quote:

Windows 10 Home - $130 amazon.com

PRO is not much more and SO much easier to work with.

quote:

Savings over getting the parts and building it myself: $833

IF you have good installation skills then you are way ahead.

FWIW, I normally don't do end-user stuff but for a favor of a client I installed a complete system like that with water-cooling, etc on-site at the guys house for $750, I was there around 6 hours.
It took a little longer that if it were at my facility as I didn't have all the tools and I was showing him "how to" step-by step.

The newegg/ABS deals were for prebuilt systems with no ability to customize or else I would have gone with Windows 10 PRO for whatever additional features it offers over home and doubled the RAM to 32gb so I wouldn't have to deal with finding matching sticks in the future.

The last time I built a computer was 2012 and it was the first and only time I didn't have to use IDE cables. The new cases and cabling systems are quite impressive and with this system everything was hidden or tucked away so it was barely noticeable. All the spare parts, screws, cables, etc. were included in the system and I could return everything back to the way it shipped from the manufacturer if I so chose.

I'm grateful that it's a normal computer with quality parts that I can upgrade over time without worrying about proprietary cases or parts that are specific to Dell or HP. I'll be very happy once I get a working system and can see what the 3070 can do.

Decent system! Give yourself a head start and upgrade to 32GBs of RAM, though. If you're doing a lot of gaming, the extra RAM definitely helps.

I plan out my builds in "upgrade cycles".

CPU, Motherboard and RAM one cycle,

GPU and SSD the next cycle.

I just built a new desktop machine for number crunching, not gaming
AMD 5950, this is a beast!
SSD drives
ATX board
32GB ram
NZXT AOI cooler
$2k and about 3 hours, its super fast

quote:

Originally posted by Hildur:
I'll be very happy once I get a working system and can see what the 3070 can do.

I've been pretty happy with the 2080 Super I ended up with a few months ago. The 3070 should excel at pretty much everything.

quote:

Originally posted by eyrich:
My opinion is the desktop will do better because of thermal loading.

Laptops have limited heat dissipation compared to a desktop. eventually the laptop chassis will no longer be able to pull anymore heat from the chip efficiently and the GPU will start throttling.

Especially given the effects Apple had on laptop design, putting insanely powerful processors in super thin systems. Most designs look sleek and sexy but thermal throttle almost immediately after startup.

Well the new PC is in. Everything appears to be the same except the graphics card. Now it's an EVGA 3070 XC3.

From what I've read online people like the card. I'm just glad it works.

I've noticed that I'm having a hard time connecting to ubisoft and steam logins. Both of them give me server/connection issues. gog is fine. I'm not using a VPN and support for either of those platforms is pretty much useless.


Bonus: The Polk T50s and Yamaha receiver I ordered came in early. That was a nice surprise. It's nice to listen to music out of proper speakers instead of tv speakers or NC headphones.


Update: I'm logged into ubisoft. Now steam is the outlying pain in the butt.