Hey Tek!
I was going to build a new PC for a friend and he's kind of on a budget. I'll be helping him out on cost as I have some spare RAM and hard drives to donate.
For his processor I was wondering if you guys could help me pick. I remember heading about an i7-4770k alternative where it didn't have the iGPU, but it sucked at overclocking compared to the K series. Also that it didn't run on LGA 1150, something along the lines of a Xeon. He'll be gaming with moderate use on things such as Premiere,PS, video editing, and things of that nature.
For his GPU, I was thinking a R9 290 then flashing it to a 290X bios, I'm open to change on this as it is a bit pricey.
As for the m-atx motherboard, I'm not even sure, if someone could help me out, that'd be awesome!(for both alternatives ie LGA1150 and the Xeon counterpart)
As for the case, he wants a sugo 9b, one of the best sff imo, but im open for recommendations as well here
For the cooler, I was thinking the oh so famous NH-D14/15 as being quiet is pretty important here but an oxymoron when you put the r9 290 in with this
I'm not an audiophile so I can't recommend him headphones to game and play either. Any help would be awesome!
Thank you everyone for the help!
You are thinking of the Xeon 1230V3. It can't over clock because it has a locked multiplier. However it uses LGA 1150 not a special socket. It is an absolutely fabulous CPU and I love mine. Works great for gaming and productivity. Plus it is much cheaper than a 4770 being only a tiny bit more than a 4670.
You can't flash an R9 290 to a 290X Anymore. Doesn't work. The 290 is very good though and is a great value. As long as you get an aftermarket one with an aftermarket cooler it will run cool and quiet. Only the reference ones are loud and hot.
The Noctua NH-U14S is a great cooler but if you get the Xeon you won't be OCing anyway so the stock cooler will work fine. The Hyper 212 Evo will be better and there are cheaper Noctua units will be quieter.
I don't know if an R9 290 will fit in that case.
Something like this > http://pcpartpicker.com/user/deejeta/saved/z7XnTW + a gpu, hdds etc of your picking. As for the noise levels of the gpu - most of the aftermarket coolers that are on plenty of the cards offer really nice noise levels - ie Asus dcu2. Dont worry about flashing it to a 290x, just oc it if you want extra grunt. GPU length wise anything under 13.3 inches fits.
I couldve sworn the CPU was a hyper-threaded too unless I was mistaken?
Phanteks is better than Noctua generally in terms of performance. Noctua might be slightly quieter, but almost negligibly.
The 1230V3 is hyperthreaded. The 1220 is not.
Actually, the noctua is noticeably quieter, and the phanteks are only a couple degrees cooler at most in tests. The noctua is also much easier to install. At full load the phanteks fans are also much louder to gain that small advantage when stress testing. You gain a little cooling, and color options with the phanteks, But they are more difficult to install and the noise is noticeable.
A friend uses a Phanteks PH-TC12DX and it's whisper quiet. Installation difficulty isn't sufficient reason not to buy something. You install it once and that's it. A CPU cooler that may require more effort to initially setup doesn't justify not buying another product which performs better.
Whisper quiet at idle or when gaming and everything's getting maxed out?
Noctua fans, when maxed out, are still amazingly quiet. I have no experience with the Phanteks, although I have heard pretty good thing about them.
The noctua NH-D14 is WAY overkill if you aren't over clocking and it is WAY to big for the sugo 9B. and I think you are looking for a mini-ITX motherboard rather than a m-atx (thats the middle size these days)
In that form factor I would recommend this:
http://pcpartpicker.com/p/nYwdxr
The case is very similar in size and design. This is about as quiet as you can get for the smallest possible form factor without spending more money on noctua fans.
I would go for something a little bigger in form factor, I would recommend this: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/xB9kjX
It keeps about the same budget, but the case will offer better dust protection and silence.
4770 and 1230v3 can be overclocked moderately depending on the chip and motherboard (most will do 4.2Ghz)
The Phanteks mounting is the same way as Noctua´s mounting. just to mention ☺
i realy doubt this...
I think you will not be able to get it much further then locking its turbo speed at 3.7ghz.
But for video editing an rendering on a budget i would go with a FX8350 anyway, caus overclocked it will be better then the xeon. There is not much of a diffrence between FX8350 and i7-4770K wenn it comes to video editing and rendering.
And no im not bottering to argue about this.
So my advice for his friend, grab a FX8350 they are on sale right now. or even a FX8320 ☺
I agree with this if you are looking to save some money on the rendering aspect. The processors do perform similarly when all 8 threads are banging away, but when they aren't the Intel does have an advantage.
Another consideration though is there are severely lacking options for mini-itx and micro ATX motherboards. The AMD processors are only viable options if you want to more traditional sized computer case.
We aren't talking about that model, we are talking about the 14cm models. Anyway.. I think it all comes down do if you want the colors.. The noise is noticeable, and both coolers will keep cool enough for almost any overclock.
You seriously won't be getting any more clock speed from either cooler. The cooling performance is so similar. Why not go for a cheaper and quieter solution. That makes the difference in the purchase.
I concede this point. I went back to look, and I saw that the issues were specifically with the AMD mounting or something along those lines. Some other reviews said that phanteks basically copied Noctua, but improved it a little and added color, but the fans aren't as quiet.
I guess it just comes down to if you want to pay for style, and there isn't anything wrong with that.
I can OC to 4.2 with an Asus z87-plus and an older corsair vengeance 2x4gb 1600mhz kit. You can get a higher clockspeed even with fixed voltage. You can OC more than 100MHz changing just BCLK strap and voltages. I probably got lucky with this chip though, for most you probably won't break 4.0 or 4.1, I haven't seen others with one like this here (mainly because everyone buys a 4770k). Keep in mind OCing a 4770 makes it heat more than a 4770k, so aftermarket cooling is required (I use a hyper 212 evo, got around 65 celsius max load @ 4.21Ghz).
4.21ghz t=65° C in games, stable
4.331Ghz t=72° C in games (natural selection 2 with igpu enabled), 80° in prime95 (the 32bit thing for max temps and power consumption in place fft, which isn't recommended for haswell)
Just to give you an idea how bad it gets even with small increments.
It did (last test) crash eventually, but not from heat (most likely it's my old ram kit that was unstable on my lga775 build when OCing too)
I'm not sure how much the igpu affects temperatures. I didn't check the speed there but I doubt the multiplier set to auto will OC the gpu as well (again, I OCd the BaseCLocK, the FSB equivalent to haswell)
I'm certain intel did this intentionally so you can't have both high clock speeds and the new instruction sets (+virtualization).
For headphones you can't go wrong with Sennheiser, look up the best you can afford and read reviews, and don't mind the ones that complain about bass depth or presence, they're mostly nocebo or copycats. If someone mentions good soundstage then they're great PC headphones (and good for classical music, if properly recorded in stereo).
Good luck with your build!
I chose mATX because it doesnt cut off TOO many options for him granted it does cut things off. He wanted compact but still packs a punch and has some expandability, am I wrong to pick mATX?
I swore you could fit it in the sugo 9b. I think i saw someone over at Overclockersclub fit one in their case
If thats the case, I'm probably going to try to help him find a sweet spot inbetween temperatures and performance gain. 100mhz isnt much of a boost either way for that 7 degree jump