# First PC build 5820K - Please check over my PCPartPicker list



## JFetter (Sep 8, 2015)

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

*CPU:* Intel Core i7-5820K 3.3GHz 6-Core Processor ($378.99 @ SuperBiiz)
*CPU Cooler:* Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO 82.9 CFM Sleeve Bearing CPU Cooler ($24.99 @ Newegg)
*Motherboard:* MSI X99S SLI Plus ATX LGA2011-3 Motherboard ($195.99 @ SuperBiiz)
*Memory:* Crucial Ballistix Sport 32GB (4 x 8GB) DDR4-2400 Memory ($229.99 @ Newegg)
*Storage:* Samsung 850 EVO-Series 500GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($170.80 @ Amazon)
*Storage:* Samsung 850 EVO-Series 500GB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($170.80 @ Amazon)
*Video Card:* EVGA GeForce GTX 960 2GB SuperSC ACX 2.0+ Video Card ($189.99 @ NCIX US)
*Case:* Fractal Design Define R5 (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case ($107.99 @ SuperBiiz)
*Power Supply:* EVGA SuperNOVA NEX 650W 80+ Gold Certified Fully-Modular ATX Power Supply ($78.99 @ SuperBiiz)
*Optical Drive:* Asus DRW-24B1ST/BLK/B/AS DVD/CD Writer ($16.89 @ OutletPC)
*Total:* $1565.42
_Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-09-08 18:10 EDT-0400_


I plan to use this for composing orchestral works as a hobby... some light gaming.

Entire Spitfire BML range (down the road)
Cubase (Do not compose for film, or need video capabilities)
Likely buy Windows 7 Professional to support 16+ RAM

Was going to go with the 4790K, but doesn't seem like the 5820K ended up costing a whole lot more with the respective motherboard and RAM. But maybe I will go back and do a 4790K build to check... I don't need state of the art here.

Thinking of the OS and programs on the first 500GB SSD, and samples on the second. (Not sure of the size of BML)


Thank you


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## ptsmith (Sep 9, 2015)

There are many members much more qualified to comment on this than me, but since no one else has chimed in:

Watch this video and read the thread. I learned a lot from it: http://vi-control.net/community/thr...e-vs-real-time-performance-in-your-daw.46807/

Processor speed is more important than the number of cores. That would make the 4790K a better choice. You'll want to overclock it, so maybe you'll need a better fan.

Fast RAM doesn't help performance. In fact, as I understand it, faster RAM puts more load on the CPU, so underclocking RAM actually improves overall performance.

I think most people use a 250GB SSD for their system drive and 500GB to 1TB drives for sample libraries.

Hope this helps.


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## EastWest Lurker (Sep 9, 2015)

I think you should go for 64 GB. Nature abhors a vacuum.


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## Vin (Sep 9, 2015)

It's a great machine (I have a very similar one), the only thing I'd change (if you plan to overclock your CPU) is to get a Noctua NH-D14 or D15 cooler instead of Hyper 212 EVO, which is great, but Noctua is even better. NH-D14 holds my 5820k completely stable at 4.2 GHz with ~64° C on 100% load.


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## JFetter (Sep 10, 2015)

ptsmith said:


> Watch this video and read the thread. I learned a lot from it: http://vi-control.net/community/thr...e-vs-real-time-performance-in-your-daw.46807/
> 
> Processor speed is more important than the number of cores. That would make the 4790K a better choice. You'll want to overclock it, so maybe you'll need a better fan.


Great video and thread - thanks!
From what I've read the 4790K is better at some things because of the procesor speed, but if you overclock the 5820K to 4.0 the gap widens considerably.



EastWest Lurker said:


> I think you should go for 64 GB. Nature abhors a vacuum.


Because I'm not using all 8 slots ?


Vin said:


> It's a great machine (I have a very similar one), the only thing I'd change (if you plan to overclock your CPU) is to get a Noctua NH-D14 or D15 cooler instead of Hyper 212 EVO, which is great, but Noctua is even better. NH-D14 holds my 5820k completely stable at 4.2 GHz with ~64° C on 100% load.


I'm considering the D15 now. Seems well reviewed and compatible with my mobo but possible RAM height issues.


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## EastWest Lurker (Sep 10, 2015)

No because you will sooner or later probably end up using combinations of libraries that require more than 32 GB.


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## ptsmith (Sep 10, 2015)

JFetter said:


> Great video and thread - thanks!
> From what I've read the 4790K is better at some things because of the procesor speed, but if you overclock the 5820K to 4.0 the gap widens considerably.


