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Building a PC

Mesh

By Mesh
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Mesh

Mesh

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I'm planning on building a PC my high school kids and wondered where's the best place to get all the parts....my last build I got everything from NewEgg (13 years ago). Is there a better place get all the parts?

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Mesh

Mesh

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1 hour ago, InstrEd said:

If you're lucking enough to be by a Microcenter that would be a good place to go IMHO 😃

There's one, but it's 236 miles from here :(...

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Shane_B.

Shane_B.

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I'm in the process of building a new PC. Everything has gone up in price in the span of the last 2 weeks. To buy everything for one PC I'm going to have to get the various parts from Newegg, Amazon, and Best Buy. eBay is a cheaper option, but the return process is horrible if you get a defective item.

The system I was going to build went up from $1130 to $1380 in just over two weeks. I had everything in my cart on Amazon for a while, all in stock. When I went to order everything this week the mobo, M.2 drive, and ram were out of stock from Amazon. My options were "Used like new" or to buy from independent sellers who are price gouging and have terrible return policies if something is received bad.

I'll wait to see what happens. My current CPU doesn't support Windows 11, so I have till October when they stop support for Windows 10. I'm building the system I always wanted and don't want to settle for something less, but I can wait.

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Shane_B.

Shane_B.

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5 hours ago, Mesh said:

Is this a good case? image.thumb.png.bdb0d973ce05e0fbf4ed84f6d30550f0.png

Thermaltake makes good cases. One thing you have to research is, some of the cooling fans for cpu's are so large now, they won't fit in every case.

The fan for the build I'm doing now is so large that I was only able to find one case it would fit in. The other requirement was I had to have a 5.25" bay to put a Blueray/CD player/burner in and they are very rare now. There was only 1 case that was wide enough that had a 5.25" bay.

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Mesh

Mesh

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5 hours ago, Shane_B. said:

Which CPU are you going with?

I'm not sure yet....Possibly when I go to Microcenter, I'll see if there are some good deals there. So far, I only got the Thermaltake Case (the one above).

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Shane_B.

Shane_B.

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23 hours ago, Mesh said:

I'm not sure yet....Possibly when I go to Microcenter, I'll see if there are some good deals there. So far, I only got the Thermaltake Case (the one above).

I looked up the specs on it. It can take an enormous CPU fan. Very nice case.

Don't look at the granddaddy of all CPU coolers. The Noctua NH-D15 G2. Resist the urge to click the link. I'm warnin' ya ... :)

I'm going with an i9 14900K. It has a reputation, but the problems have been resolved with a bit of BIOS tweaking and BIOS updates. Everyone says it requires liquid cooling, but I don't overclock. I run at standard speeds and I may underclock this. From what I read it somehow increases performance? I don't know. People run it without liquid, but you need a really really good CPU fan. 

I'm going with a mobo that supports full direct lanes to the CPU without splitting them and reducing the GPU and first M.2 SSD drive speed, as well as stock DDR 5 RAM that is not overclocked. It took a lot of research to find all this compatible stuff but I did it. 

There are brand new intel CPU's that run at the same speed as the i9, but they use a lot less power and don't heat up nearly as much. Only about $600 more for the CPU and compatible Mobo. Not worth the extra cost, especially if you aren't planning to overclock. In my opinion. My old  i7 6700K runs just fine for me, but it was old when I built it. This time I want to get the fastest I can that's still current gen. The only reason I'm even thinking about upgrading is because the 6700K won't support Windows 11, and I have to have it for work. 

If you need any input on anything feel free to ask away. I've been diving deep into this the last couple of months because I have to build a new PC before Windows 10 dies in October.

If you are planning on using an M.2 SSD, make sure you pick a motherboard that does not split the lanes with the GPU. Don't get a cheap M.2 SSD because the cheap ones don't have cache and run a lot slower.

Inexpensive non-lane splitting mobo's are out there, but you have to download the manuals and read through them to find out which one. Lane splitting is when you buy a PCIe 5 motherboard and it cuts the lanes in half when you put in a GPU and M.2 SSD in the Gen 5 slot. The GPU and M.2 Slot 1 SSD bypass the hard drive controller and go directly to the CPU making them work theoretically faster/smoother. The GIGABYTE Z790 AORUS Elite X WIFI7 does not split lanes. It's the one I'm going with.

