Ah it's no bother, I enjoy this stuff.

I didn't know/forgot that you are using a laptop, that will definitely limit the kind of frames you can push to that lovely new monitor. Yeah the 9400 wouldn't be much of an upgrade, higher clock speeds but you lose a couple of threads over the 7700 HQ. A 6 core / 12 thread or 8/16 chip would make more sense for a new machine.

You don't have to go all the way to a €1600 build, you could split the difference between that and the dell and go for €1200ish and great a great machine, or even cheaper and it would still kick ass. When you are ready to spend some funds let me know the budget and we can have a look at what you can get.

I would probably aim for a Ryzen 3600 build, and a 2060 - 2070 Super, or 5700 / XT for the GPU.

It's saying the parts lists are private. I think because they are saved to your login or summat.

I'm resisting making a private parts joke.

Hair has discovered some sort of decorum, pass it on.

Rum you say?

GurtTractor wrote:

It's saying the parts lists are private. I think because they are saved to your login or summat.

I've made them public now.

Speedhaak wrote:

This is the build you had put together for me earlier last year:https://ie.pcpartpicker.com/user/Speedhaak/saved/RvYtpg One I was tinkering with myself: https://ie.pcpartpicker.com/user/Speedhaak/saved/Cv3Czy

Just having a look now, seeing what can be done with that budget. I'm using the Ireland version of PCPartpicker, I'm not sure how shipping and ordering works over there, are you able to order from the usual UK PC parts sites or no? The price data and I guess availability of some bits isn't so great on the .ie site.

Aight here's my take on a similar build -

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 3600 3.6 GHz 6-Core Processor  (€234.95 @ Komplett)
Motherboard: MSI B450 Gaming Plus MAX ATX AM4 Motherboard  (€114.94 @ Komplett)
Memory: G.Skill Aegis 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3200 Memory  (€85.86 @ Custompc)
Storage: Samsung 970 Evo 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive  (€198.95 @ Komplett)
Video Card: MSI GeForce GTX 1660 Ti 6 GB VENTUS XS OC Video Card  (€338.95 @ Komplett)
Case: Fractal Design Meshify C ATX Mid Tower Case  (€99.94 @ Komplett)
Power Supply: Cooler Master MasterWatt 550 W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-modular ATX Power Supply  (€79.94 @ Komplett)
Total: €1153.53
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2020-01-13 21:53 GMT+0000

You're quite limited on stuff to choose from in some areas unfortunately, I guess there's fewer retailers in Ireland. I tried to match the budget of yours, you can probably shuffle things around depending on priorities.

The Asrock mobo you picked has no capability to update the BIOS without a CPU installed, this means that unless it's a recently manufactured board and has been updated at the factory it probably won't support the 3600, meaning you would either have to have a 1st or 2nd gen Ryzen chip to put in temporarily to get it updated or it will just be a brick with the 3600. The MSI board is a 'MAX' version meaning they've preupdated the BIOS so you know it will work with the latest chips, and it has a button to allow a BIOS update with just a USB stick plugged in. Some other boards have a similar feature, important to look out for if you are putting a 3000 series CPU into a B350/B450/X370/X470 board.

Either the Corsair or the G.Skill RAM will be fine, I think the Corsair stuff has a very slightly better timing.

I would go for an NVME drive as the main, just because the next consoles will be using similar tech, and I'm pretty sure we'll start to see games that really make use of fast storage for streaming in content. Also it's crazy fast for booting up, loading programs, and good for creative projects with heavy file sizes such as video editing. You can go for either 500GB or 1TB, as a boot drive it's not the sort of thing you'll be able to easily upgrade so I picked 1TB for you, a nice thing to have. I certainly wish I had more than 500GB on my boot drive.

The 1660 Ti seems reasonable for a mid-budget build, not that far behind the 2060.

The Corsair 275R case you chose is alright, but has poor airflow due to it's bad front panel design. The Fractal Meshify for comparison has great airflow and should keep GPU and CPU fans running slow. There's some other good choices too, depends on what you want.

The Masterwatt PSU is a better choice as it has a zero fan mode, so at idle or low loads the fan on it won't spin. Very nice for a quiet system. I would have picked an EVGA PSU but PCPartpicker didn't have any listed..

Speedhaak wrote:

Yeah I was looking at the NVME drives but some content creators don't recommend them just yet.

