Gaming PCs Thread...time for a sticky / running thread?

[Guvernator]

The noctua nh-d15 is a similar size, in fact it's 165mm with the fan and almost as wide. I was actually shocked at the size of the thing when my PC arrived and I had a look at it. Still it keeps the CPU nice and cool and it's very quiet so it seems size is important after all

I need to take some temps to see how it compares in comparison to the Corsair.

[wst]

159.2mm high. Runs cool as anything, even when clogged with dust. The things that came scampering out when I hit it with a compressor last year...

[Big Pants]

I've taken the plunge and ordered a new system as mine's old and slow now. Feel free to tell me I've done terribly wrong, although it's currently being tested post-build so it's probably a bit late to change anything for now.

Diablo Predator (Skylake Gaming PC)
Cooler Master CM 690 III Case
Intel Core i7 6700K Quad Core (4.0GHz, 8MB Cache, overclockable 4.4GHz+, Hyperthreading) Socket 1151
Corsair Hydro Series H80 High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler
Cool Laboratory Liquid Pro Liquid Metal Thermal Paste
Asus Strix nVidia GeForce GTX 980Ti 6GB GDDR5 PCI Express Graphics Card (Overclocked) (VR Ready) (Includes Rise of The Tomb Raider)
16GB Corsair DDR4 2400MHz C14 Dual Channel Memory Kit (2 x 8GB)
Asus Z170 Pro Gaming Intel Motherboard
Samsung 500GB 850 Evo Series SATA III 6Gb/s Solid-State Drive
Seagate 2TB Barracuda 7200 64MB Cache SATA III Hard Disk Drive
DVD-RW 22x
FSP Hydro G 750W Gold Modular Power Supply
Corsair AF120 Red LED Case Fan (Quiet Edition)
Onboard HD 7.1 Audio
Microsoft Windows 10 Home (64-bit)

I need a G-sync monitor to get the best out of this and am utterly stuck between the Acer Predator X34 and the Asus PG279Q, so anybody with a real-world recommendation to make please chip in before I inevitably order the wrong one.

[Guvernator]

Big Pants said:

I've taken the plunge and ordered a new system as mine's old and slow now. Feel free to tell me I've done terribly wrong, although it's currently being tested post-build so it's probably a bit late to change anything for now.

Diablo Predator (Skylake Gaming PC)
Cooler Master CM 690 III Case
Intel Core i7 6700K Quad Core (4.0GHz, 8MB Cache, overclockable 4.4GHz+, Hyperthreading) Socket 1151
Corsair Hydro Series H80 High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler
Cool Laboratory Liquid Pro Liquid Metal Thermal Paste
Asus Strix nVidia GeForce GTX 980Ti 6GB GDDR5 PCI Express Graphics Card (Overclocked) (VR Ready) (Includes Rise of The Tomb Raider)
16GB Corsair DDR4 2400MHz C14 Dual Channel Memory Kit (2 x 8GB)
Asus Z170 Pro Gaming Intel Motherboard
Samsung 500GB 850 Evo Series SATA III 6Gb/s Solid-State Drive
Seagate 2TB Barracuda 7200 64MB Cache SATA III Hard Disk Drive
DVD-RW 22x
FSP Hydro G 750W Gold Modular Power Supply
Corsair AF120 Red LED Case Fan (Quiet Edition)
Onboard HD 7.1 Audio
Microsoft Windows 10 Home (64-bit)

I need a G-sync monitor to get the best out of this and am utterly stuck between the Acer Predator X34 and the Asus PG279Q, so anybody with a real-world recommendation to make please chip in before I inevitably order the wrong one.

Seems like a very decent spec, the i7 is probably overkill for gaming but if you had the budget, why not. When I was speccing mine I looked at the Corsair Hydro coolers but after reading some comparisons, decided to go with a more traditional air-cooled setup.

I have the Asus PG279Q and it's a fantastic bit of kit. Great colours and VERY smooth. It also has hdmi port as well as display port which was a must for me as I connect other sources to it besides my PC and most G-Sync displays only have the one display port. I've also read really good things about the X34 however so I don't think you can go wrong with either.

