What would you get if you were building a high spec rig?

hobib_ali · 9 May 2025 at 01:16

So i have 2 PC's at the moment

Currently using a i9 10940x on a X299 board, 14 cores 48 lanes, I had loads of stuff but all I use now is sound card and a 5090 connected to 7 drives ( storage and games)

I have a Threadripper 3970x 32 core CPU and a TRX40 motherboard but I feel like this is more of a workstation for content creation rather than a gaming PC

I will sell them both.

I need to connect a minimum of 5 drives, because the new AMD X870e and Intel 1851 boards only have 4 sata slots for drives, and they all lack multiple PCIe slots, so I need a minimum of 2 slots, one for a 4 slot GPU and the other for my PCIe sound card

The only route I see now is the X870e board with a 9950X3D or a 1851 board with a Ultra 9 i9 285K

I will buy a Gen5 M.2 for the OS and DDR5 RAM, everything else I will recycle, case cooler ect

I mean the above 2 chips from AMD and Intel is the current top end, no?

Ive always used x58 x99 x299. these boards gave me loads of option as the 48 lanes are good for multiple components and drives

Im not gonna go for the current threadripper set up as its very very expensive and im not a content creator using the machine for work purposes, my goal is a top end rig for top end gaming performance

What would you guys get if in my shoes?

Gray2233 · 9 May 2025 at 01:46

Just to get this entirely straight:

Your only use purpose is gaming?

Tetras · 9 May 2025 at 01:52

hobib_ali said:
What would you guys get if in my shoes?

If all you're doing with the PC is gaming I'd just get the 9800X3D (or 265K if you're Intel-oriented). There's really no point in a 9950X3D or 285K if you're not using it for work/hobby stuff.

The Ryzen 9 CPUs just park half the CPU when you're gaming.

If you don't care about USB4, have a look at the X670E boards, since getting more than 4 SATA is easier that way (e.g. X670E Carbon has 6, though check about lane/port sharing).

hobib_ali · 9 May 2025 at 23:52

Gray2233 said:
Just to get this entirely straight:

Your only use purpose is gaming?

yeah thats all I do now, nothing creative, though I tend to play on max settings on a 4k panel, and I like fast boot speeds to, also when you install games, who doesnt like it to be really fast

hobib_ali · 9 May 2025 at 23:54

Tetras said:
If all you're doing with the PC is gaming I'd just get the 9800X3D (or 265K if you're Intel-oriented). There's really no point in a 9950X3D or 285K if you're not using it for work/hobby stuff.

The Ryzen 9 CPUs just park half the CPU when you're gaming.

If you don't care about USB4, have a look at the X670E boards, since getting more than 4 SATA is easier that way (e.g. X670E Carbon has 6, though check about lane/port sharing).

USB 4?? this is already out? on the X870 boards?>

and isnt X670E the previous gen?

SO if someone got the 9950X3D then for gaming its a pointless CPU coz u wont be utilising the full power of the CPU?

Gray2233 · 10 May 2025 at 00:03

hobib_ali said:
yeah thats all I do now, nothing creative, though I tend to play on max settings on a 4k panel, and I like fast boot speeds to, also when you install games, who doesnt like it to be really fast

You're massively overspending bud.

A good B850 for around £150-200 would be ample unless you really need certain features, which you probably don't. The 9800X3D is ample for gaming, the 9950X3D is more of an option for those that do a lot of productivity as well as gaming, or are into super niche games which there's probably less than a couple of that would benefit.

- Gen 5 SSD's are usually way over priced for the actual performance benefits, you'll see no difference between one and something like a Gen 4 Crucial T500 for a fraction of the price.
- Ram wise C30/6000 at 32-64gb depending, you don't need to spend bucket loads. For most people 32gb is ample, but if you're into certain (again niche) games or are into running a lot of mods on some titles more can be beneficial.

My basket at OcUK:

1 x AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D Eight Core 5.20GHz (Socket AM5) Processor - Retail (SKU: PRO-AMD-03517) = £449.99
1 x Crucial T500 2TB NVMe PCIe Gen4 M.2 Solid State Drive (SKU: STO-CRU-01090) = £129.95
1 x Gigabyte B850 GAMING X WIFI6E (Socket AM5) DDR5 ATX Motherboard (SKU: MOT-GIG-03858) = £194.98
1 x Corsair Vengeance EXPO/XMP RGB 48GB (2X24GB) DDR5 PC5-48000C30 6000MHz Dual Channel Kit (SKU: MEM-CRS-03748) = £155.99

Total: £938.90 (includes delivery: £7.99)

This is the route I would take personally, and given the money you were willing to spend I'd just scrap the SATA drives (assuming SSD's?) and buy a couple of large NvME's instead.

