…yeah, it’s time. I’ve finally found games I actually want to play that require a half-decent machine, I make all my money on the computer, and I regularly do video editing as well. I always keep my machines for a long time, so they need to be as future-proof as possible and I can’t justify saving up for a PC unless it’s going to be good enough for the foreseeable future. So here’s where my head is at, I’d be grateful for any advice.
tl;dr https://pcpartpicker.com/list/xjP3yF for the general idea, but I’m open to other ideas. It’s going to be a linux machine, and all AMD since I hear the drivers work better/are less fiddly. Aesthetically, I like an all-white motif but looks are secondary to pure power and long life. I would like to be able to emulate PS4, Xbox 360, run S&box so my kid can make games, and render my clip shows at high speed. The budget I’m targeting is about £2k. Will mean saving up for a couple months. Parts I’m considering:
CPU
- Ryzen 9 9950X3D (I’m most excited about having a strong CPU, this one appeals to me even though it’s a bit of a splurge)
- Ryzen 9 7950X3D
- Ryzen 9 7900X3D
GPU
Anything AMD, 16gb preferred but at least 12gb. AMD RX 6800XT or higher perhaps. RX 7800 XT or similar would be great.
Memory
16gb preferred, DDR5, not too fussy about brand. Maybe someday another 16gb if it becomes worthwhile.
Storage
1 or 2TB M.2 NVMe SSD, any really who cares. I don’t need a lot of storage, most of my games are lightweight indies or backed up on my server.
Power Supply
Anything 850-1000w, preferably modular? I dunno.
Cooling
Possibly an AIO liquid cooler. I’m iffy on that, would be happy with a fan if it’s more recommended.
Case
Fractal does a nice white wood effect one (North XL), as does Antec (Flux Pro). Happy with anything that matches, but don’t really love showy RGB, prefer understated and clean looks.
This build is already about £500 more than I had planned to spend! Now they’re saying buy monitors? Aaiiieee, my wallet. Maybe down the road if I deserve a treat I’ll spring for a higher refresh 1440p monitor. It’s likely enough, I am kinda spoiled.
The motivation for picking one small NVME SSD is that after the upgrade I’ll have two >10Tb file servers on my network, one for serving media to the projector and one for backups. I would feel just silly buying more storage at that point… At least for now.
I’m seriously considering the Thermalright Royal Pretor 130 or a Peerless Assassin 120; both are highly reputed, I’ve seen them used on this CPU with good results in completed builds on pcpartpicker, and the case I’m going with can fit a heatsink 185mm tall so either will fit, incredibly enough. Also, most of my favourite games are indies so I don’t plan on overclocking or anything crazy.
I’ve just been talked down from getting the 9950X3D for the 9800X3D instead. Benchmarks all said both will be roughly an order of magnitude as much computing power as I’m used to, and the higher wattage and heat of the 9950 would probably push me into genuinely needing a watercooler. I’m hoping I can get away with a fan cooled CPU under the hood and not have to worry about AIOs dying every 5 years. Is that reasonable?
If anything, I’d say downgrade the GPU unless you actually need 9070xt (even though its performance is stellar). It’s easier to replace than CPU down the road anyway. Upgrading monitor down the road is also an option for sure, you can get really nice 1440p MiniLEDs or OLEDs for about 350$ nowadays, and they keep on coming down in prices.
Storage: makes sense
CPU: If we’re talking just gaming, there really is no point getting 9950x3d over 9800x3d. Work, however? The extra cores can be useful, but only you yourself can answer whether or not you need them.
Cooler: Sure, that’s reasonable. Those are indeed very reputable coolers. There’s also Thermalright Frost Spirit, which should perform better than PA120. But I’m not up to date on coolers. Gamers Nexus does extensive testing on those, you should check them out. In general, yes, towers are much less of a hassle, I agree. Games I do not expect be a problem temperature-wise. Rendering for 3 hours? I think it’ll throttle. You should check the tests if that’s a concern for you. Other than that, it’s noise. Tower coolers will be your loudest component. Be aware.
People here tend to recommend balanced builds. They are the optimal price to performance solutions, but they may not be optimal for you specifically.
Games usually mean balanced build.
If work is involved, that’s when optimal solutions are imbalanced. And I think this is your case. For example, with music production, you’d want to get the best CPU there is, and the worst GPU, because GPU is there just to output a picture, nothing more.
Video rendering is more difficult because depending on what you do with the videos, you either need a beefy CPU or both CPU and GPU. Plus, they all perform differently in different apps. Sometimes, it is to a very large degree.
Thanks for the nuanced advice! I don’t mind fan noise so much, I’m very accustomed to it and I tend to crank the tunes up anyway. I would absolutely be stepping down a tier or two if I was just doing office work, gaming, video editing, or streaming media. But since I’m doing all of those - and want the build costs to amortize comfortably for the next decade or so - I feel okay with reaching for the top shelves. I’m not going for a crazy threadripper workstation or anything, so I pat myself on the back for showing humility and restraint. And then laugh at myself behind my own back.
At this point I’ve got two parts lists picked out, depending on how long I decide to save up I might either go for a “vaguely reasonable” build based on the 9800, or if I decide to hold off until after the summer when my parents have left and won’t be around to annoy me with helpful advice, I might have saved up enough to build something based on the 9950 with all the bells and whistles. If I go that route, the heat sink might end up being a Noctua NH-D15 G2 LBC instead, with six case fans just so none of them have to work as hard as all of them. Is that vaguely sane?
Sounds reasonable