No GPU supports PCIe 5 right now, but will be in the future. It's ok to put a current PCIe 4 GPU in the 5 slot.

Edited by Shane_B.
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Chaps

Chaps

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1 hour ago, Jim Roseberry said:

If you're building a 14900k, you don't want ANY air-cooler... including the D15.

Too much heat for it to dissipate.

Roger that.  These days many computer cases have AIO (All In One) Liquid coolers already built into the case. Might be good for someone who wants to avoid the hassle of installing one.

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Shane_B.

Shane_B.

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I brought up the 14900k. Here's my 2 cents on it.

If you are even remotely thinking of overclocking, don't go with a fan and go liquid.

The benchmarks I've seen show the D15 and a few other much cheaper fans giving almost the same results as liquid cooling not overclocked while being driven hard in benchmark tests.

The results I've seen running non-overclocked and hard all fall well below temps that would make it throttle down. The competitors the D15 were compared to were all within a few degrees.

@Mesh Here's what I've found after a few months or researching in my spare time:

You have to dig and search to find stock speed RAM. 99% of listed specs are their 'stable' overclocked speeds. Most are 4800 stock but the advertised speeds of 5600 and higher are 'stable' overclocked speeds tested by the manufacturer. DDR5 on mobo's are not all the same. Some only natively support 4800, some 5600.

Unless your motherboard BIOS updates fixed the default settings, the 14th gen CPU's will be automatically overclocked even if you select stock settings. You have to manually change settings to make them stock spec and run properly.

Use an Anti-Bending Buckle aka Contact Block if you are using a 14th gen cpu. And do not overtighten it. That's one mistake I've seen a lot of videos about. Barely snug the screws. You don't want to warp the anit-warper. :D

14th gen CPU's metal plates warp over time. The anit-bending buckle stops it and dissipates heat better to the cooling block on the fan or liquid cooling block. The D15 offers different version to accommodate the warping. If you install a brand new 14th gen CPU use the "all around" version of the D15 and an anit-bending buckle, or any other fan that only has 1 version and the contact block.

Get a motherboard that doesn't split lanes between the PCI and 1st M.2 slot, especially if you are getting one of the newer GPU's out. M.2 slots after the 1st one are controlled by the board and not directly by the CPU like the 1st PCI and M.2 slot are unless you get a really high end mobo.

Get an M.2 drive that has cache.

Don't fill all 4 Ram slots. Doing so slows your ram speed down. Fill 2 slots.

Research case airflow on youtube. It doesn't take a lot, but it has to have proper in and out flow.

Here's the system I'm putting together:

CPU 14900K

CPU CONTACT BLOCK Thermalright LGA1700-BCF 

MOBO Gigabyte Z790 Aorus Elite X Wifi 7 (Doesn't split CPU lanes between the first PCI and M.2 slots.) This is a PCIe5 mobo and DDR5 RAM @ 5600. I got it to be able to upgrade in the future. No GPU runs at PCIe 5 now. All are 4.

RAM Kingston (KVR56U46BD8-32) x 2 (Stock 5600 not overclockable.)

Kingston M.2 Drive (SFYRD/2000G)

PSU MSI-MAG A750GL PCIE5 (Newer video cards than my rtx 3060 with the 14900 require more than 750W).

FAN D15??

CASE Fractal Design Define R5 (Only one I could find wide enough for the D15 and has a slot for my BluRay drive.)

Hope this helps in some way and the info I've come up with is accurate. Anyone, please correct anything I got wrong. It's been a very long time since I built a PC and a lot has changed that's why I'm taking my time piecing it together. I'd love to buy one off the shelf, but money just doesn't allow. This system with the case I'm looking at and the D15 fan is around $1300. No GPU. Prices keep changing. It was $1100, now it's around $1350. I don't think you could buy the system I'm building pre-built for that.

I agree with liquid cooling if you are overclocking. I'm not convinced you need liquid if you are running stock speeds, based off the benchmarks I've seen.

Edited by Shane_B.
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