Rroff · 10 May 2025 at 00:07

There isn't really a good answer to this - if purely gaming and want maximum performance then 9800X3D - but if you say multi box thread heavy games and do other stuff alongside like OBS then neither the 9800X3D, 9950X(3D) (as you have core parking/cross CCD considerations) or Arrow Lake CPUs are ideal and you may even be better off with the 14700K or 14900K. The AL CPUs aren't really ideal for gaming at the best of times either.

Personally find the situation a horrid mess.

Tetras · 10 May 2025 at 00:21

hobib_ali said:
USB 4?? this is already out? on the X870 boards?>

X870 and X870E are both required to have USB4, but since most X870/X870E boards steal CPU lanes to provide the bandwidth, this is a mixed blessing.

hobib_ali said:
and isnt X670E the previous gen?

Yes, but they run the newer CPUs fine and are the same chipset "under the hood".

If a X670E board suits your needs better with the PCI-E lanes, SATA ports and M.2 slots, you can just get that instead.

There's a spreadsheet here that might help (updated for newer models):

https://www.reddit.com/r/buildapc/comments/xvvl9b/comment/ir6koh8/

hobib_ali said:
SO if someone got the 9950X3D then for gaming its a pointless CPU coz u wont be utilising the full power of the CPU?

Yes, it doesn't use the 16 cores for running games, it uses 8 of them. The 3D cache is only present across 8 of the cores. The next gen are believed to use a 12 core CCD, which would be the first core count upgrade for these CPUs.

Freddie1980 · 10 May 2025 at 09:52

Some simulators can use all the cores like Cities Skylines 2, also ray tracing and upscaling can add additional load to a CPU, so depending on your workload and games you play I wouldn't discount a 9950X3D out of hand, out the box it does boost higher then a 9800X3D.

Realistically your not going to be able to tell the difference in performance in most games but if you plan on keeping it a while then 9950X3D might be a good long term investment.

andy o · 10 May 2025 at 12:05

7 drives seems kind of a lot. Is that data important? Backed up somewhere? Have you considered a separate machine like a Nas for storage? Do you use all that data at short notice? There are cloud options you can store data offline n cold storage.

hobib_ali · 18 May 2025 at 02:18

Rroff said:
There isn't really a good answer to this - if purely gaming and want maximum performance then 9800X3D - but if you say multi box thread heavy games and do other stuff alongside like OBS then neither the 9800X3D, 9950X(3D) (as you have core parking/cross CCD considerations) or Arrow Lake CPUs are ideal and you may even be better off with the 14700K or 14900K. The AL CPUs aren't really ideal for gaming at the best of times either.

Personally find the situation a horrid mess.

AL CPUs?

ive been doing so much research between x870E or z890

And the result is I still dont know what route to take

Ive always had intel in the past 3 builds, X59 X99 X299, good core count on CPU's and 48 PCIe lanes on the i9s

Though I think Intel CPU is cheaper now, £529 for a Ultra 9 285K vs £699 for a 9950X3D

also is this true?

if you want faster boot times and low cpu temps, then go for core ultra 9 285k.
if you need max gaming performance with higher idle cpu temps and slow as hell boot times then go with 9950x3d.

Rroff · 18 May 2025 at 03:25

hobib_ali said:
and slow as hell boot times then go with 9950x3d.

This is pretty hit and miss - some setups you can use memory context restore, etc. and/or the BIOS is just better implemented and you'll get reasonable boot times, or you might get unlucky and stuck with 25-50 seconds per 16GB of RAM. In my experience Gigabyte boards tend to have fairly short memory training on AMD while ASRock can be terrible but your mileage may vary.

Penfold101 · 18 May 2025 at 06:18

If you want lots of storage just get one of these and fill it with NVME:

Need more M.2 storage? Sabrent has launched their 4-Drive NVMe SSD to PCIe 4.0 X 16 Adapter Card - OC3D

Want more SSD storage in your system? This add-on card could help Want more SSD storage inside your PC? Sabrent’s 4-drive NVMe SSD storage could be the solution for you If you are a user that requires a lot of PCIe storage, you will be very aware of how limiting the number of on-motherboard M.2 […]

overclock3d.net

Craig_d1 · 18 May 2025 at 08:52

hobib_ali said:
AL CPUs?

ive been doing so much research between x870E or z890

And the result is I still dont know what route to take

Ive always had intel in the past 3 builds, X59 X99 X299, good core count on CPU's and 48 PCIe lanes on the i9s

