around €2,000 build

I'm looking to get a pc for gaming but also for solid works and adobe work. Gaming includes a mix of games, from Warzone to Apex. This is my first proper pc as my current set up is a laptop which is reaching its age. I think its okay but would appreciate if you guys can have a look at it and maybe find some areas which i can reduce the cost of the device. or if i should change a product for another item


Case - NZXT H511 MID-TOWER GAMING CASE (WHITE)
CPU - Inter Core i7 Eight Core Processor i7-11700 (2.5GHz) 16MB Cashe
Motherboard - AUSU TUF Z490-PLUS GAMING WI_FI (LGA1200, USB 3.2, CrossFireX) -ARGB Ready
GPU - 8GB NIVIDIA GEFORECE RTX 3070 or 12 GB NIVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 3060 (need still to decide if the upgrade is worth
Storage - 1TB SEAGATE BARRACUDA SATA-III 3.5" HHD, 6GB/s. 7200RPM, 64MB CACHE
M.2 SSD - 256GB PCS PCLe M.2 SSD (1900 MB/r, 1100 MB/W)
Power Supply - CORSAIR 650 W TXm Series Semi_modular 80 PLUS Gold, Ultra Quiet
Cooling - CoolerMaster MasterLiquid Lite 240 High Performance Liquid Cooler
thermal Paste - ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND
2x 50 ARGB LED Strips
 

JUNI0R

VALUED CONTRIBUTOR
I'm looking to get a pc for gaming but also for solid works and adobe work. Gaming includes a mix of games, from Warzone to Apex. This is my first proper pc as my current set up is a laptop which is reaching its age. I think its okay but would appreciate if you guys can have a look at it and maybe find some areas which i can reduce the cost of the device. or if i should change a product for another item


Case - NZXT H511 MID-TOWER GAMING CASE (WHITE)
CPU - Inter Core i7 Eight Core Processor i7-11700 (2.5GHz) 16MB Cashe
Motherboard - AUSU TUF Z490-PLUS GAMING WI_FI (LGA1200, USB 3.2, CrossFireX) -ARGB Ready
GPU - 8GB NIVIDIA GEFORECE RTX 3070 or 12 GB NIVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 3060 (need still to decide if the upgrade is worth
Storage - 1TB SEAGATE BARRACUDA SATA-III 3.5" HHD, 6GB/s. 7200RPM, 64MB CACHE
M.2 SSD - 256GB PCS PCLe M.2 SSD (1900 MB/r, 1100 MB/W)
Power Supply - CORSAIR 650 W TXm Series Semi_modular 80 PLUS Gold, Ultra Quiet
Cooling - CoolerMaster MasterLiquid Lite 240 High Performance Liquid Cooler
thermal Paste - ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND
2x 50 ARGB LED Strips
Hi there! Before we can give recommendations we'll need some more info.
1) What country are you buying from? You've used Euro's so knowing where you're coming from would be great for TAX and shipping
2) What monitors are you currently using/ plan to use with this PC? (make and model or resolution and refresh rate would be great)
3) What sort of 'adobe work' will you be doing? After Effects, InDesign, Phototoshop? A little bit of description behind what you plan to do with the software would be very useful
4) Could we have the full build and a link to the spec? It's difficult to advise on a build without knowing every part and providing a link would mean we don't have to re-create it every time (how to do this can be found here. I'd copy from "Case" to the end of the link)

I'm not too knowledgable about the solid works and some of the adobe suite so will sit this one out but anyone that advises will find all this info super helpful (hence all the questions)

Thanks!
 
Hi there! Before we can give recommendations we'll need some more info.
1) What country are you buying from? You've used Euro's so knowing where you're coming from would be great for TAX and shipping
2) What monitors are you currently using/ plan to use with this PC? (make and model or resolution and refresh rate would be great)
3) What sort of 'adobe work' will you be doing? After Effects, InDesign, Phototoshop? A little bit of description behind what you plan to do with the software would be very useful
4) Could we have the full build and a link to the spec? It's difficult to advise on a build without knowing every part and providing a link would mean we don't have to re-create it every time (how to do this can be found here. I'd copy from "Case" to the end of the link)

I'm not too knowledgable about the solid works and some of the adobe suite so will sit this one out but anyone that advises will find all this info super helpful (hence all the questions)

