Hardware [PC Building] Need a nudge in the right direction

[Seriel]

So basically in the near future (month-ish) I'll come into contact with a large amount of money and I would like to dedicate some of it towards a new computer. Sounds good right?
The problems start when I try to plan ahead and look at parts. I've never done this before, so I don't really have much of a clue how to go about choosing which parts to commit to and how to tell if something isnt up to scratch before buying it.
My requirements are.. unique.

• Budget is pretty much £1,000 GBP max. That comes out as $1,294 USD but I would be getting my stuff from British suppliers anyway.
• I like to do heavy compiling from time to time so CPU multi-core performance is important for me. But I also dont want to cheap out on the singlecore because it comes in handy on multiple occasions. I don't think that makes any degree of sense since those two things contradict each other but hopefully you get the idea.
• As far as AMD vs Intel goes, I'm leaning more towards Intel simply due to its ability to work better for virtualization (Intel HAXM) and it's flawless compatibility with hackintoshes (Not the main focus of this build but I like to keep as many options as possible)
  
• I'm not a heavy gamer. I do play some games from time and time and would appreciate if my graphics card could handle that, but I don't need anything fancy like a 1080 Ti. Speaking of which, from what I've seen and read I would probably prefer one of the AMD (Radeon?) cards, since they work so much better with Linux and again give almost flawless hackintosh support (still not the focus but hey options). But I could be wrong and welcome suggestions!
• One thing however I should mention is that I am interested in the possibility of using VR with this build. One might say its the only modern gaming fad I can get behind. Not sure how hefty a gpu this would need since I haven't built at all nevermind for VR, so may need guidance on this.
• As far as ram goes I won't accept anything less than 16gb honestly, my current machine has 10 and I would love some more. Anything more than 16 is overkill though, so I think i just decided that spec already.
• Size? Case? RGB? Don't care, don't care aaand no thanks. I'd prefer a machine that works well over one that looks fancy. That said I would prefer a small form factor, but only if it doesn't come at the cost of other things (like number of ports or pci slots)
• I already have some monitors, a mouse, a keyboard and all that dank stuff and while I will replace a couple, I'm not counting that as part of the price for the machine since I can use my current hardware fine if I choose to not replace any.
• Similar to above, Windows licensing is not a problem and will not be taken into account in this build price.
• Upgradability is a good factor. When technology marches on I would rather be able to swap out bits and pieces for a while instead of having to redo it all every couple years.

(tldr) Key points are prioritise cpu over gpu, try to be compatible with as much software as possible and be able to upgrade instead of replace.

Have a problem with these requirements or think I'm being too picky? That's fine, voice your concerns as a reply and we can talk about it.

I'm not looking for a total build collated for me (though that would be nice...) but rather some help and guidance since I've never done anything like this before and aren't too skilled in the ways of computer hardware (Software is more my area of expertise)

 

[Hayato213]

https://pcpartpicker.com/list/

You can use this to help you with a build.

 

[Seriel]

https://pcpartpicker.com/list/

You can use this to help you with a build.

I saw it but it just presents a huge amount of choices which I can't see a real difference between, I just end up hitting random buttons that seem cool and end up with some weird thing idk is even good. Was hoping for some human advice about choices to make

 

[ThoD]

Let's see now... Gonna suggest a build that can last a good 5-7 years in the current age (technology is reaching a wall so won't need updates for even longer than that, the age I said is because of part deterioration mostly).

For processor, I HIGHLY advise AMD, as the current gen is much better price-wise for the same effective performance as the Intel counterparts, but without the stupid limitations Intel put in (eg: only recognizing half the RAM slots or disabling RAID and whatnot depending on what CPU you pick unless it's the very high-end ones). I suggest a Ryzen 7 2700x, easily overclockable should you need to and generally extremely powerful for anything you could ever possibly need in the next 6 years. DO get a CPU cooler though, will go a long way, especially if you overclock and assuming you get good luck with the CPU and get one with good silicon (completely random honestly), you could even overclock it to as high as 7GHz with a watercooler.

For GPU, while a 1070Ti would work nicely, going for an AMD, I'd suggest something like an RX580 or higher, preferably an RX Vega 56 (fairly expensive, but worth the money, matches the 1070Ti, negligibly lower overall performance in general, but multi-processing and clustering are considerably faster so parallel processing tasks are done faster. You lose CUDA C though by not going for NVidia, but if you don't mind using AMD's counterpart, it's a great option.

