Sherdog PC Build/Buy Thread, v6: My Power Supply Burned Down My House

If you're thinking about building, do it now. Pretty much everything is going up 10% on October 1rst and another 15% by January first, 25% total.
 
According to PassMark.com

You want to own a top PC rig? Here is what you need.

If you looking to build it yourself it should close around $4k. Funny how some websites are charging $20k on same configurations :D

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According to PassMark.com

You want to own a top PC rig? Here is what you need.

If you looking to build it yourself it should close around $4k. Funny how some websites are charging $20k on same configurations :D

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These are actual rigs, and from a theoretical point of view, they're awful. The 3DMark leaderboards are far better for what this seeks to present. Generally speaking, evaluating this question from any of these leaderboards is pointless because you're looking at ungodly overclocks on insane, airplane-loud, custom liquid nitrogen/hydrogen cooling setups that nobody in the real world would use. They also don't specifically cater to gamers.

It would be nice to see systems running purely at stock frequencies separated more cleanly in most charts & benchmarks.

From a theoretical point of view, right now, @90 50 is correct, and for gamers the top configuration should include an RTX 2080 Ti (or a Titan V at least) despite their terrible values. In fact, as garbage as SLI has become, it should include 2 x GPUs (with the NVLink Bridge). When SLI doesn't work you just turn it off. Thankfully, since they ended support beyond two cards, we can dispense with the theoretical 4xSLI nonsense. If you're going that stuff you're after dedicate photo editing GPUs like the Quadros, not gamer GPUs.

CPUs is pretty straightforward. The best 6-8 core Intel processor. There are far more powerful overall CPUs, but none as good for gamers. There's so much damn money you can waste on infinitesimal improvements for components like the RAM, SSD, and motherboards.

  • CPU: i9-9900K (+ Noctua NH-D15)
    • Not yet officially released, I know, but this will be the champ
    • The Noctua cooler is there because even at stock Intel throttles turbos depending on thermals
    • You could plug in a 28-core CPU like the upcoming Intel Xeon W-3175X CPU or the Threadripper 2990WX, but they are inferior for gaming
  • GPU: 2 x RTX 2080 Ti (NVLink SLI Bridge)
    • Duh
  • RAM: 16GB+ (x8GB sticks) DDR4 RAM
    • Brand-wise the Corsair Dominator Platinums have long been considered the gold standard among RAM, and you could drop $1K on their 64GB 4000MHz set from this line, but it will yield you virtually zero advantage over 2x8GB sticks with the lowest cycle time possible, and the 3600MHz-CAS15 or 3200MHz-CAS14 sticks are much more attractively priced.
    • In fact, RAM with much lower bandwidth, but tighter timings, once overclocked, tends to win most benchmarks
  • SSD: Intel Optane 960GB NVMe SSD
    • More overkill. Larger-sized SSDs are faster, but a 256GB+ Samsung 960 EVO will perform almost identically across almost any real world task, not just gaming, and in fact many lesser SSDs would, too.
  • Motherboard: LGA Z390 Motherboard
    • If you're not overclocking, the VRM and Power Phase Design really don't matter, so for performance, not features, really any Z390 motherboard would suffice, and generally speaking, many of the cheapest motherboards with lesser chipsets for the socket will see nominal inferiority
  • OS: Windows 10
    • Yeah, Windows 10 still dominates Linux

Indeed, with a pure focus on performance a builder could assemble the highest level of theoretical performance for gaming under $4000. It gets this right.
 
https://www.wepc.com/tips/ssd-cache/
A recent article on the effectiveness of coupling an HDD with a small SSD (128GB) with the latter using Intel's Smart Response Technology for Intel CPU owners. This is the most economical way to get SSD performance at HDD storage prices. It's a particularly fruitful avenue to consider now that 120GB-128GB SSDs are a bit thin in 2018 to run as an OS drive.
To see how an SSD cache can effect gaming performance, we’ll load up a few games and measure level load times. Tests were run three times (to allow the data to be cached), with a reboot between each run (otherwise RAM comes into play)...