Thanks!
Hi,
1) I'm buying from Ireland
2) i do not own the monitors at the moment as I'm upgrading from a laptop. so when i get a final idea of my pc, i will being looking into monitors
3)mainly I will be using a mix of Photoshop, InDesign and Illustrator and a light load with Premier
4) https://www.pcspecialist.ie/saved-configurations/intel-z490-pc/pb5uXjrXbD/

and thanks for the quick hit up
 

Citrus_9

Expert
Hi,
1) I'm buying from Ireland
2) i do not own the monitors at the moment as I'm upgrading from a laptop. so when i get a final idea of my pc, i will being looking into monitors
3)mainly I will be using a mix of Photoshop, InDesign and Illustrator and a light load with Premier
4) https://www.pcspecialist.ie/saved-configurations/intel-z490-pc/pb5uXjrXbD/

and thanks for the quick hit up
2000 Euro is a tight budget. Best would be 5800X + 32 GB and a GPU for 1440p, but that would be around 2600+ Euro without a monitor!

You could work out with 5600X + 16 GB and a GPU for 1080p for 1920 Euro, but that would be a PC for today, not tomorrow. I'm saying this because your PC wouldn't be just for gaming and a strong CPU matters too in your case.

If you want 1440p, a monitor alone would be around 350 Euro. If you want a quality 1440p PC, you need to save more and come back when your budget is higher.
 
the budget isn't including the monitor. its just for the PC i have an extra cash for the monitor and other accessories that i will need. the €2,000 is just for the PC
 

Citrus_9

Expert
the budget isn't including the monitor. its just for the PC i have an extra cash for the monitor and other accessories that i will need. the €2,000 is just for the PC
I got that. 2000 Euro just for a PC is unfortunately not a high budget for a PC meant to be used not just for gaming (where 5600X would be perfectly fine), but for Solid works and Adobe work which would gain a good performance with a more expensive 5800X CPU + more RAM (32GB).

The worst part is GPU prices. It depends a lot of whether you get a 1080p or 1440p (that dictates what GPU you'd be pairing a monitor with, and sets an overall PC price).
 
Yea, true i suppose. but coming from console gaming and laptop gaming, the difference should still be good. I can upgrade the ram to 2 sticks of 16gb ram, thats not a bother. and the 5800x CPU. thats the ryzen cpu isnt it. then something like this? https://www.pcspecialist.ie/saved-configurations/amd-am4-gen3-pc/Z8mEC7573p/

yea i know the story with the GPU shortage as well as the whole crypto and scalpers. absolutely shite. i would probablhy get a 1440p monitor but if I'm better of with a 1080, ill get one
 

JUNI0R

VALUED CONTRIBUTOR
Yea, true i suppose. but coming from console gaming and laptop gaming, the difference should still be good. I can upgrade the ram to 2 sticks of 16gb ram, thats not a bother. and the 5800x CPU. thats the ryzen cpu isnt it. then something like this? https://www.pcspecialist.ie/saved-configurations/amd-am4-gen3-pc/Z8mEC7573p/

yea i know the story with the GPU shortage as well as the whole crypto and scalpers. absolutely shite. i would probablhy get a 1440p monitor but if I'm better of with a 1080, ill get one
I've made a few ammendments to the build above to get it to a comfortable spec. The NZXT case is not a great case for airflow, if you're looking for a white case, I'd consider sending one in, the 4000D will be a much better option if you're okay with black. For RAM, you'll want at least 3200mhz although 3600mhz is ideal. The 3060 is currently just a bit of the middle of the road card, it's too good for 1080p but not good enough for 1440p. The 3060Ti would be ideal but it seems non-existent at the moment so the next best 1440p option is the 6700XT. For storage, a 256GB SSD is very small for Windows and I believe a better solution would simply be a 1TB SSD. Depending on the games you play and the amount of work you'll do you'll likely have to upgrade soon but this'll get you started. I'd go for a minimum of 750W on this PC so I've upped to the 750TXm, if you can stretch, I'd upgrade to the 850WRMx, it's a lovely top of the line unit. For cooling, the Cooler Master will do the job but really you'd want one of the Corsair coolers for the 5800X as it can get very toasty. I've removed the RGB strips as they can easily be added later and save a bit of the budget. For Wifi you'll want the AX200 wifi card, if you use ethernet it can be removed entirely, I've also got rid of the bull guard as it's known to cause issues.

As you can see, this build is 150 euro's over budget and it's still not in an ideal place, with lots of parts that would seriously appreciate a bit of extra budget. This is where you can see @Citrus_9 comment of needing to spend more money to get a well balanced well built system for 1440p gaming and SW+Adobe CC. You could switch to 1080p which would allow the buget for other parts in the build but it seems a shame to spend 2000 euros on a PC for it only to be able to do 1080p, although I guess that's the issue of having CPU and GPU intensive uses.