For RAM, I suggest Corsair DDR4, 16GBs should be plenty for a start (most people never even go above 8GBs of usage at a time so no problem there). PSU anything with Gold (or higher if you don't mind splurging some) efficiency to lower power bill costs. I suggest Corsair again, never let down by them when it comes to RAMs, PSUs, cases or coolers, so highly recommend them. Remember for the PSU to get one with head room in wattage though as over time the output goes down, a 500W and 600W on a 450W system can vary in how long they last by a difference of even 2-3 years, so plan ahead (I suggest 150W head room).

As for case, I know you said you don't want a big one, but the bigger the case, the better the airflow and cable management, plus you can fit better CPU coolers too if it's a big one should you go with a watercooler. But it honestly depends on how much room you got, I find that unless you got a lot of room and want to splurge, MIDI cases are the best by far, decent room for airflow and cable management, so no issues at all and easy to work with. Getting one with simple screws for the side panel and perhaps a see-through one can also be nice, as you can see quickly if there are any notable issues (eg: the motherboard LEDs or temperature depending on what motherboard you get).

Which brings me to the motherboard... Don't get one that limits you but also unless you are CERTAIN you will upgrade at some point, don't get one with too many upgrade slots (eg: 4 GPU slots or 4+ RAM slots). I find 2 GPU slots and 4 RAM slots to be the most you should ever go for... which would be a motherboard in the 60€ range.

Finally, for drives, a small SSD just for the OS (or OSs in your case) with a 7200RPM 6GB HDD for storage should be plenty. Western Digital's Caviar series is very good for general storage (grab a caviar green preferably, outdated, but extremely solid, never failed me)! No need for disk drives unless you really want to, as you can do most stuff digitally now so no need, thumbdrives are much better after all. For OS, just grab whichever ones you like, but highly advise against W8-10 as, personally, I consider them shit

Hope this all gave you an idea as to what to go for. I'll try to use pcpartpicker to make a sample build for you you could use for reference.

 

[ThoD]

Double posting, but wanted you to get a notification to make sure you see it, made a sample template build for you: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/xpxtr6

Went a little over budget, but was meant as an example, you can tweak it to match things to what you like, just keep it as reference. Things you can do is go from 2700x to 2700 (about 13% performance difference but 99% of the time it's negligible unless you plan to compile 100K+ lines of code or do heavy editing), remove a drive and use one you may already have laying around, etc.. You will need a mount for the SSD though but not necessary. I assume you have a monitor though, otherwise your build will have to be heavily downgraded from my template one. Just use the one I linked as a reference mostly and make one you think you will be content with

 

[Seriel]

Double posting, but wanted you to get a notification to make sure you see it, made a sample template build for you: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/xpxtr6

Went a little over budget, but was meant as an example, you can tweak it to match things to what you like, just keep it as reference. Things you can do is go from 2700x to 2700 (about 13% performance difference but 99% of the time it's negligible unless you plan to compile 100K+ lines of code or do heavy editing), remove a drive and use one you may already have laying around, etc.. You will need a mount for the SSD though but not necessary. I assume you have a monitor though, otherwise your build will have to be heavily downgraded from my template one. Just use the one I linked as a reference mostly and make one you think you will be content with

Thanks for all the help and advice!
I do have a monitor and while I may get a better one, I'm choosing to not count it as part of the build price. Similar thing for the storage, I do have a 120gb SSD which I could bring over but I may grab a decent 240 instead since I have the cash.
Only other thing about the build that sticks out to me (After switching it over to the UK prices) is that the graphics card is incredibly expensive (£515) for how little I'd use it. I could be underestimating the price of these things but is there a similar one that shaves a couple hundred off the price?

 

[ThoD]

Thanks for all the help and advice!
I do have a monitor and while I may get a better one, I'm choosing to not count it as part of the build price. Similar thing for the storage, I do have a 120gb SSD which I could bring over but I may grab a decent 240 instead since I have the cash.
Only other thing about the build that sticks out to me (After switching it over to the UK prices) is that the graphics card is incredibly expensive (£515) for how little I'd use it. I could be underestimating the price of these things but is there a similar one that shaves a couple hundred off the price?