Yes but Deferred Procedure Calls, the cause of DPC Latency, are handled by one core. So for real time audio all that matters is processor speed. A 50 core 3.0GHz CPU isn't going to process real time audio as well as a 4 core 4.0 CPU.

Or at least that's what I got from Richard's video. Maybe I have it wrong.


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## stonzthro (Sep 10, 2015)

EastWest Lurker said:


> No because you will sooner or later probably end up using combinations of libraries that require more than 32 GB.



Sooner for sure!


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## chimuelo (Sep 10, 2015)

X99s run really well with 64GBs.
The 5820k can be OC'd using the MSI Easy OC BIOS (iirc).
Should give you 400MHz with little or no voltage increases.
When using large amounts of RAM it's a good idea to keep the voltage
at what the chipset suggests.

Otherwise there's a chance the OS won't recognize the RAM.
Then you'll think you have bad sticks, and waste time with reps at
wherever you bought the hardware.

Personally I think staying with mature chips like the Z97 and X99 is wise.
Parts are mature, cheap and much more reliable than Intels latest.
We are no longer seeing the tick/tock strategy, more like the tock/tock.

The only real improvements I can see are from storage and OS's using NVMe.
GPUs are pretty impressive, but the 100 Series and the 6700s are just not as reliable.
We see reviewers bragging about 4-600MHz while overclocking.
Nothing like we saw with the i7 2600's and previous CPUs.
8-1200 MHz increased wattage and the TDP was pretty small for the speeds
gained from a good OC'd board.
Hell right now I hear guys getting crappy binned i7 6700s that won't go past 4.46GHz....!!
I suppose the reviewers always get the hand picked CPUs.

Stay with Z97 and X99.
Forget the latest greatest M$ and Intel double "tock" crap.


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## Peter Costa (Sep 10, 2015)

Chimuelo,

I remember reading a couple weeks ago that you were getting the Z170 ASR Extreme 7. Did that work out ok? I was looking at getting skylake instead of the haswell-e because of the 3 m.3 PCI3 slots. Do you recommend just going to the X99. The only downside I'm seeing on the new Z170 boards is that they have only 4 slots of memory and the 16gb sticks sell out the day they have more. Not sure how stable they run either.


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## Gerhard Westphalen (Sep 10, 2015)

If there were not overclocking involved, would the 4790K be a better choice than the 5820K for a master computer running VEP with 64GB? I'm scared to get a quad core for my new 64GB computer I'm about to have built because my 32GB slave with an i7-4770 running 26GB of sample idles (VEP connected but no notes playing) at 60% with a buffer 512. I'd be running more than 2x the samples on this new master computer so I'm hesitant to get a quad core that's only slightly faster than the one on my slave. Seems like I'd run out of processing power (not to mention realtime performance) just having everything loaded and not playing.


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## JFetter (Sep 10, 2015)

chimuelo said:


> The 5820k can be OC'd using the MSI Easy OC BIOS (iirc).
> Should give you 400MHz with little or no voltage increases.
> When using large amounts of RAM it's a good idea to keep the voltage
> at what the chipset suggests



As someone who has never overclocked before, this is going a little above my head. I see that the ram I was looking at was DDR4-2400 and 1.2v.
I was thinking overclocking from 3.3 up to 4.0 sounded safe and fairly easy but maybe I was mistaken.


I guess the question I should ask (and has been asked many times before on these forums)
Which would be the better choice for my needs?
*4790K 32GB RAM
5820K 32GB RAM* (costs +$150) (would also allow for 64GB in the future)


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## ptsmith (Sep 10, 2015)

My ASUS P9X79 PRO motherboard has "auto overclocking". I didn't have to do anything other than select it. I had selected the auto option when I first built my DAW almost 3 years ago. I never checked the CPU speed until last week while implementing some of Richard's suggestions. I was shocked to learn that my i7 3820 3.6 was running at 4.6!

I imagine that most better motherboards will do the same or better, depending on the CPU.


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## chimuelo (Sep 10, 2015)

It is easy on most MSI boards.
See if it has the Easy OC switch, or maybe it's in the BIOS now.
Pretty much automates everything for you.
Personally I'd get slower RAM and more of it.

My first i7 Overclock was on an MSI board.
They have a forum here in the USA and everyone will show you how to do it.
No need for fancy schmancy timings, etc.
One or two clicks to get you near 4.0GHz.

The benefit of slower RAM is stability. When you overclock you can also choose to
have the RAM jump up in speed too.
Slower cheaper stable RAM can follow you where as 2400 doesn't leave much room.

Just my 2 cent.


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## JFetter (Sep 10, 2015)

Thanks for the advice. 

