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Speccing a new gaming PC

firestorm

pfm Member
Got a new to me GPU card RTX3090. I don't have anything to run it on yet and trying to work out what will be optimal. I'll be running sims like MSFS 2020.

I'll be using 3 x QHD monitors.

I'm thinking MSI MAG X570S TOMAHAWK MAX WIFI mb, AMD 5800x3d, Corsair 2 x 16GB 3600 C16, Samsung 980 Pro 2TB SSD, Noctua NHD15, Corsair HX1000i psu all in a Corsair 4000D case.

Any comments?
 
Very nice choices, you will be able to run anything on such a system.

I usually prefer putting the operating system onto a smaller SSD, say 240GB, and then use the 2TB for storage.

The case looks like it supports 3x intake fans at the front, I would use all 3x, and definitely would fit a single exhaust at the back. This will keep the air pressure in the case positive and help prevent dust buildup.
 
A computer can only be as good as its mobo will allow. I haven't studied your choice but what jumps out at me is that its dual channel memory. For best performance you'll need quad channel memory support.

DV
 
A computer can only be as good as its mobo will allow. I haven't studied your choice but what jumps out at me is that its dual channel memory. For best performance you'll need quad channel memory support.

DV

This would require using 4x sticks though. Plus, there is very little benefit in gaming with dual channel vs quad channel RAM.

What is more important is the amount and speed of VRAM, which the RTX3090 has gobs of.
 
As said above, when I looked recently, it seems intel are now the best for gaming.
 
That's a very nice GPU, and with careful selection of the other components you will end up with a cracking gaming PC.

You don't mention if you are already using it, but with regard to MSFS I have 1,000 flying hours in the simulator and have tweaked my PC build and game settings over the last couple of years to optimise it as far as possible. For MSFS (and I understand most other simulators), CPU performance is just as critical, if not more so than the GPU. Your choice of the AMD 5800X3D looks good due to the size of the L3 cache, which has a beneficial effect on MSFS performance and despite it's relatively modest price, this CPU performs as well or better than most 12th or 13th gen intel chips with this simulator. The only thing I would suggest is that if possible you might look to one of the new AM5 socket CPU's which have the X3D architecture like the 7900X3D or 7950X3D. These are currently pricey, but I understand that 5 and 7 range X3D chips are soon to be released. This would mean you have the best possible performance as well as some measure of future-proofing, since there will be no further developments for the AM4 socket. If you don't maximise the CPU performance for MSFS, you will be forever frustrated with 'mainthread limited,' and your superb GPU will be idling rather than utilised to the full. Moving to the AM5 socket would however mean a B650 or an X670 motherboard, and these only use DDR5 RAM

On the other component choices, specifically with regard to MSFS: Assuming you go with the 5800X3D / X570S combo, I have similar Corsair DDR4 ram and so far it has not caused me any reliability or performance issues. Definitely go with 32GB.
The Samsung M2 MVmE drive will be perfect whichever mobo you choose, and will minimise the loading time.
The X3D CPU's run hot, and while the noctua cooler mentioned is well regarded, I would personally go for a 280mm or 360mm liquid cooler.

From personal experience, Corsair fans are NOISY, and they are not the most effective air-movers either. Just like yours will need to, my pc shifts A LOT of air when using MSFS. There isn't much that can be done about the GPU, but all of my case and cooler fans have been replaced with be quiet! fans, and it no longer sounds like a jet engine on the edge of my desk. I would therefore very strongly recommend a be quiet! case, PSU and cpu cooler, or failing that just buy their fans to replace the existing Corsair ones.

If you don't have something already, don't forget a decent joystick or yoke, along with a throttle quadrant and some rudder pedals. I have had various controllers from Logitech and Thrustmaster, and have now moved on to VKB gear which I much prefer the quality and feel of in use.
 
Plenty of things for me to consider.
I've also started looking at the Intel platform again, in particular the i5-13500 seems like a reasonable alternative to the 5800x3d and a little quicker too.

GrahamB - thanks for the feedback on the ram and ssd. I've ordered the Samsung 990 Pro instead of the 980.
I've been using a XboxX with the TurtleBeach VelocityOne Control, quadrant and rudder pedals. The yoke action feels very dry. A lot of the extras I'd like to run are not available on the Xbox unfortunately. I haven't spent many hours on MSFS, but I do have >25hrs on a Piper PA28 and I'm trying to emulate flying the PA28 on MSFS, so I can practice VFR and nav etc Would be great if I can use SkyDemon and apply airspace rules and so on.

