Build Advice Gaming PC - Custom Build guidance request

[damian.kowalski]

Hi there [helpful poster's name], thanks for reading this post!

I'm looking for some advice and guidance on components and compatibility for a custom DIY gaming PC. I've always wanted to build my own PC from scratch but never previously had the opportunity. I've got a budget of up to £1300, and my primary driver for the build (other than being able to prove to myself I'm capable of clicking pieces together) is to play Witcher 3 and a few other titles with no lag (video or audio). I'd like to end up with a system where there is no performance waste (like buying a mobo with a bus capacity that is insufficient for the CPU), is fairly quiet while running and offers decent value (i.e. using slightly dated or 2nd-tier components).

I've done a little research, and here are the key base components that seem to I'd like expert opinion on - from both a performance and more importantly a compatibility perspective:

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5800X £270

GPU: Nvidia RTX 2080 £341

SSD: Samsung 870 EVO 2TB £50

RAM: Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4 3200 C16 2x16GB £98

MBD: MSI MPG B550 GAMING EDGE WIFI (MS-7C91) £160

Monitor: Gigabyte G32QC £270

I know that I haven't mentioned case, cooler, and probably a few other key bits, so please feel free to call out any such omissions, and please make recommendations where possible! Also any general advice for building a PC from scratch would be greatly welcomed.

Many thanks in advance for any help you give...

Damian

 

[Lutfij]

Swap the memory out for a dual channel DDR4-3600MHz kit. Make and model of the PSU in your build? Outside of the missing power delivery unit, your build looks set although you could look into an aftermarket cooler for that processor.

 

[Roland Of Gilead]

Hey there,

I'd go with something like this.

Little overbudget, but your getting twice the ram, a better GPU, and overall a better experience. PSU included.

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5800X 3.8 GHz 8-Core Processor (£259.79 @ Amazon UK)
CPU Cooler: Corsair iCUE H100i ELITE CAPELLIX 75 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler (£114.99 @ AWD-IT)
Motherboard: MSI MPG B550 GAMING EDGE WIFI ATX AM4 Motherboard (£172.98 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance RGB Pro 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory (£118.49 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Samsung 870 Evo 2 TB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£149.99 @ Scan.co.uk)
Video Card: MSI GeForce RTX 3060 Ti LHR 8 GB VENTUS 2X OCV1 Video Card (£459.99 @ CCL Computers)
Power Supply: Corsair RM (2021) 650 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (£80.93 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £1357.16
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2022-09-04 13:22 BST+0100


This with an aircooler:

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5800X 3.8 GHz 8-Core Processor (£266.46 @ Amazon UK)
CPU Cooler: be quiet! Dark Rock Pro 4 50.5 CFM CPU Cooler (£72.26 @ Technextday)
Motherboard: MSI MPG B550 GAMING EDGE WIFI ATX AM4 Motherboard (£172.98 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance RGB Pro 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory (£118.49 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Samsung 870 Evo 2 TB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£149.99 @ Scan.co.uk)
Video Card: MSI GeForce RTX 3060 Ti LHR 8 GB VENTUS 2X OCV1 Video Card (£459.99 @ CCL Computers)
Power Supply: Corsair RM (2021) 650 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (£80.93 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £1321.10
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2022-09-04 13:24 BST+0100

 

[damian.kowalski]

Swap the memory out for a dual channel DDR4-3600MHz kit. Make and model of the PSU in your build? Outside of the missing power delivery unit, your build looks set although you could look into an aftermarket cooler for that processor.

Thanks for your advice on the RAM, could you share the reason behind this recommendation? Is it purely because of the higher frequency?

SNAP on the PSU. Knew I'd forgotten something vital! Guessing I'm going to need something updwards of 600W....

And with regards to the cooler, what CPU speeds demand additional cooling? Do I need a water type or is heat sink ok?

 

[Lutfij]

Ryzen likes faster ram...actually DDR4-3200Mhz was the wall on Ryzen prior to the 5000 series and B450 chipset boards. If you're set on a 3060Ti, get an 850W reliably built unit.

 

[Roland Of Gilead]

Thanks for your advice on the RAM, could you share the reason behind this recommendation? Is it purely because of the higher frequency?

SNAP on the PSU. Knew I'd forgotten something vital! Guessing I'm going to need something updwards of 600W....

And with regards to the cooler, what CPU speeds demand additional cooling? Do I need a water type or is heat sink ok?

