Critique my gaming build

[Bulldog13]

http://pcpartpicker.com/list/rHxQd6

1. What YOUR PC will be used for. That means what types of tasks you'll be performing.
Gaming, professional programming, hosting test VMs, plex media server, possibly ripping / encoding blurays (backups)

2. What YOUR budget is. A price range is acceptable as long as it's not more than a 20% spread
$1,600 - already own some parts (video card, power supply, OS)

3. What country YOU will be buying YOUR parts from.
Prefer newegg, no tax, but am open to other stores for significant discounts

4. IF you're buying parts OUTSIDE the US, please post a link to the vendor you'll be buying from.
We can't be expected to scour the internet on your behalf, chasing down deals in your specific country... Again, help us, help YOU.
Nope

5. IF YOU have a brand preference. That means, are you an Intel-Fanboy, AMD-Fanboy, ATI-Fanboy, nVidia-Fanboy, Seagate-Fanboy, WD-Fanboy, etc.
Nope

6. If YOU intend on using any of YOUR current parts, and if so, what those parts are.
eVGA 1080, 1000 watt antec ps

7. IF YOU plan on overclocking or run the system at default speeds.
I want to do automated software overclocking, not interested in manual

8. What resolution, not monitor size, will you be using?
2460 x 1440

9. WHEN do you plan to build it?
within next 2 weeks

10. Do you need to purchase any software to go with the system, such as Windows or Blu Ray playback software?
No

http://pcpartpicker.com/list/rHxQd6

My biggest question, is that motherboard a good choice? It seems to be. Would anyone recommend anything else? Any other recommendations on the build overall ?

http://pcpartpicker.com/list/rHxQd6

 

[MadOver]

The motherboard is good, but all depends on what you want to do.
Personally If there's any overclocking involved I go with Asrock.

 

[whm1974]

Looks fine to me, but you may want to get 2 x16 GB instead of 4 x 8 GB for memory.

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

There is no need for that much memory. 2x8Gb is enough. Save the money.

 

[Sho'Nuff]

Nice rig. I second the recommendations to go with 16GB ram and 2 sticks unless there is a defined need.

Otherwise, you are basically building the exact same system I am looking at building. Only differences between my systme and yours are that I am going with an air cooler and larger and more numerous SSDs.

 

[lehtv]

Dual 2x8GB kits probably wouldn't work at rated specs anyway. Always buy 4 DIMMs in a single kit. But in this case all you need is a single 2x8GB kit.

Change the SSD's to some sensibly priced ones. And why two drives anyway? You really won't notice any difference in performance or real world longevity with cheaper drives like MX200, MX300, 850 EVO, etc. I would save the M.2 slot on the board for the future, cost of fast M.2 drives is bound to come down sooner or later. Right now you pay a huge premium for a small real-world perf gain.

I would probably get the MX300 525GB, 750GB or 1000GB. Even the 1TB model saves you $300 compared to the drives you listed.

 

[whm1974]

I would get two MX300 1 TB drives myself instead of the two 512 GB ones you choose. Games take a lot of space these days.

 

[lehtv]

I would get two MX300 1 TB drives myself instead of the two 512 GB ones you choose. Games take a lot of space these days.

Sure games take a lot of space but 2TB of disk space seems a little bit overkill. You can always just add another drive later if needed, nothing requires you to buy two drives at once. I'm still doing fine with a single 500GB drive for games, OS and programs and I have a lot of games installed that I don't play actively.

 

[whm1974]

I have two Crucial M500 960 GB drives. One for data and the other for games.

 

[lehtv]

I have two Crucial M500 960 GB drives. One for data and the other for games.

Uhuh. Still doesn't change the fact that for the vast majority of people, that's way way overkill.

 

[whm1974]

My next system will have even more SSD storage.

 

[wingman04]

Go with 2X8GB for a total of 16GBs.

 

[Thinker_145]

Go with two 16GB sticks if you want 32GB.

While you are going premium with your choice of storage but I don't see the problem since you aren't sacrificing any other part of your build so more power to you.

Now talking about auto overclocking you should consider a better cooler for that because auto OC goes so heavy on voltage that temps go through the roof.

My motherboard is slightly worse than what you selected but I believe the auto OC options should be fairly similar since they belong to the same class more or less. On the Z170-K there are 2 options available. First is an OC to 4.1Ghz(lol) and the second is 4.6Ghz. First option unsurprisingly had no issue but with the second option my CPU throttled within seconds of running AIDA 64 I didn't even see the voltage and quickly restarted PC to go back to default settings.

Safe to say I am never even attempting that again. I manually oced to 4.5Ghz at 1.3v rock solid with reasonable temps. I am going to see if I can decrease the voltage and if not then maybe I'll settle at 4.4Ghz as my temps are still a little higher than what I want.

The cooler you have selected is very good but I am sure there is better stuff out there for around $50 more.

 

[Lyfer]

The H5 is overkill. I did a similar build a few months ago with a Rampage Ranger board with the cheaper H7 with a 6700k @ 4.6ghz with 1.3v. Temps never went above mid 70s on load. Also agreed on the SSD's, get a 1gb mx300 instead.

 

[Thinker_145]

I think the Z170 pro gaming is better than Z170-A. You get better audio chipset and more USB ports. The downside is that it doesn't look so good which I wouldn't put too much stock into.

 

[Chaotic42]

I don't think 32GB is overkill if you're going to be using more than one VM at a time or if you're doing development or testing which will use a lot of data. If you're doing these things for work, the cost of the extra memory may end up being fairly trivial.