I've ordered 5 x be quiet! B0L85 for ventilation.
I may get an AIO liquid cooler for the RTX3090, as the Zotac is noisy.
The Corsair 4000D and 1KW psu is on it's way.

Right now I'm not sure whether to go for the AMD 5800x3d or Intel 13th gen, perhaps the i5-13500.
 
Would like to see this in action when you get it going. I was heavily into FSX a few years back and spent quite a lot of time and money "chasing the frames".

Happy to be a Sunday driver on the Xbox now, tootling around parts of NZ I'd never get a chance to visit.
 
GrahamB - thanks for the feedback on the ram and ssd. I've ordered the Samsung 990 Pro instead of the 980.
I've been using a XboxX with the TurtleBeach VelocityOne Control, quadrant and rudder pedals. The yoke action feels very dry. A lot of the extras I'd like to run are not available on the Xbox unfortunately. I haven't spent many hours on MSFS, but I do have >25hrs on a Piper PA28 and I'm trying to emulate flying the PA28 on MSFS, so I can practice VFR and nav etc Would be great if I can use SkyDemon and apply airspace rules and so on.

I've ordered 5 x be quiet! B0L85 for ventilation.

Right now I'm not sure whether to go for the AMD 5800x3d or Intel 13th gen, perhaps the i5-13500.

No problem, happy to help!

Of the two CPU’s mentioned, the i5 may have good benchmarks, but the X3D will be way better for MSFS right now. It is the end of the AM4 socket however, and by the intel 14th & 15th gen then who can say? I have an i7 11700kf, as it was the best safe option when I built the PC, but if I was choosing one now I would go as top tier as I possibly could.

You won’t regret the be quiet! gear, it makes a big difference in practice.

I have a grand total of 2hrs GA flying, one in a Robin HR200, one in a 172, but in the sim I fly warbirds, helicopters and many hours in the DA 62, so a joystick is a flexible choice for me. Your controls will work great with a pc and you might find the sensitivity adjustment helps the realism - I don’t know if the same range of adjustments are available to the XBOX?

I haven’t tried it personally, but SkyDemon and other similar apps work well with MSFS, and you can either run them on another screen or import an additional screen as a pdf directly into the cockpit. Navigraph and Little Navmap also work well, and you can practice atc procedures with volunteers on Vatsim, although I haven’t braved that so far.
 
re: OS and app drive
I haven't messed about with a Windows PC for years, since Vista in fact.
Some one else (on another forum) was telling me I should split the SSD.
This is what I asked:

So if I have 2 physically separate SSD, say drive C and drive D. If I install the OS on drive C, I can install MSFS and it's associated plugins into drive D?
Drive C is a purely OS drive?
Do if drive C dies, I can get a new drive C, put Windows 11 home on it and it'll work out I have apps on drive D and "just work"?
I was under the impression I'd have to install everything from scratch.

If it is truly independent now and picks it up, I'll get another SSD.
(I do have a NAS that I'll back up everything to, it's on a 2.5GBPS network so isn't too slow.)

I'm still in a quandary over the CPU though - but I'm leaning towards the 5800x3d now, if the 7800x3d was out, I'd go for that probably. Or if I had a RTX4090/5090 I'd go for the 7950x3d.
 
If you are just using it as a flight sim then maybe the one big drive is more appropriate…

It is important to store core apps on the C drive, which do not take a lot of space. Otherwise, you will see various registry and dll issues in the event of switching the other drive they were on.

The D drive should be used for file / media / game storage only.

If my drives fail, I can just plug in my eSATA drive with all media intact, and away we go.

Maybe you would have to reinstall games, but that isn’t too painful.

Also, 500GB SSDs are good enough value now to have a more roomy C drive, if you did want to go down this route - I have used 240GB for previous builds.
 
Right, I've decided on the AMD 5800x3d and a MSI MAG Torpedo Max WiFi.

I've received these bits so far. The Noctua NHD15, the things is h.u.g.e - I think it my impact negatively on the case airflow. May swap it for the NHD12 instead.

I may swap get another SSD for the boot drive.

 




My thoughts so far

The Corsair 4000D case is well designed and well made.
Missing razor sharp edges that the old PC cases use to have. There are cable channels, mesh filters for the fans. The thing is mainly made of aluminium.

