[SOLVED] $2000-3000 budget; please help new builder

[hickmanj]

I am not a graphics whore (lol) and am quite content to play games at 1080 although I may step up a bit with upcoming RPG/1st persons (Cyberpunk etc).

My main goals are: a cool system while gaming, future proofing for as long as possible, decent frame-rates

I play primarily 1st person games like Skyrim, Fallout 4 etc. (yes, old but I mean for genre as new games come out) and games like Baldur's Gate 3/XCOM etc.

My budget is good but I've saved for YEARS to have this amount of money - so I feel stressed about making the right system as this is my first time building (wrestling with should I go pre-bought/pre-made?) I have someone local who is going to help me with the build (putting it together) but they are older (understand the hardware side) and don't understand the component differences as easily.

I'd appreciate any and all help in suggesting a complete system component setup..... I am learning disabled and to be honest there are so many small differences in the "types" of everything (RAM, GPU, CPU) that it makes my head spin in terms of what component works best with others, doesn't bottleneck, power supply, cooling - my hope is to get help so I don't get ripped off by buying the "newest, latest and greatest" when tried and true will give me a long lasting machine....... (for example: 2080 GPU or use 3000 series.... or: do I need more than 16 GB RAM, or liquid cooling? etc.) I could care less what it looks like (don't need bells and whistles) I want a machine that has power for the future, runs cool and is fast for single player gaming.

Help??

 

[Nemesia]

With your budget you can pretty much buy up to the top of the line right now. I would totally wait for the new Ryzen 5000 series to come out at the start of November. You could get a Ryzen 5000 series with a RTX 3000 series.

Do you need that system right now? If you do I can still build you one on pcpartpicker.

Do you need a monitor or is that budget for only the tower? Mouse keyboard?

Is that 2000-3000 USD?

 

[hang-the-9]

I would not spend that much on a computer for what you are looking to run on it, you are better off building about a $1,000 system that will play games just fine for years, then replace it as new parts come out. New warranty and possibly a newer platform instead of updating a 3-4 yr old system. A step or two under the top of the line is still fast enough. Wait a bit till the newest gen video card have settled in and the mid range parts for them are out and available.

 

[Twistfaria]

The best bang for your buck tends to be building it yourself. That way you can shop around for the best deals per-part and aren’t paying for a name. Pcpartpicker.com is any builders best friend. It will for the most part let you know if anything won’t work together and will also let you know who has the best price. There is also an extensive database of builds that people have made and most come with pictures and some come with a step by step write up. I made my first 2 systems a couple years ago and it isn’t too hard. A little bit nerve wracking but not terrible difficult. YouTube is also good you just need to find someone who actually knows what they are doing.

I agree that a Ryzen processor is the way to go. Not as expensive as Intel and better in my opinion. The graphics card might be the hardest to get at the moment as MANY of the Nvidia cards are sold out. I guess COVID created a crazy demand.

If you live anywhere near a Micro Center store I would think about buying parts from them as they often have really good deals on combos. It was worth it to me to drive 3 hours to another city to get my parts there. They also have great customer service. But you might not be close enough to one.

 

[Nemesia]

What is your 1080p monitor refresh rate? Do you intend on switching to 1440p or 4K in the future?

If you stay at 1080p and you have a 60Hz monitor and you don't wanna go to 1440p or 4K you won't need a 3000 dollars system.

 

[jjg9750]

It seems like in your use case, $1500-2000 would be plenty for a pc. You say you would consider upgrading your resolution for new games, so let's say you do decide to step up to 1440p.

By the time you build your pc, the Ryzen 7 5800x will probably be the best performance gaming cpu on the market, which will run you $449 if you can get your hands on one at launch. An MSRP-model RTX 3080 is $700, which again, you won't be able to get your hands on one for a few months. If we assume the rest of your system- power supply, motherboard, memory, cooler, storage, and case, add up to about $850, you've got yourself a rock solid, very high end gaming pc for $2000. This pc would most likely handle cyberpunk 2077 at 1440p at a very reasonable framerate on the highest settings, but of course that's only speculation as the game could release as an optimization nightmare. coughrdr2cough

The reason people pay $3k or more for gaming pcs is either hard line water cooling, which you don't need, over-the-top specs like a 5950x and RTX 3090, which you also don't need, or "cool" things like a fancy case and lots of rgb and custom gpu backplates and generally appearance-only, frivolous things.

If you want your pc to look like it was built by a unicorn and make people think a rave is going on inside your office, by all means, spend the extra cash. But you said in your original post that you don't, so there's not a whole lot of incentive to spend more than $2k.

16Gb of ram is enough in 2020, but as games start using 10gb, 11gb, 12gb of ram, you may want to start with 32 if you plan on using your pc for 5 years or more.

Liquid Cooling is mostly a looks thing when you're not going with a custom loop, and if you don't plan on overclocking the snot out of your cpu, a Noctua NH-D15 will serve you well. I would try to get the black one, as the normal one is really ugly. But then again, you said you don't care about looks, so maybe not.

For the cpu/gpu combination above, I would go with a Corsair RM850x, or an equivalent gold 850 watt unit from another brand. You could certainly use a 750 watt unit, but if you plan on upgrading your gpu in the future, Nvidia may decide 500 watts is an appropriate amount of power for a graphics card to consume.

You'll see companies flash around numbers about how their pcie 4.0 ssd transfers 59 million terabytes per second, but the reality is unless you work in a career where you are constantly moving terabytes of data between storage devices per day, it doesn't make a difference. I would recommend either a sata or pcie 3.0 ssd for your system, and if you think you'll need extra storage, pick up a WD Blue spinning drive on Amazon for 60 bucks or so.

Your case doesn't really matter a whole lot as long as you choose a modern option with a power supply shroud and good airflow. I'm running an NZXT h510i, but more for the looks than for the airflow as I don't have the highest-powered rig in the world. (yet ) I'm not knowledgeable on cases past this, though, so I would do your research on Youtube, HardwareUnboxed and GamersNexus put out some great videos with reliable information.

For your motherboard, since AMD isn't releasing a new chipset for this generation, a mid-range x570 is your best bet. I would check out the videos GamersNexus has put out about x570 boards and buy based on their recommendation.

I am no genius, nor do I know everything about pc's, but I hope this info sets you off in the right direction.