Build advice SFF/HTPC/Gaming rig

T

Tych-0

Gawd
Joined
Jul 7, 2010
Messages
545
1) What will you be doing with this PC? Gaming? Photoshop? Web browsing? etc

This is my first SFF/HTPC build and I'm really not sure what exactly I'm looking for. I'm pretty familiar with full sized gear, but I want some input from you more experienced SFF peeps on this.

This is primarily for my GF as her desktop, but will eventually be hooked up to a TV in our bedroom for movies and gaming. She will be web browsing, light photoshop, and gaming, though she's not a big FPS gamer. Mostly the Sims, and Final Fantasy and other role playing games. I'd like to get her something that can max these out at 60 fps, and continue to do so with new games like this into the next year or more. This computer could very well end up with my 1440p U2711, and a 1080p TV hooked up to it in the near future.


2) What's your budget? Are tax and shipping included?

$1000, I'll go higher though, that's just a ballpark. I want something that performs like a champ, looks great, and is quiet.


3) Which country do you live in? If the U.S, please tell us the state and city if possible.

Alberta, Canada


4) What exact parts do you need for that budget? CPU, RAM, case, etc. The word "Everything" is not a valid answer. Please list out all the parts you'll need.

This is a complete build: Chassis (should be nice and small with understated good looks, I'm not scared to splurge a little here), MOBO, CPU, RAM, SSD, HDD, video card, PSU.


5) If reusing any parts, what parts will you be reusing? Please be especially specific about the power supply. List make and model.

I have a blu-ray drive on my main rig that is basically unused, so I may steal that. Also, I may eventually give this rig one of my GTX 780s when I inevitably upgrade it sometime this year, so it would be nice if that is a possibility.


6) Will you be overclocking?

Yes


7) What is the max resolution of your monitor? What size is it?

No monitor, please recommend. I'm thinking a nice 1080p ~24" IPS or VA.


8) When do you plan on building/buying the PC?

ASAP. Probably by Feb 1.

9) What features do you need in a motherboard? RAID? Firewire? Crossfire or SLI support? USB 3.0? SATA 6Gb/s? eSATA? Onboard video (as a backup or main GPU)? UEFI? etc.

USB 3, and yes SATA 6GB/s SLI/Crossfire support isn't necessary, but I wouldn't mind having the option.


10) Do you already have a legit and reusable/transferable OS key/license? If yes, what OS? Is it 32bit or 64bit?

No, I think we'll get win 8.1


Thank you for any recommendations.
 
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No one with any advice? Really just a couple case and mobo recomendations would be nice, the rest I'm sure I can figure out.

For the case I was thinking the new Corsair 250D, but wouldn't mind going a little smaller if there are good options.

Maybe I should have this moved to 'general computing'?
 
Do you want mITX? The Corsair 250D is huge for a mITX case IMO. I'd prefer something along the lines of a Silverstone FT03 mini. I have a Node 304 I use as a NAS and it fits all the basic components you'd want if that form factor is more to your liking.

I have a Asrock Z87E motherboard, works well. Not sure what specifically you need help deciding on? Your basic requirements are pretty general, everything current will have USB 3.0 and Sata 6GB/s, no mITX boards will support SLI/Crossfire.
 
Hi :)

Difficult to recommend such an open request. I could fill in what I would buy, but there's maybe too many choices. You say your GF is only a light gamer, but then you mention 1440p and a 780. You mention overclocking, but the budget is maybe too small.

So start with case. The 250D looks very nice but it is indeed quite big for SFF (28 litres). If you want to keep the full size optical drive from your last case, then it's maybe a good choice. Since small cases often have slim-optical or no optical support.

Some popular cases in SFF:
Silverstone SG05/06 (11 litres, slim optical)
Silverstone SG07/08 (15 litres, slim optical)
Cooler Master 120/130 Elite (20 litres)
Fractal Design Node 304 (20 litres, no optical)
Bitfenix Prodigy (27 litres, 36 with handles)

Have a look at some of those and see if anything appeals. Further suggestions can be based on limitations of those cases.
 
I guess you could go cheaper with a z77 board/CPU, because since you'll be clocking the performane difference shoud basically disappear from the K-series chips (ivy tends to clock better, mostly due to a lack of on-die VRM I think). You'll be losing the upgrade path to broadwell, if you ever chose to do that.

As for cases, I guess you've seen the M1 thread already? :)
 
Haha, yeah it has been about 48h, I figured I was being reasonably patient! Thank you for that parts list though liangr, that looks pretty good.