[Big Pants]

Thanks Guv. That's reassuring. This rig needs to see me through the next few years.

I'm leaning towards the Asus on both price and performance grounds, but it's "only" another £200 for the X34, which on a man maths basis is a lot of extra screen for the money

[pimpchez]

Big Pants said:

I've taken the plunge and ordered a new system as mine's old and slow now. Feel free to tell me I've done terribly wrong, although it's currently being tested post-build so it's probably a bit late to change anything for now.

Diablo Predator (Skylake Gaming PC)
Cooler Master CM 690 III Case
Intel Core i7 6700K Quad Core (4.0GHz, 8MB Cache, overclockable 4.4GHz+, Hyperthreading) Socket 1151
Corsair Hydro Series H80 High Performance Liquid CPU Cooler
Cool Laboratory Liquid Pro Liquid Metal Thermal Paste
Asus Strix nVidia GeForce GTX 980Ti 6GB GDDR5 PCI Express Graphics Card (Overclocked) (VR Ready) (Includes Rise of The Tomb Raider)
16GB Corsair DDR4 2400MHz C14 Dual Channel Memory Kit (2 x 8GB)
Asus Z170 Pro Gaming Intel Motherboard
Samsung 500GB 850 Evo Series SATA III 6Gb/s Solid-State Drive
Seagate 2TB Barracuda 7200 64MB Cache SATA III Hard Disk Drive
DVD-RW 22x
FSP Hydro G 750W Gold Modular Power Supply
Corsair AF120 Red LED Case Fan (Quiet Edition)
Onboard HD 7.1 Audio
Microsoft Windows 10 Home (64-bit)

I need a G-sync monitor to get the best out of this and am utterly stuck between the Acer Predator X34 and the Asus PG279Q, so anybody with a real-world recommendation to make please chip in before I inevitably order the wrong one.

If this is squarely for gaming then its overkill on the CPU & PSU.I7s give literally no benefit in game vs a i5 6600/4690k ,great for rendering though .Your GPU has a 250watt TDP so you could get away with a 550w gold psu .I run a 550w with a more power hungry gpu and it works just fine .

Just my 2 cents

[Mattygooner]

Have mainly been playing Pcars, Dirt Rally and H1Z1 for some PVP/ survival goodness. The system hasn't flinched at anything thrown at it although I am ashamed to say that my Scandisk extreme is still sitting installed doing nothing so I need to get that involved. Still running my old SSD, I think with windows 10, the extremely speedy ScanDisk wouldn't make much of a difference as booting takes some 15 seconds anyway.

With the HTC Vive coming on for sale tomorrow, I am still deciding if the rather large outlay is going to be worth it, although my system is very much ready for it and it is probably the biggest advance for a good few years, I am worried that after £500 quid I am just going to throw up 5 minutes in to a take off in DCS

On cooling, the H100iGTX has been very good, not overly noisy and keeps the cpu at 55degrees under hard load.

[ajprice]

Posting to put this thread into my stuff list. I've had some spending money for my birthday (big 4 0) and I think I'm going to get a PC with it, mainly for games, somewhere plugged into the TV for some sofa gaming along with the consoles, so basically a Windows system Steam Machine kind of thing.

Initial thoughts are for something along the lines spec wise of a lower end HP Envy Phoenix or Alienware X51, but I'm pretty sure I could do a better one with a built from bits PC. Which sort of brings me here.

Initial thoughts

Windows 10
Skylake i5 or i7
8GB RAM, maybe 16?
AMD graphics, looking at the recent posts about Nvidia and DX12
m2 or SSD system disk with a bigger HD
Probably a mATX motherboard
Do I really need an optical drive?
Quiet case, no water system cooling
Case size depends where I put it and where is best to put it. Under the TV, then a 'console case' something like a Fractal Design Node 202, in the shelving (Ikea Expedit so about 14" cube to fit in) with a Shuttle type cube, or on top/take a shelf out and have a minitower.