Once a game is cached, the level loads just as it would off a dedicated SSD. If you are wondering how long it takes or how many loads it takes for a game to get cached, the answer, in my experience, is once. You might have to put up with a 15-20 second level load if you haven’t played the game for a while, but once you do, the data gets cached, and it begins running off the SSD again. All this is done without any interference from the user.
ssd-cache-game-load-batman-arkham-city.png


ssd-cache-game-load-portal2.png


ssd-cache-game-load-skyrim.png
 
https://www.wepc.com/tips/ssd-cache/
A recent article on the effectiveness of coupling an HDD with a small SSD (128GB) with the latter using Intel's Smart Response Technology for Intel CPU owners. This is the most economical way to get SSD performance at HDD storage prices. It's a particularly fruitful avenue to consider now that 120GB-128GB SSDs are a bit thin in 2018 to run as an OS drive.

ssd-cache-game-load-batman-arkham-city.png


ssd-cache-game-load-portal2.png


ssd-cache-game-load-skyrim.png
Did they ever get Intels SRT to work with Windows 10? I know at launch they had issues.

1tb budget SSD’s have been hitting the $110 mark and have been predicted to keep going down.
A WD blue 1tb usually sits around the $45 mark. A budget 120gb ssd with dram cache is $30. So you’re at $75.
If the budget drives drop to $100, the ssd caching combo for a 1tb drive becomes a tough sell. There’s a performance jump from 120gb to 250gb and another at 250gb to 500gb.
Budget ssd’s also come with a 3 year warranty vs the WD blue HDD is 2 years.
For 2tb and larger the ssd caching is an option.
 
Did they ever get Intels SRT to work with Windows 10? I know at launch they had issues.

1tb budget SSD’s have been hitting the $110 mark and have been predicted to keep going down.
A WD blue 1tb usually sits around the $45 mark. A budget 120gb ssd with dram cache is $30. So you’re at $75.
If the budget drives drop to $100, the ssd caching combo for a 1tb drive becomes a tough sell. There’s a performance jump from 120gb to 250gb and another at 250gb to 500gb.
Budget ssd’s also come with a 3 year warranty vs the WD blue HDD is 2 years.
For 2tb and larger the ssd caching is an option.
There were issues with Build 1803 (the Fall Creator's Update), but that update was a fucking nightmare for everyone and everything. Otherwise, they had resolved those issues prior.

I was disappointed he didn't discuss stability issues with his gaming tests, or if he had any, but this article obviously isn't intended for our gaming niche. The larger SSDs are definitely becoming more attractive at their price points, especially if you want the most stable and bulletproof SSD experience possible. I was reminded of this creative use of smaller SSDs when I was eyeballing that free HP S600 120GB SSD in the Newegg Combo from the other thread. Unfortunately, that combo had a Ryzen processor.

It's still a pretty beautiful concept for Intel owners, economically. The strategy doesn't favor going for smaller HDDs. Cheapest HDDs on the market are still the 3TB, but there isn't really an premium up to 6TB. PCPP is showing $150 for the Toshiba X300 6TB internal drive. Meanwhile, I see sales pop up all the time on BPC or Slickdeals for 120GB/128GB 2.5" SSDs in the $20-$25 range. Very common component sale. I see a Patriot Burst for $23 atm. Alternatively, a bunch of gamers have >128GB SSDs from older builds they could recycle. As that reviewer notes the upside is that any game in existence can be loaded in its entirety into a 120GB SSD as cache. This is superior to the measly 8GB of cache the Firecuda hybrid drives employ, and why his load times are identical to the pure SSD when it isn't cache.

I totally get if someone doesn't want it as their main game drive, especially if they play load-monsters like GTA V, but $150 + $23 = $173, and now you effectively have a 6TB hybrid drive with pure SSD load performance (not falling in between HDD and SSD like the Firecuda drives). It's enough to store a very large game library on a single drive. Six 1TB SSDs is going to run you about 5x that much.
 
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I scored a WD Blue 500GB SSD for $105 AUD

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There were issues with Build 1803 (the Fall Creator's Update), but that update was a fucking nightmare for everyone and everything. Otherwise, they had resolved those issues prior.

