new pc time

[oldskoolgent]

after 14 years ,my venerable old timer is creaking and unable to keep up with the gang. i'ts really just become a browser / print station with a little bit of office thrown in, compared to the gaming machine of old.

I've a budget of around 2.5K and no matter how easy anyone says it is, do not want to build.
I'm looking for a machine that will do the above - but also allow me to game, broad tastes from MSFS / DCS via the SIMs and of course the obligatory shooters.

monitor is all sorted for the moment, and after hearing peoples thoughts have configured the following on pcspeacilist ....
would welcome thoughts ..

Case	PCS PRISM-X ARGB MID TOWER CASE (Special Offer)
Processor (CPU)	AMD Ryzen 7 5800X Eight Core CPU (3.8GHz-4.7GHz/36MB CACHE/AM4)
Motherboard	ASUS® ROG STRIX B550-F GAMING (DDR4, USB 3.2, 6Gb/s) - ARGB Ready!
Memory (RAM)	64GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3200MHz (4 x 16GB)
Graphics Card	8GB ASUS ROG STRIX GEFORCE RTX 3070 Ti - HDMI, DP, LHR
1st M.2 SSD Drive	500GB SAMSUNG 970 EVO PLUS M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 3500MB/R, 3200MB/W)
2nd M.2 SSD Drive	1TB PCS PCIe M.2 SSD (3300 MB/R, 2900 MB/W)
Power	CORSAIR 1000W RMx SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Processor Cooling	Corsair iCUE H100i ELITE CAPELLIX RGB Hydro Series High Performance CPU Cooler
Thermal Paste	ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND
Sound Card	ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Card	10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT
Wireless Network Card	WIRELESS 802.11N 300Mbps/2.4GHz PCI-E CARD
USB/Thunderbolt Options	MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS

[Captain_Morgan]

Depending on your isp line speed / accesspoint the wireless less card at 300Mbs/2.4GHz seems a week link if you are not using a ethernet connection

[Brainpox]

If you can get the B550-E instead of B550-F you will have built in wifi and won’t need a separate card. It also has pretty decent onboard WiFi.

1000W power supply is overkill if you were looking to save a few pounds. You could get away with 700W.

Otherwise as long as you are gaming at 1440p or below it’s a good build. 3070ti is not a 4K card. £2500 is a strong price but if you don’t want to build yourself then someone needs to make their money.

[mmm-five]

Just so you know, there is a PCS forum specifically for checking your builds out.

https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/forums/

COMPONENT	DESCRIPTION	NOTES
Case	PCS PRISM-X ARGB MID TOWER CASE (Special Offer)	Not great airflow, I'd go for the Prism G or Prism TG...or Corsair iCUE 4000X (which comes with nice Corsair iCUE fans)
Processor (CPU)	AMD Ryzen 7 5800X Eight Core CPU (3.8GHz-4.7GHz/36MB CACHE/AM4)	can probably drop down to the 5700X to save a few £, and not lose any performance, along with using less power, producing less heat
Motherboard	ASUS® ROG STRIX B550-F GAMING (DDR4, USB 3.2, 6Gb/s) - ARGB Ready!	alternative with built-in wifi would be the Asus TUF X570-Plus Wifi
Memory (RAM)	64GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3200MHz (4 x 16GB)	do you have a need for 64GB, if not, 32GB is probably plenty, even for MSFS
Graphics Card	8GB ASUS ROG STRIX GEFORCE RTX 3070 Ti - HDMI, DP, LHR	I assume you're going for 1440p gaming?
1st M.2 SSD Drive	500GB SAMSUNG 970 EVO PLUS M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 3500MB/R, 3200MB/W)	for £10 LESS you can have the much faster 980 PRO version
2nd M.2 SSD Drive	1TB PCS PCIe M.2 SSD (3300 MB/R, 2900 MB/W)	it's okay, but I'd put the faster, Gen 4 1TB Solidigm in instead
Power	CORSAIR 1000W RMx SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET	very nice, and room for future upgrades, but you'd easily cope with a 850W model (unless you were planning on putting an RTX4090 in there
Processor Cooling	Corsair iCUE H100i ELITE CAPELLIX RGB Hydro Series High Performance CPU Cooler
Thermal Paste	ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND	not needed as the Corsair AIO comes with pre-applied paste
Sound Card	ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Card	10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT
Wireless Network Card	WIRELESS 802.11N 300Mbps/2.4GHz PCI-E CARD	either get a MB with wifi, or upgrade to the Intel AX200 card, as the basic/cheap one is very old, riddled with bugs and doesn't work properly
USB/Thunderbolt Options	MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS

Something more like this, perhaps?