3600mhz is the sweetspot with ram for Zen 3. It's because the Infinity Fabric clock can run at a 1:1 ratio with the memclock. It works out 1800:1800 (half of 3600 DDR). This gives lowest latency and faster response times. With higher clocked mem, the ratio shifts to 2:1 (or others) and mem latency can increase by up to 20ms.

Regarding the cooler and recommended, well that's a bit confusing now. It used to be relatively easy. A CPU had a certain TDP, and you choose a cooler that gives more coverage to ensure cool quiet operation.

So for example a 65w CPU might get away with a 65w cooler, but chances are the noise and fan speed to keep the CPU in step and not always so hot, will be very annoying. So the idea being you get a cooler rated for 120w or more (CPU depending) to give plenty of clearance for certain chips that have a lower TDP.

An example would be my own CPU. 5600x 65w CPU. I've an AIO that's rated up to 180w, and the CPU rarely goes beyond 80w at stress, so it keeps the CPU nice and cool whilst at full load. Temps at stress would be about 75-80c, gaming at about 60-65c, and idle at about 28-32c ( I live in Ireland, we have very mild summers and winters, so ambient rarely gets above 20c )

 

[damian.kowalski]

Hey there,

I'd go with something like this.

Little overbudget, but your getting twice the ram, a better GPU, and overall a better experience. PSU included.

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5800X 3.8 GHz 8-Core Processor (£259.79 @ Amazon UK)
CPU Cooler: Corsair iCUE H100i ELITE CAPELLIX 75 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler (£114.99 @ AWD-IT)
Motherboard: MSI MPG B550 GAMING EDGE WIFI ATX AM4 Motherboard (£172.98 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance RGB Pro 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory (£118.49 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Samsung 870 Evo 2 TB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£149.99 @ Scan.co.uk)
Video Card: MSI GeForce RTX 3060 Ti LHR 8 GB VENTUS 2X OCV1 Video Card (£459.99 @ CCL Computers)
Power Supply: Corsair RM (2021) 650 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (£80.93 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £1357.16
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2022-09-04 13:22 BST+0100


This with an aircooler:

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5800X 3.8 GHz 8-Core Processor (£266.46 @ Amazon UK)
CPU Cooler: be quiet! Dark Rock Pro 4 50.5 CFM CPU Cooler (£72.26 @ Technextday)
Motherboard: MSI MPG B550 GAMING EDGE WIFI ATX AM4 Motherboard (£172.98 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance RGB Pro 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory (£118.49 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Samsung 870 Evo 2 TB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£149.99 @ Scan.co.uk)
Video Card: MSI GeForce RTX 3060 Ti LHR 8 GB VENTUS 2X OCV1 Video Card (£459.99 @ CCL Computers)
Power Supply: Corsair RM (2021) 650 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (£80.93 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £1321.10
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2022-09-04 13:24 BST+0100

This is an excellent recommendation, thanks for pulling it together!

Could I ask what prompts the recommended GPU upgrade to a 3060 Ti? I ask as it's more than £100 extra than the 2080, and I wasn't sure it offered much more perf wise ?

Also, as I'm trying to be environmentally conscious and energy is now a premium commodity , is the Gold certified PSU a good enough standard if I'm running this machine nearly daily?

 

[damian.kowalski]

3600mhz is the sweetspot with ram for Zen 3. It's because the Infinity Fabric clock can run at a 1:1 ratio with the memclock. It works out 1800:1800 (half of 3600 DDR). This gives lowest latency and faster response times. With higher clocked mem, the ratio shifts to 2:1 (or others) and mem latency can increase by up to 20ms.

Regarding the cooler and recommended, well that's a bit confusing now. It used to be relatively easy. A CPU had a certain TDP, and you choose a cooler that gives more coverage to ensure cool quiet operation.

So for example a 65w CPU might get away with a 65w cooler, but chances are the noise and fan speed to keep the CPU in step and not always so hot, will be very annoying. So the idea being you get a cooler rated for 120w or more (CPU depending) to give plenty of clearance for certain chips that have a lower TDP.

An example would be my own CPU. 5600x 65w CPU. I've an AIO that's rated up to 180w, and the CPU rarely goes beyond 80w at stress, so it keeps the CPU nice and cool whilst at full load. Temps at stress would be about 75-80c, gaming at about 60-65c, and idle at about 28-32c ( I live in Ireland, we have very mild summers and winters, so ambient rarely gets above 20c )

Cheers Gilead for the supporting detail, good to factor in to things, will choose my RAM accordingly!

