BitMaster

OK...it deleted all the text I wrote to the pics....LoL....need to work now...will add the text again later but you can look and ask if things are unclear. Rad is a MoRa3 360 with 4x 180mm fans, Pump is a Eheim Aquaristic that works like a charm and is ultra silent but looks Meeh, the one built into the bottom of the Res as shown in the catalog pic is much much nicer, has more flow...but not that super silent..cant have both. Still, I would get the new kit with Res/pump and the kit to mount it on the MoRa3 and keep it outside. It looks so damn cool with that Res that one day I will get it, the latest when my pump fails haha ( Can be 20years with Eheim Aquarium pumps, reliable as hell ). The internal pics show the tubing between CPU and GPU and a Quick Disconnector between CPU outlet ( top ) and the GPU inlet ( inlet towards you on the mobo side going down into a U and up again to the QD and then to CPU_outlet ). The parts are from watercool.de but are sold world wide edit: ok, the catalog pics got deleted too.. oh my... watercool.de has all the items shown

I am using Primo Chill as well but tbh, my next tubing will be black EDPM tubing. IT#s not as nice but works better than all the rest afaik from reading it up.

I would certainly NOT do the hard tube as a beginner. If things dont work as planned it is so much more work and struggle to service it. Get 10 foot of soft tubing and start from there. You can always change to hard tubing once you have learned the basics in watercooling loops. just my 2 cents

Think about "Quick Disconnectors" from Koolance if you do your loop. It's not cheap I agree but it just makes it 10x easier to service and take apart without draining it all all the time for any thing you need to do. Get 2 Pairs and with that you can quickly disconnect your GPU from the loop. Take the biggest rad that fits your case or go external.

+1 That's what I did too. Skip the LED and save some bucks...and the LED controller software that usually only causes headaches

There you go. We could debate for hours what's best and what specs and fps it would get and then comes the awakening...none to buy far and wide. and I believe with the current Covid thing going south again it can only get worse with availability.

People with a 3090 and VR state in here that they have seen DCS having 32-40GB RAM usage on heavy MP servers. Any questions ? I would maybe not buy 64GB if I already had 32GB, I actually havent for my last system, I kept the 32GB but when you buy new you really should consider 64GB. Not saying it's a must but if you own a fat GPU with max VRAM you can buy, big fat CPU, NVMe all over the place, what holds you back getting also more RAM if ´certain scenarios alrerady show usage well above 32GB. In addition, it has been mentioned in one of the recent threads that Vulkan will benefit from 64GB. IIRC it was a dev/tester being referred to.

I am happy you took it easy. I know it wasn't what you wanted to hear. By the time you have saved enough money all HW things may have changed to such an extend that any recommendation I/we do now is likely obsolete. The general rule of thumb, as the HW topology looks right now, you cant go wrong with either AMD or Intel as long as you dont pick the smallest one they have. Any Ryzen 5000 ( 5600, 5800, 5900, 5950 ) will be OK, so are the 12thgen Intel 12600k/12700k/12900k. There are plenty boards and most of them are really OK, it's not the tough part to find the right board. It will be A LOT harder to find a performance wise sufficient GPU for acceptable money. No one can tell you what the market looks like in 6 months, 9months or a year down the road. The rest is easy. SSD ( any will do but some are better in quality and speed but for DCS that wont matter that much ) Case, check for good good airflow PSU, dont cut corners here, If you cant afford a Seasonic Prime PX or TX you can safely pick a Seasonic Focus and still be assured it's a top notch product for a fair price. WEattage wise you will end up somewhere between 750W-1kW, depending on the GPU hunger for watts. Once you got the money together, check back in and we can guide you through. PS: Now download that installer and give it a try, you can loose time, that's all you risc. See if you like it and how far your system will take it. Nothing will break.

I think I would take the Gigabyte Aorus Pro DDR4. Asus has not a single DDR4 Z690 listed on the german Asus page. Availability may differ from country to country.

