Mega Rig Advice

the1truegamer

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****EDIT****
I've just spent some time reading PP Mguire's thread in this topic and i see that not only are most of my questions answered, i probably don't even need do a new build at all. I may just overhaul the one i have. Feel free to take a stab at this build as you see fit, i would still love to hear what people have to say, but I'll probably start a new thread later with my current build and some and ask for advice to upgrade it. Thanks

****End Edit****


Hi All,

Great forum, I've been reading a lot of threads over the last few days and I've learned a lot. Now I need to throw my issues out there and see what feedback I can get.

I've decided to replace my 5 year old gaming rig. I'm not new to system building but I've never done any OC or "enthusiast builds". I've mostly done upper mid-range builds and I've been pretty happy with them. But this time around I've decided to pull out the stops and build something flashy and fun. I'm planning to spend around $2,000-$2,500 for the system not including the liquid cooling or any "flash". That being said, I still don't want to just throw money out the window on parts that aren't worth the power to cost ratio. I seem to be finding myself banging my head against the same age old questions that every system builder struggles with on a new build. Should I get the newest and most expensive or should I get one tier down and save the premium?

I want to build an enthusiast build with liquid cooling and OC. Mostly what I'm looking for here is advice on the hardware and OC/Cooling for this build. Paying special attention to the fact that I plan to water cool and OC this rig right out of the gate what do you all think of my parts list so far?
I'll post links from Newegg since I have shopped with them a lot but I may look around for deals when I get ready to actually order. I'd like to break down my parts list and see how much feedback i can get on several things.

Processor:
Intel Core i7-4790K Haswell Refresh Quad-Core 4.0GHz LGA 1150 Desktop Processor BX80646I74790K - Newegg.com - Newegg.com

I've seen some back and forth about i7 vs i5 for gaming. My logic for going with the i7 is that its a bigger number. Just kidding, actually I'm willing to go i5 but I never know what I'm going to get into tomorrow. I've been known to multi box games and stream etc. Also, I've been looking at the new line Intel of CPU's (x99 chipset i believe) but im not sure if its worth the extra money since I'll have to get a more expensive Motherboard and Ram. Although, it would give jump me onto the newest form factor so i can upgrade down the road.

Mobo:
ASUS MAXIMUS VII HERO LGA 1150 Intel Z97 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard - Newegg.com
Here is an area where i could use some advice, I've never OC'd before so i don't know exactly what to look for in the Mobo. I picked this board from a forum post I read but I'm open to suggestions. I've mostly used MSI boards in the past and I love them. Thoughts?

Ram:
G.SKILL Trident X Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 2133 (PC3 17000) Desktop Memory Model F3-2133C9D-16GTX - Newegg.com
Once again, here i could use your advice. I have no idea how to pick a quality ram. Also, is there such thing as too much ram? I don't want to throw money away, but in past builds I've bought a mid-range amount of ram for the time and ended up wishing I had bought more from the start. This time I want to max out the 32GB limit from start but i'm not sure if 16Gb would be better. Since I'll be OC'ing this rig I really need advice on what ram i should be looking for.

GPU:
SAPPHIRE TRI-X OC 100362-2SR Radeon R9 290 4GB 512-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 3.0 Video Card - Newegg.com
I figure this is where the fun will start. I am an AMD fan, i've only used on Nvidia card and i didn't have good results, but that was a long time ago and I'm open to suggestions. The real question I have is to crossfire or not to crossfire. In the past i've always bought single graphics cards with the intent to add a second later. It has always worked out that when I went to add the second card I got more bang for my buck just upgrading the first one. What are your thoughts? I am considering doing a multi monitor display like a tri monitor wrap around, so I know that will factor into this decision. I would like to do some tri monitor gaoming (star citizen) I'm just not sure if i need the second card to do that or if it's worth the extra 400 for the card plus the gpu block for whatever cooling sys I decide on. My plan right now calls for two R9 290's, which puts me almost in the price range for a single Radeon R 295X. Even so, dropping a grand on a graphics card is a hard pill to swallow. What do you think?

HDD:

SAMSUNG 840 EVO MZ-7TE1T0BW 2.5" 1TB SATA III MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) - Newegg.com
I have not used an SDD before so I could use advice here. I really want a big one because i don't like doing multi hard drive setups. I'm not very good at deciding what programs i want on what drive. I'd rather have one large SSD for all games and programs and another drive for media storage later if i need it. Are there any things to look out for in the SSD world? I know they can degrade over time but I'm not too worried about that as I believe that I will replace this PC before the HDD reaches end of life.

