Maybe when playing at 1080p where the CPU is the bottleneck, but after QHD (1440p) and higher, the GPU becomes the bottleneck. The CPU is less of a factor after 1440p.
CPU is no bottleneck at 1080p either. FX is sufficient today, no doubt about it, but it is a bottom borderline of gaming CPU and dead platform, no point saving on that one. i3 could be an option since you can still replace it with some faster CPU, replacing FX means replacing entire platfrom.
As I said above, he can save on SSD which he can buy later, that way he gets best performance for the money while not suffering financial loss due shorter life span of weaker components.
In 5+ years when FX maybe wont be sufficient it will be time for platform change no matter what platform you buy today.
Giving stupid advices to "skip SSD and just buy it later"...lol.
Best performace is what i linked. Its his decision to get better performace or Intel.
960 and 380 is enough to keep respectable frame rates with high fidelity on a 1080p 60Hz monitor for the OP. A 970 or 390x is great but you'll be wasting frame rate since the OPs monitor is locked at 60Hz. It's overkill and wasteful to have your GPU pump out 100 FPS but your display can only spit out 60. It's like saying, "I'm gonna buy this $400 GPU and only play with V-Sync on".
Respectable FPS is below 60 anyway, so it doesnt matter.
2nd even if your GPU is pumping more than 60 avg, it helps with chopping and stuttering due to minimum FPS.
3rd games tend to get more demanding over time. 960/380 can barely push 60 on current crop of games. On max settings FHD of course. Some even on 720p. Next crop of games and 960/380 will be well within 60.
"The performance benefit in-between the CPUs
is nominal to say at the least. That is the reality anno 2015. This is
going to be even closer with upcoming DX12 games."
What is your budget? What resolution will you be playing at? If you are playing at 1080p/1200p now, do you plan on going QHD (1440p) or higher? Will you be using 60Hz monitors or 120Hz/144Hz? Is G-Sync or FreeSync as an option important to you?
Monitors are easily overlooked these days, but knowing this will guide you to a balanced build. I once built a PC for a friend which included a R9 290x per his request. Come to find out when I helped him set it up at his place he had a 1600x900 60Hz display as his main with no intention of upgrading. He is still using that monitor up to now. Overkill? Absolutely.
I already have my 24" display and I am quite happy with it. 60 Hz will have to do for me. G-sync not important for me. I have not included a display in the build for this very reason, I already have the one I'll be using.
Regarding the opening post, can you guys tell me if that motherboard will do? I have always build my PCs with the intention of upgrades, and I never followed through, so.. not this time. I will NOT upgrade this one. If the mobo has the slots I need, is there a serious reason to get a different, more advanced chipset?
I generally recommend avoiding low end motherboards. They just come with too many restrictions. In the case of your original choice, it has only four USB ports, only two memory slots, it only offers D-sub if you need to plug in a monitor to the integrated graphics later (e.g., if the video card dies), and various other issues. The lowest end motherboards also tend to sacrifice build quality in an effort to get the price down.
Higher end motherboards add more and more features, but there's diminishing returns on how useful this is. You'll probably never have any reason to care about features that a $200 motherboard has and a $150 board doesn't. But the difference between an $80 motherboard and a $50 motherboard can be considerable.
Or if you want to spend 100-150$ more (and spend as much as in your OP) get better graphic card like R9 390 for better performance than in your OP.
FX 6300/8300 is weak and dead platform today, no point getting one as it has no lasting power.
The only thing that might not be a dead platform today is Sky Lake, which is barely even available at all. The whole "dead platform" bit is stupid. Hardly anyone ever upgrades a CPU without also replacing the motherboard anymore. When's the last time that a new CPU that fit an old socket was faster than the old CPU by enough to justify an upgrade? Gulftown? Thuban? We're going at least back to 2010 for that, if not further.
Maybe when playing at 1080p where the CPU is the bottleneck, but after QHD (1440p) and higher, the GPU becomes the bottleneck. The CPU is less of a factor after 1440p.
