Dedicated Gaming/Streaming PCs

MetaChedda

Hello All, I've been lurking around a bit and reading the posts, thank you for such an informative and welcoming community. My sons and I play games quite a bit and do some streaming. I do both on my current system and I'm thinking of splitting to a dedicated gaming pc and using my main for capture and streaming. Here's what I have so far. 
Main/Capture PC:
i5-3570k
Gigabyte Z77x-UD3H
32GB DDR3
Gigabyte GTX 1660 Ti
Samsung 860 EVO 1TB
WD 3TB Sata
Samsung LC27 (Gaming Monitor)
Asus VN247 (Main/Capture PC Monitor)

I'm looking to build a stand alone gaming PC that will get the most bang for the buck and provide the best gameplay/quality and use my main PC for the capture and streaming. I'd like to play at 144Hz other than that, I do not have many hard requirements. I've always been on the Intel side of things and am considering going with the i9-9900K but Budget is a very important factor. My Budget is between $1,000 and $1,500.
My main question is AMD vs Intel / Motherboard selection and GPU choice as those are the biggest budget items.

Thanks!

TSTonyV

Hello @MetaChedda! Welcome to the community. 

What types of settings and encoding were you planning to use on the dedicated streaming PC? Streaming is a workload that likes multi-threaded performance. With only 4 cores/4 threads, that i5 isn't going to handle streaming very well if you're planning to use x264 software encoding. If you're planning to use hardware encoding with NVENC on the 1660ti, then that will greatly reduce your CPU burden, but in terms of stream quality hardware encoding is inferior to software encoding. 

For the gaming PC, are you planning on an entirely new build, or were there any parts you planned to re-use? Is your budget $1500 max AFTER taxes, and is that including or excluding the cost of Windows?

The 9900K is very expensive and you have to purchase an after market cooler with it. Not only that, but by default the 9900K runs very hot, so you're look at $40 for a bare-minimum cooler. Realistically you'd want to spend more. With the budget you laid out, you'd have to sacrifice on your GPU to make room for the 9900K. My suggestion would be to either drop down to a i7-9700K or go with the Ryzen 9 3900X. the 9700K requires an aftermarket cooler as well but is a little friendlier to budget coolers. The 3900X comes with a decent stock cooler in the box. 

MetaChedda

Thanks for the reply! I guess I wasn't sure of the encoding. I assumed the x264 is the standard? If I use the hardware encoding will there be a significant loss of quality?

Would a system based around the Ryzen 5 3600X (Budget Concerns) be an option?

MetaChedda

I built this as an example

https://www.microcenter.com/site/content/custom-pc-builder.aspx?load=5aae4f4f-3128-45de-b633-e8444b387745

TSTonyV

I wouldn't call it the "standard" per se, it's just an option available. For me personally, I use x264 as that's resulted in a smoother experience for the types of games I play. For some people NVENC is the better option with the games they play and the system they have. 

x264 is generally better for picture quality on your stream. However, it depends on the games you're playing, the resolution/target framerate, your bitrate and hardware. For the streaming build you have there, hardware encoding with NVENC would probably be a better option as it would reduce CPU overhead. But to be quite honest, it's trial and error. There's a lot of settings you can tweak to optimize your stream and there's no easy answer for what will work best. 

I definitely think something like a 3600X is a better budget consideration for you, especially considering the cost of a capture card. The build you put together there is very similar to what I'd recommend, besides maybe a different motherboard. I'd also go with 3600 speed memory as that's the sweetspot for Ryzen CPUs. It'll cost a bit more, but Ryzen scales well with memory speed. Definitely recommend adding an SSD to the build for your operating system a swell. 

MetaChedda

Thanks for the reply!

Do you have a Motherboard that you'd recommend? 

I Have a Samsung 840 Pro 128GB SSD that I plan on using for the OS.

Appreciate your help!

TSTonyV

I'm a fan of the MSI B450 Tomahawk but it's more expensive. It's not THAT important to be honest, just my preference. 

MetaChedda

Thoughts on this board? I'm somewhat partial to Gigabyte boards.

https://www.microcenter.com/quickViewConfigurator/510839/gigabyte-b450-aorus-elite-amd-am4-atx-motherboard

TSTonyV

That would be a good option.