The PC Build Thread

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PSU is adequate. I'm not sure about the cooler, I've never personally used Rajintek stuff but the reviews seem to be pretty good. It won't be as good or quiet as something like a Coolermaster Hyper 212 but it is a lot cheaper.

Thank you drJohn I work with my headphones on pretty much constantly so the sound inst a problem. I just want it to work I am trying to keep the price down as much as possible.
 
Hehe. My pleasure :D

That Phanteks mITX case is pretty spacious though, but I also had to pass it by because it didn't have a bay for a Bluray drive. I ended up going Corsair 250D which is a pretty sweet case.

ITX is awesome.

Yeah, I have 2 itx builds now for media player use. Love the little beasties.
 
Yeah, I have 2 itx builds now for media player use. Love the little beasties.

I've mini-fied my entire server setup too :)

7gBQ4Eg.jpg
 
Hi Folks,

I am a complete and utter beginner when it comes to building a gaming PC. The little experience I have PC - wise revolves mainly around watching remote technicians logging into my store's network via RADMIN to fiddle on SQL and attend to minor issues on our POS software ARCH. Apart from that, nada. I do enjoy gaming but majority of it has been on consoles and the occasional Classic game downloaded to my Macbook. (currently AOE3)

I am familiar with Wootware as I purchase majority of the PC components needed in my store from them, it is recently that I came across their Custom Build PC's.

DSTV became too expensive so I got rid of the TV whilst I was at it, however the lack of gaming has gotten me a bit down and, seeing as though I would like to start working on a new venture from home, I thought getting a decent rig as a late Xmas present for myself would be the way to go!!

My question is this? I have a budget of roughly 20 - 25K (lock stock and barrel, right down to the multiplug everything will be connected into) should / can I just click the options until I reach the 20K, or is there a bit more to it?? My end-gaming-goal is to be able to play Witcher 3 on very high settings. Also, I am an avid music lover, I would like to plug the system into my Harman Kardon BDS system, so a decent sound card is a must too! (I don't see any options on Wootware Custom Builds)

Any and all assistance will be greatly appreciated, I have read through just about every post since Jan 2016 in the hopes of enlightening myself, but in all honesty, it confuses me even more. My only request is, if I could do EVERYTHING on Wootware, I'll be a happy man. Their service is pila and website user friendly so sites like Carbonite are a no no for me. The fact that they build / install it all is a big plus too.

PS. I live in a small town, so going to the local PC shop and speaking to an expert is unfortunately not possible.
 
My question is this? I have a budget of roughly 20 - 25K (lock stock and barrel, right down to the multiplug everything will be connected into) should / can I just click the options until I reach the 20K, or is there a bit more to it?? My end-gaming-goal is to be able to play Witcher 3 on very high settings.

Any and all assistance will be greatly appreciated, I have read through just about every post since Jan 2016 in the hopes of enlightening myself, but in all honesty, it confuses me even more. My only request is, if I could do EVERYTHING on Wootware, I'll be a happy man. Their service is pila and website user friendly so sites like Carbonite are a no no for me. The fact that they build / install it all is a big plus too.
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You can click on stuff till you get to R20k but it helps to know what's going to give you the best bang for your buck and that all the parts are compatible.

So just for clarity you are gonna need a a monitor, keyboard & mouse besides the 'box'?
Will you be gaming at 1080p or 1440p, (1440p might not be possible at your budget)?

Wrt to witcher 3 you will get very good performance at 1080p at max settings but with hairworks turned off, with hairworks on (which has several settings of it's own) your fps will drop but it's still playable and this is on a gtx 1060, rx 480 should be the same I suspect.

Anyway I'll see what I throw together for you on wootware that will give you good bang for your buck.
 
You can click on stuff till you get to R20k but it helps to know what's going to give you the best bang for your buck and that all the parts are compatible.

So just for clarity you are gonna need a a monitor, keyboard & mouse besides the 'box'?
Will you be gaming at 1080p or 1440p, (1440p might not be possible at your budget)?

Wrt to witcher 3 you will get very good performance at 1080p at max settings but with hairworks turned off, with hairworks on (which has several settings of it's own) your fps will drop but it's still playable and this is on a gtx 1060, rx 480 should be the same I suspect.

Anyway I'll see what I throw together for you on wootware that will give you good bang for your buck.

Yes, yes & yes. All I own ATM is my laptop.

I think I'd prefer high end 1080p rather than entry level 1440p, if that makes sense. I can always upgrade the storage at a later stage as I'm sure 1 or 2 games will keep me busy for a long time as I only have maybe 7-10 hrs a week max available for gaming. So I think focusing on performance right now would be the way to go!

Thanks man. It was after your suggestion of moving to PC gaming on one of the other threads I posted on that got me thinking!
 
Yes, yes & yes. All I own ATM is my laptop.

I think I'd prefer high end 1080p rather than entry level 1440p, if that makes sense. I can always upgrade the storage at a later stage as I'm sure 1 or 2 games will keep me busy for a long time as I only have maybe 7-10 hrs a week max available for gaming. So I think focusing on performance right now would be the way to go!