CPU is no bottleneck at 1080p either. FX is sufficient today, no doubt about it, but it is a bottom borderline of gaming CPU and dead platform, no point saving on that one. i3 could be an option since you can still replace it with some faster CPU, replacing FX means replacing entire platfrom.
As I said above, he can save on SSD which he can buy later, that way he gets best performance for the money while not suffering financial loss due shorter life span of weaker components.
A computer that doesn't have an SSD is slow, no matter what else it has.
Getting a Core i3 today on the basis that you can update it to a Core i5 later when you could have bought that same Core i5 today is stupid. Do you really want to buy both a Core i3 and a Core i5 instead of just the Core i5? Well, you probably do, but most people wouldn't.
The original parts the OP has chosen are more than edequate for what he needs it to do. He's got a 1080p monitor that's locked at 60Hz, so no matter if he is getting 65fps or 180fps, his monitor can not output more than 60fps. The CPU and GPU he has chosen can get him those frame rates in any game out right now unless that game has some serious issues in its code.
OP didn't say he was going to be doing any heavy multi tasking or video rendering so an i7 part is overkill. OP had no interest in QHD so there is no need to get a GPU higher than a GTX 960 or R9 380 anything more powerful is overkill and wasted money and consumes more power than necessary.
His main concern was about the mobo on the list. It checks out to be compatible with his selection other than it having a PCI-e 2.0 slot (which is still perfectly viable for his GPU) everything is kosher. He can shave off a few $$$ by switching out the 2x8GB sticks for 2x4GB sticks but that's his call. The 4GB GTX 960 is a steal for the price he's getting at, it only cost $20 more than an average 2GB card and it comes with a back plate and a free copy of Metal Gear Solid 5. You'd have to be a fool to pass that deal up.
Thank you guys, I think I have pretty much finished editing the list, in the OP. I have taken into account your opinions, thank you for the help
There's a big problem with your new build: you need two memory modules, not one. Otherwise, you lose half of your memory bandwidth. Getting two 4 GB modules is fine. Getting one 8 GB module is not.
@Quizzsical : I will educate myself about the pairing RAM stuff (worst case scenario, probably will go back to 2x8GB).
Can anyone tell me realistically how much would this machine consume, power wise? PCPartPicker tells me 298W, and I find that very hard to believe. What is a decent wattage for the source? is 650W overkill? I saw some recommendations here for 520W even.
@Quizzsical : I will educate myself about the pairing RAM stuff (worst case scenario, probably will go back to 2x8GB).
Can anyone tell me realistically how much would this machine consume, power wise? PCPartPicker tells me 298W, and I find that very hard to believe. What is a decent wattage for the source? is 650W overkill? I saw some recommendations here for 520W even.
Dual channel is just a paper stat with no bearing on desktop performance, especially gaming. You can just keep 1 module. Quizzical is just all theorycrafting with no basis in actual data....
However, for that price you could have B85 board with 4 DIMMs...
Power consumption is around 240W(120W GPU, 84W CPU + the rest). Yeah, 650W is way more than you need. Stick with some Seasonic around $50-60.
Velika: City of Wheels: Among the mortal races, the humans were the only one that never built cities or great empires; a curse laid upon them by their creator, Gidd, forced them to wander as nomads for twenty centuries...
@Quizzsical : I will educate myself about the pairing RAM stuff (worst case scenario, probably will go back to 2x8GB).
Can anyone tell me realistically how much would this machine consume, power wise? PCPartPicker tells me 298W, and I find that very hard to believe. What is a decent wattage for the source? is 650W overkill? I saw some recommendations here for 520W even.
650w or 520w is up to you. The higher the wattage of the PSU the less the fan will spool up if using a PSU with a variable speed fan. Meaning: if with normal use, you consume less power the PSU fan will stay off since it does not generate much heat. If you get a lower wattage PSU like 400w, most likely the fans will be spooled up at all times. If you had a 1500w PSU your fans would probably never kick in unless you are playing under the afternoon sun if you live in Australia.