PSU:
CORSAIR RM Series RM1000 1000W ATX12V v2.31 and EPS 2.92 80 PLUS GOLD Certified Full Modular Active PFC Power Supply - Newegg.com

Not much to see here. Just went with a decent one that would support the amount of hardware im putting in. I used an online calculator and estimated I need about 880W for my projected build so I think a 1KW PSU should do fine.

Total for this build as it sits (with $180 set aside for the case I haven't decided on yet) is about $2,600 bucks.
There is a lot I could trim out of this and still have an amazing rig. But this is the starting point I can go up or down from here. What do you all think?
 
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Before I read this long thread (thanks for proper formatting and grammar BTW) I have to ask. Are you building this now or window shopping? My next question would be, have you read my build guide yet?
 
Honestly I'm not sure if i read yours specifically is it a sticky in this section? If so i'll go read it now. I have read several over the last week or so to get spun up on the latest hardware. I've done about a week of research before i wrote this thread. As for the other question, I am building this for sure, but not necessarily right this second. I have a decent rig working right now so i don't mind waiting a few months to get this one right. But i will be building sometime in the next 6 months at the latest.
 
Yes my thread is top sticking in this sub-forum. On the last page you'll see a post where I talk about "window shopping" threads and it'll explain why I asked that question.

Just understand that I have no issues answering your questions about parts, but by the time you build my answers will be different based on a different hardware set which would be more bang for your money. Like for instance right now I'd say the best to get would be a 780ti rather than a 290. Next week (literally) it'll be a 980.
 
I see, thanks for helping out, I'll go read your thread right now. I'll refine my answer by saying i'd like to build in the 2-6 month time frame. One thing i'm out of touch with (since i haven't done a build in 5 years) is where we are in the product life cycle. I'm willing to wait a little while if i need to for a better deal but I don't know how to predict that right now. I normally don't ask for advice when i build i just read up on whats new and get what i want. But i'm sinking about 2K more into this build than i normally do after the mods and cooling so i want to be sure i get it right. That being the case i wanted to reach out to the community early on and see what the pro's suggest or would build for their dream set up before i start swiping plastic.
 
I guess at this point i'm undecided. I started this build because i started playing ESO and was getting really poor frame rates in the PVP area (My internet speeds are plenty good) so i thought what the heck its time for a new PC. I kinda got caught up in the pretty new toys and have always wanted to do a flashy enthusiast build. But something you said in your prior post about spending money where it really matters seems smart to me.
 
Yea like you chosing an i7 for gaming, not really money smart. A better buy would be a 980 here in a bit for the GPU or even two. The motherboard you chose is over the top and you can save like 60 bucks there. No need for any RAM speed faster than 1600 unless 1866 is cheaper (deals) or the same price. No point in 1TB of SSD space either. Unless you plan on going 4 way SLI or Crossfire you could do 750w easy even with dual GPU.

As to the overclocking you want to do, as of right now I highly discourage CPU overclocking. It's simply not needed for the reasons I expressed unless you're running older hardware. I can understand wanting a flashy water loop but unless you have expendable income put away just for that I can't really justify it either.

ESO runs just fine on my single 4GB 680. A 780ti, 290x, or unreleased 980 would play it with ease.
 
Any idea what my bottle neck is? I feel like i should still be in the game but i'm dropping to like 18 fps or below anytime i get into a battle on ESO. I used to play PlanetSide 2 with no problem but now i cant even pretend to. I haven't even turned on this computer in a year do to some traveling for work but it seems that Planetside updated dramatically in that time frame.

I attached a dxdiag dump. What do you think i should do?.

I'm running:
Radeon 6870
AMD Phenom(tm) II X4 965 Processor (4 CPUs), ~3.4GHz

Also, i used to think i was at least a non newb. But i just looked at my mobo and realized i have 4 more gb of ram that aren't in the right slot so they aren't even being used...that's 5 years i didn't notice that. Back to the bottom of the status ladder for me.
 

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The 6870 for sure man. I have a 955BE in my server and it can kick it with my 3960x in any game. Planetside 2 is way more CPU using than before but you shouldn't have any issues. Before dumping a million bucks into a new machine (which don't get me wrong is still fun and awesome) I'd try getting yourself a new GPU with your current rig. Fresh format, updated drivers, and an SSD wouldn't hurt either.
 
Is there a reason not to get 1TB of SSD space? I know its costly but in the past i've done different drives for programs vs storage and i hate it. I like to have a ton of games installed at one time also. I think that's one check i'd be willing to write unless there is a technical reason its a bad idea.
 
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