I was disappointed he didn't discuss stability issues with his gaming tests, or if he had any, but this article obviously isn't intended for our gaming niche. The larger SSDs are definitely becoming more attractive at their price points, especially if you want the most stable and bulletproof SSD experience possible. I was reminded of this creative use of smaller SSDs when I was eyeballing that free HP S600 120GB SSD in the Newegg Combo from the other thread. Unfortunately, that combo had a Ryzen processor.

It's still a pretty beautiful concept for Intel owners, economically. The strategy doesn't favor going for smaller HDDs. Cheapest HDDs on the market are still the 3TB, but there isn't really an premium up to 6TB. PCPP is showing $150 for the Toshiba X300 6TB internal drive. Meanwhile, I see sales pop up all the time on BPC or Slickdeals for 120GB/128GB 2.5" SSDs in the $20-$25 range. Very common component sale. I see a Patriot Burst for $23 atm. Alternatively, a bunch of gamers have >128GB SSDs from older builds they could recycle. As that reviewer notes the upside is that any game in existence can be loaded in its entirety into a 120GB SSD as cache. This is superior to the measly 8GB of cache the Firecuda hybrid drives employ, and why his load times are identical to the pure SSD when it isn't cache.

I totally get if someone doesn't want it as their main game drive, especially if they play load-monsters like GTA V, but $150 + $23 = $173, and now you effectively have a 6TB hybrid drive with pure SSD load performance (not falling in between HDD and SSD like the Firecuda drives). It's enough to store a very large game library on a single drive. Six 1TB SSDs is going to run you about 5x that much.

So what I said except you made a long drawn out post. Got it
In b4 you try to play semantics.

Btw that patriot drive you posted is complete garbage. Do your research on it. It should only be recommended to people you hate.
 
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https://www.wepc.com/tips/ssd-cache/
A recent article on the effectiveness of coupling an HDD with a small SSD (128GB) with the latter using Intel's Smart Response Technology for Intel CPU owners. This is the most economical way to get SSD performance at HDD storage prices. It's a particularly fruitful avenue to consider now that 120GB-128GB SSDs are a bit thin in 2018 to run as an OS drive.

ssd-cache-game-load-batman-arkham-city.png


ssd-cache-game-load-portal2.png


ssd-cache-game-load-skyrim.png

My main SSD just died. I have a 128 gb backup and a 2 tb HDD. This is about to be real handy.
 
So what I said except you made a long drawn out post. Got it
In b4 you try to play semantics.
I don't understand the source of this hostility. It was an article that happened to pop up in my Google News feed which I doubt was a coincidence considering I was Googling about that HP SSD. I spent the first half of the post acknowledging some of your points, and the second half elaborating with more concrete figures on the fruitfulness of the strategy for larger sizes (or for recycling older SSDs in a useful way). Even at the lower 1TB size it is far cheaper if you don't go out of your way with hypothetical future prices to dismiss the truth, and this is a silly approach to this strategy when 2TB and 3TB drives offer so much more bang-for-your-buck. I don't understand why you waste time analyzing a purchase that doesn't make sense. Let price be the symmetry instead of storage size itself. Cheapest prices available to me right now:
  • (55.0% Cost) $43 1TB Barracuda HDD + $23 Patriot Burst 120GB SSD = $66
  • (60.0% Cost) $43 1TB Barracuda HDD + $29 ADATA SU800 128GB SSD = $72
  • (73.3% Cost) $59 2TB Barracuda HDD + $29 ADATA SU800 128GB SSD = $88
  • (77.5% Cost) $64 3TB Hitachi Ultrastar HDD + $29 ADATA SU800 128GB SSD = $93
  • (100% Cost) WD Blue 1TB SSD [active Google Express sale] = $120
  • (108% Cost) $100 4TB Toshiba PH3400U HDD + $29 ADATA SU800 128GB SSD = $129
  • (116% Cost) $110 5TB Toshiba X300 [active Fry's sale] + $29 ADATA SU800 128GB SSD = $139
Why compare 1TB vs. 1TB when you can have 3TB with this strategy for cheaper? I leave it to the reader to determine for himself if any of these options is worth it to him. I just thought our PC builders would appreciate the inspiration.
Btw that patriot drive you posted is complete garbage. Do your research on it. It should only be recommended to people you hate.
I mentioned it as a hypothetical placeholder, but how so? A quick Google showed a relatively strong customer review on Amazon with hundreds of votes, so I assumed it doesn't suffer from an extraordinarily high failure rate. The tech reviews actually showed inordinately good read speeds (particularly 4K random read) for a budget SSD-- especially a 128GB size. It's built on the same technology as the Inland drives and most other budget SSDs with the TLC Nand, but I assume most aren't worried about lifespan cycles. Looking at the Amazon and Newegg comments it looks like there is a bit of a lottery with whether or not the drives work, but overall satisfaction is okay. It's just a rebranded Patriot Blaze (same memory controller and Nand flash).

