[SOLVED] Gaming Desktop for $300 or under

May 24, 2018
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Can anyone recommend a gaming desktop for $300 or under? I’m looking to play mostly league of legends and vrchat. And probably watching youtube videos and movies.
 
Solution


To say it is "useless" is a bit of an overstatement. If you look at the article on memory and impacts on the 2400G you can see that memory timings do have an impact. But a change from around 50 FPS to mid 50s FPS is a good percentage but not earth shattering.

ohenryy

Honorable
PCPartPicker part list: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/fhjHRJ
Price breakdown by merchant: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/fhjHRJ/by_merchant/

CPU: AMD - Ryzen 3 2200G 3.5 GHz Quad-Core Processor ($93.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Motherboard: ASRock - A320M-HDV Micro ATX AM4 Motherboard ($53.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: Crucial - Ballistix Sport LT 8 GB (2 x 4 GB) DDR4-2400 Memory ($60.99 @ Amazon)
Storage: Western Digital - Caviar Green 500 GB 3.5" 5400RPM Internal Hard Drive ($21.95 @ Amazon)
Case: Rosewill - FBM-01 MicroATX Mini Tower Case ($22.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: EVGA - 500 W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($37.89 @ OutletPC)
Total: $291.79
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2018-12-28 22:51 EST-0500

This should do it...
 

This system won't post because motherboard won't have a bios updated to recognize the 2200g.
 

kanewolf

Titan
Moderator


The 2200G requires the 4.40 BIOS according to the website. That was released almost a year ago. Is it possible it won't have a compatible BIOS, yes. Is it definite anymore? No. I would give it a 90% chance of having a compatible BIOS today.
 

kanewolf

Titan
Moderator
There's no percentage of weather it will have a bios update or not. How did you calculate 90%? Either it has the bios update or it doesn't. Did you just think of that number and type it? I'm not going to take that chance, but maybe the OP might to save money.

I absolutely made up that number and I labeled it as my opinion. Is a B450 a better choice to guarantee compatibility? Yes. But if a year passing since a chip is supported isn't sufficient time for a motherboard to be delivered to Newegg with compatible BIOS, then I don't know what is. If this were listed as a smaller retailer, or purchased from a local shop, then it is a much higher probability of an older BIOS. But IN MY OPINION, it is a small risk.
 
You need 3000 MHz memory for the APUs. Wasn’t talking about timings.

Also they used 4x8 which Ryzen sometimes has an issue with and you get worse performance with 4x8 than 2x16 as you’re running 2 sets in dual channel which takes more effort for the controller.

 

kanewolf

Titan
Moderator


My point was you benefit from 3000 but it will function just fine with 2400. To say you "need" 3000Mhz is just untrue.
 

People are still posting in all the time regarding a mismatch in AMD Gen hardware. You're entitled to your own opinion but I'd lower that percentage quite a bit.

 

punkncat

Champion
Ambassador
MERGED QUESTION
Question from victorchou1 : "Gaming Laptops or Desktops for $300 and under"











I think even that is speaking rather highly of the budget, particularly in light of desire for a gaming laptop.

You could build your own very meager "gaming" rig in the neighborhood of $500 now, probably including OS. Even at that you would likely be stuck at low settings.

If you were serious about pursuing this desire....
Find a 3/4th gen i5 or i7 office refurb. Make sure it's a Mid or Full sized tower, not SFF, and factor in a new PSU/GPU combo and you 'could be' gaming. As far as laptop is concerned, simply isn't going to happen on the honest market.