New bulid advice

[trevor999]

Greetings all

I am planning on doing my first build in the spring. After doing some research I have selected the following components:

ASUS Z97-A LGA 1150 Intel Z97 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard
Intel Core i5-4690K Devil's Canyon Quad-Core 3.5GHz LGA 1150 Desktop Processor BX80646I54690K
Windows 7 OEM
G.SKILL Sniper Series 8GB (2 x 4G 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1866 (PC3 14900)
Cool Master HAF 922 Tower
Rosewill CAPSTONE-750 750W Continuous @ 50°C, Intel Haswell Ready, 80 PLUS GOLD, ATX12V v2.31 & EPS12V v2.92, SLI/CrossFire Ready, Active PFC Power Supply

I will be using my existing HD's (2) and SSD (1), my existing CD/DVD drive, my existing Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Audio card (ancient yes, but I like it) and my existing GTX 650 Ti GPU.

I do NOT plan to do any sort of overclocking etc.

Are these components compatible? Are there better choices for comparable money? I'm looking in the area of $800 - $900. Do I still need to get a higher capacity cooler like the Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus - CPU Cooler ?

Thanks in advance for any input or advice.

Regards

Trevor

[killjoyjim]

WELCOME TO PUREOC..

[ali500mph]

Welcome! You will find some great advice on this forum as everyone here has helped me build my first PC! To make sure if the parts are compatable you can use pcpartpicker which is a great site to determine the parts compatibility and also comparing prices.

[Gu3]

Personally, I generally wouldn't put anything but a SeaSonic PSU in my machines (or an Brand that re-labels Seasonics), but I have been swayed recently by the EVGA PSU's. I almost certainly wouldn't use Rosewill, (Newegg's house brand), unless it turns out to be a Seasonic as the OEM. I second the notion of using PCPartpicker, if for no other reason than calculating your power NEEDS. Buying too much power supply is not as bad as buying too little, but if you don't NEED 750 Watts....why pay for it? I'd take the PC Part Picker recommendation for Wattage, then add say 20% (in case you upgrade) then choose a quality PSU in that range. PC Partpicker would also let you model what you'd LIKE to have in the machine, so if someday you'd like to have SLI 980's, then you can throw that in there and adjust your PSU wattage for future needs.

Just my .02, however a quality PSU will almost always pay for itself in reduced frustration if not better efficiency.

I'm also personally a fan of more RAM = Better. 16GB would be my preferred amount at a minimum, but given your budget, 8GB might be a good figure. Are you going for 1866 for a reason, or just "the fastest RAM I can afford"? In most cases, you'd be hard pressed to detect any difference between 1600 and 1866, and you may find it's more cost effective to get More than faster...(just a thought, I haven't looked at the current cost for RAM, so I can't say).

Good choices all in all! Best of luck in your build!

Gu3

[Ciarlatano]

Personally, I generally wouldn't put anything but a SeaSonic PSU in my machines (or an Brand that re-labels Seasonics), but I have been swayed recently by the EVGA PSU's. I almost certainly wouldn't use Rosewill, (Newegg's house brand), unless it turns out to be a Seasonic as the OEM. I second the notion of using PCPartpicker, if for no other reason than calculating your power NEEDS. Buying too much power supply is not as bad as buying too little, but if you don't NEED 750 Watts....why pay for it? I'd take the PC Part Picker recommendation for Wattage, then add say 20% (in case you upgrade) then choose a quality PSU in that range. PC Partpicker would also let you model what you'd LIKE to have in the machine, so if someday you'd like to have SLI 980's, then you can throw that in there and adjust your PSU wattage for future needs.

Just my .02, however a quality PSU will almost always pay for itself in reduced frustration if not better efficiency.

The thing about Rosewill PSUs is that they are either very bad, or very solid. The Capstone 750 happens to be one of their very solid pieces. It is a Superflower made piece on a proven platform. While it may not be a sexy brand name, there is no conceivable reason not to buy this PSU. JG says soRosewill Capstone 750W Review

Personally, I think you have a nice assortment of components put together there. I do think you should get an aftermarket CPU cooler, and I do have a strong recommendation for one at the $34.95 price point that outperforms a 212 EVO and is much quieter. Unfortunately.....NDA will not allow me to say which until it officially launches on the 12th.....

