Desktop Upgrade

[paulrockliffe]

I have an average spec PC, it's a few years old now, the processor is an i5 that's I think 2016 vintage and the motherboard similar. I put an M.2 drive in it a couple of years ago and it's got 32Gb of decent spec RAM, so it works well still. It's best feature is that it's running a 1080ti and a 1050, so it'll let me work across 5 4k displays at 60Hz. I don't use it for gaming.

I've not had a top-spec PC in 20 years and fancy putting together something a bit faster, just because really. Last time I bought parts was 15 years ago, since then I've picked up someone's second hand thing and that's been fine, but I now haven't a clue what's worth spending on, where's good to buy from and if there's anything I need to watch out for in terms of compatibility.

I had a look on Scan last night and managed to get up to £1,000 fairly easily for an Intel i9 13th Gen setup picking close to the top spec options, 64Gb of RAM, fast M.2 SSD etc. I'm happy that the Graphics I have are good enough for what I do now, so not looking to change that, so basically looking at everything apart from that. Not averse to buying off the shelf if that makes sense, not averse to spending less money as I probably don't need top spec stuff. So I guess looking at the value for money element towards the top end.

What would you do if you were in a similar position, but you knew what to buy and from where?

[xeny]

I’d look at something similar, but unless you do a lot of very parallel multithreaded workloads I wouldn’t bother going as high end as an i9.

Be aware, Raptor lake refresh with higher core counts/clocks is likely to launch shortly.

What do you consider your most CPU intensive workload?

[HRL]

Don’t discount AMD Ryzen offhand.

I’ve had a 5950X for two years and it’s a cracker. I’d imagine the 7950X is even better.

[bobthemonkey]

HRL said:

Don’t discount AMD Ryzen offhand.

I’ve had a 5950X for two years and it’s a cracker. I’d imagine the 7950X is even better.

The X3D chips are particularly well reviewed as well. Just put a little aside for a decent cooler as they do run hot.

[paulrockliffe]

xeny said:

I’d look at something similar, but unless you do a lot of very parallel multithreaded workloads I wouldn’t bother going as high end as an i9.

Be aware, Raptor lake refresh with higher core counts/clocks is likely to launch shortly.

What do you consider your most CPU intensive workload?

When you say there's a refresh to Raptor Lake due, do you mean I should wait and buy the same CPU for less money? I'm not in any particular rush.

I don't know what I have in terms of CPU load, I'm increasing offloading more of that to cloud services, maybe Fusion 360. it's probably more that I have 50 Chrome tabs open and loads of other stuff going on and I like to be able to put stuff on Virtual Desktops and just leave it all open, though maybe that's more a RAM issue than CPU.

[xeny]

paulrockliffe said:

When you say there's a refresh to Raptor Lake due, do you mean I should wait and buy the same CPU for less money? I'm not in any particular rush.

I don't know what I have in terms of CPU load, I'm increasing offloading more of that to cloud services, maybe Fusion 360. it's probably more that I have 50 Chrome tabs open and loads of other stuff going on and I like to be able to put stuff on Virtual Desktops and just leave it all open, though maybe that's more a RAM issue than CPU.

same CPU for less money, or faster CPU for roughly the current money.

More "stuff" open is typically more a case of having enough RAM than running short of CPU.

Have you tried keeping task manager open and seeing how much time you spend with a "lot" of CPU load? Leave it on the processes tab sorted by CPU. You're interested in processes that take up a bit more than (100%/no of cores) worth of CPU as that works out as at least one core flat out.

If typically you only max out one core (so say 25 to 33% for a 4 core CPU) utilization, then your workload is dominated by single or lightly threaded applications - so you shop for good single core performance (very roughly equivalent to clock speed). If you frequently get all the cores busy (maybe split across multiple apps) then you're also interested in more cores, so it's worth spending more for an i7 or i9.

TL;DR - if the workload is predominantly single threaded and you care at all about budget get an i5 13600 or 13600K. If it is significantly threaded then look at the i7 and i9 as budget allows. If you're after "snappy" and have a mostly single threaded workload, then i5, enough RAM and a decent SSD will "feel" better than i7 or i9 and slower SSD or not really enough RAM.

Particularly if you're going to load up an i7 or an i9, pay attention to purchasing a good cooler. The Peerless Assassin has a good reputation and isn't ridiculously expensive. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mm4hyIHe1PM

[mmm-five]

bobthemonkey said:

The X3D chips are particularly well reviewed as well. Just put a little aside for a decent cooler as they do run hot.

But they're designed to run hot...and so even a mediocre cooler will suffice.

Whereas the 13th Gen i9 will overheat, throttle and eventually melt

You could get away with a Peerless Assassin on a 7600/7700/7800/7900, or an i5-13600/13700...anything else (i9-13900, 7950 or X3D versions) and I'd want to ensure peak performance with a 280/360mm AIO (no need for flashy RGB if you don't need it). I run a 5800X on a 240MM Corsair AIO and hit about 80ºC max after sustained gaming (in a Corsair 220T case housing a RTX4090 too).

The advantage the AMD offering has at the moment, is upgradability...as the AM4 socket is on its first CPU generation, and they plan to support another 2 CPU generation, so you'll be able to put in a 9800 or 11800 CPU in a few years time if you want. The current Intel socket is end-of-life, so it's a matter of throwing it away and starting again if you want an upgrade in 3 years time.

[xeny]

mmm-five said:

But they're designed to run hot...and so even a mediocre cooler will suffice.

Running hot is what lets you get away with the mediocre cooler - a bigger temperature gradient will dissipate more energy for a given spec cooler.

Disadvantage of AMD is I still hear odd mentions of RAM compatibility issues, and memory training delays during POST can be significant.

