New PC for streaming/Gaming help?

2014-07-02 07:23:53 am

The Overlord has arrived!

Yo all, the Overlord here.

In the near future I will get a bit of money. The heritage from my aunt you could call it. With this money I intend to buy some parts for a good streaming/gaming computer and then spend some money on a SC-512 capture board since I´ve heard and read a lot of good about this.

For anyone interested in the capture card you can read more about it here: http://www.solarisjapan.com/sc-512n1-l-dvi-component-hd-and-dvi-capture-board/ which is a bit pricey but in regards to the review written it looks great.

My current setup is as follows

i7 2600K running at base speed.
16GB Corsair ram 1600mhz
Msi Twin Frozr 680gtx

And a MSI Z68 motherboard. Together with a Corsair Carbide 500r and I think it was a cooler master power supply. This has worked fine and dandy streaming, playing and such. But I want to upgrade. This computer is starting to become a bit old and yeah. New stuff is always good to have right?

The things I am concerned about though is the hardware. Should I go for a 2011 socket, 1150 socket or wait untill the new pricey intel sockets come out in August/September?

Memory, as I intend to stream and keep other things going at the same time 16GB is a must. Corsair has not failed me yet so I intend to keep em going. But I do not know. Does the mhz on the memory do that much in how the memory work?

Graphics card. I am looking at a 780ti from MSI or Asus. I am not going to do SLi. The AMD card that I recently had was a HD5850. I liked it but the nVidia cards for me have been better. These 780 TI cards are pricey though so if you can motivate me to grab something else than by all means, give it a shot.

SSD, well I am inclined to try the samsung brand of SSD. The current one I have now is a OCZ and it has worked very well. Or should I upgrade to one of the newerr OCZ? I want to discuss this with you all.

My budget is well let´s say it´s around 1500US for parts. The GPU is not included in this. But parts.

What I am looking for is:

CPU - Is going for a high end i7 from the 1150 socket the right choice for streaming/gaming or is a high end i5 enough? I play everything from Wildstar to Transistor.
CPU Cooling - Thinking about the Corsair h100i as so far the h100 I currently use has been awesome.
Memory - 16GB is a must. Not for what I do with the computer but to be sure everything works fine.
Motherboard
Power Supply - Been looking at the EVGA brand for supplies. Anyone got any info on how they are from experience?
SSD - Samsung, OCZ or Intel? You help me decide.
Case - Have a case you like or enjoy? Do give me a link to it and I will check it out.

I don´t think I will ever need a DVD/Bluray reader since I never use discs any longer.

I think that is all. If this is the wrong place then I am sorry. I couldn´t find any other place really for this.

Thank you for reading this far and let´s have a good discussion.

Best Regards

-The Overlord

Thread title:

Yo all, the Overlord here.

In the near future I will get a bit of money. The heritage from my aunt you could call it. With this money I intend to buy some parts for a good streaming/gaming computer and then spend some money on a SC-512 capture board since I´ve heard and read a lot of good about this.

For anyone interested in the capture card you can read more about it here: http://www.solarisjapan.com/sc-512n1-l-dvi-component-hd-and-dvi-capture-board/ which is a bit pricey but in regards to the review written it looks great.

My current setup is as follows

i7 2600K running at base speed.
16GB Corsair ram 1600mhz
Msi Twin Frozr 680gtx

And a MSI Z68 motherboard. Together with a Corsair Carbide 500r and I think it was a cooler master power supply. This has worked fine and dandy streaming, playing and such. But I want to upgrade. This computer is starting to become a bit old and yeah. New stuff is always good to have right?

The things I am concerned about though is the hardware. Should I go for a 2011 socket, 1150 socket or wait untill the new pricey intel sockets come out in August/September?

Memory, as I intend to stream and keep other things going at the same time 16GB is a must. Corsair has not failed me yet so I intend to keep em going. But I do not know. Does the mhz on the memory do that much in how the memory work?