You only consume what your system draws when it comes to PSUs, I don't think there are any PSUs pulling constant max rated power. Rule of thumb: get a PSU with twice your system power consumption for reliability and silence.
650w or 520w is up to you. The higher the wattage of the PSU the less the fan will spool up if using a PSU with a variable speed fan. Meaning: if with normal use, you consume less power the PSU fan will stay off since it does not generate much heat. If you get a lower wattage PSU like 400w, most likely the fans will be spooled up at all times. If you had a 1500w PSU your fans would probably never kick in unless you are playing under the afternoon sun if you live in Australia.
You only consume what your system draws when it comes to PSUs, I don't think there are any PSUs pulling constant max rated power. Rule of thumb: get a PSU with twice your system power consumption for reliability and silence.
You would only consume what you draw if you had 100% efficient PSU which does not exist and efficiency tends to drop with low loads so that 1500W PSU will likely draw more power than 520W unit.
Also, having an overkill PSU that never spin the fans isn't particularly smart. The temperature in PSU box varies depending on place so the unit would need to be specifically designed for 0 RPM or be completely fanless. Regardless, those PSUs are different price tag anyway.
Getting a PSU with double of your power requirements is a good rule of thumb tho - the unit loses performance over time and GPU tends to produce high spikes in power draw that go way beyond TDP, so some buffer is good to have. I would probably go with slightly lower multiplier, the thing is, despite power consumption getting lower and lower as technology evolves, the choice of sub 500W isn't all that great and modern computers rarely use more than 300W so you are usually left with +- 500W supply anyway.
@Quizzsical : I will educate myself about the pairing RAM stuff (worst case scenario, probably will go back to 2x8GB).
Can anyone tell me realistically how much would this machine consume, power wise? PCPartPicker tells me 298W, and I find that very hard to believe. What is a decent wattage for the source? is 650W overkill? I saw some recommendations here for 520W even.
Another thing to note is that the EVGA PSU you chose also comes with a 10 year warranty (that can be important to many people). It's up to you to choose the wiggle room of your PSU. So, PCPartpicker states you will draw 298w with that configuration which should be at normal load. When gaming, your CPU and GPU should pull a bit harder considering Turbo clock along with GPU boost. At load your CPU may bump up from 85w to 100w and on the GPU side maybe 250w for a total of 350w at least for those two parts. The more load you put on your PSU capacity the more heat and wear is added to the unit. Then again you won't be bench marking 24/7/365 with a gaming PC, at least I hope not. lol
What it comes down to is: make sure you get a PSU from a reliable manufacturer. For this I recommend - Seasonic, Corsair (many products made by Seasonic), EVGA, Rosewill, and BeQuiet as reputable PSU manufacturers off the top of my head. There are more out there, these are just the ones I trust overall.
Having a 4GB GPU is nice if you are into moding games and it's only about $20 more than a 2GB base 960 MSRP. If the 4GB card had a $60 - $100 difference then it could be an issue but it's only an additional $10 per GDDR5 memory, that's a really good deal and it has a back plate to boot and a free copy of MGS5.
It is not $20 extra.
Price of GTX 960 starts at $180, your pick of 4GB version is $230. That is $50 for 4GB. Definitely not a good deal, performance difference is negligable.
Comments
Giving stupid advices to "skip SSD and just buy it later"...lol.
Best performace is what i linked. Its his decision to get better performace or Intel.
2nd even if your GPU is pumping more than 60 avg, it helps with chopping and stuttering due to minimum FPS.
3rd games tend to get more demanding over time. 960/380 can barely push 60 on current crop of games. On max settings FHD of course. Some even on 720p. Next crop of games and 960/380 will be well within 60.
4th mentioning VSync...wtf
Here is a nice overview of 380/390/960/970
http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/powercolor_radeon_r9_390_pcs_8gb_review,13.html
http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/core_i5_6600k_processor_review_desktop_skylake,15.html
And reality in 2015:
"The performance benefit in-between the CPUs is nominal to say at the least. That is the reality anno 2015. This is going to be even closer with upcoming DX12 games."
