for gaming, the others can be lower if required but that needs to be included in the budget.
Storage requirements are mostly taken care of as I plan to re-use my SSD's with the exception of adding an M.2 drive as an install disk.

Don't want...RGB don't care for it whatsoever.

Needs to last at least 5 years.

Ideally would like a single 3090 as the center piece purely as this is going to get me through gaming for a little while.

Thoughts and advice much appreciated.

Ideally want to get this done for new year, or as close to it at possible.
 
TBH with a 4k Budget you're going to be easily good for a 5yr build, It's up to you if you decide on 10900k or wait for the new cpu Intel are desperately trying to get out, or you can go AMD with the new zens.
Looking at availability, and the fact that zen 3's are hard to source
10900k/ or 10850k
Asus Maximus xii hero with or without wifi.
16/32gb ram aim for 3600mhz.
SSD's Use your OS on a small fast 350-500gb and then, 1 or 2 2tb sata ssds , HDD's are pretty easy to get
3090's are becoming much more available then the other 3000 skus, depending on your colour scheme, tastes, there's something for everyone, even Gigabyte have an all white rtx 3090 Vision.
Case Lian Li O11, Enthoo, Meshify.. all good options
And just a decent branded 1kw psu should set you up for a pc that will probably outlast your tv and be around the 3.5k mark, the 3090 will probably cost more than then your cpu, mobo, ram, and psu combined.

Depending on work and if you'll need the multicore performance for say rendering, I'd go AMD, and have a pcie gen 4 ready mobo, and upgrade to pcie gen 4 nvme drives, I upgraded my 4770k system at the end of August. I am only running a 10700k at present as the 10900k's were unavailable everywhere at the time, but for my needs and with the OC I have on it, it's fine until I source a 10900k or have decent set of results for the 11900k to look at.
 
Thanks for the feedback.

With availabiltiy of parts, I would have liked to go for AMD as they are crushing it at the moment.

I don't know where to start on the AMD side, so if you could put together a potential spec, that would be really helpful for a rough comparison.

Currently sitting in my basket:

Intel Core i9-1900K - £499.99
Asus Rog Maximus XII Hero MB - £369.95
Samsung 970 EVO Pluse 1TB m.2 - £158.99
Asus GeForce RTX 3090 - £1729.99
Kolink Continuum 1200W 80 plus Platimum Modular PSU - £174.95
Team Group 8Pack Edition 32GB 3600MHz DDR4 RAM - £259.99
Corsair Hydro Series H100i 240mm liquid cooler - £134.99
Total £3340.55

Would this look like a solid build?

Just need to find a case, and 3 monitors.
 
So gamingwise I play a variety:
Halo MasterChief collection
GTA V
Cyberpunk when they iron out the glitches a bit more
Forza
Command and Conquer
Rocksmith


Workwise, I work in a helpdesk environment, but it's all virtualised so it's not dependend on my machine apart from the speed of my internet connection, it's a pretty broad role where I need access to a lot of different systems.

Before WFH the TV worked well as it was casual use and gaming with the occasional log on for weekend cover. However I use 3 screens at work for better workflow management - ticket systems, emails, backend system access and I've found that one screen even if it's quite large just doesn't work as well for me.

So whilst the horsepower would be underutilised for work, my gfx card and the TV are both on the way out. Backlight on the tv is starting to flicker, and only one port of the gfx card works properly, and even then it is starting to show artifacts on the screen.

Thanks
 
MSI are doing a cash back thing with Intel, so might be worth a look. Otherwise for AMD, MSI X570 Tomahawk and 5800x will easily last 3-5 years.
 
So current build looks like:

ASUS hero xii 369.99
intel core i9 10850k 428.99
Samsung evo 970 m2 1tb 158.99
ASUS 3090 1729.99
Patriot viper steel 32gb 149.99
Kolink continuum 1200w psu 174.99
Alpha cool eisbar 360mm aio cpu cooler 109.99
Total 3129.34 before case and monitors

case and monitor suggestions would be helpful.

thanks
 
Ok, so out of stock, but looking at alternative suppliers, Corsair 1000w RXi PSU. Won't say from where for forum rules.

Monitor wise, ideally 3, current total for buiild before case and monitors is budget can be stretched a bit to get monitors into the build:

ASUS hero xii 369.99
intel core i9 10850k 428.99
Samsung evo 970 m2 1tb - sourced from alternative
ASUS 3090 1729.99
Patriot viper steel 32gb 149.99
Alpha cool eisbar 360mm aio cpu cooler 99.95
Corsair RXi 1000W Gold certified PSU - Sourced from alternative

Total:
£3114.04
 
Get the Arctic Freezer 2 360mm AIO rather - probably the best value for your money.

On the monitor side, check out (Hardware Unboxed); they do comprehensive monitor reviews and have their best of 2020 video up - can just search for 4K or whatever you're after. Really depends on your use case for the 2nd and 3rd monitor but for your main 4K, LG do a really good IPS panel.
 
I am simply building a PC based off of recommendations here.
If there is another alternative that provides similar performance / offers similar features for less, I am open to suggestions.
This build is to last at least 5 years.

So in the here and now it might seem a bit overkill for my requirements, I'd much rather spend more within reason, for quality parts that will provide the potential for future games, and if my work requirements change.

I also in need to get this build done ideally before my return to work on the 6th Jan with components that are available.

I'm aware about the rule of diminishing performance gains after a certain price point which is why is stepped the processor down a level and also switched out the RAM.

If there is money to be saved I'm open to it.

As I said in my OP, I've been out of the PC build game for a fair while so require some guidance on what is good VFM vs just paying for minimal gains.

Thanks for the input.

Current build:

ASUS hero xii 369.99
intel core i9 10850k 428.99
Samsung evo 970 m2 1tb - sourced from alternative
ASUS 3090 1729.99
Patriot viper steel 32gb 149.99
Arctic Luiquid Freezer II 360mm AIO - Sourced from alternative
Corsair RXi 1000W Gold certified PSU - Sourced from alternative
FRACTAL DESIGN MESHIFY S2 - £131.99
Current cost: £3256.07
 
Thanks for the suggestion build looks as follows:

MEG Z490 Unify (Socket LGA 1200) DDR4 ATX Motherboard £239.99
intel core i9 10850k 428.99
Samsung evo 970 m2 1tb - sourced from alternative
ASUS 3090 1729.99
Patriot viper steel 32gb 149.99
Arctic Luiquid Freezer II 360mm AIO - Sourced from alternative
Corsair RXi 1000W Gold certified PSU - Sourced from alternative
FRACTAL DESIGN MESHIFY S2 - £131.99

I think it's almost there, probably looking to order tonight once I've found 3 screens.

Current build total: £3139.31
 
So a few more tweaks, and the gfx card going out of stock.

MEG Z490 Unify (Socket LGA 1200) DDR4 ATX Motherboard £239.99 - 149.99 after cash back
intel core i9 10850k 428.99
WD 1tb 3D nand m2 86.99
Zotac 3090 1729.99
Patriot viper steel 32gb 149.99
Arctic Liquid Freezer II 360mm AIO - Sourced from alternative
Corsair RXi 1000W Gold certified PSU - Sourced from alternative
FRACTAL DESIGN MESHIFY S2 - £131.99

build total 2987.61 after cash back

so the search for monitors begins. I think that’s the build sorted. Need to add maybe a few case fans but might be able to salvage some of my existing case fans
 
Back
Top Bottom