Hey everyone,
I am looking to build a new heavy-duty gaming rig with the capacity to easily handle such games as SKYRIM with full graphics and High-Res mods.
Bear in mind that I live in Greece, and have limited access to components unless I order them from Amazon (which remains an option if necessary).
I am currently leaning towards the following configuration:
- BOX: BitFenix Colossus Full Tower with 850MW Power Source
- CPU: Core i7-4960x
- Motherboard: MSI Big Bang XPower III (X79, DDR3)
- Graphics Card: Palit PCI X GTX TITAN 6GB GDDR5
- Memory: Corsair 32GB DDR3 1866MHz Vengeance
- Primary HD: Samsung 750Gb SSD Sata III 840 EVO
- Secondary HD: Western Digital HDD SATA III 4TB 64MB Cavial Black
- Monitor; any Samsung or LG 27''
- O/S: Windows 7 PRO 64bit
What do people think? Do you have any improvement / upgrading recommendations? What would you do differently?
Many thanks in advance for all your contributions,
Bendiwolf
I cannot speak to anything but your CPU / OS... excellent choices. I run an i7 with win7 home premium, and I have no problem running skyrim with max graphics settings and mods.
I think it looks... a bit crazy for me.
But if you want even more ULTIMATE PC you can purchase GTX TITAN BLACK instead of simple TITAN (more shader processors, 2880 vs. 2688).
On the other hand it's possible to make computer cheaper with almost no loss in performance.
First, i7-4930K instead of 4960X (same performance in games).
Second, 16GB RAM instead 32GB (because a lot of modern games cannot use even 8GB).
Third, GTX 780Ti instead TITAN. GTX 780 Ti has 2880 SP, but only 3GB video RAM (if you will play in 1080p there will be no difference). Also you can check Radeon R9 290X with 4GB GDDR5, it has performance between GTX 780 (no TI) and simple TITAN.
P.S. I play Skyrim in 1080p with texture mods on the PC with i5-3570k (4.2ghz), 8GB RAM and Radeon HD 7870. And it's okay.
Drop Titan in favor of 780i or 780 from EVGA, if you insist on 6GB of RAM. Unless you need its 64bit computing capabilities OFC, but since you say gaming duty, i doubt that. Thats 300-400 EUROs down right there, which you can spend elsewhere.
And i would go into something from HP or Dell, possibly Apple - LCD display-wise.
No SSD in this age? For this kind of high-end machine? Cant be serious. I bought something similar back in 2010 (980x, gtx590, 24gigs of RAM) and i had 2 80GB SSDs already in that machine...its simply a must. These days you can get 240GB for 130 EUROs...what did i say about those money spent better elsewhere? This is that case.
Replace BitFenix Colossus with something not sp hideous, preferably somrthing from Lian Li, Antec or Fractal Design. You dont specify the PSU manufacturer, that is kinda important. Preferable choices are Corsair or Seasonic, but there are some other quality manufacturers. Just be sure to avoid some noname chinese shit.
Otherwise, no complaints there, very nice rig. Congratulations.
I'd consider an SSD from Crucial. They made good products, and their SSDs happen to be the cheapest anywhere.
IF you want to run Syrim in constant 60 FPS with the official HD texture pack addon, a 150$ 2gb Vram video card will do it.
If you want to run the 4k texture mod, you need almost 4gb vram. I think skyrim with that mod is possibly the most Vram hungry game out there. 2gb vram will run just about anything else high detail in 1200p.
Also, why 32 Gb? I am not aware of any game that even requires more than 8 gb.
Good advice - thank you
"For the PSU, unfortunately my best options are either a Corsair 600W or a no-name 850W ... which one would you recommend?"
Travel to another EU country and physically buy something else to bring back as hand luggage?
You've specified a very high end system and while 600w is ok for any single gpu it's not recommended for the titan and the 4960 is a 130w cpu, you are not doing justice to a computer where every other component is high end.And you will not be able to add a second video card later with 600w.
For gaming you do not need and would hardly benefit from a six core cpu. And you do not need the nvidia titan.
Drop those components for the 4770 and standard 780 and you will save $2000.
Also drop to 16gb. No gaming pc needs 32gb for the forseeable future.
**nm I see you already specified a larger ssd.
*** If I was you with the budget you have. I'd downsize this desktop considerably (full tower to mid tower or even micro/mini itx) and spend the difference on a respectable gaming capable laptop in addition (assuming I didn't have one of those already).
I agree that 600W seems a bit low, while i am afraid going into the noname PSU as well. Its probably more preferable choice of those 2, sadly.
Bottom line, i found it difficult to believe you only have those 2 PSUs to choose from, now i realize you have no reason to lie about this, but it still seems odd. If you lived outside of Europe, it would be understandable, but Greece? Seriously? I get its not Germany or England, but then again i live in Slovakia, which is not really that different from Greece (meant as its not the top western-european country either)...and we have no such issues here. Lot of possibilities, when it comes to hardware.
My best advice would be therefore to find a way to get, what you need.
One more thing, as Rahal says, you dont really need the 6core CPU for gaming, but i am not going to tell you not to get it, if you want either. I bought one myself 4 years ago as well, so who am i to tell you not to buy it, if you want it, hehe. I was not buying it for gaming back then, it was meant for work too, but still...it makes more sense now than it did back then.
If you are not on unlimited budget though, think about replacing the 4960x for 4930k at least, it will be 400-500 EUROs cheaper, while equally powerful. It does not make much sense to buy EXTREME sixcore CPU either. as this summer it will be replaced with 8-CORE version and the six-cores will most likely replace the current quads in the higher mainstream segment of market. In other words. you will be able to buy equally strong CPUs for one third of the current price most likely in few months...so its waste of money IMHO.
One more thing, the LCD displays. If you wont go into more profi IPS panels from either HP or Dell and stick with Samsung, dont forget to look into displays with that Nvidia G-sync technology! Its probably going to help a lot with stuttering and screen tearing in games....
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