[RedWhiteMonkey]

ajprice said:

Posting to put this thread into my stuff list. I've had some spending money for my birthday (big 4 0) and I think I'm going to get a PC with it, mainly for games, somewhere plugged into the TV for some sofa gaming along with the consoles, so basically a Windows system Steam Machine kind of thing.

Initial thoughts are for something along the lines spec wise of a lower end HP Envy Phoenix or Alienware X51, but I'm pretty sure I could do a better one with a built from bits PC. Which sort of brings me here.

Initial thoughts

Windows 10
Skylake i5 or i7
8GB RAM, maybe 16?
AMD graphics, looking at the recent posts about Nvidia and DX12
m2 or SSD system disk with a bigger HD
Probably a mATX motherboard
Do I really need an optical drive?
Quiet case, no water system cooling
Case size depends where I put it and where is best to put it. Under the TV, then a 'console case' something like a Fractal Design Node 202, in the shelving (Ikea Expedit so about 14" cube to fit in) with a Shuttle type cube, or on top/take a shelf out and have a minitower.

What is your budget?

If you want to use the Node 202 you'll have to go Mini ITX, mATX is too big for that case.

[ajprice]

If they are smaller size cases, these are the two I was on about.

Envy Phoenix is £999 at PCW, i5 6600k, 16GB RAM, 4GB R9 370, 2TB/128GB HDD/SSD
http://www.pcworld.co.uk/gbuk/computing/desktop-pc...

X51 is £949 at Dell, i7 6700, 8GB RAM, 4GB R9 370, 1TB HDD
http://www.dell.com/uk/p/alienware-x51-r3/pd?oc=d0...

Wouldn't want to spend more than that, the less the better for building one, or better than those if it costs the same.

[RedWhiteMonkey]

The problem with looking at computers like that is that the descriptions of the specifications are very limited. They never tell things like the speed of the RAM, the manufacturer of the SSD, the manufacturer of the PSU, which all makes it hard to judge the overall quality. The HP is odd as well in the fact that it comes with an overclockable CPU and an overclocking motherboard but does not appear to be overclocked or to come with an appropriate CPU cooler to allow proper cooling.

If your budget is around £1000 you should be able to build something very good for the use you describe, I really recommend this website for putting builds together - http://uk.pcpartpicker.com For that sort of money you should be getting something with a better GPU than an R9 370.

[RedWhiteMonkey]

CPU - Intel Core i5-6500 3.2GHz Quad-Core Processor - £166.48 @ Amazon UK

Motherboard - ASRock H170M-ITX/ac Mini ITX LGA1151 Motherboard - £87.99 @ Ebuyer

Memory - Kingston Savage 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR4-2400 Memory - £36.94 @ Ebuyer

Storage - Samsung 850 EVO-Series 500GB 2.5" Solid State Drive - £121.48 @ Amazon UK

Video Card - Zotac GeForce GTX 970 4GB Video Card - £249.98 @ Novatech

Case - Silverstone ML07B HTPC Case - £61.55 @ Overclockers.co.uk

Power Supply - Silverstone 600W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular SFX Power Supply - £106.99 @ Kustom PCs

Operating System - Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM (64-bit)] - £74.99 @ Ebuyer

Total £906.40

Edited by RedWhiteMonkey on Thursday 31st March 07:54

[ajprice]

Thanks for the part picker site link , very useful!

[ajprice]

OK, I've been looking stuff up, found out a few bits and pieces. Things I don't need - i7, i5 is fine. 16GB RAM, 8 is fine. So with the HP and X51 I posted, the HP is OTT for RAM, the X51 is OTT for the processor. Still not sure on a graphics card. I don't think I need an optical drive, most software is downloadable, and I've got the consoles to play Blu-rays on. So I've put this together on part picker, is there anything weird or wrong wth it? For £850 it seems fine for a 1080p TV mainly game system, but I don't know what I'm talking about really