I guess it depends a lot on to what level you plan to use Solid Works and the Adobe Suite, if it's super hobbyist level and not something you'll do very often then you might get away with a 5600X and 16GB then can upgrade to 32GB if needed but my knowledge on the software is fairly limited and I'm not sure if that would be an appropriate build.

Case
CORSAIR 4000D AIRFLOW TEMPERED GLASS GAMING CASE
Processor (CPU)
AMD Ryzen 7 5800X Eight Core CPU (3.8GHz-4.7GHz/36MB CACHE/AM4)
Motherboard
ASUS® TUF X570-PLUS GAMING (USB 3.2 Gen 2, PCIe 4.0, CrossFireX) - ARGB Ready!
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3200MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
12GB AMD RADEON™ RX 6700 XT - HDMI, DP - DX® 12
1st M.2 SSD Drive
1TB PCS PCIe M.2 SSD (2000 MB/R, 1100 MB/W)
Power Supply
CORSAIR 750W TXm SERIES™ SEMI-MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
CoolerMaster MasterLiquid Lite 240 High Performance Liquid 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
Wireless Network Card
WIRELESS INTEL® Wi-Fi 6 AX200 2,400Mbps/5GHz, 300Mbps/2.4GHz PCI-E CARD + BT 5.0
USB/Thunderbolt Options
MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS
Operating System
Windows 10 Home 64 Bit - inc. Single Licence [KUK-00001]
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Windows Recovery Media
Windows 10 Multi-Language Recovery Image - Unlimited Downloads from Online Account
Office Software
FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft 365® (Operating System Required)
Anti-Virus
BullGuard™ Internet Security - Free 90 Day License inc. Gamer Mode
Browser
Microsoft® Edge (Windows 10 Only)
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
2 - 3 DAY DELIVERY TO REPUBLIC OF IRELAND
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 10 to 12 working days
Price: €2,148.00 including VAT and Delivery

Unique URL to re-configure: https://www.pcspecialist.ie/saved-configurations/amd-am4-gen3-pc/0DDtKjFZuP/
 

Citrus_9

Expert
Yea, true i suppose. but coming from console gaming and laptop gaming, the difference should still be good. I can upgrade the ram to 2 sticks of 16gb ram, thats not a bother. and the 5800x CPU. thats the ryzen cpu isnt it. then something like this? https://www.pcspecialist.ie/saved-configurations/amd-am4-gen3-pc/Z8mEC7573p/

yea i know the story with the GPU shortage as well as the whole crypto and scalpers. absolutely shite. i would probablhy get a 1440p monitor but if I'm better of with a 1080, ill get one
Ryzen, we don't talk about Intel for desktop these days as AMD are much better. Your specs aren't good. First of all, PC case should be with a better airflow as 5800X gets hot, and this case is very closed, little open spaces for intake and exhaust.

RAM for AMD should be at least 3200Mhz speed, otherwise you don't utilise all of a CPU's potential.

A 3060 GPU you've picked is for 1080p. I would personally pick 2060 as 3060 is more expensive. It newer, but not as good as we all expected. If you'll be changing monitor(s) to 1440p in 3 years (not more), then 2060 would be better as you don't want to "invest" in to 3060 - would be false economy.

M.2 SSD 256GB is too low. 500GB is minimum recommended as they get very slow when fills up by 70%.

HDD you picked 1TB but 2TB would cost you just 8 Euro more. I'd take 2TB in this case.

PSU 650W is very low. If you'll upgrade to 1440p monitor, you'd probably need to change a PSU then too, which is false economy and also a pain of rewiring the cables as TXm series PSU you picked is just semi-modular, not fully modular. 850W RM or RMx are the usual recommended PSUs. 750W is probably the minimum. Some even take 1000W thinking of the future upgrades.

CoolerMaster Liquid 240 cooler is ok, but pretty poor for 5800X CPU as they get much hotter comparing to 5600X. I'd take Corsair H100i as minimum. I've bought 5800X with H115i just recently.

Drop extra paste - most of PCS coolers comes with already preapplied good quality paste. If you take extra paste, a PC builder would take the preapplied paste off and apply themselves the one you take as an extra which may lead in to not just paying more but also a slight chanche in paste being applied not as good as it would be applied in a cooler factory (hence called preapplied).

I wouldn't recommend N wifi, AX is better as it also supports 5GHz wifi + has a bluetooth (N doesn't have those). Price difference is 13 Euro, you save 11 Euro from extra paste by dropping it.