Can you offer any advice in terms of a case (ATX?) to keep things quiet?

 

[Vic 40]

Something else under your budget, think i only give less storage, but it has a nice nvme drive for the OS and still has a 1tb ssd for games,

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5800X 3.8 GHz 8-Core Processor (£266.46 @ Amazon UK)
CPU Cooler: Deepcool AK620 68.99 CFM CPU Cooler (£55.00 @ Computer Orbit)
Motherboard: MSI MAG B550 TOMAHAWK ATX AM4 Motherboard (£146.95 @ Box Limited)
Memory: ADATA XPG GAMMIX D45 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory (£109.27 @ Box Limited)
Storage: PNY CS2140 500 GB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive (£45.99 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Crucial MX500 1 TB 2.5" Solid State Drive (£69.99 @ Box Limited)
Video Card: Sapphire Radeon RX 6700 XT 12 GB PULSE Video Card (£438.89 @ Overclockers.co.uk)
Case: Fractal Design Meshify C ATX Mid Tower Case (£59.99 @ Scan.co.uk)
Power Supply: Corsair RMx (2021) 850 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (£104.99 @ CCL Computers)
Total: £1297.53
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2022-09-04 21:33 BST+0100

 

[Roland Of Gilead]

This is an excellent recommendation, thanks for pulling it together!

Could I ask what prompts the recommended GPU upgrade to a 3060 Ti? I ask as it's more than £100 extra than the 2080, and I wasn't sure it offered much more perf wise ?

Also, as I'm trying to be environmentally conscious and energy is now a premium commodity , is the Gold certified PSU a good enough standard if I'm running this machine nearly daily?

No probs, you're welcome

The 3060ti is the better GPU, with mostly better FPS in nearly all games. It also brings with it the next gen ray tracing if you like all the graphical goodness that brings. You could argue that for the price difference it's not worth the increase in performance though. There's a big boost in some games, but not all.

For the PSU, although gold certification is important, it's really more about the components. Those ones listed are top quality and will last from one build to the next. They also come with long warranties. But, yes, those PSU's are Gold rated and perform as such in terms of efficiency.

I'm not terribly au fait on cases. I use a Lian Li 215, which I really like. Great airflow for a budget case, with plenty of drive bays and fan placements for additional cooling. Other than that, I often think the case purchase is very much a personal choice (RGB or not RGB!?)

 

[damian.kowalski]

Thanks all for your help and advice thus far.

Having a look at the total cost of everything, I've had to trim back on some components and remind myself I'm really not looking too far beyond a build that allows me to play Witcher3 smoothly at max resolution.

As such, here's the revised list of components I've trimmed back to:

CPU	Intel Core i7-11700KF	£200
GPU	Nvidia GTX 1080	£256
SSD	Samsung 870 EVO 2TB	£180
RAM	Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4 3600 C18 2x16GB	£106
MBD	MSI MPG Z590 GAMING CARBON WIFI (MS-7D06)	​ £179
CLR	be quiet! Shadow Rock Slim 2	£40​
PSU	Corsair RM (2021) 650 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply	£81​
CTX	Fractal Design Meshify C ATX Mid Tower Case	£60
MTR	Gigabyte G32QC	£270

Can you kindly call out if you spot any compatibility issues here? Or if there any obvious swaps for components that won't increase cost of that component by more than 10%?

Thanks again for all your help with this! Once this list has been vetted, I'm planning on waiting for black friday/cyber monday then buying the lot then.... feel free to share any advice on which sites I should scan for the best bargains!

 

[logainofhades]

DDR4 3600 CL18 is no different, in performance, than DDR4 3200 CL16. 3600 CL16 is the performance sweet spot, though 3200 cl16 isn't a huge difference. Zen 3 is a bit less ram speed sensitive than previous Zen chips.

Thanks all for your help and advice thus far.

Having a look at the total cost of everything, I've had to trim back on some components and remind myself I'm really not looking too far beyond a build that allows me to play Witcher3 smoothly at max resolution.