Higher end motherboards add more and more features, but there's diminishing returns on how useful this is. You'll probably never have any reason to care about features that a $200 motherboard has and a $150 board doesn't. But the difference between an $80 motherboard and a $50 motherboard can be considerable.
Getting a Core i3 today on the basis that you can update it to a Core i5 later when you could have bought that same Core i5 today is stupid. Do you really want to buy both a Core i3 and a Core i5 instead of just the Core i5? Well, you probably do, but most people wouldn't.
거북이는 목을 내밀 때 안 움직입니다
OP didn't say he was going to be doing any heavy multi tasking or video rendering so an i7 part is overkill. OP had no interest in QHD so there is no need to get a GPU higher than a GTX 960 or R9 380 anything more powerful is overkill and wasted money and consumes more power than necessary.
His main concern was about the mobo on the list. It checks out to be compatible with his selection other than it having a PCI-e 2.0 slot (which is still perfectly viable for his GPU) everything is kosher. He can shave off a few $$$ by switching out the 2x8GB sticks for 2x4GB sticks but that's his call. The 4GB GTX 960 is a steal for the price he's getting at, it only cost $20 more than an average 2GB card and it comes with a back plate and a free copy of Metal Gear Solid 5. You'd have to be a fool to pass that deal up.
Can anyone tell me realistically how much would this machine consume, power wise? PCPartPicker tells me 298W, and I find that very hard to believe.
What is a decent wattage for the source? is 650W overkill? I saw some recommendations here for 520W even.
However, for that price you could have B85 board with 4 DIMMs...
Power consumption is around 240W(120W GPU, 84W CPU + the rest). Yeah, 650W is way more than you need. Stick with some Seasonic around $50-60.
https://youtu.be/OHtzUVuQtC0
Velika: City of Wheels: Among the mortal races, the humans were the only one that never built cities or great empires; a curse laid upon them by their creator, Gidd, forced them to wander as nomads for twenty centuries...
You only consume what your system draws when it comes to PSUs, I don't think there are any PSUs pulling constant max rated power. Rule of thumb: get a PSU with twice your system power consumption for reliability and silence.
Also, having an overkill PSU that never spin the fans isn't particularly smart. The temperature in PSU box varies depending on place so the unit would need to be specifically designed for 0 RPM or be completely fanless. Regardless, those PSUs are different price tag anyway.
Getting a PSU with double of your power requirements is a good rule of thumb tho - the unit loses performance over time and GPU tends to produce high spikes in power draw that go way beyond TDP, so some buffer is good to have. I would probably go with slightly lower multiplier, the thing is, despite power consumption getting lower and lower as technology evolves, the choice of sub 500W isn't all that great and modern computers rarely use more than 300W so you are usually left with +- 500W supply anyway.
I have a similar build: 4790, 980 instead of 960, (that's all the stuff that would make a big difference), a Toshiba HDD and 2 SSDs, a few case fans
Plugged into the sameUPS I'm measuring power: 2x24" LCD screens, a 4-bay NAS, a stereo amplifer
undre synthethis benchmarks (Furmark + Prime95), I'm just shy of 400W from the wall, right now, for everything that's plugged into that UPS.
Under a normal gaming load, I'm pulling 340W
At idle it's under 200W.
I'm using a Seasonic SSR-450RM in the build right now.
What it comes down to is: make sure you get a PSU from a reliable manufacturer. For this I recommend - Seasonic, Corsair (many products made by Seasonic), EVGA, Rosewill, and BeQuiet as reputable PSU manufacturers off the top of my head. There are more out there, these are just the ones I trust overall.
Try this PSU calculator if you like:
http://www.bequiet.com/en/psucalculator
Price of GTX 960 starts at $180, your pick of 4GB version is $230. That is $50 for 4GB. Definitely not a good deal, performance difference is negligable.
http://pcpartpicker.com/part/gigabyte-motherboard-gab85hd3
Or do you need mATX?
http://pcpartpicker.com/part/msi-motherboard-b85meco