In general Nvidia charges more for their stuff, and have certain quality requirements and testing that end up making there cards cost more. In general Nvidia cards are more consistent between manufacturers, AMD cards not so much.

--- What would be the gain for upgrading the Internal Ethernet Network Card from standard to:
Intel Pro 10/100/1000

Probably not much, most MotherBoards come with 10/100/1000 ports already and for 99% of people buying the motherboard that's good enough. I guess the biggest upside is having a 2nd port if you think 1 of them died. Otherwise unless you're doing something specific you probably won't need it.

Historically, older AMD CPU performed quite inconsistent and worse thant Intel ones in source engine (TF2, CS GO) and I can attest of that myself having two system with one of each. Still, idk if the new Ryzen gen has made it better or if that gap between the 2 brands concerning TF2 is still a thing.

For the GC, you might want to make sure you only buy what you need, cuz realistically, unless you are doing 4K or 1440p at very high fps, you don't need a 1080ti nor a 1080. So I'd suggest that you focus on your needs by checking out benchmarks and comparaisons on the internet. Also, going for an AMD GPU allow you to choose a Freesync monitor down the road, which is a nice technology from what I've read and is alot less expensive that GSYNC (the Nvidia version of it).

Lastly, for the network, you should definetly check what kind of ethernet card your pc has already (usually decent mobos have more that sufficient ethernet controllers). But obviously going for more means that that part would not bottleneck your connection in any way.

I don't claim to know everything about pc so if someone sees something that I've written that seems very strange or untrue, just correct me.

EDIT: Ninja'd

Ryzen 9

http://www.pcgamer.com/amds-ryzen-9-threadripper-cpu-lineup-leaked/

http://www.teamfortress.tv/12714/pc-build-thread

Depends on the game and actual budget.

One is Z270 and is X99.
They were named so it would be easier to tell them apart.
Same for Ryzen 5 and Ryzen 7.

You should probably figure out which CPU you'll get first. It's kind of important that CPU and mobo use the same socket.

Sound dampening is indeed for noise reduction. Do you want to reduce the noise?

This is way too complicated to explain.
Wait one month, then you'll see.

Yes, you are wrong.
It's not about quality, it's about performance.
E.g. the RX 580 and GTX 1060 6GB are similarly priced and perform similarly.
As for why AMD doesn't offer any GPUs >250$ right now see above.

None.

#2

Uhm, no.

More consistent in what?

I try and do some homework before spending this kind of money but on a site like ibuypower, there is a lot to consider and a lot of choices for processors.

My current rig doesn't play Quake Champions at a high enough level for me. It is very playable but not at high quality, so that made me want to upgrade, not just for Quake Champions, but for down the line several years.

Budget is high, I am aiming for high end stuff.

I understand that I listed 4 differently named processors. I was more asking what is the real difference between them and wondering if it would even be necessary to get the biggest and best.

Ah yes, ibuypower.
Quick example.
Bullshit parts, but here's the same or comparable parts:
https://pcpartpicker.com/list/3BMczM
~1000$
IBP wants
https://www.ibuypower.com/Store/Gamer-Special-Z270
1500$
Sounds like a good deal?

Not to mention the fact that with non bs parts you can get the same or better performance for 800$.

"Budget is high". How much exactly is high?
For some high means 800$, for some it means 5000$.

Z270 and X99 are chipsets.
No offense but you probably won't understand the difference between Intel Core i5/i7 and Ryzen 5/7 if I told you. Just look at benchmarks, you only need to know what's faster for what you're going to use it for.

ryzen 5 1600 and 1500X are teh best price to performance if you account for the motherboard cost afaik

I mean obviously buying individual parts and assembling your own computer can cut costs and I guess, as you say, increase performance. This isn't an option for me so yes ibuypower sounds like a good deal. I got my last 2 Cpu's from there, they have done well by me and I can afford the extra cost.

My questions were more geared towards the items I could not research on my own with any confidence.

I said high end computer and high budget. I wouldn't drop 5k on it but I could if I felt like it.

The whole reason for my thread was because on ibuypower, I can choose and afford any of the options they offer.
Naturally I don't want to overspend on things that may be overpriced or not really needed.

I didn't just blindly make the post, I did try and do some research.
Thanks for the replies, I'll figure it all out somewhere.

paying $500 extra just for having the parts assembled isnt a good deal
just go to any computer store or repairshop and they'll assemble the components you buy for $80 at the most

I guess we're done here then.

If 50% extra is a good deal for you then I'm not the right guy to talk to. I think if you can get the same for less, including assembly then you should go with that imho. See #10.

You won't tell me your budget.
You won't tell me how much performance you want, apart from it being better than your current rig, which again, you won't tell me what that is.

There's nothing I can do.

I never asked how to assemble or where buy my new computer so I have no idea why that is even a topic.
My exact budget isn't a concern because I never asked anyone to make my computer for me. Even so, I just said if I needed to go 5k, I could, so the number is right there.

