Building a new tower computer – last one I built was a decade ago…

Topic

Hi all,
I’m moving my main desktop to Win 11 Pro – and for me that means not “moving” but building a new desktop computer. The last computer I built was over a decade ago, so I’ve been out of the loop for a while.

In this last computer I built – the MoBo is an Asus M3A78-CM with a 3.20 gigahertz AMD Phenom II X6 1090T and 8GB of DDR2 RAM. It has a 3.5″ FDD (that I have actually needed a few times) and a CD and DVD drive (2 separate drives).  It runs 4 monitors off of an nVidia NVS510 Quadro card – which I think I can repurpose into the new box since nVidia appears to have Win11 drivers for this card. I’m also planning on re-using the CD & DVD drives.

I’m on a Lumos Fiber 1GB connection to the Internet. All of my desktop computers are hardwired to my house network.

This computer will get used for:
– monitoring stock market in real time – ThinkOrSwim, TC2000
– graphic design – Photoshop, InDesign, CorelDRAW, etc
– video editing – Premiere, Camtasia, After Effects, etc
– general computing – web, email, MS Office, etc

I’m probably looking at the same sort of specs as a gaming / hi end computer – or similar at least. Budget is pretty open – I’m OK at the $2-3k mark – maybe more.

I’m looking for any recommendations on the following:
1- Mid-tower / full tower (preferred) case – would like it to have 2 CD/DVD drive bays and USB connectors on the front for easier access. I realize the FDD bay is gone at this point – but I still use the CD bays.

2- Motherboard – still trying to weigh AMD vs Intel based motherboards. My gut is to go with Intel. But I have read that Intel has had some issues with the latest processors? Anyone had experience with this? I’m thinking i9 processors or higher end i7. Or the comparable AMD if it makes more sense.

3- RAM – I’m looking at doing 64GB of RAM. It seems DDR5 is the new standard now? I used to use Corsair RAM a lot – does anyone have any opinions on RAM Mfr’s?

4- Processor – ties in with #2 above, but I guess the latest Intel’s are the i9 series. Does anyone have experience with these or the AMD Ryzens?

Sorry for the length in this – was trying to supply adequate details. Any thoughts from you all are very much appreciated.

Thanks,
Bill

Replies

Sounds like you have the right ideas about RAM and CPU.

As for mobos, I’ve used various and never had any issues, so features and price will dictate.
I would look for one with 2 or 3 NVMe slots that you can actually access once you have installed everything.

That video card is old and out-performed by even on-board GPUs these days (3.11 vs 5.19 Intel 630). You need ports, not performance so you can get away with a lower end card.

cheers, Paul

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billbled

billbled wrote:

It runs 4 monitors off of an nVidia NVS510 Quadro card – which I think I can repurpose into the new box since nVidia appears to have Win11 drivers for this card.

Paul T wrote:

That video card is old…

Paul’s right, you card is indeed old. Old enough that it’s no longer supported by Nvidia, and the driver for Windows 11 is the last one that they’re likely to issue for it, version 475.14. Here’s the low-down on your card’s support directly from Nvidia: https://nvidia.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/5210/kw/kepler%20support/related/1
The only thing that was in the 475.14 driver release was a security hole patch for several lines of their older, out of support cards.

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billbled

Thanks – Good point – I didn’t realize support had been dropped for it – I guess I need to plan on a replacement card.

Paul T wrote:

You need ports, not performance so you can get away with a lower end card.

The cheapest Nvidia-based card in the T-series workstation cards (non-gaming cards) is the T-600 with 4GB of GDDR6 memory and 4 Display Port 1.4 ports for $370 right now from Newegg.

Here’s the link to the current lines of workstation cards with multiple ports, either 3 or 4:

https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/design-visualization/desktop-graphics/#solutions

The list is expandable and includes three generations of GPUs (from newest to oldest): Ada Lovelace, Ampere, and Turing. Although the oldest, Turing is still supported and just had a release of its driver a week and a half ago. Like @Paul-T said above, you need ports, not necessarily performance.

Thanks very much for the info and research! (love the names of the generations).

If you use a CPU/GPU (i7 12700, Ryzen 7 9700) you will get all the performance you need at a significant reduction in price, but you need to make sure the mobo supports 4 monitors.

An i7 14700k will cost less than the card suggested by Bob and you get a CPU thrown in.

cheers, Paul

They make motherboards that support 4 monitors off the board? I had no idea. We always had to buy multimonitor cards – but that was 10+ yrs ago.

Searching now. Thanks for the heads up.

billbled wrote:

I’m also planning on re-using the CD & DVD drives.

Why when a DVD drive can also read/write CDs?