I just got the Gskill 64GB kit 3200-14-14-14-34 1.35v and with 1.4v it now is a 3600-16-16-16-36 kit with mostly the same sub settings as my original 3600-16-16-16-36-kit uses. All kits are B-die btw. I would get the 3200 kit and oc it to 3600. 1.4v are not a downside. 4 sticks usually need a little more than 1.35v on most boards anyway to run stable. Even if I was buying a 12thgen I would sticj with DDR4 for now and get the exact same kit. ~400€ for 64GB 3200/14 and about 500€ for the same kit with 3600/16, no LED. LED is about 45€ more for each kit.

FYI. Riva Tuner just got released in a new stable version at guru3d.com

It's actually pretty simple: Either get a FAST recent Intel or AMD that fits your bill. 12700k and 5900X where my choices, I went AMD a month ago since I dont trust Z690 yet ( very personal thing ) Get a decent board, some like the real fancy ones, some like it not so overloaded with features but cheaper. That is maybe the hardest pick to do. Likely you will end up in the 275-400€ corner where most solid boards are advertised, you have ample choices there. Asus has the best Bios but MSI or Gigabyte are also very capable, each one has drawbacks and even if it is the price only. Among the best ones usually are Asus Hero series , Gigabyte Master series. I would not overload the board with features and stuff like the 800€+ boards have. The CPU has a limited amount of lanes and PCI bridges add complexity, cost and Bios complications. If you dont need the features listed, dont buy it. If you go Intel 12thgen you also need to decide DDR4 or 5. DDR5 does not really show what it can deliver with those specs yet. Once far beyond 10k MHz DDR5 becomes relevant, not before, dont fall for the advertising, read the numbers..and the price tag..and availability. This all goes contra DDR5 as of now. No doubt, DDR5 will rock our socks off...in late '22 or early '23. For now, it's hard to beat a DDR4 3200 CL14 or 3600 CL16 kit in price/performance ratio, for AMD this counts even more. Get 64GB right away. Get 1, better 2, PCIe v4 NVMe drives, Samsung 980 Pro 1TB if you want a simple answer. I just did that as well, my DCS is 300+GB meanwhile. Get a decent PSU, 850W-1kW is reasonable again. Platinum grade efficiency is desired as it also usually comes with 10-12y warranty, much better components used, clean currents without noise and ripple that stresses/destroys your components over time much more than the better PSUs do. Dont cut corners on the PSU. Seasonic PX-850 or 1000 is among the best you can buy for money, the TX1000 being the top tier Titanium grade with even better scores but the Seasonic Prime PX is really good, no need for another 80€+ for the TX unless you want the best of the best. Get a case with good airflow, if you aircool you will pump 350-450w of heat into the system while gaming. Consider that. I would at least get an AIO for the CPU, 280 or larger. GPU... as much as you can afford and what's available. Very simple. Here in Germany, 3080ti sells for roughly a notch below 2k€, a 6900XT a little less and the first really usefull card is still above 1k€, absolut insane. You have to make this up with yourself how much you can pay and how far you are willing to play this absurd GPU game. I know I am lucky to still have this 1080ti...heck...if it dies I am screwed LoL. As long as you get one of the fastest CPU's, at least 32GB, 1 or 2 SSDs and a fast GPU you are all set. Just match your desired resolution & LOD with your GPU, if you misjudge that relationship you will have a nasty surprise in your fps counter.

I am no fan of beating around the bush when it comes to Hardware capabilities. There is a 5% chance that you will be able to get that PC to run DCS with smooth frame rates without spending considerable money. Your RAM is too little, 8GB is more often than not not even enough to properly run Win10 or 11 in many scenarios, not even thinking about starting a serious simulation. The CPU will hardly deliver what you ask for but may be up to the task if you play very easy missions, Single Player and are willing to accept some struggle with the game here and there. Running all this off a HDD just makes it look even worse. At least, you need double the RAM, better 32GB, a SSD ( ANY one will be fine ) and maybe a better CPU. I would save for a new PC and get some PC expertise till then, it will pay back if you understand more of this yourself. It's not that I like to tell people that their PC is meeh, it is easier to talk about what to change if the user himself already knows what his PC actually "is", out of his own knowledge. It saves us from being the bad guys and gives a better overall start. Convincing people to accept our view ( administrators and PC Builders view ) is not easy but again, one can argue about taste and colours but not about measurable capabilities.

