Question Need Help Deciding on a New PC!

[lakersfreak]

I'm not an avid PC gamer. Can I get away with an intel i5 processor and RTX 3060? Or should I go with an i7? Costco has an iBUYPOWER i7 on sale for $1,349 (https://www.costco.com/.product.1658983.html). Wondering if it's worth the price tag. Let me know!

 

[logainofhades]

Ibuypower tend to use junk quality power supplies. I would avoid them. Also that case looks to be terrible for airflow.

 

[Eximo]

You can do a build with similar parts for around $1200.

For $1350 you can easily do something like this:

RX6600XT is right between the 3060Ti and 3060 in gaming performance. You lose out on raytracing, but that is a serious performance penalty for mid-range cards.

1TB SSD. i5 K edition, which gets you 4 efficiency cores, and a decent air cooler. Z690 board for no real reason, not much more than B660 with Wifi...Kind of a black and white theme (mostly because of the GPU.)

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: Intel Core i5-12600K 3.7 GHz 10-Core Processor ($278.95 @ Amazon)
CPU Cooler: Deepcool AK400 66.47 CFM CPU Cooler ($34.99 @ Amazon)
Motherboard: ASRock Z690 Steel Legend WiFi 6E ATX LGA1700 Motherboard ($184.99 @ Newegg)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance RGB Pro SL 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory ($102.00 @ Amazon)
Storage: Samsung 970 Evo Plus 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive ($99.99 @ Amazon)
Video Card: MSI Radeon RX 6600 XT 8 GB MECH 2X OC Video Card ($319.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Fractal Design Focus 2 RGB ATX Mid Tower Case ($89.98 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA G6 650 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply ($79.99 @ EVGA)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 11 Home OEM 64-bit ($99.98 @ Newegg)
Total: $1290.86
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2022-08-22 15:17 EDT-0400

 

[logainofhades]

If building, and keeping within the $1350, I would do something like this.

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: Intel Core i7-12700F 2.1 GHz 12-Core Processor ($312.96 @ Newegg)
CPU Cooler: Deepcool AK400 66.47 CFM CPU Cooler ($34.99 @ Amazon)
Motherboard: MSI PRO B660-A DDR4 ATX LGA1700 Motherboard ($129.99 @ B&H)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance LPX 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory ($86.00 @ Amazon)
Storage: Corsair MP600 PRO 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive ($109.00 @ Amazon)
Video Card: Gigabyte Radeon RX 6700 XT 12 GB EAGLE Video Card ($414.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Cougar MX330-G Air ATX Mid Tower Case ($59.99 @ B&H)
Power Supply: EVGA SuperNOVA G6 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply ($99.99 @ EVGA)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 11 Home OEM 64-bit ($99.98 @ Newegg)
Total: $1347.89
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2022-08-22 19:52 EDT-0400