Building a gaming system

[DarrinS]

So, my son wants to get into PC gaming and build his own system. Is $700 budget enough to build a respectable gaming system with an easy upgrade path? Also, I'd like to not have to worry about overclocking. Thanks

[baseline bum]

So, my son wants to get into PC gaming and build his own system. Is $700 budget enough to build a respectable gaming system with an easy upgrade path? Also, I'd like to not have to worry about overclocking. Thanks

What does he play? For an all around gaming system able to handle heavy duty games like Fallout 4, Witcher 3, Star Wars Battlefront, Battlefield 4, etc at 1080p I'd go with an i3-6100 and a GTX 960 4GB. If you're able to snag a Windows license from work, this would be a nice build with lots of room to upgrade:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i3-6100 3.7GHz Dual-Core Processor ($125.98 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: ASRock Z170M Pro4S Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($102.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: Mushkin Redline 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2666 Memory ($57.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($51.99 @ Newegg)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 960 4GB Video Card ($211.98 @ Newegg)
Case: NZXT S340 (Black/Blue) ATX Mid Tower Case ($64.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: XFX TS 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($51.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $667.90
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-11-20 12:41 EST-0500

That also comes with $45 in mail in rebates that I didn't include. But if you do include MIR, you could go up to an i5-6500 and after that $45 in rebates you'd be at $701.91.

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-6500 3.2GHz Quad-Core Processor ($204.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: ASRock Z170M Pro4S Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($102.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: Mushkin Redline 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2666 Memory ($57.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($51.99 @ Newegg)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 960 4GB Video Card ($211.98 @ Newegg)
Case: NZXT S340 (Black/Blue) ATX Mid Tower Case ($64.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: XFX TS 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($51.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $746.91
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-11-20 12:46 EST-0500

I added the Z170 board and the overclocked RAM to give the option to add an unlocked cpu later on and because when cpu bound (which is going to happen in modern games with an i3) the RAM speed can make a real difference. See the review of the i3-6100 on Digital Foundry's youtube page to see what I mean. Also, going with an H series board you'll be stuck at DDR4-2133, but getting full speed out of your RAM on a Z series board is as simple as just selecting the XMP profile from the BIOS. I also put a power supply that is pretty overkill for an i3 + 960, but it's a high quality unit (Seasonic OEM) in case your son wants to add a higher power GPU and/or CPU later on, since you want upgradability.

The case is pretty nice, the NZXT S340. It's got great build quality, pc gamers love windows in their computers, and it's easy to do the cable work for a clean build. I was thinking of buying this case myself after checking it out firsthand at Altex, though I opted with a Phanteks Enthoo Pro instead because I love full towers. The S340's window does scratch really easily though, so make sure your son knows this if you end up getting it. Also, note the one I picked in those builds above has different colors from the one in this review, as the all black one was more expensive.



Since you want an upgrade path Skylake is the only way to go. Intel isn't making any more chips on LGA 1150 while they'll be making Skylake, Kaby Lake, and Cannonlake on LGA 1151, so the earliest you'd see a new mainstream socket is late 2017, though I'd bet more on late 2018 since I doubt Intel would just want to punt Cannonlake like they just had to do with Broadwell.

[baseline bum]

That system should be pretty good for 60 fps at high in most games, and close to 60 fps on medium on the hardest to run games like Witcher 3 or Crysis 3.

[baseline bum]

Another option if you up your budget another $50 you could go with an EVGA B-Stock GTX 970 and turn that i5 rig from a midrange 1080p system to a borderline high end system for playing games at ultra and high at 60 fps at 1080p. EVGA's B-Stock cards are refurbs with one year warranties. I suspect a lot of them are perfectly fine cards traded in through their Step Up program which allows you to return your card to buy something higher end within 90 days for the difference in the two cards' prices. I bet they get a lot of people who buy a 970 and then think they should have gotten a 980 Ti and upgrade. Or people grab 960s and decide they want to upgrade to a 970. Their 970s sell out quick though, and most of the time they don't have any in stock.

http://www.evga.com/Products/Product...04G-P4-2977-RX

If you go the 970 route I'd recommend adding a 140 mm intake fan in front of the S340 (it doesn't come with front fans) since the 970 can draw quite a bit more power than the 960.