Drop Bullguard trial antivirus - it causes software troubles. Best to use other antivirus solutions or a prebuilt Windows Defender which comes for free with Windows 10.

Highly recommending to take a Silver warranty - it's just 7 Euro extra.
 

Citrus_9

Expert
it seems a shame to spend 2000 euros on a PC for it only to be able to do 1080p, although I guess that's the issue of having CPU and GPU intensive uses.
Great review above! Just wanted to point that 2000 Euro isn't a lot, don't get tricked, it's just £1720 - simply one of top shelves for 1080p in a today's prices context. It really doesn't seem too much for 1080p - just an illusion due to a currency rate.
 
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thanks for the feed back. taking both of your feedbacks into account. i'll upgrade and get the 750w power supply as for now and may upgrade in the future if required. ill get the H100i cooler as well as upgrade the m.2 drive and hard drive. ram will be at the 3200MHz range. but im still not sure about either to upgrade to the 3060ti or get the 2060 instead. AMD GPU's are good i know but im more comfortable with NVidia products so i would like to stick with their products
 

JUNI0R

VALUED CONTRIBUTOR
thanks for the feed back. taking both of your feedbacks into account. i'll upgrade and get the 750w power supply as for now and may upgrade in the future if required. ill get the H100i cooler as well as upgrade the m.2 drive and hard drive. ram will be at the 3200MHz range. but im still not sure about either to upgrade to the 3060ti or get the 2060 instead. AMD GPU's are good i know but im more comfortable with NVidia products so i would like to stick with their products
What does the full build look like with these changes? I'm having trouble visualising it all. The 3060TI currently isn't available from PCS (the stock has just been so bad) so personally I'd go 2060 and stick to 1080p for now, it'll save some budget and give a clearer upgrade path into 1440p
 

Citrus_9

Expert
thanks for the feed back. taking both of your feedbacks into account. i'll upgrade and get the 750w power supply as for now and may upgrade in the future if required. ill get the H100i cooler as well as upgrade the m.2 drive and hard drive. ram will be at the 3200MHz range. but im still not sure about either to upgrade to the 3060ti or get the 2060 instead. AMD GPU's are good i know but im more comfortable with NVidia products so i would like to stick with their products
I think 3060Ti should appear in stuck some time in June, so you'll need to keep an eye on it and prepare make a purchase fast when it's back.

Try to think what monitor you want: if 24 inch, then go with 1080p and 2060 GPU, if 27inch or 32inch, then definitely 1440p and 3060Ti, 3070 or 6700XT.

Best 1080p monitor would be AOC 24G2U or Asus VG249Q



1440p one of the best is Samsung Odyssey G5 or G7 (G7 are two options: 27inch and 32inch)



 

JUNI0R

VALUED CONTRIBUTOR
I think 3060Ti should appear in stuck some time in June, so you'll need to keep an eye on it and prepare make a purchase fast when it's back.

Try to think what monitor you want: if 24 inch, then go with 1080p and 2060 GPU, if 27inch or 32inch, then definitely 1440p and 3060Ti, 3070 or 6700XT.
I'd go for resolution over the screen size personally (ie you can find 27 inch 1080p's) but effectively this

1660S or 2060 for 1080p
60TI, 70 or 6700XT for 1440p
 

JUNI0R

VALUED CONTRIBUTOR
Looks good! Although the hundred euro WiFI card isn't necessary, that's saved a lot of the budget. With it I've upped to a 1TB SSD and RMx850W PSU. Also the 4000D has just gone out of stock again so switched it for the TD500 Mesh for a few euro's more

Case
COOLERMASTER MASTERBOX TD500 MESH ARGB GAMING CASE
Processor (CPU)
AMD Ryzen 7 5800X Eight Core CPU (3.8GHz-4.7GHz/36MB CACHE/AM4)
Motherboard
ASUS® TUF X570-PLUS GAMING (USB 3.2 Gen 2, PCIe 4.0, CrossFireX) - ARGB Ready!
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 3200MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
6GB NVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 2060 - HDMI, DP - VR Ready!
1st Storage Drive
2TB SEAGATE BARRACUDA SATA-III 3.5" HDD, 6GB/s, 7200RPM, 256MB CACHE
1st M.2 SSD Drive
1TB PCS PCIe M.2 SSD (2000 MB/R, 1100 MB/W)
Power Supply
CORSAIR 850W RMx SERIES™ MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
Corsair 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
Wireless Network Card
WIRELESS INTEL® Wi-Fi 6 AX200 2,400Mbps/5GHz, 300Mbps/2.4GHz PCI-E CARD + BT 5.0
USB/Thunderbolt Options
MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS
Operating System
Windows 10 Home 64 Bit - inc. Single Licence [KUK-00001]
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Windows Recovery Media
Windows 10 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
Browser
Microsoft® Edge (Windows 10 Only)
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
2 - 3 DAY DELIVERY TO REPUBLIC OF IRELAND
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 10 to 12 working days
Price: €2,049.00 including VAT and Delivery

