Since I'm terribly new to the pc building world (maybe a week tops) I have considerably less knowledge than most. But since I'm interested in building a new PC (my first too), I was hoping to get some feedback on the one I have now.
My budget ideally should be at 1200, preferably to not go over it (including taxes and shipping, but shipping is hard to take into account, taxes will do for now). I am expecting the system to last a significant amount of time (3 years+), so if there's anything that needs changing, please let me know!
Generally speaking I don't plan on switching out the gtx 970 despite many of my friends suggesting it's overkill for most games and working programs, but I've heard amazing things and reviews about it, so I don't think I'll be dropping it. I understand intel cpus are generally more reliable(?) and provides better performance, but the pricetag is beyond what I can afford, so I settled for amd (which is still amazing for its price). But my biggest questions will be on storage; it was suggested to me to go one HDD and one SSD, and I'm not sure how that works. Also, suggestions on the cooling system is also welcome, since I'm not too sure if the 120V is enough. Thanks!
Well, games usually will take more advantage of stronger single cores, hence why the i5 is usually recommended over something like the FX-8350. Both are reliable, it's just that the FX-8350 is over 3 years old and is getting a bit dated.
The Seidon 120V is a bit noisy, especially with its stock fan. I wouldn't really recommend it - get a Hyper 212 Evo instead.
http://pcpartpicker.com/p/yf8Cgs
Install your operating system and common programs on the SSD, and put the rest on the hard drive.
This build will allow you to add another GTX 970 in the future, and overclock as well.
There's a person on the buy/sell/trade part of the forum that's selling Windows keys for quite cheap. Couple people have confirmed that they work, so you might wanna check them out.
Everything in the build seems to be in order, I would suggest you get your RAM in Dual channel unless you are going to pick up another 8GB stick down the road.
Also if you are only going to run a single GPU I would suggest a lower wattage PSU at higher quality, this should do fine LINK
If you are in the US, or can trick newegg and Amazon into thinking you are in the US - wait 2 weeks and order your parts on the 28 (BLACK FRIDAY) and probably save 10-30% easily. Then you can definitely do the intel build and possibly upgrade a part or 2. I know 8gb of RAM didnt cut it for me after about 6 months. But I don't just game. I do a bit of everything.
I may or may not go SLI in the future, which is why i seleceted the 750W power supply. And yes, I do plan on getting a second 8g ram, just the budget issue is making me from doing so. But if that power supply can support SLI and possible other upgrades, I might go with it
if gaming is your main usage of the build, then just go with an i5-4690K. Because it will simply be better in cpu bound games.
Offcourse a FX8350 is also not a bad choice, if you do virtualization for example, or 3D rendering. But for just gaming and random ussage, i would recommend to concider an i5
If you are only gaming and doing regular daily stuff, you won't see a difference between an i5 and an i7. The i7 will help with things such as video editing. Nothing wrong with going with an i7-4790k, but it's just pricier. If it's on sale, and you can still stay within your budget without making any part of your system weaker, then go for it.
FX-8350 will usually be behind the i5-4690k except for a couple of applications which can fully take advantage of all 8 threads. The 8350 has much weaker single core performance than the i5's.
Sounds like amd and intel go neck and neck, just a few differences on what I'll be doing. Since I don't know what I may or may not do, I'll probably keep both in mind. Could you explain what single core performance is? I can't seem to find a decent explanation online.
However, not all cores are created equally. Some are weaker than others.
Some game engines and programmers are old/lazy and don't bother to use more than one or two cores. As a result, the one with weaker cores will not perform as well as the one with stronger cores.
That's an over-simplified answer, but I hope you understand the concept. I would rather just go with the i5, since it's newer and most games will benefit from having stronger cores.
Ah I see, in that aspect it's not the cpu that's bad but the game. Well that gives me a good idea since I know those kind of games. Thanks for your input!