Upgrade kit combo recommendations

primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' BoopinDetroit, MI Icrontian
edited December 2015 in Hardware

Hoping to buy today:

Motherboard
CPU

Budget: under $400 would be cool. Looking for mid- to lower-high end, something that'll have 3-4 years of longevity out of it. Have current ram, GPU, SSD, and PSU so all I need are the core components.

What's good lately. Amazon Prime availability a strong preference.

Thanks!

Comments

  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian

    Ayyyeee forgot the DDR4 factor. I guess I'll need RAM too

  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian

    For that price on Newegg I can get two day shipping and still come in under Prime

    Garg
  • RyderRyder Kalamazoo, Mi Icrontian

    Just out of curiousity.. what do you have now?

  • RyderRyder Kalamazoo, Mi Icrontian
    edited December 2015

    Here is a Skylake system. Not as bad as I thought, but will need DDR4:
    sorry, but newegg is easier to search on.. just have to transpose it to Amazon

    CPU - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819117563&ignorebbr=1

    Mobo: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157672

    Wow.. a lot cheaper than I thought.. maybe you can get DDR4

    EDIT: I like Gskill memory: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820232178

    Total: $415.00

    I don't know if the DDR4-2800 memory is a sweet spot for skylake or slow.... someone else will have to comment.

    primesuspect
  • GargGarg Purveyor of Lincoln Nightmares Icrontian

    @primesuspect said:
    For that price on Newegg I can get two day shipping and still come in under Prime

    Not only is Newegg usually price competitive with Amazon, it's much easier to shop for computer components there. Amazon never gives me the right product metadata to filter by (for anything - they're a jack of all products, masters of none). I try to order from Newegg out of principle, since they seem to give a damn.

    Ryder
  • RyderRyder Kalamazoo, Mi Icrontian

    That is the problem I was having.. filtering - the choices sucked. I knew what I wanted but couldn't select it in the filter.

  • GargGarg Purveyor of Lincoln Nightmares Icrontian
    edited December 2015

    But back on the rest of the subject, a couple months ago I helped a friend of mine pick out these parts, and he loves his new system. These are current prices for what he got:

    i5-6500, Skylake, $205
    MSI Micro-ATX Mobo, $89
    Corsair 16GB DDR4, $85

    primesuspect
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian
    edited December 2015

    So, I'm a big believer that the chipset is extremely important to the overall longevity of the computer. Intel's latest z170 chipset adds native support for:

    • a new physical SSD connector called m.2 (the future is not SATA ports)
    • a new system bus for m.2 drives called NVMe (it's a PCI Express link optimized for SSDs)
    • USB 3.1 Gen2, AKA SuperSpeed+ (10Gbps)
    • USB Type-C connectors
    • DDR4

    These are major developments in the chipset space, and you're going to feel the burn in 3-4 years if you don't have these connectors on your mobo.

    Having the fastest USB connector always helps. But did you know that we're beginning to phase out the USB connector everyone knows and loves? Its replacement is called USB Type-C. This one is about the same size as MicroUSB (Android phones), but it's reversible. USB Type-C is independent of the USB version, but you ideally want USB 3.1 Gen2 for bandwidth and USB Type-C connectors on your motherboard.

    But SSDs on SATA will be a thing of the past in a few years, too, as SSDs move over to the m.2 connector and use NVMe for bandwidth--about 4-8x faster than a SATA SSD right now, and climbing. Sure, budget SSDs will stick around on SATA for a long time to come, but even decent performance drives that a PC gamer might buy will probably go m.2+NVMe.

    And on the DDR4 front, it's basically no better than DDR3. Tests have conclusively proven that no amount of DRAM bandwidth yields increased performance for the processors it's currently being paired with. However, DDR4 is expected to hit economy of scale in 18 mos, at which point DDR3 is going to become more difficult and more expensive to obtain all the time. It's better to buy into DDR4 now so you can get affordable DRAM replacements down the road if something goes wrong.

    With that in mind, I suggest this. It ticks all the boxes: USB Type-C, USB 3.1 Gen2, an m.2+NVMe port, DDR4, and more. Save $70 more if you don't care about overclocking by swapping in the Core i5-6600 vs. 6600K, and the 6600 is Prime.

    primesuspectGargpigflipperBuddyJ
  • GHoosdumGHoosdum Icrontian

    Only three eggs on that Gigabyte Z170-HD3P on Newegg. Do ya trust it?

  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian

    It suffered from some early BIOS issues that were since ironed out. I'd buy it. /shrug

    There are other mobos in that price range that come with the specs I outlined, so teach a man to fish...

  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian

    I'm with you @Thrax re: the chipset.

    Combo looks great. Thank you. I think we have a winner winner chicken dinner.

  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian

    I really appreciate the help fellas! Always love talking hardware with you guys <3

  • RyderRyder Kalamazoo, Mi Icrontian
    edited December 2015

    Hey, mine was cheaper :tongue: and had faster memory... pfft!

    primesuspect
  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian

    What is the difference between the i5 6600 and i5 6600K ?

  • SnarkasmSnarkasm Madison, WI Icrontian

    The K means it's unlocked, and you can do overclocking. The non-K is locked.

  • RyderRyder Kalamazoo, Mi Icrontian
    edited December 2015

    You can overclock a locked CPU, but you have to overclock the base clock, which overclocks everything else.
    K means the multiplier is unlocked so you can just change that to make the CPU faster.
    /pedantism

    Snarkasm
  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian

    Skylake bclk is unlinked from the other buses.

  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian

    Not gonna overclock at all, so I'm gonna save the $ and buy the non-K

  • primesuspectprimesuspect Beepin n' Boopin Detroit, MI Icrontian

    @Ryder said:
    Hey, mine was cheaper :tongue: and had faster memory... pfft!

    Yeah but I don't wanna touch this thing for years (it's not for me)

  • RyderRyder Kalamazoo, Mi Icrontian

    @Thrax said:
    Skylake bclk is unlinked from the other buses.

    Yea, but not the memory, you have to change mem multi and so far only small overclocks of like 104..... don't need to get into it :)

  • ThraxThrax 🐌 Austin, TX Icrontian

    @Ryder said:

    @Thrax said:
    Skylake bclk is unlinked from the other buses.

    Yea, but not the memory, you have to change mem multi and so far only small overclocks of like 104..... don't need to get into it :)

    Check out the latest news on ASRock and Supermicro's BCLK BIOS. Easy air bclk OCs up to 120 or 130MHz.

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