You also might consider ditching them both and upgrading to a single Blu-ray drive (like this $100 LG BH16NS40 16x Blu-Ray) which can read/write CDs, DVDs, Blu-ray & M-DISC.

They are both DVD drives actually – one a R only and one a RW – in my head I just think of them as “CD & DVD” drives since they do both. I should have been more specific in typing. I use them in the media work that I do to transfer from one disc to another without having to unload the source disc and then load a target disc.

I need to find a suitable tower / mid-tower that has 2 bays to accomodate them. Seems like a lot of towers nowadays are getting away from optical media drives period as I’m looking. There are still some out there – I’m just sorting through the choices.

billbled wrote:

I need to find a suitable tower / mid-tower that has 2 bays to accomodate them. Seems like a lot of towers nowadays are getting away from optical media drives period as I’m looking. There are still some out there – I’m just sorting through the choices.

A good place to search for cases, as well as other parts, is Choose Your Parts at PCPARTPICKER.

It lets you filter the selection by motherboard size, front panel USBs and number of drive bays.

Seems the integrated GPU 4 monitor setup requires 3 x DisplayPort connected monitors, via a splitter, and 1 HDMI connected. The separate video card is 4 x DP connected monitors.

cheers, Paul

Yeah – I’m seeing MoBo’s with 1 VGA, 1 DP and 1 HDMI output – I guess you can run that as 3 separate monitors? I’m just used to doing quad video cards and setting up that way. This computer I’m on has 4, the other computer in my office has 8 (even though they’re ancient CRTs) – but that’s another story (see pics).

billbled wrote:

– video editing – Premiere, Camtasia, After Effects, etc

Then I’d suggest you get a much newer graphics card. That way you can off-load the video processing to the graphics card and lighten the load on the CPU/memory.

I do a lot of video processing myself and my Nvidia RTX-3060Ti can process a 25 min video in slightly over 1 min where my overclocked CPU/memory (Intel i7-9700K @ 4.8 GHz, G.SKILL Ripjaws V DDR4 @ 4GHz) takes over 4 mins to finish the exact same processing.

There’s also the issue of heat while processing the video.

The Nvidia never goes above 35.2° C while the CPU stays right at it’s idle temp of ~42 – 48° C. If I use the CPU to do the processing, the temps get as high as 97° C!

BTW, most video processing S/W, especially those you listed, can be configured to use a standalone graphic’s card instead of the CPU.

FYI, my RTX-3060Ti has 4 video outputs (3 min-Display & 1 HDMI) so I “assume” it’d be capable of supporting up to 4 monitors. Heck, even my old Nvidia GTX-1060 has the same 4 ports so most newer Nvidia cards should also have that many ports.

 

Thanks – great info! I’ll look into the 3060 series.

With building a new PC in 2025 I wouldn’t use the old generation Intel 13-14xxx CPUs but use a CPU like the new Core Ultra 200v..

Thanks – I guess I wasn’t aware that the 13/14 gens were that old. I’ll look into the Core Ultra CPUs – I really appreciate all the tips in this thread. Very helpful since I’ve been out of building for over a decade.

A quick wander through the performance graphs suggest an Intel i7-14700KF (no graphics) is about the best price / performance, with the i9 / Ryzens not performing much better despite being >50% more expensive. Same for the Ultras.

This frees you up to spend more on a 4 output video card, like this 8GB unit.

cheers, Paul

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billbled

For what it is worth, we just finished setting up a new HP Z2 Tower G9 Workstation running Windows 11 Pro.We bought a low end version of the workstation and then upgrades the RAM and storage.

Configuring the system and setting up Windows was not an easy task but well worth the time and effort.  In fact, we are finding Windows 11 Pro 24H2 to be stable and operates like summer lightning when installed on the new computer.

Our new machine is configured as follows:

• Windows 11 Pro 24H2
• Intel Core i7-14700 Processor vPro Enterprise (2.1 GHz, up to 5.4 GHz w/Boost, 33 MB cache, 20 core, 65W) + Intel UHD Graphics 770,
• Crucial Pro 32GB (2 x 16GB) DDR5 6000 (PC5 48000) Desktop Memory Model CP2K16G60C48U5,
• NVIDIA T400 (4 GB GDDR6, 3 x Mini DisplayPort) Graphics,
• Two WD BLACK 2TB SN850X NVMe Internal Gaming SSD Solid State Drive with Heatsinks,
• Intel Wi-Fi 7 BE200 + Bluetooth 5.4 (no-vPro),
• 5mm SuperMulti DVDRW Optical Disc Drive,
• Two Type-C USB 3.1 Gen 2 Port v2,
• A HP 125 Black Wired Keyboard, and
• A HP Wired 320M Mouse.