It performs far below the WD Blue or ADATA SU800, for example, in terms of overall performance, but not in those critical read speeds.
 
Massdrop is making it easier and cheaper to find new gaming PC hardware
The online, community-driven marketplace, Massdrop, has added a few extra ‘communities’ to its roster. There are now baking, board games, flashlights, trading card games, and… oh yeah, PC gaming.

The PC Gaming community will include monitors, gaming mice, desks, chairs, mouse mats, microphones, gaming glasses, and graphics cards. Mechanical keyboards are also available on the site, although these clacky slabs of metal and plastic already have a dedicated, thriving community on the e-commerce site all to themselves – and rightfully so.

There are already a few big name component drops listed on the PC Gaming community right now, including: the Samsung 960 Evo NVMe SSD, Adata XPG DDR4 memory kits, gaming chairs from various big name brands, and even the MSI Optix 34-inch curved gaming monitor. There are also multiple requests open if you need something a bit more specific for your build – including a whole heap of graphics cards...

While prices are not always cheaper than some of the more aggressive markets or retailers online, occasionally you can grab a great deal through the community, which, after this last year of price hikes, is a breath of fresh air.
Thought the dog would appreciate the heads up.
 
Never heard of them, thanks. It looks like you have to sign in with FB or Google just to browse though.
I hope everyone knows about r/HardwareSwap.
it is basically a group buy website. if they hit X number of orders the price is lower than if you were to just buy something on your own.
 
Never heard of them, thanks. It looks like you have to sign in with FB or Google just to browse though.
I hope everyone knows about r/HardwareSwap.
I learned about them either from @jefferz or from @nhbbear in the headphone thread, IIRC, since headphones was one of the first products they platformed for the headfi community.

Very cool concept. Their prices on Sennheiser headphones have often beaten the pants off any retailer elsewhere including Amazon, Best Buy, and Wal-Mart.
 
Upgrading from Radeon 280x to GTX 1060 6GB should be here sometime tomorrow. Basically got it for “free” due to some small bonus things I got from work that I converted into amazon gift cards. Was planning on building a new PC in a year or two and this card should hold me over until then and I think probably will be good to carry over
 
I learned about them either from @jefferz or from @nhbbear in the headphone thread, IIRC, since headphones was one of the first products they platformed for the headfi community.

Very cool concept. Their prices on Sennheiser headphones have often beaten the pants off any retailer elsewhere including Amazon, Best Buy, and Wal-Mart.

I am so sad. Both my hifi 400 and my phillips fidelios broke. My kids knocked the hifi under my recliner and the left headphone snapped off and I stood up and stepped on the fidelios after they fell off my lap.

But i am close to pulling the trigger on sennheiser 650s.
 
I am so sad. Both my hifi 400 and my phillips fidelios broke. My kids knocked the hifi under my recliner and the left headphone snapped off and I stood up and stepped on the fidelios after they fell off my lap.

But i am close to pulling the trigger on sennheiser 650s.
I learned completely to my surprise that there was a promotion to obtain a free Siberia Steelseries 200 headset with the purchase of an MSI Stealth Pro GS63 laptop by merely posting a review and providing proof of purchase. I was delighted. 4-8 weeks to ship. Thing is that I already have a Sennheiser HD 650 and a HyperX Cloud. So I want to sell it, but that means I'll probably halve my resale value just by cracking the box. People are like that with "used" headphones, and I totally get it. Dilemmas.
 
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