In my OP, the main question was on the merits of different processors since there are several to choose from and any research I did wasn't helpful. Any additional questions I had were just random choices on ibuypower that I had several options for but figured to ask anyways.

Perhaps that basic question just isn't enough information for a good answer. If more detail is needed for the answer then I guess its my fault.

The point is that the topic is complex and it's a waste of people's time to give you the entire history of modern computing when if you just say what you want setsul can give you a full explanation of all relevant information and example build if needed.

For example, saying "I want to play high end games" doesn't help. Say what sort of games, what framerates and what graphical settings you'll be targeting.

and if you are going to be doing any video editing or streaming etc

I did say what game and I said future games as well.
My post (#6) was as simple as I could possibly put my questions.
If they still can't be answered, that is fine, all I did was pose a question.
The tone of the answers seem like angry Geek Squad employees from Best Buy annoyed at people who don't know all the technical details of computers.

Its hard for me to give the exact details you are talking about because I am frankly not sure what they are, so like I said in post #12, its obviously my fault and he can't help with that vague information.

I get it, this is not the place to ask these questions. SORRY. The thread can just die, I'll figure it out.

Quake Champions is in its first open beta stage. It might get optimised heavily before its full release -- you just don't know. I personally am not up to date on benchmarks for it either, partially because it's so new that there might not be any reliable ones yet.

Actually this is the place to ask these questions -- at least, the pc build thread is, but you're just not even giving the most basic information for people (read: setsul) to help you.

You're more like someone's technologically incompetent parent who has vaguely good intentions but everything you say makes it obvious that there's no real point trying to educate you, because it just won't go in.

Expecting people to predict what performance you'll need for future games is impossible, especially when you have given literally no information about target framerates or graphical settings! It's impossible for current games without that information. If you really want a build that can smash quake champions, wait until it hits its full release first so that people know what cpu + graphical power it requires.

This is literally all you or anyone else had to fucking say. Instead of just answering a simple question with a simple answer, from someone who is obviously uninformed, it turned into a nit-picking session even after I admitted that I was wrong/vague.

I was vague and not helpful. I said it twice. I apologized and said I was wrong for even asking with little info.

AMD releases their Vega cards in a few months, which will probably have performance similar to the higher end Nvidia cards (1070, 1080, 1080ti, etc). Prices of Nvidia cards currently often have pretty good deals on them to account for that, though once the Vega cards are sold out Nvidia will probably price hike again.

Intel cards generally perform better in single threaded applications, while Ryzen is better for multithreading. This is a big simplification and there's lots of specifics involved but that's not a big deal for you. In terms of games, they're generally pretty reliant on single thread performance, even if they do make use of multithreading. If you go top of the line in either, it won't make too much of a difference in the majority of games, especially if you're just doing 1080p 144hz. However, if you multitask while gaming, such as streaming or watching video or something, then Ryzen will be better for those scenarios.

As an aside, I think you should really take the time to build your own PC if possible. Like others have said, if that's not possible for you then you can pay to have your parts assembled at a much lower premium than ibuypower. It's nice to know in depth what's going into something that is a major part of your daily living.

edit: I was wrong about Vega release date, gaming specific cards aren't out until probably q3 2017.

check CPU and GPU benchmarks if you haven't already

https://www.cpubenchmark.net/

please please PLEASE don't pay ridiculous amounts of money just to have your pc assembled, putting together a pc is easier than putting together legos, everything has its own specific place it goes

Ah well, let's go over this again.

So you want a faster pc. But you won't tell us your current pc's specs.

Budget unknown, but "high".

Apart from some minor mistake where you named chipsets instead of CPUs we have a problem here.
Yes, you won't need the biggest and best probably, but how much performance do you need? You won't tell us.
You won't even tell us your current CPU so we could at least rule out anything slower than that.

Now I could tell you almost everything about the two CPU architectures and list the differences. But you won't understand a single thing.
I could skip that and go straight to which performs better on what applications. In fact let's do that.
So AMD's Zen performs better on INT heavy workloads, mixes of INT and FP, 128b vectors and highly threaded applications due to better SMT scaling. Intel's Skylake performs better on 256b vectors, latency bound (both memory and instructions) workloads or ones with high cache bandwidth requirements.
Is that useful to you?

And we're back to

I'd even look at benchmarks for you, but you haven't told me how much performance you want and what games you'll run.
Apart from Quake Champions.
Which is still in beta.
For all we know beta performance and release performance might be as closely related as Barack Obama and Osama bin Laden.

So won't spend 5k but you could. Ah yes, that narrows down the budget significantly.

Now it's great that you don't want to overspend. But you're still keeping what you need a secret so we can't tell what would be overspending.

Ah yes, you're only going to play one game.
And future games.
Well I can't blame you for not knowing which games will be released in a few years, so maybe just focus on the present?

Maybe when everyone is asking for more information, phrasing your questions as simple as possible isn't all that helpful.