Though I think Intel CPU is cheaper now, £529 for a Ultra 9 285K vs £699 for a 9950X3D

also is this true?

if you want faster boot times and low cpu temps, then go for core ultra 9 285k.
if you need max gaming performance with higher idle cpu temps and slow as hell boot times then go with 9950x3d.

what storage do you have and capacity..as said above, might be worth ditching and just going full m.2 4tb drives..if youre rocking multiple smaller drives then I'd look at retiring them..if you have some larger drives that's another matter of course, or go 4/6 slot nas drive with raid array to protect your data remote access etc
If you're usedto top end bards, I'd get one with a led post debug display on it..unfortunately seems only top end boards use them, but if you ever have a problem, having a code spit out the problem to you saves a lot of time troubleshooting the problem. have a clear cmos button on the back is also nice rather than having to do the jumper/take out the battery etc..only say that as came home to a dead pc once..worked fine the night before, morning zilch..no output to screen(screen saying no input)...took out memory, nothing, unpluged/reseated all cables from psu, reapplied thermal paste to cpu....the whole works trying to get it to work and nothing...I'd just done a firmware update on the tv and thought that was the problem and was onto Sony about it (as a forum saying it didn't talk nicely with pc's)...anyway...long story short..my pcnormally sat on desk where I see it but at the time I'd put it on the floor plugged into the tv, so in my frustration I never saw the post debug display...Felt like a complete idiot when realised...botted up pc, still didn't work but a nice code appeared...memory problem...taking out the ram didn't have any effect as the memory training had been corrupted...so a clear cmos and fresh memory training and fixed...2/3 days of searching with no result...30 mins from seeing the code display to fixing pc...100% worth it in my book...never buying a mobo without one now
also, what games do you play most..that might narrow down the choice for your cpu games wise. Persoanlly, I had a 7800x3d and jus tgot a 9800x3d, having given my mobo/7800x3d/ram/m.2 to my son...just deciding on mobo ram at mo myself

adrichardson81 · 18 May 2025 at 08:55

You should be able to comfortably get support for 4 gen4 m.2 drives from an x670e (technically a mix of gen4 and 5, but don't both with gen5).

Personally I'd ditch the soundcard and get a USB DAC instead - it'll sound better and free up a pcie slot for extra storage.

hobib_ali · 22 May 2025 at 00:37

Penfold101 said:
If you want lots of storage just get one of these and fill it with NVME:

Need more M.2 storage? Sabrent has launched their 4-Drive NVMe SSD to PCIe 4.0 X 16 Adapter Card - OC3D

Want more SSD storage in your system? This add-on card could help Want more SSD storage inside your PC? Sabrent’s 4-drive NVMe SSD storage could be the solution for you If you are a user that requires a lot of PCIe storage, you will be very aware of how limiting the number of on-motherboard M.2 […]

overclock3d.net

so 2 months ago I bought a Asus Hyper M.2 x16 PCIe Gen 5 NVMe card adaptor with 4x M.2 slots, so I inserted 4x 1TB M.2s and put it in one of my PCIe slots, I expected all 4 drives to show but this didnt happen, only 1 drive was shown, having then looked at the situation it then appears that you need to go to the bios and do some sort of tinkling, somthing to do with bifurication which i didnt get, so I removed the card with the 4 drives and shelved it

hobib_ali · 22 May 2025 at 00:40

adrichardson81 said:
You should be able to comfortably get support for 4 gen4 m.2 drives from an x670e (technically a mix of gen4 and 5, but don't both with gen5).

Personally I'd ditch the soundcard and get a USB DAC instead - it'll sound better and free up a pcie slot for extra storage.

yes, the desktop DAC is the way to go, but I use the sound card so I can connect the PC to my receiver via optical cable, I do have a DAC but I dont think i can connect to the receive to get my floor standing speakers in action.

Penfold101 · 22 May 2025 at 05:44

hobib_ali said:
so 2 months ago I bought a Asus Hyper M.2 x16 PCIe Gen 5 NVMe card adaptor with 4x M.2 slots, so I inserted 4x 1TB M.2s and put it in one of my PCIe slots, I expected all 4 drives to show but this didnt happen, only 1 drive was shown, having then looked at the situation it then appears that you need to go to the bios and do some sort of tinkling, somthing to do with bifurication which i didnt get, so I removed the card with the 4 drives and shelved it

Yes, the hyper X is different (and cheap) and doesn’t have a controller on it, meaning each drive needs 4 physical PCI lanes. Essentially, you either have this OR a GPU as there’s only 20 lanes available.

The sabrent has a controller on board which channels the individual drives through the single 4x connector - you’ll see all the drives you fit to it.