[Cry Havoc]

So, my son wants to get into PC gaming and build his own system. Is $700 budget enough to build a respectable gaming system with an easy upgrade path? Also, I'd like to not have to worry about overclocking. Thanks

If you buy on black friday/cyber monday, you can probably get some really good deals. A couple years back I got $100 of a video card on Black Friday.

[baseline bum]

If you buy on black friday/cyber monday, you can probably get some really good deals. A couple years back I got $100 of a video card on Black Friday.

The card that really seems like it's going to get some nice price drops is the GTX 970. I have already seen them selling as low as $270 new this month. Last year you could get really high quality R9 290s for $200-$220, I mean the best ones like PowerColor PCS+ and Sapphire Tri-X, but there will be no deal that good this year since AMD cards were going on fire sale after the GTX 970 released at $330. Damn when the 970 released in late September 2014 the R9 290s were $400 cards, by early November it was easy to find them for $220-$250. Sadly there haven't been any gpu releases like the 970 in 2015 and there won't be until 2016 when Pascal and Arctic Islands launch.

The GTX 960 2GB will probably get big price drops too, but that card isn't at all worth buying. 2GB of vram is ridiculous in 2015, and Nvidia is actually discontinuing the 2GB models of the 960.

[Cry Havoc]

The card that really seems like it's going to get some nice price drops is the GTX 970. I have already seen them selling as low as $270 new this month. Last year you could get really high quality R9 290s for $200-$220, I mean the best ones like PowerColor PCS+ and Sapphire Tri-X, but there will be no deal that good this year since AMD cards were going on fire sale after the GTX 970 released at $330. Damn when the 970 released in late September 2014 the R9 290s were $400 cards, by early November it was easy to find them for $220-$250. Sadly there haven't been any gpu releases like the 970 in 2015 and there won't be until 2016 when Pascal and Arctic Islands launch.

The GTX 960 2GB will probably get big price drops too, but that card isn't at all worth buying. 2GB of vram is ridiculous in 2015, and Nvidia is actually discontinuing the 2GB models of the 960.

The 390 was on for $260 yesterday. I think it's the best deal in GPUs right now.

[baseline bum]

The R9 380 4GB has seem some great price drops too. Now that I think of it, that i5 build I posted for DarrinS would be better with a 380 4GB and actually cheaper too. Plus there is also a $20 rebate that isn't figured into the price below:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-6500 3.2GHz Quad-Core Processor ($204.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: ASRock Z170M Pro4S Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($102.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: Mushkin Redline 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2666 Memory ($57.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($51.99 @ Newegg)
Video Card: XFX Radeon R9 380 4GB Double Dissipation Video Card ($189.99 @ Newegg)
Case: NZXT S340 (Black/Blue) ATX Mid Tower Case ($64.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: XFX TS 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($51.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $724.92
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-11-20 15:05 EST-0500

This to me about an optimal ~$700 build. The 380 is a little stronger than the 960 when combined with an i5 or better. I recommend the 960 for an i3 build though, as the DirectX11 overhead in AMD drivers is pretty bad and overwhelms an i3 to where the 960 performs a lot better. But that driver overhead in AMD cards usually isn't a problem with an i5 or better, and the AMD R9 380 usually outperforms the Nvidia GTX 960 then.

[baseline bum]

Nvidia is usually better if you want to play games at launch though. For instance, Dying Light, Witcher 3, and Fallout 4 ran horribly at launch on AMD cards and pretty well on Nvidia. So sometimes you have to wait for a game to be out for a month or two for AMD's drivers to catch up. But AMD's drivers tend to get really good over time. For instance, Far Cry 4 was actually an Nvidia sponsored game that ran so much better on Nvidia hardware the first couple of months it was out. Now AMD absolutely slaughters Nvidia on Far Cry 4 though. It happens in a lot of games, since AMD tend to have stronger hardware at a given price point than Nvidia.