The combination of the NVIDIA T400 with 3 Mini DisplayPorts combined with two additional video ports driven by the Intel UHD Graphics 770 allows us to connect up to five monitors to the system.

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billbled

How are you doing the 5 monitors?
What resolution do you get?

cheers, Paul

Paul T

At the present time we are using three monitors with Mini Display Ports that are being fed through the NVIDIA T400 4GB graphics card.  Their current resolution is set at 1920 x 1080 with a refresh rate of 59 Hz.

In addition, the system has Intel UHD Graphics 770 with two HDMI ports. The Intel graphics current resolution is set at 1920 x 1080 and refresh rate at 60 Hz.

Billbled

If you are looking at spending in the $2-3k range why build your own?

You can purchase a new HP Z2 Tower G9 Workstation direct from HP for that amount of money.

The only thing is that HP charges premium prices for components so when we purchased ours, we acquired RAM and SSD storage from third party vendors.

https://www.hp.com/us-en/shop/mdp/desktops-and-workstations/hp-z2-workstation-3074457345617390668–1

That workstation with an i7 and an NVIDIA T1000 comes in very well priced at present.

cheers, Paul

Hi Kathy,
To answer your question-
1- Because I always have built my own computers – starting in/around 1989.
2- I enjoy the process of building one. (I’m a mechanic by trade.)
3- I like loading *exactly* the software I want/need and no more. Hate bloatware.
4- I always felt by building my own I get to chose the specific hardware I want.
5- I probably have control issues (haha).

Thanks for the info you’ve provided. It’s interesting and helpful.

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PL1, Kathy Stevens

Just remember that after you move to your new computer Windows 11 may not play well with your existing software and hardware.

Have fun building the system.

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billbled

Hi Kathy,
FWIW – I have a laptop that is running Windows 11 (latest patches) and the software I run actually has all run fine on it. It’s all pretty main stream stuff – Office 365, Adobe products, Techsmith products, brokerage platforms – so all of that has kept up. I don’t have too much esoteric software that I deal with so I think I’m good.

I think the hardware I’m transferring should be ok – it’s not much that’s going to transfer – but if it throws a fit I guess I’ll be looking at replacing it as well. At this point it’s likely 2 DVD drives and some legacy hard drives that I use for kind of archival storage. Pretty much everything else will be new. I’m looking at new:
-Motherboard, CPU, RAM
– Video Card
-Case
-Power supply
– system hard drive – (NVMe)

So there’s not a lot of “old” left at that point.

I do appreciate all of the ideas and feedback in this thread. It’s been very helpful.

Hi everyone,
Just wanted to update everyone on this thread. Work has been very busy last few weeks, so it’s a slow process doing the research and purchasing components. But it’s been interesting. A LOT has changed since I last went through the build process.

Here’s what I’ve decided on and purchased:
– Case: (full tower) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00KFAG6DA?ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_fed_asin_title
– CPU: (AMD 9900X) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D6NN87T8?ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_fed_asin_title
– Main SSD: (Samsung 990 Pro)  https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BHJJ9Y77?ref=ppx_yo2ov_dt_b_fed_asin_title&th=1

Still working on the:
– Motherboard  – considering ASRock X870E Taichi, ASRock X870E Nova, MSI MPG X870E Carbon or Gigabyte X870E Aorus Master – open to other suggestions but these are the current contenders
– RAM: looking at 64GB (minimum) – DDR5 – and fast as I can reasonably (in my head) afford.
– CPU cooling: looking at “All in One” liquid coolers – brand new to this so researching.
– Power Supply: will be decided after I zero in on MoBo and Vid card – but am researching different options and general education about them now.
– Video Card: looking at nVidia 3060ti (prev. suggested – thx) and other nVidia cards in the $1k-1.3k range.
– Blu-Ray writer: zeroing in on the LG that was previously suggested –

I truly appreciate the suggestions and pointers offered here. I know I haven’t been on here in a few weeks – so I wanted to stop and update everyone that had replied to let you know your posts are appreciated very much. Additional suggestions and ideas always welcome.

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TechTango

To wrap this thread up – this is what I ended up building. Right at $2200 including shipping. It’s built, it’s running and I’ve been using it for about 2 weeks and all’s good! I did pull my 2 “archive” hard drives from the old computer – they’re not listed but they’re old platter HDDs (SATA) that I store files on – but the main C drive is listed in the JPG posted. All in all about 5TB of HDD space. I also had some SATA HP DVD-RW drives “in stock” on the shelf that hadn’t been used so I put them to use in this build.

thanks for all the input in this thread – much appreciated.
-Bill