Graphics card. I am looking at a 780ti from MSI or Asus. I am not going to do SLi. The AMD card that I recently had was a HD5850. I liked it but the nVidia cards for me have been better. These 780 TI cards are pricey though so if you can motivate me to grab something else than by all means, give it a shot.

SSD, well I am inclined to try the samsung brand of SSD. The current one I have now is a OCZ and it has worked very well. Or should I upgrade to one of the newerr OCZ? I want to discuss this with you all.

My budget is well let´s say it´s around 1500US for parts. The GPU is not included in this. But parts.

What I am looking for is:

CPU - Is going for a high end i7 from the 1150 socket the right choice for streaming/gaming or is a high end i5 enough? I play everything from Wildstar to Transistor.
CPU Cooling - Thinking about the Corsair h100i as so far the h100 I currently use has been awesome.
Memory - 16GB is a must. Not for what I do with the computer but to be sure everything works fine.
Motherboard
Power Supply - Been looking at the EVGA brand for supplies. Anyone got any info on how they are from experience?
SSD - Samsung, OCZ or Intel? You help me decide.
Case - Have a case you like or enjoy? Do give me a link to it and I will check it out.

I don´t think I will ever need a DVD/Bluray reader since I never use discs any longer.

I think that is all. If this is the wrong place then I am sorry. I couldn´t find any other place really for this.

Thank you for reading this far and let´s have a good discussion.

Best Regards

-The Overlord

blizzz

Edit history:

blizzz: 2014-07-02 07:50:34 am

2014-07-02 07:48:01 am

If you're willing to buy a new CPU I would advise that you just overclock your current one. An overclocked 2600K should be faster than a stock 4790K. 4.2GHz should be safe or 4.5GHz if you've got a good chip. Just keep an eye on the temps and don't go too crazy on the voltage. In games you won't notice any difference between your 2600K and a 4790K. That also eliminates the need for a new motherboard.

1600MHz RAM is absolutely fine on Intel platforms. For AMD I would advise to go for a bit more speed, but on your PC you would only get 1-3% more performance if you invest in faster memory. Not worth it.

Why do you want to upgrade your PSU? If you're in a country with high electricity costs it might seem like a good idea to buy a Gold or Platinum PSU, but that will only safe you a couple € per month. Edit: Just realized that you're in the US. Your electricity prices are so low that upgrading a PSU will never safe you money, even after many years.

The 780 Ti is a nice card, but might be overkill for most games. It's about 30% faster than your 680. If you sell the 680 for a good price it might be worth the upgrade.

For SSDs you sould go with Samsung. I've got both a Samsung 830 and 840 Pro and they are great. Currently the 840 Evo is a good choice, but the 850 Pro is coming soon. The general recommendation is to only consider SSDs from companies that produce their own chips. But I've also got an OCZ Vertex 3 in my gaming PC which is still a great SSD despite all the bad press about OCZ.

Personally I like Fractal Designs cases, but the looks are always a personal choice.

If you're willing to buy a new CPU I would advise that you just overclock your current one. An overclocked 2600K should be faster than a stock 4790K. 4.2GHz should be safe or 4.5GHz if you've got a good chip. Just keep an eye on the temps and don't go too crazy on the voltage. In games you won't notice any difference between your 2600K and a 4790K. That also eliminates the need for a new motherboard.

1600MHz RAM is absolutely fine on Intel platforms. For AMD I would advise to go for a bit more speed, but on your PC you would only get 1-3% more performance if you invest in faster memory. Not worth it.

Why do you want to upgrade your PSU? If you're in a country with high electricity costs it might seem like a good idea to buy a Gold or Platinum PSU, but that will only safe you a couple € per month. Edit: Just realized that you're in the US. Your electricity prices are so low that upgrading a PSU will never safe you money, even after many years.

The 780 Ti is a nice card, but might be overkill for most games. It's about 30% faster than your 680. If you sell the 680 for a good price it might be worth the upgrade.

