Nervously Waiting for New PC

[shakydd]

Nerviously awaiting delivery of new PC - nervous because I'm hoping it's the nuts and worried it won't be! I should have posted in these forums before I bought but take a look below and it'd be great if anyone has any thoughts or comments. Primarily business and development use, a lot of virtual machines hence the RAM, and the odd game or four when I need some down time!

Case
PCS PRISM-X ARGB MID TOWER CASE
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™ i9 24-Core Processor i9-13900K (Up to 5.8GHz) 36MB Cache
Motherboard
GIGABYTE Z790 GAMING X AX (DDR5, USB 3.2, PCIe 5.0) - ARGB Ready
Memory (RAM)
192GB Corsair VENGEANCE RGB DDR5 5200MHz (4 x 48GB)
Graphics Card
12GB ASUS TUF GEFORCE RTX 4070 Ti OC EDITION - HDMI, DP
Graphics Card Support Bracket
NONE (BRACKET INCLUDED AS STANDARD ON 4070 Ti AND ABOVE)
1st M.2 SSD Drive
2TB SOLIDIGM P44 PRO GEN 4 M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD (up to 7000MB/sR, 6500MB/sW)
1st M.2 SSD Drive
2TB SOLIDIGM P41+ GEN 4 M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD (up to 4125MB/sR, 3325MB/sW)
1st Storage Drive
8TB SEAGATE IRONWOLF PRO 3.5", 7200 RPM 256MB CACHE
Power Supply
CORSAIR 850W RMx SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1.5 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead, 1.0mm Core)
Processor Cooling
PCS FrostFlow 360 Series ARGB High Performance Liquid Cooler
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND
LED Lighting
50cm RGB LED Strip
Sound Card
ASUS Xonar SE 5.1-Channel Gaming Audio Card
Network Card
10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT
USB/Thunderbolt Options
2 PORT (1 x TYPE A, 1 x TYPE C) USB 3.1 PCI-E CARD + STANDARD USB PORTS
Operating System
NO OPERATING SYSTEM REQUIRED
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Windows Recovery Media
NO RECOVERY MEDIA REQUIRED
Office Software
FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft 365® (Operating System Required)
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser
Microsoft® Edge
Warranty
3 Year Standard Warranty (1 Month Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 7 to 10 working days
Welcome Book
PCSpecialist Welcome Book - United Kingdom & Republic of Ireland
Logo Branding
PCSpecialist Logo

 

[SpyderTracks]

Personally I wouldn't suggest the Intel platform, it absolutely sucks for virtualisation as the e cores can't handle virtualised processes. It's not a small margin either, you're talking about 133% improved performance on equivalent AMD processors.

Plus you can't effectively cool it, so it WILL thermal throttle, so you'd never get the available performance anyway.

Intel Core i9-13900K Review - Power-Hungry Beast

With the Core i9-13900K, Intel delivers impressive performance. Our in-depth review confirms: Raptor Lake is the world's fastest CPU for gaming. Even in applications the processor is able to match AMD's Zen 4 Ryzen 9 7950X flagship. If only power consumption wasn't so high...

www.techpowerup.com

I would strongly suggest cancelling and getting some advice.

 

[shakydd]

Thanks for posting that link @SpyderTracks, it's a really interesting read. Also a bit of a conundrum - I do work with Oracle VM so that speed difference was quite something, but then I do a lot of MySQL (and other database) work and it seems the opposite effect?

When you say you can't effectively cool it, are you saying there's nothing anyone could do to effectively cool the spec I've got?

Thanks again for taking the time to reply, much appreciated.

 

[SpyderTracks]

but then I do a lot of MySQL (and other database) work and it seems the opposite effect?

Is that within virtualised environments or natively?

When you say you can't effectively cool it, are you saying there's nothing anyone could do to effectively cool the spec I've got?

The 13900k will thermal throttle and very likely warp as a result on anything but cryogenics, it's a dreadful socket design. The only way you can avoid it is by applying what's been called a "contact frame" which basically corrects the weakness of the chip and socket design, but of course, if you were to add one, it would void your warranty with Intel as if they admitted it was an issue, they'd have to issue a recall which would totally cripple them.

Intel Comments On Alder Lake's Warping and Bending Issues, Mods Void Warranty

"Nothing to see here, folks"

www.tomshardware.com

 

[shakydd]

For SQL and db, natively - I generally run all the VMs as test machines or servers, different OSes within a domain infrastructure to test code but the code itself and a lot of the db work is done native.

That sucks about the 13900k. If it's such a bad CPU, it's a shame it's even offered. I'm assuming that if something bad did happen, this would covered under the one year parts warranty?

I have a Z600 here ;-) That's lasted forever!

 

[SpyderTracks]

If it's such a bad CPU, it's a shame it's even offered. I'm assuming that if something bad did happen, this would covered under the one year parts warranty?

It would likely be covered by PCS, Intel say they'd cover it, but I don't hold Intels words very highly personally.

But effectively you'd lose almost nothing on MySQL vs 33% gains on virtualisation. It's not a compromise that would sway me personally, I'd be undoubtedly going AMD.

 

[shakydd]

It would likely be covered by PCS, Intel say they'd cover it, but I don't hold Intels words very highly personally.

But effectively you'd lose almost nothing on MySQL vs 33% gains on virtualisation. It's not a compromise that would sway me personally, I'd be undoubtedly going AMD.

Thanks Spyder - what a conundrum, going AMD would mean quite a change in spec. As a matter of interest, putting virtualization to one side, does Intel/my spec hold any advantages over AMD?

 

[SpyderTracks]

Thanks Spyder - what a conundrum, going AMD would mean quite a change in spec. As a matter of interest, putting virtualization to one side, does Intel/my spec hold any advantages over AMD?

If it were cooled effectively then yes, you'd reach slightly higher performance with database processing, especially on large data sets. If you had any single core workloads also, those would benefit from short term boost performance. But that's if you had cryogenics.

I couldn't give you expected performance, it's all down to your individual chip and how it sits in the socket as to how effective the cooling will be.

 

[SpyderTracks]

Nearly forgot, Adobe products tend to favour Intel also because of the single core frequency bump.

 

[Scott]

Just to add, the differences between Intel and AMD at the tight end are measurable, but I don't think they would be noticeable in usage. It would take some serious datasets to actually feel you were waiting longer IMO.

I wouldn't touch Intel right now. Will see what they bring with the next socket. After the 13 series they're changing the socket again so it's going to be another motherboard to upgrade anything (This annoys me the most).

I would genuinely recommend switching to AMD. You'll get so many more positives out of it, not to mention the fact that you will be able to upgrade over the coming years should you want to (vastly surpassing the 13900k which you'll be stuck with without a full platform change).

The 7950X3D may even be a viable option if the gaming rates highly. 7950X if it's secondary.