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cyberf4n · 27 Oct 2018 at 13:00

Hi everyone,

I am planning to build a PC for both gaming and work. I need a PC that can sustain 3-4 Hyper-V VMs open at all times doing some tasks (not extremely intensive), but in the same time do my day to day stuff, sometimes gaming (World of Warcraft for example, not 4k games).

This is what I came up with and fits my budget:

X399 AORUS XTREME AMD X399 (SOCKET TR4) DDR4 E-ATX MOTHERBOARD £450.00

RYZEN THREADRIPPER 32-CORE / 64-THREADS 2990WX 4.20GHZ (SOCKET TR4) PROCESSOR - RETAIL £1,628.00

EVGA SuperNOVA 1200 P2 80+ PLATINUM, 1200W ECO Mode Fully Modular NVIDIA SLI and Crossfire Ready Power Supply 220-P2-1200-X3 £214.00

Samsung (MZ-V6E1T0BW) 1TB EVO PCI Express 3.0 x4 NVMe Solid State Drive £267.00

Corsair CMW32GX4M4C3200C16 Vengeance RGB PRO 32 GB (4 x 8 GB) DDR4 3200 MHz C16 XMP 2.0 Enthusiast RGB LED Illuminated Memory Kit, Black £328.00

NZXT CA-H442W-M1 Mid Tower Computer Case - Black £137.00

Cooling £500.00

Nvidia 1080 Ti £600.00

Total £4,124.00

I haven’t built a PC in years and I am not up to date with nowadays technologies so I have few questions:

If I want to go for 64 GB RAM should I do 4x16 or 8x8? Is 3200MHz ok? Or should I go for faster speed \ better latency? Please advise.
Is this Mid Tower case big enough for the board and GPU? Or for future additional components like another GPU
In the future I want to go for SLI and I think 1080 Ti will still be good in the next few years, what do you think?
Cooling is from EK, but I really have no clue which kit to choose, but I don’t want to pay more than £500 for it.

Feel free to give an opinion on what you would change in this build.

Thanks

X x X · 27 Oct 2018 at 14:17

Why not go for a older xeon?

cyberf4n · 27 Oct 2018 at 14:39

X x X said:
Why not go for a older xeon?

Because it is faster on 95% of all the tests. The 2990 price is amazing for what it offers.
PS: I was an Intel fan, but for the first time I feel that AMD is just better.

Journey · 27 Oct 2018 at 16:48

What are you using at the moment for your VM's and gaming solution?

cyberf4n · 27 Oct 2018 at 17:09

Journey said:
What are you using at the moment for your VM's and gaming solution?

Nothing, I used only laptops and my work PC in the last 3-5 years, moving house etc, multiple factors. I had 2x Xeon, 16GB dual and some Nvidia card, can’t remember exactly. The same setup won’t be good in 2018.
Will start some projects now and I need personal development environments.
1-2 blockchain nodes for development, video editing (not professional level), web\ MS Win 10 development, some VMs with different network appliances like Netscalers for testing. I used Azure cloud as well, but it gets expensive.

Journey · 27 Oct 2018 at 17:48

How many cores are you planning to dedicate to each VM, and how much RAM? Or are you going to allow some autonomy within reason? Don't forget with the 2990WX the RAM access is limited due to the layout of the CPU, so take that into account as it is not 8-channel RAM like it's EPYC server counterpart.

cyberf4n · 27 Oct 2018 at 20:20

4 cores, RAM dynamic allocation, 2 GB startup and 8GB max\VM (I will never need all of them on high workload). Thanks, it is a good point, but I think 4 channels are still ok for what I am doing. If I would chose an EPYC, 7551P would be max I can go, £2k, but do I really need it.

Journey · 27 Oct 2018 at 21:51

cyberf4n said:
4 cores, RAM dynamic allocation, 2 GB startup and 8GB max\VM (I will never need all of them on high workload). Thanks, it is a good point, but I think 4 channels are still ok for what I am doing. If I would chose an EPYC, 7551P would be max I can go, £2k, but do I really need it.

Yes, I merely pointed out the performance deficit vs. the EPYC since unless you really need 32 cores, the 16 core 2950X is a much better overall solution and doesn't have the bottleneck caused by the shared RAM access of the 2990WX. I'd possible consider looking at the 2950X anyhow, since the TR4 socket is stable for another 2 years of updates. Getting the 2950X now could easily be updated to the Zen2 architecture equivalent chip in 12/18 months and you'll likely end up with a 24/32 core CPU with dedicated RAM access per core and the added bonus of better IPC per core, better/lower power usage, and potentially higher clock speeds for the same over all TDP.

If you are going for 64GB do a 16GB x4 setup, as this leaves room for expansion later on, and with the 2990WX you want to get the timings lower, not necessarily the speed higher as the lower latency has a pretty big effect on certain functions of the CPU. Aim for a minimum of 3000MHz C14, if possible 3200MHz+.