[trevor999]

Gu3

Thanks for your advice. I have a 650 watt PSU in my current machine. Should I just keep that? Any recommendations in particular? I picked the RAM basically from reviews. Most people said it was decent at a good price. In as far as 8Gb goes, I figure I can always upgrade to 16Gb later. But I'll look into it. If I can save on the PSU, then I'll put the money into the RAM. Any recommendations on RAM?

Thanks

Trevor

[Gu3]

The thing about Rosewill PSUs is that they are either very bad, or very solid. The Capstone 750 happens to be one of their very solid pieces. It is a Superflower made piece on a proven platform. While it may not be a sexy brand name, there is no conceivable reason not to buy this PSU. JG says soRosewill Capstone 750W Review

I stand corrected! Superflower is indeed a good brand as well. I should have made that point (Seasonic, SuperFlower & FortronSource are often fine). A good approach is to read the reviews for individual PSU's, as Ciarlatano so correctly illustrates. And as he says, you have a good list.

Gu3

[Gu3]

Gu3
Thanks for your advice. I have a 650 watt PSU in my current machine. Should I just keep that? Any recommendations in particular? I picked the RAM basically from reviews. Most people said it was decent at a good price. In as far as 8Gb goes, I figure I can always upgrade to 16Gb later. But I'll look into it. If I can save on the PSU, then I'll put the money into the RAM. Any recommendations on RAM?
Trevor

No problem! If you have a solid PSU, then there's probably no reason to change it. 650W for your configuration would seem perfectly adequate to me. I run a 660 Platinum for my system, and I have a lot more power hungry hardware. A lot depends on your future plans. If you plan on SLI or a lot more RAM & Drives, then perhaps a 750 or 850 would be a good choice. As Ciarlatano points out, the Capstone 750 as a good choice. He's also pointed out an EVGA SuperNova 850 which is well reviewed and solid. I like SeaSonics, and use the 660XP2 on two of my machines.

RAM is very dependent on your MB, I personally like Crucial & Kingston, but have used G-Skill & Patriot in the past with good success. If you look at Ciarlatanos Hardware spec, he has an Asus Z97 based Motherboard, and is using some Patriot Viper RAM. I generally pull the MB RAM compatability list, and start from there. Then followup on Newegg's reviews for people using the same MB I am, because you will often see people list the specific RAM they are successfully using with that specific Motherboard.

Again, throw your hardware in PC Part Picker, and have a look at the compatible options. At the very least it's a good starting point, and will give you some ideas of the options you have! The G-Skill Sniper 1866 you have chosen looks great to me, I just wondered why you had gone with 1866...

Gu3

[Cyberburnout]

Welcome to PureOC. Looks like you're in good hands with the answers you have been getting.
You dont plan on overclocking and that's cool. but what do you plan on doing? Work? Gaming? Do you plan on upgrading gpu later? Adding a 2nd or newer gpu?

16gb is becoming the standard but 8gb may work for you depending on usage. If sticking with 8gb I'd get 2133 instead of 1866. If 16gb you can balance speed/capacity/cost with 1866

What case were you using?

[trevor999]

So many choices, so many opinions.

I've run my component list through several online tools and got results anywhere from 330W to 1000W. I figure 650 to 750W gives me some wiggle room in the future, in case of upgrades. I'm more interested in quality. "I can't afford to buy cheap goods" as the proverb goes. As far as why I chose the G-Skill Sniper 1866, it just came down to reviews and what seems like the best bang for the buck. I'm afraid to say that I'm a little ignorant when it comes to technical spec stuff, so I rely on user reviews a lot. (My mom thinks I'm a computer genius. HA!) I will probably upgrade RAM in the future. I don't really need a "hardcore" gaming machine. My current machine will play Fallout 3 and Skyrim with heaps of mods and fairly high video settings. I just want a machine that's more advanced than my current 5 year old machine, and one that will be good for another 5 years.

[Cyberburnout]

Oh ok looks like you picked a good setup for that. By spring prices will Change so revist this again before pulling trigger.

The choices is one reason I love doing custom builds. I decide everything

[DeViLzzz]

OP if you are not going to overclock then don't get an i5 4690K. Simple as that.