I was thinking m-ITX yes, so the 250D while very nice looking, and I like the flexability is about a large as I want to go. Thank you for those case ideas WiSK, I'm going to take a look at them all and get back here. I also realize there are some contradictions there, but I can see her systems ending up with my main rig's hand-me-downs, but that isn't 100% needed if it throws out the idea of keeping this a relatively SFF system. Taking my optical was just an idea, certainly not needed, just figured it could be used for watching Blu rays.

As far as the MOBO goes, I'm looking for advice as to what are your favourites, best features and performance for the price basically.

Hmmm, never considered z77, though an upgrade path is a very nice option to have. I've seen the M1 and LOVE it, but time is of the essence here, this is for her birthday on Feb 19! I don't think I can get it by then can I?
 
M1s aren't available so it isn't really relevant. You'll have to post the dimensions (length) of your 780 if you want that to be an option. Most cases have a max gpu length and this may force your hand in one direction or the other.

You are looking at spending 300 on a monitor, 100 for windows, and 100 on a case. That doesn't leave a lot of budget for everything else (500). If you want the current generation and an upgrade path, you'll want an LGA 1150 motherboard.

If you want to be able to drive your 780 down the road, a stronger CPU will be a benefit, and something like:
Intel Core i5-4570 Haswell 3.2GHz LGA 1150 84W Quad-Core is nice for $190.

Add a 600 watt evga/corsair PSU for $70, and your budget is running thin.

The ASRock Z87E-ITX LGA 1150 at $150 is very nice. You can go cheaper here if you want, but for ITX I find premium motherboards to be worth it more often than not (better NICs, sound, wireless, etc.).


Now you have $90 left for VGA, RAM, and HDD. You can save some money by skimping on the MB (~$70), but your VGA solution will have to be a stop-gap until your 780 can be used.
 
liangr's list is pretty good if the monitor is separate from your budget. I would recommend a slight PSU upgrade into the 600W range if you want to drive a 780 down the road (780 can pull 375W on its own).

Also note the Obsidian 250D isn't shipping until mid-february either, so I don't think its an option. Some cases restrict the size of PSU you can use as well, so take that into account. (I'm not sure the 250D can use a full size optical drive with a long VGA, it wasn't clear from the reviews if the drive bay had to be removed permanently or just temporarily to ease installation).
 
Case: $50 Cooler Master Elite 130 if you want to save some $$. It should easily handle the 780.
The 250D if you can wait a few weeks for it to arrive and want something nicer looking.
Mobo: $135 GIGABYTE GA-H87N-WIFI
CPU: $190 Intel Core i5-4430 Haswell 3.0GHz
RAM: $77 G.SKILL Ares Series 8GB (2 x 4GB)
SSD: $149 Crucial M500 240GB SATA
HDD: $90 Western Digital WD Green 2TB
Videocard: $140 GIGABYTE REV2 Radeon R7 260X 2GB - This should be sufficient until you can spare your 780.
PSU: $75 SILVERSTONE Strider Plus ST50F-P 500W.... Also pick up a set of these for $30 That should be plenty of power and the short cables will make cable management a snap.

That is $936 total for the items you included in your main list, not including any shipping and taxes. CA prices average out about the same as those US prices as far as I can tell. If you wanted to spend the remaining $ and still intended to overclock then spend it on the motherboard as nothing else worthwhile can be had for the difference.

Windows 8.1 is $100 more.
Monitor: $127 HP Smartbuy LV2311 Black 23"

If you are trying to get the entire deal including the monitor and Windows 8.1 for under $1000 then the above build is $163 over budget, not including shipping or taxes.

The places you can make up the difference are:
Cheaper PSU and no short-cords. Savings:~$40.
128GB SSD instead of 256GB. Savings: ~$60
Buy from somewhere other than the egg. Savings: ~$50

However, you said you would be willing to go higher if needed, so it might be worth it. If you want to spend more than $1163 then spend the extra on the monitor first, motherboard second. Though if you are really going to move it to some other monitor/TV in a year or less then maybe you should stick with a very inexpensive 23" like the one above.

Personally on a build like this I would skip the SSD entirely for now. Wait for prices to drop even more, then replace the one in your main system with a newer and bigger one later and move your old one to this PC. Get by with a regular desktop harddrive in the meantime.
 
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Quick note: it appears the Obsidian 250D is available from Corsair directly, if you are interested in going that direction.
 
Lol, I guess I missed this post a few days ago and I just looked at the time :)

arentol that is a reasonable build if newegg didn't charge an arm and a leg for shipping in Canada :)

I usually pick things that are available from NCIX because they have free in store pick up.

Also sorry the build I picked is not overclock friendly, going with a Z87 board and the 4670k will limit any decent gpu.
 
liangr said:
arentol that is a reasonable build if newegg didn't charge an arm and a leg for shipping in Canada :)
Click to expand...