Cooling is something that I cannot really help you with, since all the Threadripper systems I have designed/built have been off the shelf CLC/AIO's with a Nocuta air cooler thrown in for good measure. The new Enermax Liqtech TR4 MKII 360/280/240MM is meant to be a real step up from the first generation, and offers full coverage TR4 block and they don't cost the earth either <£150.

cyberf4n · 28 Oct 2018 at 00:08

Many thanks, I was just looking into 2950X

and you confirmed my thoughts. I will use the money difference for an Evolve X case with an extra ITX motherboard (dual-system) and I think I actually get a faster \ better latency environment overall.

orbitalwalsh · 28 Oct 2018 at 09:50

cyberf4n said:
Many thanks, I was just looking into 2950X and you confirmed my thoughts. I will use the money difference for an Evolve X case with an extra ITX motherboard (dual-system) and I think I actually get a faster \ better latency environment overall.

Would make a killer system

My basket at Overclockers UK:

1 x AMD Ryzen Threadripper Sixteen Core 1950X 4.00GHz (Socket TR4) Processor - Retail= £679.99
1 x Gigabyte X399 Aorus Xtreme AMD X399 (Socket TR4) DDR4 E-ATX Motherboard= £449.99
2 x Team Group Vulcan T-Force 32GB (2x16GB) DDR4 PC4-24000C16 3000MHz Dual Channel Kit - Grey (TLGD432G3= £259.99
1 x AMD Ryzen 7 Eight Core 1700 3.70GHz (Socket AM4) Processor - Retail= £199.99
1 x Gigabyte B450-I AORUS PRO WIFI (Socket AM4) Mini-ITX Motherboard= £109.99
1 x Antec Series 3 Samsung B-Die 16GB (2x8GB) DDR4 PC4-19200C15 2400MHz Dual Channel Kit= £139.99
1 x Phanteks Enthoo Evolv X Digital Midi Tower Glass Gaming Case - Galaxy Silver= £209.99
1 x Phanteks ITX Upgrade Kit for Evolv X= £16.99
1 x Phanteks Revolt X 1200W 80 Plus Platinum Modular Power Supply= £234.95
2 x Gigabyte GeForce GTX 1080Ti Gaming OC BLACK 11264MB GDDR5X PCI-Express Graphics Card= £599.99
1 x be quiet! Dark Rock Pro TR4 CPU Cooler - 135mm= £79.99
1 x Alphacool Eisbaer LT120 CPU AIO Water Cooling Unit - 120mm (11444)= £74.99
1 x Phanteks 600mm Premium Shielded High Speed PCI-E x16 Riser Cable 90 Degree Adapter= £52.99

Total: £3,992.31 (includes shipping: £22.50)

Cheapest 16GB (2x8GB) B-Die on the market though you'll have to do ryzen ram Calculator to bring it up to speed (possible using a few for Samsung's demo rigs as it's easier the .ripper off heatsinks) .

Seems not to much difference between 2950x Vs 1950x - least it's a saving and as journey pointed out, Zen2 - in the future - though believe design will still be the same, CCX core count should be higher, and Infi fabric etc (fingers crossed )

New flagship x299 do look killer and 18 core - but just not worth the price at all

Though I don't think you'd need two 1080ti ...

cyberf4n · 28 Oct 2018 at 11:02

Nice, I haven't found too many comparisons between Aorus Xtreme and Zenith Xtreme, except that the WiFi is a lot better on the Asus ones. Might get that one, the rest of the specs seems to be the same.
I need to go with RGB RAM, I am not a fanatic with lights, but on the RAM just looks cool (personal thing).
I thought about the 2x1080 Ti and I do not need them. I will get 1x1080 Ti for gaming and 1x maybe Vega 64 for compute power (this one not now, maybe Feb 2019)
The Ryzen 7 on the ITX sounds great, if my time would be 50% gaming I would go with this one on the main PC, but not the case here.
My idea of cooling was open loop with hard tubing, but I've dropped this last night after seen how much time it takes to set it up. After all it is just a fancy thing useful for hardcore overclockers.

I have only 1 more task now: decide between Zenith Xtreme and Aorus Xtreme.

Great replies both, very helpful.

orbitalwalsh · 28 Oct 2018 at 11:19

cyberf4n said:
Nice, I haven't found too many comparisons between Aorus Xtreme and Zenith Xtreme, except that the WiFi is a lot better on the Asus ones. Might get that one, the rest of the specs seems to be the same.
I need to go with RGB RAM, I am not a fanatic with lights, but on the RAM just looks cool (personal thing).
I thought about the 2x1080 Ti and I do not need them. I will get 1x1080 Ti for gaming and 1x maybe Vega 64 for compute power (this one not now, maybe Feb 2019)
The Ryzen 7 on the ITX sounds great, if my time would be 50% gaming I would go with this one on the main PC, but not the case here.
My idea of cooling was open loop with hard tubing, but I've dropped this last night after seen how much time it takes to set it up. After all it is just a fancy thing useful for hardcore overclockers.

I have only 1 more task now: decide between Zenith Xtreme and Aorus Xtreme.

Great replies both, very helpful.

Oc3D did a review on the Xtreme Vs Asus - VRM didn't fair to well , but was 32core beast .
And oc3d do love to rip into Aorus for VRMs, and x399 and z390 have proved better then rivals , all bR X399 meg

Aorus RGB is cheapest Samsung B-Die , but is only 8GB sticks