[baseline bum]

The 390 was on for $260 yesterday. I think it's the best deal in GPUs right now.

Which 390 was it? If it's Asus or Gigabyte I'd pass, their AMD cards usually suck. If it was Sapphire, MSI, PowerColor, or XFX though, those are usually awesome cards. Strangely Gigabyte makes some of the best Nvidia cards, though Asus still sucks on Nvidia.

[Cry Havoc]

Nvidia is usually better if you want to play games at launch though. For instance, Dying Light, Witcher 3, and Fallout 4 ran horribly at launch on AMD cards and pretty well on Nvidia. So sometimes you have to wait for a game to be out for a month or two for AMD's drivers to catch up. But AMD's drivers tend to get really good over time. For instance, Far Cry 4 was actually an Nvidia sponsored game that ran so much better on Nvidia hardware the first couple of months it was out. Now AMD absolutely slaughters Nvidia on Far Cry 4 though. It happens in a lot of games, since AMD tend to have stronger hardware at a given price point than Nvidia.

I had Dying Light at launch, and I remember it running fairly terribly across all cards. Which was fixed pretty quickly in a patch. FO4 is running poorly across the spectrum as well.

AMD is likely going to be much better set up for DX12 with the current gen cards also. Worth thinking about.

[baseline bum]

I had Dying Light at launch, and I remember it running fairly terribly across all cards. Which was fixed pretty quickly in a patch. FO4 is running poorly across the spectrum as well.

AMD is likely going to be much better set up for DX12 with the current gen cards also. Worth thinking about.

Toms Hardware did a benchmark on Dying Light version 1.04 where the 960 outperformed the 290x. In Fallout 4 the 970 outperformed the Fury X at launch.

I think AMD is making a huge miscalculation throwing all their eggs in the DX12 basket. Their hardware should murder Nvidia's at most price points, but it doesn't because they have never fixed their DX11 drivers. Instead it's like they're hoping DX12 will make their ty FX processors relevant, but all games coming out are DX11. The FX series loses to Intel at every price point other than ultra budget sub $80 where the Athlon 860k is much better than the Pentium G3258. It's sad their GPU division is making stupid moves to try to prop up their CPU division. Their DX11 drivers are so bad you can't even recommend AMD cards in budget builds. Look at the gimpy GTX 750 Ti beating an R9 280 in Call of Duty Advanced Warfare when paired with an i3-4130 at the 72 second mark.

[baseline bum]

GTX 950 beating R9 380 in Fallout 4

[DarrinS]

Thanks for the tips. I don't yet know what kind of games he's going to get into. He's been playing a Wii and Wii-u for several years now.


i notice everything is at 1080p. Is that so you can use a tv instead of a monitor?

[Cry Havoc]

Toms Hardware did a benchmark on Dying Light version 1.04 where the 960 outperformed the 290x. In Fallout 4 the 970 outperformed the Fury X at launch.

I think AMD is making a huge miscalculation throwing all their eggs in the DX12 basket. Their hardware should murder Nvidia's at most price points, but it doesn't because they have never fixed their DX11 drivers. Instead it's like they're hoping DX12 will make their ty FX processors relevant, but all games coming out are DX11. The FX series loses to Intel at every price point other than ultra budget sub $80 where the Athlon 860k is much better than the Pentium G3258. It's sad their GPU division is making stupid moves to try to prop up their CPU division. Their DX11 drivers are so bad you can't even recommend AMD cards in budget builds. Look at the gimpy GTX 750 Ti beating an R9 280 in Call of Duty Advanced Warfare when paired with an i3-4130 at the 72 second mark.

I'm not sure where you're getting this information. As of now, Nvidia has the performance edge in some games.

In others, AMD leads. In fact, it's widely held that a 390 will be a superior card farther down the road, since the 970 only has 3.5 GB of VRAM.