I used Newegg to find the parts and get general pricing because they have about everything available and their search system is the best around. However, no matter where you live I would actually recommend looking around to find better pricing on each part before actually buying them.
 
liangr said:
Lol, I guess I missed this post a few days ago and I just looked at the time :)

arentol that is a reasonable build if newegg didn't charge an arm and a leg for shipping in Canada :)

I usually pick things that are available from NCIX because they have free in store pick up.

Also sorry the build I picked is not overclock friendly, going with a Z87 board and the 4670k will limit any decent gpu.
Click to expand...

A 4670k will limit any decent gpu.....?!
I trust you meant the opposite :)
 
Okay, so I've been using everybody's great suggestions and trying to piece myself something together. I’ve most definitely having trouble keeping it under that budget; that is my own damn fault for not really adding things up beforehand, I’m almost certainly blowing it to get what I want for her, but please let me know if any of these parts seem like over kill.

I would love some more input on the below, but here is what I have for the moment:

Case: Fractal Node $90
PSU: Seasonic G Series 650W 80PLUS Gold (heard this fits nicely with the node) $120
MOBO: ASRock Z87E-ITX $200
CPU: i5 4670k $270 Can somebody recommend a cooler?
RAM: Corsair Vengeance Blue CMZ8GX3M2A1600C9B 8GB $93 (might these be too tall?)
HDD: Seagate Barracuda 3TB $130
SSD: Crucial m500 240GB $154
GPU: XFX R9 270X $240 (I was thinking I want a ref style cooler that exhausts air…do I?)

$1204 yikes!

I’m pretty much sold on on the Node 304, it looks great, but no optical (no biggie), will this fit my 780? Any other cases like it I should consider?

I’m most likely going to get things from NCIX, I’ve found couple price matches in there already but if you know of any places above I’m getting ripped off on; please let me know!

Oh and any other decent monitors for cheap you can recommend?

Thanks!
 
You could always drop to 550W and save yourself $20 as you will never need 650W

ASUS PB238Q is going for $240 after rebate, 23inch 1080p ips screen with pivot. This is the one I would probably get at this very moment. All depends on your budget of course.
 
Tych-0 said:
Okay, so I've been using everybody's great suggestions and trying to piece myself something together. I’ve most definitely having trouble keeping it under that budget; that is my own damn fault for not really adding things up beforehand, I’m almost certainly blowing it to get what I want for her, but please let me know if any of these parts seem like over kill.

I would love some more input on the below, but here is what I have for the moment:

Case: Fractal Node $90
PSU: Seasonic G Series 650W 80PLUS Gold (heard this fits nicely with the node) $120
MOBO: ASRock Z87E-ITX $200
CPU: i5 4670k $270 Can somebody recommend a cooler?
RAM: Corsair Vengeance Blue CMZ8GX3M2A1600C9B 8GB $93 (might these be too tall?)
HDD: Seagate Barracuda 3TB $130
SSD: Crucial m500 240GB $154
GPU: XFX R9 270X $240 (I was thinking I want a ref style cooler that exhausts air…do I?)

$1204 yikes!

I’m pretty much sold on on the Node 304, it looks great, but no optical (no biggie), will this fit my 780? Any other cases like it I should consider?

I’m most likely going to get things from NCIX, I’ve found couple price matches in there already but if you know of any places above I’m getting ripped off on; please let me know!

Oh and any other decent monitors for cheap you can recommend?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

Do you have a Microcenter near you? Through them I got that processor for $200 and that exact motherboard for ~$100 through a combo deal. Also, have you considered using a mSATA drive as your SSD? Since the node is a small case, I find it important to try to cut down on the number of cables when working with mITX. The Plextor M5M and Mushkin Atlas drives should work just fine and are pretty comparably priced.

Also, the case is pretty flexible on coolers, you can probably fit just about any air cooler in it, take this thread for example: http://www.overclock.net/t/1328389/fractal-node-304-with-gtx-690-and-a-big-cooler-and-a-long-story
 
Why not the stock cooler? Will you be overclocking? You could get some cheaper memory and a cheaper SSD.

Also something like an ASUS direct cu r9 270 is clocked nice and gets pretty close to a 270x. It's usually around 200
 
Good idea on the stock hsf, I'll stick with that for now, and steal my Coolit Eco from mine when I upgrade (probably for Haswell-e).

Which would you all choose, for video cards? Ref style exhausting cooler or beefed up third part style like the direc5 CU etc.?
 
So no one with any input as to which style of gpu cooler 8s preferable in this setup? How about that vengeance ram, will the fins on top of it be a problem with the cpu hsf or any other part?
 
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