Truth is, about GPUs and RAM, memory chips are scarce nowadays thanks to those shitty/pesky coinminers hogging all the hardware, so prices are about 180-220% of what they should be and it's ridiculous! It's gonna take close to half a decade for prices to go back to normal... ALWAYS expect half the price of the build to end up going to the GPU alone with the current state of things, reason I haven't been able to make a new PC myself and I have to make do with a 7 year old build The next best choice is the RX580, which is about half the price, but the performance hit is MASSIVE in heavy tasks (depending on what you are doing it may even be 80+% slower/weaker). There ARE cards in between, but RX Vega 56 is a considerable jump still, plus all cards in-between guzzle wattage like crazy making them terrible if you plan to have the computer running for more than a few hours (otherwise expect really high bills). Another option (inferior in my opinion by a bit though) is to just go with the Intel 1070Ti and save about 20€... Your call really, see what you will like the most, remember that I'm giving you more of a template rather than actual build.

EDIT: Forgot, here's the comparison between 580 and Vega 56: http://gpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/AMD-RX-580-vs-AMD-RX-Vega-56/3923vs3938

 

[subcon959]

Sounds to me like you might want to wait and see what the 9900k is like when it releases shortly. If it doesn't seem like a good buy then either 8700k or 2700x will work well.

GPU is a trickier one as you need to decide whether the VR stuff is important to you or not as that's pretty much the same thing as being a heavy gamer in terms of requirements.

 

[RattletraPM]

I largely agree with @ThoD 's post but there's something else about GPUs which you should take into consideration.

You said that so far you have a monitor and you don't consider it part of the budget, but if you're even considering of changing it sooner or later you should remember that G-Sync monitors tend to cost a fair amount more than FreeSync ones. So if taking a performance hit isn't that much of a deal for you I'd recommend an AMD GPU, otherwise if you want to squeeze each and every single bit of performance out of your rig and don't mind spending more then NVidia is the way.

As a last note there are ways to use team green's cards on FreeSync monitors and vice-versa but they aren't really economically viable (you need to already own a FreeSync compatible GPU alongside to do so).

EDIT: One last thing that I forgot to mention: AMD GPUs tend to last a bit more thanks to what's jokingly referred to as "FineWine technology" (the drivers are usually pretty meh at launch but they're updated, optimized and longer supported than NVidia's). So again, if longevity is important to you then stick to AMD, otherwise if you don't mind to swap out your GPU each once in a while go with NVidia.

 

[ThoD]

I largely agree with @ThoD 's post but there's something else about GPUs which you should take into consideration.

You said that so far you have a monitor and you don't consider it part of the budget, but if you're even considering of changing it sooner or later you should remember that G-Sync monitors tend to cost a fair amount more than FreeSync ones. So if taking a performance hit isn't that much of a deal for you I'd recommend an AMD GPU, otherwise if you want to squeeze each and every single bit of performance out of your rig and don't mind spending more then NVidia is the way.

As a last note there are ways to use team green's cards on FreeSync monitors and vice-versa but they aren't really economically viable (you need to already own a FreeSync compatible GPU alongside to do so).

EDIT: One last thing that I forgot to mention: AMD GPUs tend to last a bit more thanks to what's jokingly referred to as "FineWine technology" (the drivers are usually pretty meh at launch but they're updated, optimized and longer supported than NVidia's). So again, if longevity is important to you then stick to AMD, otherwise if you don't mind to swap out your GPU each once in a while go with NVidia.

My reason for suggesting the GPUs I did is because, knowing Seriel, I found it best to go for ones that are MUCH better for VMs or parallel processing compared to NVidia's. Sure, they lose to performance when handling clumps, but when handling clusters they are considerably faster, plus have higher detail level, meaning better displayed visuals. Additionally, at that range, unless you are using VR that's VERY shittily programmed, you can still easily squeeze 90FPS or higher at a stable rate even at top settings (with Vega 56), which is more than good enough in my opinion.

I agree with the drivers thing, NVidia tends to just abandon cards that are more than a year or so older half the time while AMD may keep support for even 5+ years, which is a great bonus to have. Also, I suggested MSI motherboard for the same reason, they have a tendency to not work well with new stuff but they get updates very fast and support keeps going until the socket itself is discontinued (eg: my AM3+ motherboard is a 8 or so years old model and I was getting BIOS updates and whatnot up until recently).

It would help a lot though if you could be more specific on what tasks you plan to be doing most of the time. I prioritized throughput (serial processing for CPU and parallel for GPU with more than good enough clock speeds and transfer rates) in what I suggested, but that may not be optimal for your case and you may potentially be able to save a LOT if that's not what you want...