Case
PCS PRISM TG BLACK ARGB MID TOWER CASE (for some reason the PCS configurator is saying the GPU or PSU is too big for some of the cases...when I'm not so sure as my case is even smaller and I have a 3080Ti and RM1000
Processor (CPU)
AMD Ryzen 7 5700X Eight Core CPU (3.4GHz-4.6GHz/36MB CACHE/AM4)
Motherboard
ASUS® TUF X570-PLUS GAMING WIFI (USB 3.2 Gen 2, PCIe 4.0, CrossFireX) - RGB Ready!
Memory (RAM)
32GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3600MHz (4 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
8GB NVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 3070 Ti - HDMI, DP, LHR
1st M.2 SSD Drive
500GB SAMSUNG 980 PRO M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 6900MB/R, 5000MB/W)
1st M.2 SSD Drive
1TB SOLIDIGM P41+ GEN 4 M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD (up to 4125MB/sR, 2950MB/sW)
Power Supply
CORSAIR 850W RMe SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1.5 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead, 1.0mm Core)
Processor Cooling
Corsair iCUE H100i ELITE CAPELLIX RGB Hydro Series High Performance CPU Cooler
Thermal Paste
STANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Card
10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT
USB/Thunderbolt Options
MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS
Operating System
Windows 11 Home 64 Bit - inc. Single Licence [KUK-00003]
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Windows Recovery Media
Windows 10/11 Multi-Language Recovery Image - Unlimited Downloads from Online Account
Office Software
FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft 365® (Operating System Required)
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE (Microsoft Windows built-in offering is plenty)
Browser
Microsoft® Edge
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 5 to 7 working days
Price
£2,053.00 including VAT and Delivery
Unique URL to re-configure
https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configuration...

For another £100, you could step up to the RTX3080!

For £200 you could do the RTX3080 and the 2TB Solidgm SSD.

Edited by mmm-five on Monday 31st October 14:02

[oldskoolgent]

Thanks for that ....
64GB is recommended on the DCS forums for heavy missions and as this machine is built to last more than a cpl of years seemd to make sense for not much outlay.
PSU is again to support going forward...

Would a 3080 support 4K gaming ? Not that i've got a 4K monitor yet lol. Also what about multi monitor support ? i can't VR due to glasses and poor eyes.

[mmm-five]

oldskoolgent said:

Thanks for that ....
64GB is recommended on the DCS forums for heavy missions and as this machine is built to last more than a cpl of years seemd to make sense for not much outlay.
PSU is again to support going forward...

Would a 3080 support 4K gaming ? Not that i've got a 4K monitor yet lol. Also what about multi monitor support ? i can't VR due to glasses and poor eyes.

Yes, the 3080 is a 4k GPU...of course the 3080Ti/3090/3090Ti/4090 are better, but also considerably more expensive/power-hungry.

At not far off the RTX3080 price, there's also the AMD RX6900XT to take into account, which shows a few FPS more than the 3080 in the testing I've seen on youtube...for example:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRftG_gDIQg

Edited by mmm-five on Monday 31st October 13:54

[xeny]

If you're doing an AMD build right now with half an eye to gaming wouldn't you'd want a 5800X3D or if the budget is sufficient (which may be tricky if it has to stretch to 64 GB of DDR5) something Ryzen 7000 based?

[FourWheelDrift]

https://www.scan.co.uk/3xs/configurator/3xs-gamer-... config it on here if you want to change anything, it is with a 3080 AND a 5800X3D for under £2.5k check config in the screen shot with a Corsair case not the Fractal in the top picture and other changes.

Long screen capture in spoiler.

In fact you can save another £100 by changing the B550-E to the B550-F I missed that.

[mmm-five]

xeny said:

If you're doing an AMD build right now with half an eye to gaming wouldn't you'd want a 5800X3D or if the budget is sufficient (which may be tricky if it has to stretch to 64 GB of DDR5) something Ryzen 7000 based?

If the budget was there, then that would be my choice...but configuring a similar system with a 7700X and DDR5 RAM takes it to £2800...and you can't configure 64GB of the 6000MHz RAM (in the preferred 2x32GB or less-preferred 4x16GB) at the moment on the PCS tool.

Obviously that's just a limitation of their stock/configurator, and I expect other system builders to have different availability.

Edited by mmm-five on Monday 31st October 14:05

[BlueMR2]

Isn’t Intels 13 series faster than most of Amd’s offerings?

[mmm-five]

BlueMR2 said:

Isn’t Intels 13 series faster than most of Amd’s offerings?

Not so much in gaming...but if you're doing video/rendering, then the benefit can be huge!

[FourWheelDrift]

FourWheelDrift said:

https://www.scan.co.uk/3xs/configurator/3xs-gamer-... config it on here if you want to change anything, it is with a 3080 AND a 5800X3D for under £2.5k check config in the screen shot with a Corsair case not the Fractal in the top picture and other changes.

Long screen capture in spoiler.

In fact you can save another £100 by changing the B550-E to the B550-F I missed that.

Gorilla Gaming Level 2.2 from Orbit, gets you a 5900x with a 3080 for just over £2000 - https://computerorbit.com/pages/gorilla-gaming-cus...

You can configure and make changes too.