When everyone from Best Buy employees to all posters on a forum have reacted the same way then don't you think that maybe, just maybe, it could be worth considering that there's the tiniest sliver of a chance that you might be the one in the wrong here? Just speculating of course. But once you rule out the impossible...

I wish you the best of luck on your neverending search for someone who can answer all your questions without having to ask any of their own by virtue of possessing a crystall ball.

Maybe the answer isn't simple?
Maybe this could be solved by providing the needed information or if you do not have it yet, asking how to acquire it.

Of course throwing a hissy fit might work better. I'm really not sure since I don't really have experience with these sorts of things.

EDIT:
#18
"Late June" sadly isn't "a little under a month".
Also that's just one card. The rest comes even later apparently.

"Intel cards"?
The Problem is unlike Bulldozer Zen is actually close, so depending on the price single threaded performance is actually better.
E.g. i5-7400 vs 1500X or i7-6800K vs 1700X/1800X.

#19
Passmark is bullshit.

You win dude, you won several posts ago. You can't possibly help me.
I get it, you don't have to post anymore about it.

Thank you TerryCrews

You're behaving like an idiot and deserve to get ripped off for 1000$ and get a PC that doesn't do what you want, that's what's gonna happen btw

tbh if you just post your current pc specs Setsul will be able to help you out way more than I can, if in a wordier fashion. What I posted is really just generalized info about AMD vs Intel, and knowing your specs and usage patterns will allow people to be a lot more detailed in answering your original questions in the frame of what you want out of it.

just post what's in your current pc

fuck, maybe even something as small as a gpu upgrade could help you, because we don't know what the fuck you're even running

Buying in on a PC isn't such a bad idea right now - mainly because with all the new gen stuff coming out (particularly from AMD - but I doubt Nvidia/intel are that far behind) a lot of large retailers and warehouses are clearing stock and I imagine sales will come up fairly frequently for yesterday's news.

If you're not intending to be a big time streamer or do tons of video editing for hours upon hours, that would be the market I'd look to get in on - regardless of whether it's AMD/Intel Nvidia/ATI - if money is a huge concern you have to decide at which you're going to cut off spending on each individual part and what your budget over all is.

You'll likely, depending on sales, get a better deal for AMD products because they're typically cheaper for roughly equivalent specs - but you never know sometimes you can snatch things up for maybe 20-50$ more, and you have to decide if that's something you're willing to do.

Building your own PC is basically as easy as putting legos together - there's nothing to panic about unless you're very accident prone and like to spill water all over yourself. .

The best advice I can give you is:

INCLUDE warranties into your budget. If something is 10$ more expensive but offers 1-2 extra years of warranty, that's not a bad investment. Look at the different vendors (newegg, amazon, bestbuy, ebay, tiger direct, direct from manufacturer, etc)and see what sort of warranty policy they have - some stores offer you their own warranty ON TOP of the part's own warranty, and that is definitely something to keep in mind. Typically things don't break down that fast if you pay for quality hardware, but you just never know when something freaky may happen, or a design flaw nobody saw coming pops up.

Think about routine maintenance. Is this case/hardware going to be easy for you to maintain (this is a big one for people who are first getting into things like liquid cooling, or want to buy a fancy case, or do a funky HDD set up).

Make sure the manufacturer is a reputable and established company - there are lots of new hardware companies cropping up all the time, and they are relatively short lived sometimes, and that can leave you in the lurch if you take a risk on a new manufacturer. If you choose to go this route, I would strongly suggest investigating their customer service practices and perhaps look for that kind of content in reviews - the first case I bought came with the wells for the MOBO screws slightly out of alignment, and when I tried to get in touch with the manufacturer, all I kept getting were messages in Cantonese - despite them having a website that was in English, and the company died only a few months later, and I was left with very big piece of scrap metal. But it turned out OK because I just made new holes for myself - guess it should've said some assembly required.

Spending big on CPU and skimping on GPU is a good idea if you're short on money.

Depending on what GPU you have right now, you could even just continue using the one you have and throw even more money into your CPU. The reason for this is that it's often impossible to upgrade your CPU - socket types change frequently enough that if you don't plan to be able to drop another 200-500$ on another CPU in the next 2-3 years, you're going to want to spend more money on a CPU because that *will be* your CPU for the life of the machine most likely. Graphics cards however are a different story. Their socket type as it were hasn't changed appreciably in the last 10+ years (since we stopped using AGP ports) and likely won't be changing in a big way any time soon. Even if you have a PCIe 2.0 card and a 3.0 PCIe slot, you'll still have a functional GPU. Then 2-3 years from now you can just buy a new GPU as an upgrade.

You can do the same for RAM - so long as its compatible with your chosen CPU, and just upgrade to more later on in life (it's cheap anyways, and will only get cheaper). You could also try to salvage your power supply as long as it isn't super dirty, works correctly, and has the required amount of wattage for your build. That's a few hundo in savings at least. Maybe you'll have to buy more later, but it can put off the cost until you're able to save up more.