As such, here's the revised list of components I've trimmed back to:

CPU	Intel Core i7-11700KF	£200
GPU	Nvidia GTX 1080	£256
SSD	Samsung 870 EVO 2TB	£180
RAM	Corsair Vengeance LPX DDR4 3600 C18 2x16GB	£106
MBD	MSI MPG Z590 GAMING CARBON WIFI (MS-7D06)	​ £179
CLR	be quiet! Shadow Rock Slim 2	£40​
PSU	Corsair RM (2021) 650 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply	£81​
CTX	Fractal Design Meshify C ATX Mid Tower Case	£60
MTR	Gigabyte G32QC	£270

Can you kindly call out if you spot any compatibility issues here? Or if there any obvious swaps for components that won't increase cost of that component by more than 10%?

Thanks again for all your help with this! Once this list has been vetted, I'm planning on waiting for black friday/cyber monday then buying the lot then.... feel free to share any advice on which sites I should scan for the best bargains!

I would recommend against going with an 11700k. An i5 12400/12500 would game faster than that chip.

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: Intel Core i5-12500 3 GHz 6-Core Processor (£199.50 @ Technextday)
CPU Cooler: Deepcool AK400 66.47 CFM CPU Cooler (£30.00 @ Computer Orbit)
Motherboard: MSI PRO B660-A DDR4 ATX LGA1700 Motherboard (£146.49 @ Box Limited)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance LPX 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory (£93.99 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: TEAMGROUP MP33 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive (£73.70 @ Technextday)
Video Card: MSI Radeon RX 6700 XT 12 GB MECH 2X OC Video Card (£393.44 @ Amazon UK)
Case: Cougar MX410 MESH-G RGB ATX Mid Tower Case (£53.09 @ CCL Computers)
Power Supply: Corsair RM750 (2019) 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (£69.98 @ Scan.co.uk)
Monitor: ViewSonic XG2705-2K OMNI 27.0" 2560x1440 144 Hz Monitor (£199.99 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £1260.18
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2022-09-08 21:37 BST+0100

 

[damian.kowalski]

Thanks for the advice @logainofhades !

Can I just ask for a bit more info on the GPU? WHat advantage is there for choosing an RX6700XT over say the RTX2080? The site userbenchmark seems to say the 2080 is faster (as well as being cheaper).

Also would you say the XG2705-2k monitor is stronger than the G32QC? I was only going with the latter because it came up favourably in a few review articles, and it approximates a 34" monitor that I've been using recently...

 

[logainofhades]

Userbenchmark is a trash website. The 6700xt is faster than an RTX 2080. From the techspot 6700xt review.

Monitor I would say just choose the one you like more. I personally am still using 1440p 60hz Lenovo monitors, myself, so high refresh isn't something I am overly knowledgeable about.

 

[damian.kowalski]

Hello again all! Thanks to a house renovation project this PC building idea had to take a pause, but I'm back now and thanks to GenAI and an upcoming redundancy payout I've got both the component list and capital to finally go ahead with this.

I'd like to ask for your feedback once again, this time on the configuration below. I've used PC Parts Picker to track my components and there aren't any compatibility issues, but would appreciate your expertise on where improvements could be made:

Component		Selection	Price
CPU			AMD Ryzen 5 7600X 4.7 GHz 6-Core Processor	£184.80	Buy
CPU Cooler			Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE 66.17 CFM CPU Cooler	£33.98	Buy
Motherboard			Gigabyte B650 AORUS ELITE AX ATX AM5 Motherboard	£176.49	Buy
Memory			Corsair Vengeance 64 GB (2 x 32 GB) DDR5-5600 CL40 Memory	£158.97	Buy
Storage			Samsung 990 Pro 2 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 4.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive	£149.99	Buy
Video Card			Asus DUAL EVO OC GeForce RTX 4070 12 GB Video Card	£496.94	Buy
Case			Lian Li LANCOOL 216 ATX Mid Tower Case	£89.00	Buy
Power Supply			Corsair RM750e (2023) 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply	£89.98	Buy
Operating System			Microsoft Windows 11 Home Retail - Download 64-bit	£100.32	Buy
Monitor			Gigabyte G27QC 27.0" 2560 x 1440 165 Hz Curved Monitor	£229.99

 

[helper800]

Hello again all! Thanks to a house renovation project this PC building idea had to take a pause, but I'm back now and thanks to GenAI and an upcoming redundancy payout I've got both the component list and capital to finally go ahead with this.

