First Time Self Build specs advice please

C

CAM1

New member
Hi everyone.
I had been planning a ready built system but realise that I really have to build it myself from scratch. I live in Oman at the moment and cant get stuff delivered here so I will have to take it as checked baggage from the UK.
Its not that I dont trust airline baggage handlers but.... I think it has got a better chance of surviving if I just carefully pack the individual components and assemble it here.

Ive never done this before but Im sure it will be useful experience. :confused:

Here are the parts I am looking at after some previous advice from the forum and a lot of searching.


Fractal Design Define Mini Series Micro ATX Case
Asus Z97M-PLUS Micro ATX Motherboard
Intel Core i5-4690K 3.50GHz (Devil's Canyon) Socket LGA1150 Processor
Noctua NH-U12S Ultra-Quiet Slim CPU Cooler with 120mm NF-F12 fan
Seasonic M12-II EVO 520W Bronze Power Supply Unit
16GB (2x8GB) Corsair DDR3 Vengeance Low Profile Jet Black, PC3-12800 (1600),
250GB Samsung 850 EVO 2.5" SATA 6Gbps 32 Layer 3D V-NAND Solid State Drive
1TB WD Blue WD10EZEX SATA III 6GB/s 7200rpm 64MB Cache 8ms
Windows 7 64 bit

UR44 interface already got this.

Probably a max of about 20 tracks, a few live guitar and vocals the rest mostly VSTIs, with plugins and the usual effects.

I am not planning to OC but thought it was useful to have the option in case, and CPU is same price.
Had most trouble deciding on PSU and CPU cooler.

Any advice on suitability of or better alternative components, or of any glaring ommisions would be great , at the moment it comes in at about £750 and I dont really want to go any higher.

All input is welcome, Im new to the game so hopefully the voices of experience will help guide me.


Cameron
 
I see nothing wrong with the specs. You might opt for a larger (or a couple) of hard drives as projects tend to take up a lot of room. Advantage to larger, is of course, that it's larger. Advantage of multiple is speed. You can put your projects on a specific drive and have all your programs and plugs on another making less bottleneck on the SATA buses. You did not mention a video card and your specified MB does not have built in support for such. You need a different mobo or a graphic card to complete the project.

Unless you're getting a large graphics card, you can probably scale back to a 500W PS as well.
 
Looks like a good setup. Your plan to get individual parts is solid, as they won't have as much a chance to rattle around during transport. However, Dell and other manufacturers send computers all over the planet and most of the time the computers arrive in fine, working condition. Nowadays, you can get sale price deals from a OEM for as much or less than building it yourself. I did that for mast my last upgrade (Asus i7 desktop) and I have mastery level skills for building one myself (and have built/disassembled hundreds over the years).
 
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Thanks BroKen_H

Thats just the sort of dumb ass newbie thing I need pointing out.:facepalm:
I just sort of assumed it had on board graphics that would do me as Im not using dual monitors or video editing.

Can anyone suggest an alternative MOBO that has what I need on board. ??

I was going to use the SSD for OS and Cubase programmes and the HDD for projects Im working on and samples with an external drive for backup and storing finished projects. Any suggestions of better ways to do this without too much extra costs ??

Good thought on the PSU any cash saved can go on other components.

This is really helping me.
 
CAM1 said:
I was going to use the SSD for OS and Cubase programmes and the HDD for projects Im working on and samples with an external drive for backup and storing finished projects. Any suggestions of better ways to do this without too much extra costs ??
Click to expand...

I have a similar setup, and keep the active projects on the SSD and keep a copy on the Sata hard drive (backup). I keep the larger plugins, like Superior Drummer, cached on the Sata drive which also saves on SSD storage needed. Sata drives are fine for loading such things since they get loaded to system memory (RAM), so it only loads from the drive that one time not each time you press play in the project.

For the prices of drives, there's probably no reason to get anything smaller than a 2TB but 1TB is still a lot of space. With YEARS of stuff accumulating, I'm at 1.2TB right now.
 
Thanks Pinky

Thats the sort of system I was looking to set up but wasnt quite sure what to run from what drive for best performance.

It is all slowly becoming clearer to me
 
Tried the link but keep getting this.

You don't have permission to access "http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/search.asp?" on this server.
Reference #18.404b3917.1434039519.9d90723 Access Denied

Looks like its blocked from Oman. censorship stinks. will put on my vpn and try again
 
Not letting you look at a American prices? That's scary. Anyway, see if you can find ASUS H81M-E or H87M-E. Decent boards, not the top, but not the bottom either...
 
You just saved me £25 and a shit load of trouble.
Thats gotta be worth a beer if your ever in Muscat:thumbs up:
 
Its the morning after and im still slightly confused, not that thats unusual.


After looking further into the MOBO and CPU specs .

https://www.asus.com/Motherboards/Z97MPLUS/overview/
ARK | Intel® Coreâ„¢ i5-4690K Processor (6M Cache, up to 3.90 GHz)

My reading of these is that the asus z97m plus, combined with the i5 4690k, does give me on board graphics without the need for a seperate card.
Am I reading this right ?
Is this therefore all i need for running Cubase ? (except for a monitor to plug into it of course)

Also how about the Gigabyte Z97M-DS3H Micro-ATX Motherboard.
Its about £25 cheaper but is it false economy compared to the Asus z97m-plus ?

Cameron
 
I suggest a low end graphics card, even if it has one. Takes the processing off the CPU and doesn't share memory. You don't have to spend a lot, just get a card that is decent (low ends are 50-75). To add, you will probably want dual monitors at some point in the future. It really is nice to faders on one screen, and the tracks on another.

Separate GPU equals more processor for your work.
 
DM60 said:
I suggest a low end graphics card, even if it has one. Takes the processing off the CPU and doesn't share memory. You don't have to spend a lot, just get a card that is decent (low ends are 50-75). To add, you will probably want dual monitors at some point in the future. It really is nice to faders on one screen, and the tracks on another.

Separate GPU equals more processor for your work.
Click to expand...

Copy that! Sorry about the confuse. I didn't know the 4600s had internal graphics...still, as David said, separate and conquer! Would anyone care for a slice of humble pie? Got some I'm working on.
What you gain on the PS, put towards the graphics card. Any simple graphics card that supports two monitors will do nicely for music (not much going on on the screen). See if you can find fanless (saves money and keeps the noise down.)
 
BroKen_H said:
Copy that! Sorry about the confuse. I didn't know the 4600s had internal graphics...still, as David said, separate and conquer! Would anyone care for a slice of humble pie? Got some I'm working on.
Click to expand...

Not needed BH, most of us are not focused on graphics, so we tend to discount it. And while most of us do not require intense graphics, it is easy to overlook the added burden of graphic processing.

That said, if someone had to live with onboard graphics, I wouldn't say it is a show stopper. Just that, if given the option ...
 
DM60 said:
Not needed BH, most of us are not focused on graphics, so we tend to discount it. And while most of us do not require intense graphics, it is easy to overlook the added burden of graphic processing.

That said, if someone had to live with onboard graphics, I wouldn't say it is a show stopper. Just that, if given the option ...
Click to expand...

Yes, yes...quite. The pie was from the oversight of the internal graphics on the processor. Thought the 4600s had none...didn't check. Should have realized when the mobo said it relied on the CPU's GPU.
 
No problems

Im learning all the time from this,:thumbs up:

I guess given a certain budget its always a case of the best trade offs and compromises to an extent. Im just learning where to and where not to make them

cameron
 
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