Moved to General Hardware.

Get an I7-9700k
8 cores has been better for me than 6 cores were.
The Asrock Taichi mobo has been said to be the best mobo for the price, with much more expensive features at much lower cost, and stable as heck.
I would go with a pcie/m.2 over a dedicated m.2 card. Especially with the Z3xx series, as they dont have many pcie lanes, and the dedicated m.2 cards take up a lot of lanes. Also, m.2 can be finicky, and not very drop-in friendly.
Heck, even some GOOD sata SSD's, like the Intel, or the Pro series, will have you singing praises.
 
Just my opine.

True. And I did mean to say a sata m.2/ssd, not a pcie/m.2. That is if they even make them still. I havent looked at recent m.2's since they very 1st came out, and they had ssd's, ssd/m.2, pcie/m.2, pcie/ssd.
I didnt even bother putting in my m.2 in my Z370 setup. The ssd I have in is just fine, and I cant really tell much difference, except maybe some tiny game load time, of the m.2 vs the ssd.

 
Check out the rig in my signature.. i7-8700k, 500GB Samsung 970 Pro NVMe m.2 drive, ASUS ROG Maximus XI Z390 Hero, 32GB Corsair Dominator Platinum 3000MHz @ 15-17-17-35 timings. Sounds like what you're looking for. I also have a very good GPU, but that isn't as important for your needs.
 
With this setup, I went into the BIOS and set the RAM to run at spec using XMP profile, and set the CPU o/clock at 5GHz without having to touch voltage or anything else - left it all on auto. Took all of 2 minutes, and the overclock is stable as a brick craphouse - I've never had a crash, and so easy to do, no messing around pushing voltage up bit by bit and testing each time. I believe the majority of i7-8700k CPUs will clock to 5GHz without issue. I run the CPU under water using EVGA's CLC280 AIO cooler - easy to install, zero maintenance, and very effective cooling, as well as running quietly, although I replaced the stock fans with a couple of 140mm high-speed 'be quiet!' SilentWings3 PWM fans for the radiator, which I strongly recommend for both performance and low noise. I do not recommend air cooling if you're planning to overclock this CPU, particularly if low noise matters to you. I also used 120mm 'be quiet' SilentWings3 fans for the case, purely for low noise and high performance. They do not make fans with multi-colored LEDs, they just make quality performance fans. If you really want RGB fans, you don't have to compromise on quality - just grab these RGB fan frames and you're good to go with whatever fans you have. Nice right?
 
I find the integrated audio very good on this motherboard, and the ASUS Sonic software gives you some added tools to tweak the performance to your preference. In saying that, I am not an audiophile by any means, but I have used Creative sound cards in the past (standard models, not top of the range), and this integrated sound is just as good, if not better - certainly I don't have the driver issues that Creative almost always gave me. A description from ASUS:
 
SupremeFX : Utilizing the S1220 codec, SupremeFX is the integrated-audio solution that's engineered to provide a flat frequency response for a neutral, detailed sound signature. And to ensure that pristine signature is perfectly preserved, the front-panel output is driven with dual op amps, delivering sonics with the scale and authority to create virtual worlds via your gaming headset.
 
You can always drop in a separate sound card - EVGA have just released a rebranded(?) AudioNote sound card as it happens, although I haven't looked into any reviews but you might want to check it out.  Alternatively you can go for an external sound card - I believe these Burson Audio ones are top of the line, but you definitely pay for quality. If you're an audiophile you're probably used to that though.
 
I use photoshop reasonably often and that performs much quicker than the previous i7-7700k quad core I was using (also clocked at 5GHz), and very occasionally do a bit of video editing, and I've also rendered a little bit using DAZ3D, and it was quicker than I expected. This i7-8700k CPU is fast. 6 cores (12 virtual) @ 5GHz and decent RAM should make you pretty damn happy. Combined with the 970 Pro NVMe drive makes for a very snappy system (I run it as PCIe which disables SATA ports 5 & 6, but still leaves you 4 more SATA ports for additional hard drives / optical drive, and retains x16 lanes for the GPU). I also run 3 x 850 EVO SSD's (SATA) for data, media, backups etc., plus an optical (DVD/CD) drive. I am very very happy with this rig, and sounds like it might be close to what you're looking for.
 
Good luck, and let us know what you end up getting!