I'd like to ask for your feedback once again, this time on the configuration below. I've used PC Parts Picker to track my components and there aren't any compatibility issues, but would appreciate your expertise on where improvements could be made:

Component		Selection	Price
CPU			AMD Ryzen 5 7600X 4.7 GHz 6-Core Processor	£184.80	Buy
CPU Cooler			Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE 66.17 CFM CPU Cooler	£33.98	Buy
Motherboard			Gigabyte B650 AORUS ELITE AX ATX AM5 Motherboard	£176.49	Buy
Memory			Corsair Vengeance 64 GB (2 x 32 GB) DDR5-5600 CL40 Memory	£158.97	Buy
Storage			Samsung 990 Pro 2 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 4.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive	£149.99	Buy
Video Card			Asus DUAL EVO OC GeForce RTX 4070 12 GB Video Card	£496.94	Buy
Case			Lian Li LANCOOL 216 ATX Mid Tower Case	£89.00	Buy
Power Supply			Corsair RM750e (2023) 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply	£89.98	Buy
Operating System			Microsoft Windows 11 Home Retail - Download 64-bit	£100.32	Buy
Monitor			Gigabyte G27QC 27.0" 2560 x 1440 165 Hz Curved Monitor	£229.99

You can do a lot more with 1700 than chatGPT is giving you. What is your total budget? Is this going to be a gaming PC most of the time or do you do any production tasks as well? Something like the following would be the best performance you can get right now, in my opinion, if you are talking about purely gaming:

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: Intel Core i5-14600KF 3.5 GHz 14-Core Processor (£190.97 @ Amazon UK)
CPU Cooler: Thermalright Phantom Spirit EVO 69 CFM CPU Cooler (£43.90 @ Amazon UK)
Motherboard: Gigabyte Z790 EAGLE AX ATX LGA1700 Motherboard (£159.00 @ Computer Orbit)
Memory: Patriot Viper Venom 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR5-7000 CL32 Memory (£97.99 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Crucial T500 2 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 4.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive (£133.97 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: Palit Dual OC GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER 12 GB Video Card (£539.99 @ AWD-IT)
Case: Phanteks Eclipse P400A Digital ATX Mid Tower Case (£67.94 @ Overclockers.co.uk)
Power Supply: MSI MAG A850GL PCIE5 850 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (£95.98 @ Novatech)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 11 Home Retail - Download 64-bit (£100.32 @ Senetic)
Monitor: Gigabyte M27Q-X 27.0" 2560 x 1440 240 Hz Monitor (£288.95 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £1719.01
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2024-10-26 20:28 BST+0100

 

[damian.kowalski]

You can do a lot more with 1700 than chatGPT is giving you. What is your total budget? Is this going to be a gaming PC most of the time or do you do any production tasks as well? Something like the following would be the best performance you can get right now, in my opinion, if you are talking about purely gaming:

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: Intel Core i5-14600KF 3.5 GHz 14-Core Processor (£190.97 @ Amazon UK)
CPU Cooler: Thermalright Phantom Spirit EVO 69 CFM CPU Cooler (£43.90 @ Amazon UK)
Motherboard: Gigabyte Z790 EAGLE AX ATX LGA1700 Motherboard (£159.00 @ Computer Orbit)
Memory: Patriot Viper Venom 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR5-7000 CL32 Memory (£97.99 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Crucial T500 2 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 4.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive (£133.97 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: Palit Dual OC GeForce RTX 4070 SUPER 12 GB Video Card (£539.99 @ AWD-IT)
Case: Phanteks Eclipse P400A Digital ATX Mid Tower Case (£67.94 @ Overclockers.co.uk)
Power Supply: MSI MAG A850GL PCIE5 850 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (£95.98 @ Novatech)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 11 Home Retail - Download 64-bit (£100.32 @ Senetic)
Monitor: Gigabyte M27Q-X 27.0" 2560 x 1440 240 Hz Monitor (£288.95 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £1719.01
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2024-10-26 20:28 BST+0100

Thanks helper800 for the advice! Is the i5 CPU a better choice for gaming because of the 14 cores it boasts? I was just basing my AMD choice on the 4.7GHz core clock speed (perhaps naively!)...

 

[logainofhades]

I personally would avoid 13th and 14th gen. I don't trust that Intel has actually fixed there issues with regards to degredation. Normally I would say 7800x3d, but prices are inflated due to low supply. You might want to hold out for the 9800x3d coming in a couple weeks.