I've been warned that the Zotac RTX3090 is noisy, I may be looking for a water block, rad and pump in the near future.
I've got a Noctua NH-U12A open the way for the CPU.
I'll probably put in an order for another SSD to keep the OS.
 
That's a very nice GPU, and with careful selection of the other components you will end up with a cracking gaming PC.

You don't mention if you are already using it, but with regard to MSFS I have 1,000 flying hours in the simulator and have tweaked my PC build and game settings over the last couple of years to optimise it as far as possible. For MSFS (and I understand most other simulators), CPU performance is just as critical, if not more so than the GPU. Your choice of the AMD 5800X3D looks good due to the size of the L3 cache, which has a beneficial effect on MSFS performance and despite it's relatively modest price, this CPU performs as well or better than most 12th or 13th gen intel chips with this simulator. The only thing I would suggest is that if possible you might look to one of the new AM5 socket CPU's which have the X3D architecture like the 7900X3D or 7950X3D. These are currently pricey, but I understand that 5 and 7 range X3D chips are soon to be released. This would mean you have the best possible performance as well as some measure of future-proofing, since there will be no further developments for the AM4 socket. If you don't maximise the CPU performance for MSFS, you will be forever frustrated with 'mainthread limited,' and your superb GPU will be idling rather than utilised to the full. Moving to the AM5 socket would however mean a B650 or an X670 motherboard, and these only use DDR5 RAM

On the other component choices, specifically with regard to MSFS: Assuming you go with the 5800X3D / X570S combo, I have similar Corsair DDR4 ram and so far it has not caused me any reliability or performance issues. Definitely go with 32GB.
The Samsung M2 MVmE drive will be perfect whichever mobo you choose, and will minimise the loading time.
The X3D CPU's run hot, and while the noctua cooler mentioned is well regarded, I would personally go for a 280mm or 360mm liquid cooler.

From personal experience, Corsair fans are NOISY, and they are not the most effective air-movers either. Just like yours will need to, my pc shifts A LOT of air when using MSFS. There isn't much that can be done about the GPU, but all of my case and cooler fans have been replaced with be quiet! fans, and it no longer sounds like a jet engine on the edge of my desk. I would therefore very strongly recommend a be quiet! case, PSU and cpu cooler, or failing that just buy their fans to replace the existing Corsair ones.

If you don't have something already, don't forget a decent joystick or yoke, along with a throttle quadrant and some rudder pedals. I have had various controllers from Logitech and Thrustmaster, and have now moved on to VKB gear which I much prefer the quality and feel of in use.

My AMD Ryzen 9 5900x is cooled by a Arctic Freezer Pro 360 aio, does a really good job and is very silent to boot.
my case is the Fractal Meshify 2
i have 3x 140 mm Noctuas fitted as intakes
gpu is MSI RTX 3080 Suprim X
 
See how you go in-use before worrying about aftermarket water cooling for the GPU. I reckon that even with a cpu of your AMD's calibre, the gpu will still not be running near 100% for long periods so you may find it isn't too intrusive. The noctua cooler and be quiet! case fans will ensure that any other fan noise is minimised, so you'll soon know if the gpu is an issue or not.

My Gigabyte gpu audibly ramps up when starting a flight, at low altitude in complex scenery areas or at busy large airports like EGLL and KLAX, but as all the other fans are effectively silent it isn't a problem. At other times in flight it's still audible but much quieter, sounding more like an ordinary fan as opposed to a Concorde performing a go-around.

It certainly doesn't hurt to have another SSD for Windows, as long as you have the M2 with MSFS on the fastest PCIe socket. I have a 1TB M2 NVMe for the game which I thought would be massive overkill, but it's almost half full currently and there's plenty more I'd like to add. Some of the add-on aircraft can be 5 - 8GB or more, so it soon fills up.
 
My AMD Ryzen 9 5900x is cooled by a Arctic Freezer Pro 360 aio, does a really good job and is very silent to boot.
my case is the Fractal Meshify 2
i have 3x 140 mm Noctuas fitted as intakes
gpu is MSI RTX 3080 Suprim X

Nice! What kind of temperatures does the CPU reach with that cooler? I'm toying with changing to one of the Ryzen 9 X3D's later this year.
 
My nipper rang the other night ..apparently he has ordered some monster gaming pc ...coming on a pallet !!! He will have fun as he lives 3 flights up with no lift :D:D:D
 


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