And just like you, I can cite games where AMD does better than NVidia out of the gate:

http://www.pcper.com/reviews/Graphic...rdor-2560x1440

Here is the 290x beating out the 980, 77fps to 75. The 970 meanwhile is at 66 fps.

http://www.techspot.com/review/1019-...380/page3.html

In Battlefield, the 390 is clearly ahead of the 970. It even outscores the 970 in The Witcher 3 on this benchmark.

I don't understand your insinuation that they have all their eggs in Dx12. As of now, the 390 is considered to be *at worst* on par with the 970, and in many cases better, with more future proofing at a cheaper price point. The only clear advantage Nvidia has right now is ultra top end (980ti) and power consumption.

[Cry Havoc]

Also, fallout 4 is known to use a massive amount of tessellation, much of which appears to be unnoticeable. Reducing that frees up both Nvidia and AMD cards to higher framerates.

[Cry Havoc]

Thanks for the tips. I don't yet know what kind of games he's going to get into. He's been playing a Wii and Wii-u for several years now.


i notice everything is at 1080p. Is that so you can use a tv instead of a monitor?

Most monitors are still 1080p. You can absolutely use a TV instead, but I prefer a monitor for most gaming. Newer monitors coming out are 1440p or 4k, however video cards at present are really not capable of 4k gaming unless you reduce some visual effects or you spend $3000+ on a serious rig with multiple video cards.

[baseline bum]

I'm not sure where you're getting this information. As of now, Nvidia has the performance edge in some games.

In others, AMD leads. In fact, it's widely held that a 390 will be a superior card farther down the road, since the 970 only has 3.5 GB of VRAM.

And just like you, I can cite games where AMD does better than NVidia out of the gate:

http://www.pcper.com/reviews/Graphic...rdor-2560x1440

Here is the 290x beating out the 980, 77fps to 75. The 970 meanwhile is at 66 fps.

http://www.techspot.com/review/1019-...380/page3.html

In Battlefield, the 390 is clearly ahead of the 970. It even outscores the 970 in The Witcher 3 on this benchmark.

I don't understand your insinuation that they have all their eggs in Dx12. As of now, the 390 is considered to be *at worst* on par with the 970, and in many cases better, with more future proofing at a cheaper price point. The only clear advantage Nvidia has right now is ultra top end (980ti) and power consumption.

The 970 destroys the 390 in Fallout 4



Yes, they're putting their eggs in the DX12 basket since they still haven't, and won't, fix their cpu overhead problems in DX11.

[DarrinS]

Most monitors are still 1080p. You can absolutely use a TV instead, but I prefer a monitor for most gaming. Newer monitors coming out are 1440p or 4k, however video cards at present are really not capable of 4k gaming unless you reduce some visual effects or you spend $3000+ on a serious rig with multiple video cards.

Ant recommendation for a budget monitor? Say, $100 at most.

[baseline bum]

Ant recommendation for a budget monitor? Say, $100 at most.

I would look for whatever is on special on Thanksgiving/Black Friday/Cyber Monday at newegg, amazon, Best Buy, at that price point you can't really be choosy on a 1080p monitor. You can often find nice monitors on special in the $120 or so range, and I imagine you'll find some nice specials next week.

[DarrinS]

I would look for whatever is on special on Thanksgiving/Black Friday/Cyber Monday at newegg, amazon, Best Buy, at that price point you can't really be choosy on a 1080p monitor. You can often find nice monitors on special in the $120 or so range, and I imagine you'll find some nice specials next week.

I think I might go for the first build you listed. I may go for different ram brand, tho. Not familiar with mushkin


CPU: Intel Core i3-6100 3.7GHz Dual-Core Processor ($125.98 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: ASRock Z170M Pro4S Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($102.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: Mushkin Redline 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2666 Memory ($57.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($51.99 @ Newegg)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 960 4GB Video Card ($211.98 @ Newegg)
Case: NZXT S340 (Black/Blue) ATX Mid Tower Case ($64.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: XFX TS 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($51.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $667.90
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-11-20 12:41 EST-0500

[baseline bum]

Thanks for the tips. I don't yet know what kind of games he's going to get into. He's been playing a Wii and Wii-u for several years now.


i notice everything is at 1080p. Is that so you can use a tv instead of a monitor?

