Maximum PC - UK (2020-01)

(Antfer) #1

98 MAXIMUMPC JAN 2020 maximumpc.com


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For more of our component recommendations,
visit http://www.pcgamer.com/hardware/buying-guides/ Approximate Price: $2,625

INGREDIENTS

PART PRICE
Case NZXT H700i $175
PSU 850W Corsair RM850 80+ GOLD $125

Mobo ASRock X399 Phantom Gaming 6 $240
CPU AMD Threadripper 2950X $680
Cooler Cooler Master MasterLiquid ML360 RGB
360mm AIO
$140
GPU Gigabyte GeForce RTX 2080 Super
8GB Turbo Edition NEW
$700
RAM 32GB (2x 16GB) G.Skill Ripjaws V Series
@ 3,600MT/s NEW
$125
SSD 1TB XPG Gammix S50 M.2 NVMe NEW $180
HDD 2x 3TB Seagate BarraCuda Compute $160

OS Windows 10 Home 64-bit OEM $100

MERCIFULLY, we managed to save a bit of cash on our Turbo build!
Although our choices of PSU and motherboard rose slightly in
price, a switch to Gigabyte’s Turbo Edition RTX 2080 Super saved
us 20 bucks without sacrificing that sweet gaming performance,
and the NZXT H700i case dropped in price by a gentle $4. A
particularly pleasing change for this build was the RAM; we stuck
with G.Skill, but moved over from Sniper X to the Ripjaws V series,
which cost us $25 less, and also has a lower CAS latency for
improved performance. It’s nice when things work out, isn’t it?
With a bit more cash to play with, we decided to get ahead of
ourselves in a different area. While the Threadripper 2950X doesn’t
support PCIe 4.0 for speedy new M.2 drives, the next generation
of Threadripper does, so we’re going to prep our Turbo build with
XPG’s Gammix S50 1TB, a fourth-gen NVMe SSD that’ll be ready
to unleash hell with ultra-fast transfer speeds when Threadripper
3000 CPUs arrive, and we inevitably shove one into this build.
We’d love to change some more things, but there’s plenty of
s tuf f coming in the ne ar f u tur e that w il l b e exciting to s e e, pr imar ily
for this high-end build. We contemplated going down to a 240mm
radiator AIO cooler, but if we’re going to be using upgraded parts
in the near future, we’ll stick with the powerful and good-value
ML360 from Cooler Master, for that crisp triple-fan cooling setup.

UPGRADE OF THE MONTH


Slowly but surely, more and more manufacturers are putting
out PCIe 4.0 M.2 drives. First came Corsair and Gigabyte,
swiftly followed by Patriot, Team Group, and XPG (the latter
of which is featured in the Turbo build this month). The
latest, though, comes from drive production giant Seagate
Technology, in the form of the gaming-oriented FireCuda
520 SSD. The 500GB model is, at the time of writing, one
of the cheapest PCIe 4.0 drives currently on the market, so
if you want crazy transfer speeds without having to spend
a ridiculous amount of money ($400 isn’t an uncommon
price for high-capacity PCIe 4.0 SSDs), this is the way to go.
$133, http://seagate.com

500GB SEAGATE FIRECUDA
520 M.2 PCIE SSD

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