Scott,
As usual sublime, and I'd be hard pressed to argue otherwise, and on price v performance absolutely no contest. But it is a business expense, which I depreciate over 2 years, the marginal differences are negligible.
I will admit, I had a certain aesthetic bias in what I could easily configure and so I made my choices. Human decisions are often more emotional than pragmatic.
Apart from mere performance, or performance per cost on the capex I still have two niggling concessions, which are seldom considered, and perhaps 3.
Sheer performance difference here is for the most part imperceptible, but:
1. the Ryzen does what it does way cheaper on power ( that's big, cant write that off in the business sense)
2. 7nm vs 14nm - massive technological difference, and advantage
3. 4 more cores... useful for my usecase
Not to mention issues with Intel, per se
All said and done, I'll get the job I want done, done. albeit it could have been done better. My old PCS beast (10 years old next month - where does the time go), now being retired to a server (and running my very own flavour of linux, dalix (no arrogance here lol) - is still exceptionally capable - amazingly so.
And I'll do well to be a bit less hasty in 2 years time.
Thanks for the input Scott
It's a monster system, there's absolutely no doubt. It's a powerhouse.
We just always want people to get the best for their money. We are enthusiasts and passionate about it.
The one thing you don't seem to have taken into consideration has been the platform. The X299 socket is finished. The AM4 socket still has some life left in it and should happily house the next generation chip. It also has PCIe-4.0 which allows for the next generation (or 3) of GPU.
Having gone down that route, in 2 years time you would be throwing in a new Chip & GPU and being back to full poowaaarrr
Regarding the aesthetic, I only chose the Fractal as it houses the H115i, which is what you would want with any high end system (keep an eye on your temps when running all cores btw).
For the extra cash I would ALWAYS choose the 500D SE (It's soooooo purdyyyy).
Regardless, you'll be happy. I was just explaining my reasoning.