In 2021 I posted about building an X570 build which was for my girlfriend and was completed and is running amazingly, now it is time for me to upgrade my PC which is coming up to about 16 years old, give or take a year or two. Part of the reason for the upgrade is some of the games I want to play my CPU does not have the instruction sets for (looking at you AVX2) and also my GPU is starting to really get long in the tooth for playing the more modern game titles. Here is what I am currently running for a system:
- Motherboard: Gigabyte X58A-UD3R (Rev 2.0)
- Processor: Intel Core i7-960
- Graphics Card: Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 6GB
- System Memory: 24 GB (DDR3)
- Operating System Storage: Intel 520 Series SSD - 240GB
- Data Storage: Samsung 860 Evo - 500GB x 2
My current parts list is laid out below and I’ll add some comments about some of the parts I am still trying to decide between. I will also add information on how I plan to configure the system but will try to not go into exhaustive detail.
- Case: Lian Li - O11D Dynamic XL Case (Black) [x 1]
- Intake Fans: Lian Li - Uni Fan SL120 Modular RGB 120mm Fan 3 Pack – (Black) [x 2]
- Exhaust Fans: Lian Li - Uni Fan SL120 Modular RGB 120mm Fan (Black) [x 1]
- Processor: AMD Ryzen 7950x [x 1]
- Cooler: Lian Li - Galahad 360 Uni SL Edition ARGB AIO Liquid CPU Cooler (Black) [x 1]
- System Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws S5 DDR5 5600MHz CL36 (2x32GB) Memory Kit [x 2]
- Primary GPU: GeForce RTX 3070 Ti Graphics Card [x 1]
- Secondary GPU: GeForce RTX 3060 Ti Graphics Card [x 1]
- SSD Storage: 870 EVO SATA III 2.5in SSD – 2 TB [x 4]
- M.2 Storage: 970 EVO Plus NVMe M.2 SSD – 1 TB [x 4]
- HDD Storage: IronWolf NAS SATA III 3.5in HDD – 12 TB [x 4]
- Secondary Wireless Adapter: Asus USB-AX56 Dual Band USB WiFi Adapter [x 1]
As for the motherboard I am debating between these four: MEG X670E ACE, ROG STRIX X670E-E GAMING WIFI, MEG X670E GODLIKE and the PROART X670E-CREATOR WIFI.
The issues or limitations I have already noted with the boards I have selected are:
- The GODLIKE board will disable the second USB-C port when using the third PCI-e slot and it is also short one USB-A port on the board.
- The ACE board only has one 10G NIC so ideally another NIC would be added to the system, it too disables a USB-C port when using the third PCI-e slot and it is also short one USB-A port on the board.
- The CREATOR board only has four total SATA connections and its third PCI-e slot is running at 2x only, it is also very hard to find where I live at the moment.
- The GAMING board only has a single 2.5G NIC as well as it only has four total SATA connections and the slot for the second GPU only runs at 4x.
The requirements I used to select these boards are:
- At least 4 x 3.5" HDDs for general storage
- At least 2 x 2.5" SSDs for hypervisor installation & other hypervisor related storage
- At least 2 x M.2 SSDs for high-speed Storage for virtual machines
- Enough USB ports to cover all the devices that would be connected to the system: 2 x USB-C for connecting between the motherboard and the monitor for KVM, 2 x USB-A for connecting between the motherboard and the monitor for KVM, USB-A ports for the following devices: USB hub, Game Controller, Dual HDD/SSD Dock, 3D Printer, 3D Printer Camera, and Secondary Wireless Adapter.
- Dual GPUs with enough lanes to capitalize on card performance
- Prefer dual NICs with (10G & 1G) but also will take single 10G as adding a slower speed card is a lot easier and cheaper
My Plan is to install Proxmox on the SSDs (using ZFS) and use them also for OS disks for the virtual machines I will create on the system and also story ISO images for those machines. I plan to use the M.2 SSDs (with ZFS) for high-speed storage for gaming on a Windows virtual machine and also for storage on my Linux virtual machine when editing videos and pictures though most will be for the gaming virtual machine. I plan to create a TrueNAS scale virtual machine and have the HDDs passed through to it by passing the SATA controller through to it for longer-term storage of files and also backups of the various virtual machines, though most of my files are already stored on my NAS devices.
I am really looking for feedback on this plan and any areas that should be tweaked or changed as I am planning to start ordering parts after the holiday season though I will be keeping an eye out for deals. I have also not had any experience with the AM5 platform or the X670 chipsets and know that being a new generation it might still be best to look at the older AM4 and X570 for my build but not sure if that is the case for my use-case and build plan.