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 7700X 4.5 GHz 8-Core Processor (£263.97 @ Amazon UK)
CPU Cooler: Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE 66.17 CFM CPU Cooler (£33.98 @ Overclockers.co.uk)
Motherboard: Gigabyte B650 GAMING X AX V2 ATX AM5 Motherboard (£143.61 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: TEAMGROUP T-Create Expert 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR5-6000 CL30 Memory (£94.16 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Western Digital Blue SN580 2 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 4.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive (£99.95 @ Amazon UK)
Video Card: PowerColor Hellhound Radeon RX 7900 XT 20 GB Video Card (£622.99 @ MoreCoCo)
Case: Montech AIR 903 MAX ATX Mid Tower Case (£65.47 @ Scan.co.uk)
Power Supply: be quiet! Pure Power 12 M 850 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply (£92.72 @ NeoComputers)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 11 Home Retail - Download 64-bit (£100.32 @ Senetic)
Monitor: MSI G27CQ4 E2 27.0" 2560 x 1440 170 Hz Curved Monitor (£165.99 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £1683.16
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2024-10-28 12:00 GMT+0000

 

[helper800]

Thanks helper800 for the advice! Is the i5 CPU a better choice for gaming because of the 14 cores it boasts? I was just basing my AMD choice on the 4.7GHz core clock speed (perhaps naively!)...

The i5 is a good CPU because of the high single threaded performance it has for the low cost.

As some others have pointed out, there were some issues with Intel CPUs rapidly degrading because of various issues, however, there have been several BIOS updates and a warranty extension from 3 to 5 years for all 13th and 14th generation CPUs. Intels BIOS updates supposedly fixed such issues, but the big caveat is that because of the nature of such issues its hard to confirm this 3rd party so a lot of people are extremely wary of these CPUs. I personally believe that the mitigations put into place and Intel's extension of all the warranties are sufficient enough to dispel any doubts.

The 14600k is significantly cheaper or comparable in price than any 7000 or 9000 series AMD CPU, and faster. The only exceptions to this are any AMD X3D CPU, but those are 450+ or more and not worth the extra FPS for the cost unless you play a select few games that massively benefit from them like Microsoft Flight Simulator. A 14600k will either match or be at worst be about 18% slower than a 7800X3D for less than half the cost.

 

[damian.kowalski]

Appreciate the advice all. Have revised my build accordingly. Comments/revisions welcome!

The question I have now is: from a components angle what else do I need? Specifically I'm worried that I have nothing from this list:
Sound Cards, Wired Network Adapters, Wireless Network AdaptersHeadphones, Keyboards, Mice, Speakers, Webcams, Case Accessories, Case Fans, Fan Controllers, Thermal Compound, External Storage, Optical Drives, UPS Systems

Am I right to naively believe that I can get away with plugging in an old keyboard and optical mouse and being good to go? Are soundcards still a thing? What is a Fan Controller, and do I need one??

Please guide me on the finishing touches!

 

[logainofhades]

You do not need sound card, wired network, or wireless adapters, as the motherboard has them. Case has plenty of fans, and a fan hub. Motherboard can control the fan speeds through bios, or with Gigabyte's own software utility, so do not need a fan controller either. Any USB keyboard and mouse will work. Almost nobody uses optical drives these days. If you have need of one, just buy a USB external model.

Thermal compound comes with cooler, but it doesn't hurt to have some extra on hand. As far as speakers, or headphones, that depends on how your preferences for audio delivery. Webcam really only needed if you do video meetings, or want to do some kind of streaming that people can see you.

External storage, you will want an 8gb USB drive for your Windows installation. More than that depends on your needs. It's good to have one for backups, but it isn't required for a gaming only PC. UPS is another nice to have, for power outages, but not necessary for gaming pc either.

I would not buy that Asus 7900gre. You can get a powercolor fighter for quite a bit less, and powercolor is one of the top AMD gpu vendors out there. Do not buy the KF model, as it lacks integrated graphics. It's good to have that for troubleshooting, or if your GPU were to for some reason die. PC is at least usable still.

 

[damian.kowalski]

Sorry can you expand on the 8gb USB drive for Windows - is that to house the OS externally? Or just keep a backup?

 

[logainofhades]

Sorry can you expand on the 8gb USB drive for Windows - is that to house the OS externally? Or just keep a backup?

For Windows installation. Also, I added some more recommendations in my previous post you may have missed.

 

[damian.kowalski]

Thanks for the steer on the CPU and GPU, have revised accordingly. I was planning on downloading the windows OS - do I still need a USB drive in that case? I had understood that the OS installation could be initiated via a CLI or similar...

 

[logainofhades]

To install windows on a new system, you use the windows media creation tool, to make a bootable USB drive, then install it that way.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6U7INlXbchs