It won't neccessarily temper fps but a HDD will cause some stutter here and there when it needs to load things. The less RAM/VRAM the more this happens...I think you get the idea. Try it out.

Don't forget Riva Statistics part of MSI Afterburner. Best to deinstall both, reboot and install the newest one again, reboot and it should work. Never had any issues with it tbh.

Tbh, if you can give that DDR5-Board back, DO IT !

I cant answer VR questions but I want to emphasize again the incompatibility of the Asus Hero Z690 with many big air coolers. YOu should only think AIO or DIY-Loop and cancel any AIR idea for this specific setup. Asus has nice some AIO as well, so it would match with Asus Aura RGB etc.., Anyway, most AIO are made by 1 company and rebranded to Asus, Corsair, beQuiet, NZXT, etc etc etc. The real name is "Asetek", they make those AIO's. Get a nice tower that can fit a "280" AIO ( 2x140mm ) or bigger ( 3x 120mm "360" or even 3x 140mm "420" ), the bigger the cooler and quieter it gets. Most towers accept at least 280, some do 360 and the 420 is usually only found with full size towers ( 6x CD slot size ). I like Phanteks cases, Evolv-X is what I currently use, very sturdy, solid Aluminium mostly but others have nice towers too, just check the AIO sizes and maybe read a review or two about it.

The good thing about TM Hotas is that it's drivers prohibit a VBS activation, so does my Logitech G25 Wheel driver and Saitek Rudder Pedals driver. Those 3 are listed as "solve those first before enabling VBS again..." No, I won't

We have been over this to death and back again in the past but I think Hiob is right..or more right than false...LoL here we go again. And Bossco's experience with not having it in 10, than having it after upgrading to 11 and then getting rid off it with a downgrade to 10 again does not sound as a per se hardware related time slice ( locked 60 fps ) issue but more like a software/setting issue to me.

^ He is 100% right !

You dont need to reinstall Win10 or Win11, not even Win7 really if you move it to another PC. The days of WinXP HAL are long gone. I mean, I have done this many times and it hardly ever causes driver issues. Just plug it into the new board, let it boot and sort the drivers and reboot by itself and you are all set. Deinstall the old boards software and install the new stuff, update Windows and you are done. It's ment to be possible. If you have hardware that is crucial and natively unsupported it may be a good idea to install that onto the old machine before you do the swap. At least copy the drivers onto C drive so you could access it but I have never needed that as all I did was hopping from 2700k to 6700k to 7700k and 8700k and always initially just plugged the drive into the new board and it always worked, not so with XP and earlier, they have a HAL, hardware abstraction layer...and if that acts up... that's what you refer to.

and I want to add, there are also external radiators, which means less tubing and no pump or reservoir inside the case unless you want to. Considering the cost per 120mm² rad space the external radiator wins as well. Imho the best one right now, tho not cheap if done right, is the MoRa3-420 (9x140mm or 4x 200mm )with 4x200mm Noctua fans for cooling. That is even larger than my MoRa3-360 ( 9x120mm or 4x180mm ) and with Noctua you get super silent fans that push a lot of air combined. Coupled with a Heatkiller CPU & GPU block and a D5/Heatkiller Pump/Res combo you can game full tilt at 18-20dB and the fans at 275-350 rpm... that is real nice, believe me. AIO is great to get the CPU cooler than with air usually but don't think those are quiet. Once you push the CPU the fans spin up... The smaller the radiator the louder it all gets, it's a rat's tail from there on, if the rad is too small for the heat load the fans need spin up higher and at 2000rpm any fan is loud, even Noctua.