For SSDs you sould go with Samsung. I've got both a Samsung 830 and 840 Pro and they are great. Currently the 840 Evo is a good choice, but the 850 Pro is coming soon. The general recommendation is to only consider SSDs from companies that produce their own chips. But I've also got an OCZ Vertex 3 in my gaming PC which is still a great SSD despite all the bad press about OCZ.

Personally I like Fractal Designs cases, but the looks are always a personal choice.

Overlord_Manga

2014-07-02 08:14:55 am

The Overlord has arrived!

Thanks for the feedback blizzz. I should mention that no, I´m not from the US but Sweden. So electrical bills do matter a bit ;p

I don´t like overclocking. I´ve never before done it in my life and I am not sure I would handle the matter good. For streaming and doing loads more at the same time, skype, winamp, mail and such would be a good thing then?

The reason for this "upgrade" is that basically I want some new gear. My father is willing to buy this old computer of me and together with the heritage it should provide a nice solid upgrade to this computer which I am satisfied with but you know. You always want better parts if you can afford them. So I want some new parts and a nice capture card.

My reasoning for a 780 Ti is that I do not have to buy a new GPU in a long long time. So it should prove most usefull for me. AMD is never a choice for me. I´ve been spooked away from AMD since I watched a old video of a AMD CPU burning.

I have used Fractal Define R3 and R4 before. Good cases, well thought design and all. But I tend to switch from cases when I upgrade. unless it´s a case I really really like. Been eyeing some Lian Li cases a long time... but never gotten ahead to try one out.

Thanks for the feedback! I will consider it and think about it.

Thanks for the feedback blizzz. I should mention that no, I´m not from the US but Sweden. So electrical bills do matter a bit ;p

I don´t like overclocking. I´ve never before done it in my life and I am not sure I would handle the matter good. For streaming and doing loads more at the same time, skype, winamp, mail and such would be a good thing then?

The reason for this "upgrade" is that basically I want some new gear. My father is willing to buy this old computer of me and together with the heritage it should provide a nice solid upgrade to this computer which I am satisfied with but you know. You always want better parts if you can afford them. So I want some new parts and a nice capture card.

My reasoning for a 780 Ti is that I do not have to buy a new GPU in a long long time. So it should prove most usefull for me. AMD is never a choice for me. I´ve been spooked away from AMD since I watched a old video of a AMD CPU burning.

I have used Fractal Define R3 and R4 before. Good cases, well thought design and all. But I tend to switch from cases when I upgrade. unless it´s a case I really really like. Been eyeing some Lian Li cases a long time... but never gotten ahead to try one out.

Thanks for the feedback! I will consider it and think about it.

blizzz

2014-07-02 08:49:48 am

Overclocking i5 / i7 CPUs is extremely easy. You basically just set a multiplier in your BIOS. The base clock is 100MHz, so a multiplier of 42 would give you 4.2GHz. There's really not much else to do unless you want to get to the limits of your chip. There hasn't been much improvement with CPUs for several years. You will get maybe 10% more speed at the same clock rate. So buying a new CPU doesn't make too much sense. If you sell your current PC and buy a new one you will not gain all that much.

One thing to consider with the 780 Ti is that the next generation of NVidia GPUs (Maxwell) will be a lot more power efficient. Possibly lowering the power consumption by ~40% if the 750 Ti is any indicator. Though the difference isn't all that great. Even with the current power prices here (30ct per kWh where I live) the 780Ti will "only" cost 50€ per year if you game 3h per day.

For a PSU you could consider something around 600W for a high end PC. It won't use 600W, but you will be at the sweet spot for power efficiency. I don't know a particular PSU at the moment, but 80+ Gold (or Platinum), all Japanese caps and at least 5 year warranty should be a requirement.

Two things about the Micomsoft capture cards: They disable the C1 state of your CPU and from time to time don't reactivate it when you close the program. This results in unnecessary power usage and more heat / fan noise. The second thing is that you might have to correct color space issues in post processing. No huge problems, but something to consider at that price point.