Unique URL to re-configure: https://www.pcspecialist.ie/saved-configurations/amd-am4-gen3-pc/zM7krq85!h/
 

NoddyPirate

Grand Master
Just throwing in my thoughts down here - both @Citrus_9 and @JUNI0R are pretty much all over this one though! Super stuff lads!

Adobe Photoshop doesn't scale well beyond about 4 cores and would see little difference between the 5600X and 5800X. Premier does a little better and can use up to 8 cores pretty efficiently, so the 5800X would be the better choice. But It might be helpful for @fukisamakun to consider exactly what their worklfow involved is to be when considering between the 5600X and 5800X. Just to be sure they don't save on some other area in the build which might make quite a difference in favour of a CPU that might not give them the benefit they think it will.

The usual Puget Systems have benchmarks for various types of operations are here for Photoshop and here for Premier.

When it comes to Solidowrks I can't find any useful benchmarks which include the 5600X, but it again it seems to depend on the type of tasks. It might be telling though that Puget Systems don't include the 5600X in their report here at all, but having said that they also state in it that the "application [varies] greatly in how it uses the CPU, with some functions being single-threaded while others are able to use all the cores effectively - and, of course, a spread of behavior in-between those extremes."

When you look through the results you can see that many of the benchmarks tasks show little difference between the 5800X, 5900X and 5950X suggesting that these tasks are single threaded and the extra cores are making little difference. Only a few appear to be clearly multi-threaded as indicated by the 5950X taking a big lead.

Some interesting info here suggesting multi cores might not make an impact also.

Finally Solidworks themsleves have a list of supported Graphics Cards which can take advantage of performance acceleration. It's a pretty obscure list I'm afraid!

All just additional info to help the OP get a feel for what might make what sort of difference in what area - if that is even a sentence! It's also why I favoured more RAM for my build over an 8 core CPU. My uses include Lightroom of course and I don't use anything like Solidworks at all - but still.....
 

JUNI0R

VALUED CONTRIBUTOR
Just throwing in my thoughts down here - both @Citrus_9 and @JUNI0R are pretty much all over this one though! Super stuff lads!

Adobe Photoshop doesn't scale well beyond about 4 cores and would see little difference between the 5600X and 5800X. Premier does a little better and can use up to 8 cores pretty efficiently, so the 5800X would be the better choice. But It might be helpful for @fukisamakun to consider exactly what their worklfow involved is to be when considering between the 5600X and 5800X. Just to be sure they don't save on some other area in the build which might make quite a difference in favour of a CPU that might not give them the benefit they think it will.

The usual Puget Systems have benchmarks for various types of operations are here for Photoshop and here for Premier.

When it comes to Solidowrks I can't find any useful benchmarks which include the 5600X, but it again it seems to depend on the type of tasks. It might be telling though that Puget Systems don't include the 5600X in their report here at all, but having said that they also state in it that the "application [varies] greatly in how it uses the CPU, with some functions being single-threaded while others are able to use all the cores effectively - and, of course, a spread of behavior in-between those extremes."

When you look through the results you can see that many of the benchmarks tasks show little difference between the 5800X, 5900X and 5950X suggesting that these tasks are single threaded and the extra cores are making little difference. Only a few appear to be clearly multi-threaded as indicated by the 5950X taking a big lead.

Some interesting info here suggesting multi cores might not make an impact also.

Finally Solidworks themsleves have a list of supported Graphics Cards which can take advantage of performance acceleration. It's a pretty obscure list I'm afraid!

All just additional info to help the OP get a feel for what might make what sort of difference in what area - if that is even a sentence! It's also why I favoured more RAM for my build over an 8 core CPU. My uses include Lightroom of course and I don't use anything like Solidworks at all - but still.....
This is fantastic! I just about know my way around gaming builds but this is a whole new realm of knowledge. Very useful and will definetly give OP a lot to ponder! Gonna give the links a read and add some bookmarks to my 'Useful links for PCS' folder 😂
 
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