You got the most expensive components already, what's left to buy should match your overall goal. Let's start with easy decisions, drives: It should be NVMe, PCIe v4 and at least 1TB for the "Games" drive and if money is not an issue I would get 2 NVMe drives, 1x OS & 1x DCS. My pick was always Samsung and with my new rig I again went with Samsung. The 980Pro 1TB is for sure no bad choice, overall a very competitive drive with no surprises. I would buy 2 of them again. Next was PSU: Keep it simple, buy a Sesonic Prime PX or TX 1kW. With new GPUs likely to surpass 4-500w peak power draw ( which isn't actually a new thing ) you should have enough juice for years to come with 1kW. A 850w should be fine too for now but will have limited reserves down the road. Estimnate 300w minimum for the 3090 while gaming +50-80w for the CPU plus all the rest of the rig... you land somewhere around 450ish watts...about half of a 850-1kW PSU. PSUs run most efficient around 50% load, so aim for that as your max load over time. Seasonix Prime PX1000 ( Platinum ) or if you really want the best, get the TX1000 with Titanium Efficiency. 12 year warranty, ultra quiet in normal use, 0dB - no fan till ~40°C. The Board...ohh...with the board you also decide between DDR4 and DDR5. Tbh honest, now that you went that way, do it all the way and try to get a decent kit of 32GB DDR5-6xxx, the fastest with the lowest latency you can get and pay for, that's the expensive truth with 12th's gen. For the board, I would either get Asus Hero or Gigabyte Master. The Asus may have the better Software and Sound but they are at the very top end of the ladder. Either one is fine I guess. DDR4 is afaik only available from low-mid range boards and all mid-highend boards come with DDR5. I assume you do not want to pair the 3090 & 12900k with a mid-low tier motherboard and. If you can afford AND find it, a 64GB kit is more future proof. DCS can tab into the 30GB range already and it has been said that Vulkan will benefit from 64GB capacity. Since it is hard to add more RAM later on, buying it right away is usually better but in the current situation it may not be possible to find 64GB, fast & low latency for an acceptable price. I went 64GB and don't regret it but mine was only 400€, yours may well be double that. So 32GB is still a fair decision, for SP I guess anyway. Cooling....Socket 1700 has it's issues with large air coolers I would not air cool that thing but get a large AIO or even build a Loop myself and also include the GPU if you can get a block for it. Watercooling the GPU makes a lot of sense. It's the hottest, loudest and most critical part in your rig when it comes to temp limits and throttling. My card hardly ever runs over 50°C under foll load and 0dB. It's a long road to a proper Loop but does pay back. If not a loop, at least get a 240 or larger AIO for the CPU and a case that accepts the radiator. Take your time

Let me put it in other words: If you ru(i)n a 1-3k€/$ GPU on a cheap PSU it's your own fault. Running such expensive HW on a 80,-€ Bronze PSU is a crime, but hey...the victim is also the murderer. I have seen dozens of blown PSU's over the years, about 50% of them kill the whole PC when they blow up. There is only a handful of companies that build PSUs. Corsair, beQuiet, NZXT, Tagan, Antec, Chieftec, Asus, Gigabyte, MSI, Phanteks and many many more DO NOT BUILD THEIR PSU's !! They order them to their specs from that dozen of companies that actually build Power Supplies. Among them for example: Seasonic, SuperFlower, Flextronics, Delta, and maybe 5-10 others in total. The difference between a Bronze "Brand XYZ" and a Seasonic PSU for example is that Seasonic has their PSUs 20% overpowered, so a 1kW PSU will hold 1200w for quite some time before it fails. Many others that claim to be 1kW or whatever fail at 75-80% of their rated output. Unfortunately, Hard-OCP's website is offline, that site had the best PSU reviews over a decade. Those reviews told me a lot and explained many issues I came across with low-quality-to-mediocore PSU's when they were pushed hard. I run this "Corsair" AXi-1200 which is actually built by Flextronics, the recent years all my builds I did used Seasonic Platinum PSU's with very few exceptions and I have no issues with them in machines doing 24/7 for years as a Server. Very robust & reliable. I would not by my AXi-1200 again but get a Seasonic Prime 850-1kW range.