Thanks man. It was after your suggestion of moving to PC gaming on one of the other threads I posted on that got me thinking!

Do you know what type of games you will be playing? Reason I ask is that so far I got a gtx 1070 paired up with a 144Hz 1ms 1080p display. If you are not going to jam fps games competitively then a 144Hz monitor might be overkill and we should rather look at a 1440p display as the gtx 1070 is more than capable of driving that resolution. The other reason I'm leaning towards 1440p is that I got the gtx 1070 paired with an i5-6500 cpu and I'm worried that it could be a potential bottleneck at 1080p but at 1440p it will be less stressed (yeah I know that probably sounds wrong but I can explain if you want)

So far I'm sitting at R20 539 and that excludes the case, psu, mouse & keyboard.

Btw do you need an optical drive?
 
Do you know what type of games you will be playing? Reason I ask is that so far I got a gtx 1070 paired up with a 144Hz 1ms 1080p display. If you are not going to jam fps games competitively then a 144Hz monitor might be overkill and we should rather look at a 1440p display as the gtx 1070 is more than capable of driving that resolution. The other reason I'm leaning towards 1440p is that I got the gtx 1070 paired with an i5-6500 cpu and I'm worried that it could be a potential bottleneck at 1080p but at 1440p it will be less stressed (yeah I know that probably sounds wrong but I can explain if you want)

So far I'm sitting at R20 539 and that excludes the case, psu, mouse & keyboard.

Btw do you need an optical drive?

RPGs like Witcher, Skyrim. Want to get into Overwatch but no, nothing online. The speeds here aren't conducive to it. Civilization, Dark Souls..

Would love a bit of insight. I don't want to stop at this build so any advice / info is most welcome!!

And no, no optical necessary. I'm patient, if it takes 2-3 days to download from Steam, I won't lose my mind.
 
Talking about chassis, I'm trying to decide between these two Phanteks cases for a build I'm going to be doing over the year.

I really like the tempered glass but I don't like that it's clear on both sides, wish it was a solid panel on the one side.

http://www.wootware.co.za/phanteks-...y-silver-e-atx-mid-tower-desktop-chassis.html

http://www.wootware.co.za/phanteks-...laxy-silver-windowed-atx-desktop-chassis.html

Which one would you take? I'm leaning towards the non-tempered glass one but that cost just doesn't seem to make sense when comparing the two :(

I'd get the glass just because I've never had one...then again, the one glass side is going to show a crapload of cable mess.
 
RPGs like Witcher, Skyrim. Want to get into Overwatch but no, nothing online. The speeds here aren't conducive to it. Civilization, Dark Souls..

Would love a bit of insight. I don't want to stop at this build so any advice / info is most welcome!!

If you're more into RPGs etc then I think a 1440p display would be a better option imho. You don't need super high fps in those games and the added resolution would make for better picture quality.


It's less resource intensive for a gpu to render a 1080p frame vs a 1440p one as a 1080p frame has less information (for the lack of a better word) so the same gpu would render a 1080p frame faster than a 1440p one. The thing is the CPU is the one handing off the draw calls to the gpu, at 1080p the GPU works much 'faster' pumping out those frames and the cpu has to keep up. If it can't keep up you are gonna see your cpu utilization max out while your gpu utilisation is gonna drop from max (you want the gpu to max out for best performance) which indicates a bottleneck situation which could be minor or a lot.

Now if you are gaming at 1440p the gpu takes longer to process the frames as it more resource intensive and you will have less fps at 1440p than 1080p. Because the GPU takes longer to process each frame the CPU does not have to work so hard in handing off drawcalls to the gpu and can easily keep up thus not maxing out and creating a bottleneck.

Hope I explained that ok.
 
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http://www.wootware.co.za/corsair-200r-carbide-compact-atx-desktop-chassis.html

Not too sure what specs are required for a chassis but so long as it can accommodate future memory / storage upgrades then nothing too fancy is necessary.

Same goes for the keyboard / mouse... will just get a Run o' the mill wireless combo until such time that my bank balance recovers and I can afford a legit Mechanical.

Is a cooler not required?? Microsoft? And installation?
 
If you're more into RPGs etc then I think a 1440p display would be a better option imho. You don't need super high fps in those games and the added resolution would make for better picture quality.


It's less resource intensive for a gpu to render a 1080p frame vs a 1440p one as a 1080p frame has less information (for the lack of a better word) so the same gpu would render a 1080p frame faster than a 1440p one. The thing is the CPU is the one handing off the draw calls to the gpu, at 1080p the GPU works much 'faster' pumping out those frames and the cpu has to keep up. If it can't keep up you are gonna see your cpu utilization max out while your gpu utilisation is gonna drop from max (you want the gpu to max out for best performance) which indicates a bottleneck situation which could be minor or a lot.

Now if you are gaming at 1440p the gpu takes longer to process the frames as it more resource intensive and you will have less fps at 1440p than 1080p. Because the GPU takes longer to process each frame the CPU does not have to work so hard in handing off drawcalls to the gpu and can easily keep up thus not maxing out and creating a bottleneck.