Overclocking i5 / i7 CPUs is extremely easy. You basically just set a multiplier in your BIOS. The base clock is 100MHz, so a multiplier of 42 would give you 4.2GHz. There's really not much else to do unless you want to get to the limits of your chip. There hasn't been much improvement with CPUs for several years. You will get maybe 10% more speed at the same clock rate. So buying a new CPU doesn't make too much sense. If you sell your current PC and buy a new one you will not gain all that much.

One thing to consider with the 780 Ti is that the next generation of NVidia GPUs (Maxwell) will be a lot more power efficient. Possibly lowering the power consumption by ~40% if the 750 Ti is any indicator. Though the difference isn't all that great. Even with the current power prices here (30ct per kWh where I live) the 780Ti will "only" cost 50€ per year if you game 3h per day.

For a PSU you could consider something around 600W for a high end PC. It won't use 600W, but you will be at the sweet spot for power efficiency. I don't know a particular PSU at the moment, but 80+ Gold (or Platinum), all Japanese caps and at least 5 year warranty should be a requirement.

Two things about the Micomsoft capture cards: They disable the C1 state of your CPU and from time to time don't reactivate it when you close the program. This results in unnecessary power usage and more heat / fan noise. The second thing is that you might have to correct color space issues in post processing. No huge problems, but something to consider at that price point.

Overlord_Manga

2014-07-02 09:16:11 am

The Overlord has arrived!

Nice info. I can say though that I don´t mess with bios unless I absolutely must. And in that case it´s usually modyfying the boot order or checking to see if things have been found. I´ve updated a couple bios and such. But yeah. I stick to the few things I know about bios and don´t mess with the other things. Overclocking also means I must have better cooling. Sure the h100 makes it easy to cool the CPU but with how hot my room is the air isn´t that cool to begin with so I rather not take any chances.

Yeah, Maxwell are supposedly more power efficient. But those don´t arrive untill mid-late 2015 and yeah, not really waiting that long. So far my power consumption have been neglectable.

For a PSU I was considering the EVGA Supernova G2 750W, 80+ Gold, Modular. It´s gotten good reviews and is pretty cheap for that power and such.

blizzz

2014-07-02 09:46:10 am

The EVGA Supernova G2 750W seems to be a good choice. Good efficiency, Japanese caps and 10 year warranty. They seem to be pretty confident in it. 750W is way more than you need, but it also doesn't hurt much.

For the CPU you have a couple choices. You could go with a Haswell i7 (the 4790K is the better choice if you don't want to overclock the 4770K), a Xeon E3 or an i5. The i5 would be a step down from your current CPU and currently the Xeons don't seem to be as attractive as last year. You could also go with an extreme edition CPU, but I never found them to be a good value. For cooling you could go with the Corsair H110 or H100i, but a good air cooler would also be enough. For example the Thermalright Silver Arrow.

If you buy new memory you could buy 1866MHz RAM from Corsair or G.Skill that runs at 1.5V.

Overlord_Manga

2014-07-02 11:55:46 am

The Overlord has arrived!

I´ve basically only had air cooling with the standard heatsink from intel and that got to hot. After switching to the corsair h cooling systems the temperature has been fine so I´ll keep on buying those when I buy new parts like this. Yeah, the 4790K seems to be the CPU I´ll be getting from the reviews and such that I´ve read since waiting for the new LGA 2011-3 systems would probably mean me going over budget by a far bit. But they might shock me...

Thanks for the feedback blizzz.

oasiz

2014-07-08 03:32:44 am

Iha paska

Overclocking is as easy as pressing a "overclock my CPU" button in the BIOS, then it reboots itself for a few minutes and you are good to go. It's zero effort these days.
I have my 2600K running at 4.3GHz and 2500K running at 4.2GHz, both with automatic clocking.

Honestly, upgrading from a sandy i7 is not worth the money at the moment, the performance gains will be minimal.