I'm the moderately happy owner of a Dell L502x laptop which has served me well for the last 4 years. It's a very mediocre laptop for gaming (I can't remember the last time I've had stable 30 FPS even at low video settings) and I believe it's time for a change. I'm looking into streaming games on twitch as a hobby and would like to get myself a desktop. However, being used to the silence of my laptop, I began doing some research on silent desktops. It led me to this pc build: http://mutepc.com/2015/07/completely-si ... r-edition/, which uses the Scythe Kotetsu and mentions SPCR. Although I'm not looking for an open air build, that SPCR mention was a game changer:
What an incredible site and community!
I was very pleasently surprised with the level of detail and the scientific approach in reviews, as well as the great feedback in this forum. Kudos to everyone involved!!! Now, after reading many great articles and debates, I think I've rounded up some component ideas to get me started on the brainstorming bit.
My budget is $1000-1500, but because of import taxes in Brazil everything can be a lot more expensive. If something is not readily available, as a rule of thumb, multiply any local US prices by 2.5 and that should roughly illustrate the price of products that are harder to find and could only be bought on Amazon such as the Scythe Kotetsu, which would cost me $130. Also, all prices mentioned are roughly converted from local Brazil shops.
So again, my goal is gaming and streaming. This is what I've come up with so far:
1) Monitor: my current LG 23MP65 monitor does not have 144Hz or 4k capabilities. Would wanting this in the future make any major changes to my build? I'm open to the possibility of getting a new monitor, but this would be out of my budget at the time being.
2) CPU: i5-6600. I don't understand much about overclocking so I was thinking about not getting the K version. I've also read that there is marginal improvement from the i5-6600 to the i7-6700, which is considerably more expensive. Can anyone confirm this?
3) CPU cooler: CoolerMaster Hyper 212X/TX3/T4. These are my cheap, readily available options at $38-66. Noctua readily available options include NH-L9a, NH-C14s, NH-D15S, NH-D14, NH-L9i, NH-D15, NH-U14S, NH-L9x65, NH-U9S, NH-U12S, NH-L12, NH-D9DX and NH-D9L, all above $66. Are any of these rough equivalents of the Kotetsu? It'd be a great way to compare bang for buck considering a $130 Kotetsu.
4) GPU: GTX 980 or 970. Should I wait for the new GTX 10xx? I thought about the new AMD RX 480 but it seems to run way too hot. I'm not very keen on the idea of getting the 970 because of so many people talking about coil whine. On the other hand, it's a lot cheaper than the 980. Would I need additional GPU cooling, such as the Prolimatech MK-26 mentioned in the link above, to achieve a silent build? What if I went with a factory overclocked GPU such as the GTX 980 SC ACX 2.0, would I need additional cooling then?
5) Mobo: Asus Z170M Plus/BR. Picking a mobo was very tricky and I'm not even remotely sure this is a good pick. If at all possible, I'd like to stick to mATX, but I don't have size limitations. I do want good sounds from it. For streaming I might use an external mic depending on driver compatibility. I chose Asus because I'd much rather control fan speed through software than through BIOS. Also, I'll be sticking to a single GPU so I don't care about any SLI stuff.
6) PSU: Seasonic Fanless 520W 80 Plus Platinum SS-520FL2: at $300, this thing's expensive! However, I do like the efficiency and also the prospect of a silent fanless PSU.
7) RAM: 2x4GB or 2x8GB. Any recommendations as to which one?
![Cool 8)](./images/smilies/icon_cool.gif)
9) Fans: would I need additional fans?
Thanks for reading. Cheers!