Maybe I'm missing something, but it seems most of the DDR4 is _at_ _least_ 2400.
The lowest and cheapest I could find is 32GB of 2133 by Crucial for $169


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## Przemek K. (Sep 10, 2015)

Seems like a good build. I have the i7 5820k with a msi x99s sli plus and 32gb ram (crucial 2133mhz). I opted for the x99 because of future upgradeability to lets say 64gb ram, or cpu either to a i7 8core or xeon to even get up to 128 gb ram.


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## kitekrazy (Sep 11, 2015)

Make sure case is compatible with the cooler. If you go with an EVO, the Cooler Master forum will tell you if it fits. Also these behemoth coolers will hog the first RAM slot. There's also those mini water cooler units as well. I have a Corsair running in one. My other case using the EVO could not take water cooler units because of the case top. BTW that video card put you in gamer territory. Do you really need that? I'm using a low power consumption 750ti.


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## JFetter (Sep 13, 2015)

I don't game as much as I used to, mainly games from a couple years ago. But the extra $50 or so seems to buy me some future-proofing.


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## chimuelo (Sep 13, 2015)

[QUOTE="JFetter, post: 3894455, member: 
The lowest and cheapest I could find is 32GB of 2133 by Crucial for $169[/QUOTE]
Great. But if 2400 CAS 13 is a must
Buy my unopened 16gb for sale below.
I am literally giving it away since I will never use it with my Z97 rigs.


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## fraz (Sep 29, 2017)

Hi,

An old thread I've found about overclocking after searching 5820 K - If a CPU like 5820 K is over clocked 25% from 3.3 Ghz to about 4.125 Ghz - Will this equate to 25% extra performance for the loading of Kontakt instruments etc......


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## gsilbers (Sep 29, 2017)

just fyi. you can go up to 128gb of ram with some x99 motherboards even if the info on the i7 says max is 64gb. 
its been working fine for me for a while.


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## JohnG (Sep 30, 2017)

EastWest Lurker said:


> I think you should go for 64 GB



Second this -- get 64GB. It's amazing how fast you can eat up RAM if you are doing ambitious things.

Also, before you buy, double check your final build with the motherboard manufacturer website to confirm that PC Partpicker is in fact accurate in compatibility. I had a semi-disaster with that this summer -- turned out the mobo was not (as a practical matter) compatible with other parts, even though PC Partpicker said it was.


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## Publius (Sep 30, 2017)

If its not too late, I strongly suggest getting a 1tb ssd rather than 2 500 gig. This sort of load balances and extends the live of the drive. I can explain in more detail if requested to.

Also, others have suggested 64 gig. If you don't want to spend the money at this time, I recommend getting a mobo that can support 64 gig and only buy 32 gig, leaving half the memory slots open so you can get more later if you want. Might want to spend a little bit more on the cpu fan, as I think ball bearings last longer than sleeve bearings.

I have never used partpicker. What I do is make sure the cpu socket type is the same as the mobo. For instance an older one is socket 1150. For the ram, check the type and maybe get more specific by getting a supported ram list from the mobo web site if they have one. I am lucky to live by micro center and their prices are very competitive on the core parts, so I go in there and have one of the guys there make sure I am getting the right mobo-cpu-ram. I have to pay sales tax, but there is a no questions asked return policy I have used at least once on a big purchase when a new system would not post. Maybe partpicker can be used as a double-check.


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## Andrew Aversa (Sep 30, 2017)

fraz said:


> Hi,
> 
> An old thread I've found about overclocking after searching 5820 K - If a CPU like 5820 K is over clocked 25% from 3.3 Ghz to about 4.125 Ghz - Will this equate to 25% extra performance for the loading of Kontakt instruments etc......



It doesn't exactly equate to a 25% performance boost, but it will certainly help. I have a 5820k myself and you can indeed generally use more voices / more plugins (etc) with the extra speed


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## fraz (Sep 30, 2017)

zircon_st said:


> It doesn't exactly equate to a 25% performance boost, but it will certainly help. I have a 5820k myself and you can indeed generally use more voices / more plugins (etc) with the extra speed



What percentage increase would you say you've experienced? - roughly how much more potent has your 5820 K been over clocked compared to stock 3.3 Ghz?


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## Publius (Sep 30, 2017)

There is a Microsoft employee who posts at gearslutz and he recommends overclocking a bit and using those closed system liquid cpu coolers. Some report they are noisier than a simple fan based cooler, though. I had been avoiding liquid cooling due to concerns about leaks and the need for outboard coolers, but these all in one units avoid all that. Regrettably, as I was preparing to try it out I learned my xeon can't be overclocked, so no point.


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## fraz (Oct 16, 2017)

No but the Xeon could be cooled with liquid - Or you could de-lid


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