Dunno why this would be. I mean it's generally not necessary at all unless you are scrubbing through 4k footage or something, but it can really help speed some things up. The difference between NVME and SATA SSD is much less noticeable than between a HDD and a SATA boot drive, it does make everything feel just a bit smoother and nicer though. I noticed much reduced stuttering with Kingdom Come installed on my NVME compared to a SATA drive, most games aren't like that now but it's only a matter of time before things get really demanding.

He didn't really pick that case in that video, he was given it by Corsair and was like 'yeah alright'. It's an ok case really, but the front panel design is just straight up terrible for airflow, things have started to change recently but a lot of case manufactures persist in having a solid front panel right up against the front fan mounts, with tiny little slits on the sides or top and bottom for air to squeeze through. The efficiency and effectiveness of fans in that situation is much degraded.

Ideally you want at least an inch between the fan and a solid surface such as a front panel, with enough openings on the sides to allow air to flow. Or just a mesh front like the Meshify or other cases. If you look at some older cases by Fractal like the Define or R series you can see they have a decent amount of side venting and distance between fan and panel. My Corsair 600Q is a great example of ideal solid front panel design actually, there's a good inch and a bit of space with a really minimal side grille. Cools very well and is very quiet.

Lord_Griff wrote:

Anyone got a 15 inch Surface Book 2 with the nVidia GPU. They have reviewed well, down in price because they are old. Good for work and play?

Battery drain may be an issue, obviously, and I know the Pros suffered from pretty heavy throttling when things got hot and heavy. However, the Book 2 (I assume the Nvidia GPU you are referring to is the 1060) is decent. You're not gonna run the latest and greatest at super high spec, but you'll get decent performance (generally 30-60fps) on many games running at high spec or dropped down to medium, if needs be. 

I haven't used them a huge amount (I bought the missus the newest Pro as she only uses them for work and chilling, not gaming) but they're surprisingly competent. The Book I used (may have been the 2) did pretty well on the Final Fantasy XIV benchmark tool I ran - high resolution at 60FPS in most places, 30 in crowded scenes.

GurtTractor wrote:

Speedhaak wrote:

Yeah I was looking at the NVME drives but some content creators don't recommend them just yet.

Dunno why this would be. I mean it's generally not necessary at all unless you are scrubbing through 4k footage or something, but it can really help speed some things up. The difference between NVME and SATA SSD is much less noticeable than between a HDD and a SATA boot drive, it does make everything feel just a bit smoother and nicer though. I noticed much reduced stuttering with Kingdom Come installed on my NVME compared to a SATA drive, most games aren't like that now but it's only a matter of time before things get really demanding. He didn't really pick that case in that video, he was given it by Corsair and was like 'yeah alright'. It's an ok case really, but the front panel design is just straight up terrible for airflow, things have started to change recently but a lot of case manufactures persist in having a solid front panel right up against the front fan mounts, with tiny little slits on the sides or top and bottom for air to squeeze through. The efficiency and effectiveness of fans in that situation is much degraded. Ideally you want at least an inch between the fan and a solid surface such as a front panel, with enough openings on the sides to allow air to flow. Or just a mesh front like the Meshify or other cases. If you look at some older cases by Fractal like the Define or R series you can see they have a decent amount of side venting and distance between fan and panel. My Corsair 600Q is a great example of ideal solid front panel design actually, there's a good inch and a bit of space with a really minimal side grille. Cools very well and is very quiet.

Is your knowledge self accumulated or do you work in the industry? Thanks for all the insight, I do like learning more about PC Builds / Components. I'll take your feedback and hopefully soon I can pull the trigger on some parts and begin my own build

Cheers Cinty.

FINALLY!
After a whack of a wait, new PC coming tomorrow. Apparently a free copy of MOHAN ICEBORNE too

So it's not Mohan sadly, but two of the following -

Borderlands 3
Breakpoint
AC Odyssey
RDR2
Outer Worlds
DMC 5
RE2
Battlefield 1
Far Cry 5
Forza Horizon 4
Gears 5


Given I have Gamepass Ultimate, there's no point in Outer Worlds, DMC, Horizon or Gears.

Thoughts on other two? I might give RDR2 a third shottie and see how pretty it looks I guess if it's free.

Yeah, I guess if it's free, go for something that I can show off.