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU:Intel Core i5-6600K 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor (£198.99 @ Ebuyer)
CPU Cooler:CRYORIG H7 49.0 CFM CPU Cooler (£26.49 @ Ebuyer)
Motherboard:ASRock Z170M Pro4S Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard (£78.45 @ Amazon UK)
Memory:Kingston FURY 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR4-2666 Memory (£33.40 @ Amazon UK)
Storage:Crucial BX100 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£55.00 @ Amazon UK)
Storage:Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£54.98 @ Novatech)
Video Card:Sapphire Radeon R9 380 4GB NITRO Dual-X OC Video Card (£169.98 @ Ebuyer)
Case:Aerocool DS-Cube MicroATX Mini Tower Case (£71.86 @ Amazon UK)
Power Supply:Silverstone 500W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular SFX Power Supply (£84.59 @ More Computers)
Operating System:Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM (64-bit) (£74.99 @ Ebuyer)
Total: £848.73
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-03-30 21:01 BST+0100

[RedWhiteMonkey]

ajprice said:

OK, I've been looking stuff up, found out a few bits and pieces. Things I don't need - i7, i5 is fine. 16GB RAM, 8 is fine. So with the HP and X51 I posted, the HP is OTT for RAM, the X51 is OTT for the processor. Still not sure on a graphics card. I don't think I need an optical drive, most software is downloadable, and I've got the consoles to play Blu-rays on. So I've put this together on part picker, is there anything weird or wrong wth it? For £850 it seems fine for a 1080p TV mainly game system, but I don't know what I'm talking about really

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU:Intel Core i5-6600K 3.5GHz Quad-Core Processor (£198.99 @ Ebuyer)
CPU Cooler:CRYORIG H7 49.0 CFM CPU Cooler (£26.49 @ Ebuyer)
Motherboard:ASRock Z170M Pro4S Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard (£78.45 @ Amazon UK)
Memory:Kingston FURY 8GB (1 x 8GB) DDR4-2666 Memory (£33.40 @ Amazon UK)
Storage:Crucial BX100 250GB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£55.00 @ Amazon UK)
Storage:Seagate Barracuda 2TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£54.98 @ Novatech)
Video Card:Sapphire Radeon R9 380 4GB NITRO Dual-X OC Video Card (£169.98 @ Ebuyer)
Case:Aerocool DS-Cube MicroATX Mini Tower Case (£71.86 @ Amazon UK)
Power Supply:Silverstone 500W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular SFX Power Supply (£84.59 @ More Computers)
Operating System:Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM (64-bit) (£74.99 @ Ebuyer)
Total: £848.73
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2016-03-30 21:01 BST+0100

Personally I don't think you need an overclockable CPU for a 1080p living room type setup, are you really going to overclock the system? A locked CPU (non K chip) will be perfectly fine and save you some money. The rest of it is fine, 2TB of HD storage seems an awful lot but they are cheap now.

Edited by RedWhiteMonkey on Wednesday 30th March 22:02

[ajprice]

So a locked i5 6500 would be fine with the the Intel cooler that comes with it too?

Google search pic

[RedWhiteMonkey]

ajprice said:

So a locked i5 6500 would be fine with the the Intel cooler that comes with it too?

Google search pic

The stock cooler will work perfectly fine. Aside from the fact that the new Skylake CPUs have low TDP (Thermal Design Powers) why would Intel supply something that wouldn't work when they give a warranty on all their CPUs? An aftermarket (if correctly) picked could be quieter than the stock one but the stock cooler really isn't loud to start with.

[FUBAR]

I was swayed away from Alienware by this thread, and as I still wanted a built (to order) machine went with http://www.chillblast.com/

They have budgets to suit most so have a look

[ajprice]

Things have happened. After talking to my mates who are PC gamers, I upped my budget and spec to something i7 and 16GB with space for SLI, found a PC on Amazon which was a PC Specialist machine for around £1100, the parts for it were the same price on pcpartpicker, I was all set to tweak a few parts on the list and get something similar to the Amazon PC. Now I've forgotten all that and got a Dell outlet store Alienware Area 51, 6 core i7, SLI, HD and SSD. Its a £2k machine new. Done it now, don't care, I'm calling it my mid life crisis

[Guvernator]

I assume people have seen this?

http://www.pcworld.com/article/3102877/components-...