Hope I explained that ok.

Got it
 
http://www.wootware.co.za/corsair-200r-carbide-compact-atx-desktop-chassis.html

Not too sure what specs are required for a chassis but so long as it can accommodate future memory / storage upgrades then nothing too fancy is necessary.

Same goes for the keyboard / mouse... will just get a Run o' the mill wireless combo until such time that my bank balance recovers and I can afford a legit Mechanical.

Is a cooler not required?? Microsoft? And installation?

Oh, I see Wootware will install :D toema.
 
CPU comes with the stock intel cooler.

http://www.wootware.co.za/microsoft-windows-10-home-32bit-64bit-operating-system-retail-pack.html
http://www.wootware.co.za/pc-assembly-stress-testing-and-windows-installation.html

Windows is expensive and that's the home version, I would look at alternate sources like kinguin for example but then wootware is not going to install it for you.

Well, I've added everything to the Basket. I went with this Chassis

http://www.wootware.co.za/thermalta...ll-wing-window-mid-tower-desktop-chassis.html

Gonna bite the bullet and just get WW to install Windows for me. All in all with KVM it comes to R25722.

I just got a couple more questions to put my mind at ease.

1) Will the Chassis & Motherboard be able to accommodate future upgrades? Also, will it actually even be necessary to do any upgrades in the near future? I understand storage poses a problem once I start filling up with Games and such. But memory? An additional SSD? That kind of thing... If I want to go 'balls to the walls' in a years time, what are some of the things I should consider now??

2) Compared to consoles, how does this setup compare Graphics wise? Seeing as though the primary function of this rig is for gaming, 25K is 4 PS4's worth.... Even with the additional functions one gets out of a PC..

3) May sound painfully obvious but, why is there such a wide variety of CPU's? Would it not make more sense to purchase one a bit more expensive and have it be compatible for longer?

PS I cannot wait now.... Hoping to post PICS of this rig before New Years. Wifey can go out partying while I enjoy the two days off I get in December.
 
1) Will the Chassis & Motherboard be able to accommodate future upgrades? Also, will it actually even be necessary to do any upgrades in the near future? I understand storage poses a problem once I start filling up with Games and such. But memory? An additional SSD? That kind of thing... If I want to go 'balls to the walls' in a years time, what are some of the things I should consider now??

The motherboard has 6x sata ports for drives if you want to add more. You can upgrade your cpu to an i7 (non-k). You have two dimm slots for RAM one populated with a 8GB stick so you can add another 8GB later on, if you want more ram you will have to remove the single 8GB one and replace it with 2x16GB sticks. The mb only supports a single gpu so you can't sli (dual gpu), sli would require a more expensive MB and a bigger PSU but then again I'm not a fan of sli as it comes with its own issues. Something else you cant do with this MB is overclocking, you can't overclock the cpu even if you buy an unlock K-series i5 like the 6600k, you need a Z-series MB for overclocking as well as better cooling solutions both of which is gonna hike the price up more.

Wrt the case keep in mind that it can only take 2x 3.5" hard drives so instead of more drives you might want to look at bigger drives instead. It has space for 4x 2.5" SSD/HDD or 6 if you don't use the 3.5" bays.

Some people itch to constantly upgrade as it's an obsession to have the latest stuff. I don't see any need to upgrade in the near future and you should be good for 4-5yrs. If push comes to shove and you need something better you can sell a component like a gpu/cpu for example and get something better if required.


2) Compared to consoles, how does this setup compare Graphics wise? Seeing as though the primary function of this rig is for gaming, 25K is 4 PS4's worth.... Even with the additional functions one gets out of a PC..

PS4 1.84 terraflops, PS4 Pro 4.2 terraflops, gtx 1070 6.5 terraflops. The PS4 is R6k I think x4 = R24k for 7.36 tflops which is slightly more than the 6.5 of the 1070. The ps4 pro is R7k x 4 = R28k @ 16.8 tflops which is a lot more than the 1070.


3) May sound painfully obvious but, why is there such a wide variety of CPU's? Would it not make more sense to purchase one a bit more expensive and have it be compatible for longer?

Not really sure, probably just to cover all market/price segments. Define a bit more expensive? Example the fastest i5 is the 6600k and is one level up from the 6500 in your build and costs R600 more. On it's own it's not that much faster than the 6500 part but it is a (K) part so it's overclockable which will get you more performance BUT in order to OC it you will need a Z-series MB and decent cooling solution, the cheapest Z MBis gonna cost R700 more than the current one and a decent cooler at R1000+ if you going the water route. Instead I would rather look at an i7-6700 cpu for future proofing but it costs R5500 (you can pick them up new for R3100-3500 on carbonite though) and stick withh the existing MB.


PS I cannot wait now.... Hoping to post PICS of this rig before New Years. Wifey can go out partying while I enjoy the two days off I get in December.

Think last day to order is 21Dec before they close.

Have you given more consideration to the 1080p vs 1440p monitor situation?
 
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