[mmm-five]

xeny said:

Running hot is what lets you get away with the mediocre cooler - a bigger temperature gradient will dissipate more energy for a given spec cooler.

But for the same performance level of CPU, you can get away with a lower-level AIO cooler or air-cooler on AMD Zen4 than you can on the equivalent 13th Gen Intel.

xeny said:

Disadvantage of AMD is I still hear odd mentions of RAM compatibility issues, and memory training delays during POST can be significant.

The earlier AGESA/BIOS did have some issues with anything over 5600MHz, but the latest release (only in the last week or two) has fixed it, and the system integrators are offering 6000MHz+ again (and some of my friends have tweaked their 6000MHz RAM to 6200MHz to stress test it).

Not seen any of them mention issues in training RAM in any situation other than changing the sticks or trying different speeds than the RAM specifies.

There were also issues with 4 sticks of 3600MHz in the last gen, Zen3 boards...but I was lucky as I didn't suffer...and the later AGESA/BIOS updates seemed to solve it for those who did.

[paulrockliffe]

I'm not for or against AMD stuff particularly, I think my requirements are firmly in the 'can't really go too far wrong' space, so unless there's a compelling reason to go one way or another, I'd probably just end up keeping it simple by looking for the best cost/value/performance answer in one space rather than mixing and making it harder to research or more importantly, harder to convince myself I'm picking the right stuff.

Not sure upgradability is a good enough reason to go AMD, I'm so far beyond what I need that realistically I'll either set this up and leave it alone until it starts to struggle in 10 years time and replace it all, or I'll fancy something better just for the sake of it in 5 years and then I won't want to keep an older motherboard anyway. I just don't see me trying to eek out the last bit of performance by picking up the fastest chip compatible that I couldn't afford when the computer was new, like I used to do 15 years ago.

It might be more useful to know where's good to buy from, a bit on price, but also prioritising websites that won't just let me fill my basket with bits that don't really play nicely together.

Thanks for all the details, really helpful, I'm back at my main PC now, and I basically have Microsoft Windows Search Indexer consistently at about 15% CPU and Google Chrome flitting between 1-2% and 30%. I'm not really doing much though as it crashed and I've not loaded much back up yet. 4 Core CPU and it's averaging about 30-40% across all applications and services.

Processor is i7-6700K @4.00GHz, 4 cores, 8 logical processors. Motherboard is an MSI Z270 Gaming Pro Carbon (MS-7A63)

It sounds like I want an i5, but I'll probably end up specing the RAM and SSD highly and then if I can afford an i7 I'd probably just do that just in case. Do you know when the new stuff is likely to arrive and prices to drop?

I would like to put the computer in a case that's built into the bottom of a box of drawers that's part of the desk I'm building, so if anyone knows of any cases that would be good in that configuration? I'm looking for old-school non-tower box, with front mounted water cooling.

[mmm-five]

PCPartPicker is a good site for building/configuring, and making sure things are compatible.

https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/

[Pent]

as above i currently building one too just because i havent had a new machine in so long.. didnt even know people didnt use SSD's lol

i have gone for an i7-13700k ( will be waiting for the 14th gens to come out as these should get cheaper or allow me to get a 14th gen)
Z790 mobo
360mm artic freezer 2 AIO
3060 graphics card
32gb ram and 1TB of corsair m2 at pcie 5.0 or something

im not so hot on all the latest gear , i just picked some stuff that went together well on that pc building site.

oh i have got a corsair 5000D case and a corsair 850w power supply.

Edited by Pent on Thursday 24th August 14:46

[xeny]

mmm-five said:

xeny said:

Running hot is what lets you get away with the mediocre cooler - a bigger temperature gradient will dissipate more energy for a given spec cooler.

But for the same performance level of CPU, you can get away with a lower-level AIO cooler or air-cooler on AMD Zen4 than you can on the equivalent 13th Gen Intel.

Certainly - I'm not seeing it as a disadvantage, more a smart approach that requires a bit of a mindset adjustment. I remember similar comments about how hot Haswell ran.

My experience with 12/13th gen Intel is that if you avoid allowing high all core turbo speeds then the power/heat situation is fine, but MB makers are all tempted to enable high all core clocks to get better reviews.

[HRL]

PC Specialist

Case
CORSAIR 5000D AIRFLOW TEMPERED GLASS GAMING CASE
Processor (CPU)
AMD Ryzen 9 7950X 16 Core CPU (4.5GHz-5.7GHz/80MB CACHE/AM5)
Motherboard
ASUS® TUF GAMING X670E-PLUS WIFI (DDR5, PCIe 5.0) - RGB Ready!
Memory (RAM)
32GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR5 5600MHz (2 x 16GB)
Graphics Card
INTEGRATED GRAPHICS ACCELERATOR (GPU)
1st M.2 SSD Drive
1TB SOLIDIGM P44 PRO GEN 4 M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD (up to 7000MB/sR, 6500MB/sW)
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
CORSAIR H100x RGB ELITE HIGH PERFORMANCE CPU COOLER
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND
Extra Case Fans
3 x 120mm Thermaltake TOUGHFAN 12 Case Fans
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Network Card
ONBOARD 2.5Gbe 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
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 8 to 10 working days
QTY
1
£1,172.50
ex VAT
£1,407.00
inc VAT and Delivery

No additional GPU added and you can use your existing Windows licence to activate it as it will come with an unlicensed Windows preinstalled.

Will keep you going for a very long time as long as 1Tb is enough storage for you. You can just transfer the GPU from your existing PC too.

[Brother D]

I went down the route of 2nd hand workstation and transferred my GPU over to it. HP Z8 G4 - the 256gb ram is probably over kill : )

Based purchase on my Z800 which I had for ages (also orignally 2nd hand)