In regards to the psu it rates well and is priced aggressively so hard to not recommend it but I think others would go for Seasonic, Antec, Corsair and others before they would go with the brand you selected. Still for $49 to $79 depending on when you get it I would say take a shot at it if nothing else rates as well and is priced similar. Here is a good review on that psu -

http://www.hardocp.com/article/2015/...1#.VK4GNCvF98E

[nSone]

From the looks of it you're about to build a rig very similar to the one I've got now
First of all my most important advice is to exactly determine your current needs and go from there, since there's no guarantee what will be good 5 years from now you better build a system that will do everything you want now and save the investment for future next gen stuff
You also said that you don't plan to do any overclocking, so that means there's no need to buy a more expensive unlocked -K CPU. Benefits from OC-ing can be great but it takes proper cooling, some knowledge and luck too, so if you don't plan to OC you could even go for an i5-4590 and relocate some funds to RAM or whatever ...
If your current PSU is stable and you think you could rely on it I'd keep it for now. Anything above 600W would be fine for those specs. Just have in mind a good PSU is a must for every system so if you doubt the current one might cause trouble I'd go for a [semi]modular 80+ bronze at least. The 750-850W range is safer for future additions - SLI etc. although even sli configurations are getting less demanding considering latest GPU efficiency.
For the RAM, as it's been said you won't notice the speed difference but these days apps crave for more and more RAM so try to go for 16GB, if you can't afford 2 sticks x8GB than buy 1x8GB and save the slots for a future upgrade
Again, OC-ing can be great, and can be really beneficial, a decent 4690K chip can easily be ran at 4.4GHz but you must decide on your plans first.

Hope this helps, Cheers!

[Cyberburnout]

From the looks of it you're about to build a rig very similar to the one I've got now
First of all my most important advice is to exactly determine your current needs and go from there, since there's no guarantee what will be good 5 years from now you better build a system that will do everything you want now and save the investment for future next gen stuff
You also said that you don't plan to do any overclocking, so that means there's no need to buy a more expensive unlocked -K CPU. Benefits from OC-ing can be great but it takes proper cooling, some knowledge and luck too, so if you don't plan to OC you could even go for an i5-4590 and relocate some funds to RAM or whatever ...
If your current PSU is stable and you think you could rely on it I'd keep it for now. Anything above 600W would be fine for those specs. Just have in mind a good PSU is a must for every system so if you doubt the current one might cause trouble I'd go for a [semi]modular 80+ bronze at least. The 750-850W range is safer for future additions - SLI etc. although even sli configurations are getting less demanding considering latest GPU efficiency.
For the RAM, as it's been said you won't notice the speed difference but these days apps crave for more and more RAM so try to go for 16GB, if you can't afford 2 sticks x8GB than buy 1x8GB and save the slots for a future upgrade
Again, OC-ing can be great, and can be really beneficial, a decent 4690K chip can easily be ran at 4.4GHz but you must decide on your plans first.

Hope this helps, Cheers!

I have a i5-4590 in my work desktop. Not impressed with it. NEEDS MOAR POW-WA!! Could just be spoiled from the at home pcs.. I am of the mind set that you buy the best you can afford at the time. I would get the K series now even if he isnt planning on overclocking. a year or 2 down the road he might decide he wants to start overclocking or he may run into a need for more cpu performance. A quick OC than will save him the money of buying a new cpu. If he is dead set against OC ever than get a 4670 or 4690 non k model. same stock performance but about $20 cheaper.

I do see the point of shaving a few $$ of the cpu cost and putting it towards memory or something else. That final call will have to come when he is ready to purchase parts and has a set budget.

[nSone]

^yup, the best you can afford at the time + timing [when price change should be round the corner] is the best advice in any case
actually I'd always buy an unlocked chip, no matter what - but that's my preference. The 4670K I got now I bought like almost a year ago and saved for a decent cooler ever since, and now all that planning turned out great - but my point is I plotted the OC from the very start, OP looked decisive on never doing an overclock so...
now that I think of it dismiss the i5-4590 and wait for a few weeks to see the restock, but $800 - $900 should be more than enough if those prices are right http://pcpartpicker.com/p/N63VZL

[Gu3]

Trevor, do you have access to a MicroCenter?

If so, buy your CPU there: 4690K $199, 4590 $159. I don't really know how they do it, but MicroCenter always has great prices on CPU's. And their MB combo deals when they run them are almost unbeatable.

Also, if it's in your budget, I'd still go for the 4690K over the 4590. The base and turbo frequencies are both higher on the 4690K. Is it worth $40 more? That's up to you. I prefer to always have the option of changing my mind regarding overclocking, especially since easy overclocks are often available right in the BIOS of many motherboards, no real effort required. As you can see though, opinions vary!

A good comparison of the two processors is here (Spec Comparison): http://cpuboss.com/cpus/Intel-Core-i...l-Core-i5-4590

Gu3