Advice on new build please - £1750-£2000 gaming PC

[SaijoBob]

Looking for some advice on the below spec please. Aim is to comfortably run modern and games over next few years at high specs, whilst also keeping the system reasonably quiet as it will be based in the living room.

Maximum budget is £2,000 if you think there are some changes that would make a material difference to either performance or noise. Not planning on any over locking for now.

Case
FRACTAL DEFINE S BLACK GAMING CASE (Window)
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™i7 Quad Core Processor i7-7700k (4.2GHz) 8MB Cache
Motherboard
ASUS® ROG STRIX Z270E GAMING: LGA1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GB, WiFi - RGB Ready!
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3200MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
8GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 1080 - DVI, HDMI, 3x DP - GeForce GTX VR Ready!
1st Hard Disk
480GB KINGSTON UV400 2.5" SSD, SATA 6 Gb (550MB/R, 500MB/W)
2nd Hard Disk
2TB SEAGATE FIRECUDA 3.5" SSHD - UP TO 5X FASTER THAN HDD!
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
NOT REQUIRED
Power Supply
CORSAIR 650W TXm SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
Noctua NH-U14S Ultra Quiet Performance CPU Cooler
Thermal Paste
EK-TIM ECTOTHERM THERMAL COMPOUND
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Wireless/Wired Networking
10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT (Wi-Fi NOT INCLUDED)

Total inc. VAT and delivery - £1795.00

URL to reconfigure: https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/intel-z270-pc/!FZxqH8f3z/

 

[Oussebon]

I'd suggest waiting for Intel's Coffee Lake CPUs to be out from 5th October. Initial indicates are they give better performance and should be more futureproof.

I'd suggest a better SSD like the 850 Evo, or 960 Evo from the M.2 SSD section. And for added quietness the RM850x PSU, as unlike the VS and TXm it has a passive mode where it will often cool itself silently, i.e. without needing to use its fan.

If you're not bothered about a side window, the Fractal Define R5 has a 3-speed fan controller built in that can be used to turn the case fans down.

What monitor are you pairing it with? 1080p TV?

 

[SaijoBob]

Thanks for the advice, not in a great rush so will wait for the new i7 8700k Coffee Lake CPU in October.

Will make the switch on SSD and PSU as well - good to get the noise down.

Question on the case though - how would I tell which of the three fan speeds I should use, as looks like there is no temperature reader on the case itself. Just switch off when using for internet browsing/work, and switch on to normal setting when gaming?

Monitor wise - will be getting a new monitor for Christmas, probably something in the £450-£650 range. Also will be hooking up to a nearby 4K TV for big screen games.

 

[Oussebon]

Question on the case though - how would I tell which of the three fan speeds I should use, as looks like there is no temperature reader on the case itself. Just switch off when using for internet browsing/work, and switch on to normal setting when gaming?

If you want to monitor temps, you can use software like MSI Afterburner, HWinfo, Realtemp, etc. But as you say, you'll want the fans turned up fully (the default) when gaming, and you could turn them down when doing less demanding stuff. On my R4, I tend only to use the 12v (full) and 7v (middle) settings, as 5v (lowest) doesn't sound much quieter than 7v to my ears, though I think the R4 has a different model of fans.

Monitor wise - will be getting a new monitor for Christmas, probably something in the £450-£650 range. Also will be hooking up to a nearby 4K TV for big screen games.

For 4k gaming you'd likely want the extra horsepower of the GTX 1080 ti. If wrangling it into the budget is an issue, dropping the SSD to a 256gb PM961 would probably be my first move - since you can always add more SSD storage in the future as and when you want.

 

[SaijoBob]

Great, will pick up the software to monitor temperature and switch itself looks easy enough to use. This will make it much better for using next to TV when other half is in the room.

Not too worried on the 4K gaming side as I expect cards in the next couple of years to make 4K gaming more achievable - even with the ti card still seems like compromises have to be made. Will prioritise frame rate in the meantime. Still, will double check price difference of the changes you suggest and if not much in it may swing to the top graphics card...

 

[Oussebon]

Maybe something like:

Case
FRACTAL DEFINE R5 BLACK QUIET MID-TOWER CASE
Overclocked CPU
Overclocked Intel® Core™ i7-8700K Six Core (3.7GHz @ up to 4.8GHz)
Motherboard
Gigabyte Z370 AORUS Ultra Gaming: ATX, LG1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GBs - RGB Ready
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3000MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
11GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 1080 Ti - HDMI, 3x DP GeForce - GTX VR Ready!
FREE Middle-Earth: Shadow of War with select GTX 10 Series Graphics Cards!
1[SUP]st[/SUP] Hard Disk
2TB SATA-III 3.5" HDD, 6GB/s, 7200RPM, 64MB CACHE
M.2 SSD Drive
256GB SAMSUNG PM961 M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 2800MB/R, 1100MB/W)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
NOT REQUIRED
Power Supply
CORSAIR 850W RMx SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
Noctua NH-U14S Ultra Quiet Performance CPU Cooler
Thermal Paste
EK-TIM ECTOTHERM THERMAL COMPOUND
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Wireless/Wired Networking
10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT (Wi-Fi NOT INCLUDED)
USB Options
MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS
Operating System
Genuine Windows 10 Home 64 Bit - inc DVD & Single Licence
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Office Software
NO OFFICE SOFTWARE
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser
Microsoft® Edge (Windows 10 Only)
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 8 to 10 working days
Quantity
1

Price £1,977.00 including VAT and delivery

Unique URL to re-configure : https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/intel-z370-overclocked/q8Vn8FQDjv/