1080p is the real bang for your buck sweetspot right now. The picture quality is enormously better than 720p and you can run it pretty well with midrange gpus in the ~$180 price range. When you drop below about $110 on gpus you start hitting enormous drops in performance per dollar saved, so might as well go 1080p instead of 720p since 720p doesn't save you much money. Conversely, 1440p in modern AAA games isn't reasonable without a $200 CPU (i5) and $300 GPU (GTX 970 or R9 390), not to mention your monitor is going to be way more expensive. 4k is completely unreasonable unless you want to spend $1300 just on graphics cards.

[Cry Havoc]

I think I might go for the first build you listed. I may go for different ram brand, tho. Not familiar with mushkin


CPU: Intel Core i3-6100 3.7GHz Dual-Core Processor ($125.98 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: ASRock Z170M Pro4S Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($102.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: Mushkin Redline 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2666 Memory ($57.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($51.99 @ Newegg)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 960 4GB Video Card ($211.98 @ Newegg)
Case: NZXT S340 (Black/Blue) ATX Mid Tower Case ($64.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: XFX TS 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($51.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $667.90
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-11-20 12:41 EST-0500

That's not bad, just don't pull the trigger yet. You'll see a lot of prices drop drastically on Black Friday.

Additionally, I'd still recommend a 390 or even the new 280x over a 960. If you can afford to fork over a bit more for a better processor that would be great too, since a processor is more intensive to upgrade than a proc. Dual core could be limiting down the road for gaming.

[baseline bum]

I think I might go for the first build you listed. I may go for different ram brand, tho. Not familiar with mushkin


CPU: Intel Core i3-6100 3.7GHz Dual-Core Processor ($125.98 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: ASRock Z170M Pro4S Micro ATX LGA1151 Motherboard ($102.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: Mushkin Redline 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR4-2666 Memory ($57.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($51.99 @ Newegg)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 960 4GB Video Card ($211.98 @ Newegg)
Case: NZXT S340 (Black/Blue) ATX Mid Tower Case ($64.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: XFX TS 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($51.99 @ Newegg)
Total: $667.90
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-11-20 12:41 EST-0500

You definitely should consider DDR4-2666 or better, the RAM speed can really matter when cpu bound.



Probably the best brands for RAM are Corsair, G.Skill, Crucial, and Kingston. I usually use G.Skill as they have good prices and offer lifetime warranties. I used to use Mushkin a lot but it has been a while since I have built a system with their RAM.

You might wait for Black Friday and surrounding days for the GPU, I'd imagine you might see some deals on 4GB GTX 960s. On an i3 though an AMD GPU should be a no-go. In that Call of Duty video I posted above the GTX 750 Ti beating an R9 280 is a really horrible indictment of AMD's DX11 overhead in their drivers. A GTX 750 Ti is the lowest performing gpu out there that can really be considered a modern gaming card while the R9 280 was a really solid midrange card at the time. Here is how the 750 Ti and HD 7950 compare at 1080p when run with an i7, and the R9 280 is an HD 7950 with a significantly higher clockspeed that puts its performance more in between the GTX 760 and GTX 670.

[baseline bum]

That's not bad, just don't pull the trigger yet. You'll see a lot of prices drop drastically on Black Friday.

Additionally, I'd still recommend a 390 or even the new 280x over a 960. If you can afford to fork over a bit more for a better processor that would be great too, since a processor is more intensive to upgrade than a proc. Dual core could be limiting down the road for gaming.

AMD doesn't make any sense with a lower end CPU. With an i5 or better I'd absolutely recommend a 380 over a 960, but not with an i3.