Post your PC build (1 Viewer)

[TheDeparted]

Oh, one last thing - once you've built the computer, unless you are explicitly planning a future upgrade, ignore hardware news until your rig no longer objectively satisfies your requirements.

 

[GeauxWhoDats]

Wow Denzien that has to be the most thorough response that I have ever seen. I am going to have to read this again with another cup of coffee. I wasn't planning on building a PC, more of "here are some specs" or "I recommend this **link*" type of responses but your information is great. I am going to really dive into this. Thanks a lot.

 

[TheDeparted]

Wow Denzien that has to be the most thorough response that I have ever seen. I am going to have to read this again with another cup of coffee. I wasn't planning on building a PC, more of "here are some specs" or "I recommend this **link*" type of responses but your information is great. I am going to really dive into this. Thanks a lot.

I really tried to keep it short, too. I hope it's not overwhelming, but there's a lot of information to know when trying to make an informed decision - whether you're buying pre-built or otherwise.

You get better stuff when you just go ahead and build it yourself - in particular the RAM and SSD. IF you know what you're buying. Sort of like changing your cars' oil yourself. You always buy the best oil and filter, and for cheaper than having someone do it for you.

Like I said, I'm happy to help by elaborating and I'm sure there are plenty of others here who can help at least as well as I can. I was the guy in college all my friends went to to spec and assemble machines with their student loans, but I hadn't built a PC for something like 13 years until recently - so I'm packed full of recent information from my research. There are some holes in what I know about older parts though, and you can save a lot of money buying older parts someone is dumping because there's a new version this year.

 

[GeauxWhoDats]

I really tried to keep it short, too. I hope it's not overwhelming, but there's a lot of information to know when trying to make an informed decision - whether you're buying pre-built or otherwise.

You get better stuff when you just go ahead and build it yourself - in particular the RAM and SSD. IF you know what you're buying. Sort of like changing your cars' oil yourself. You always buy the best oil and filter, and for cheaper than having someone do it for you.

Like I said, I'm happy to help by elaborating and I'm sure there are plenty of others here who can help at least as well as I can. I was the guy in college all my friends went to to spec and assemble machines with their student loans, but I hadn't built a PC for something like 13 years until recently - so I'm packed full of recent information from my research. There are some holes in what I know about older parts though, and you can save a lot of money buying older parts someone is dumping because there's a new version this year.

Any brands to avoid? I am not familiar with ASUS, ABS, Skytech, etc.

 

[TheDeparted]

Any brands to avoid? I am not familiar with ASUS, ABS, Skytech, etc.

ASUS is well known, I've never heard of ABS or Skytech. Do you mean brands for a pre-built?

 

[GeauxWhoDats]

ASUS is well known, I've never heard of ABS or Skytech. Do you mean brands for a pre-built?

Yeah those were some boxes that I saw on Newegg that were "recommended" via sorting by reviews.

 

[TheDeparted]

Yeah those were some boxes that I saw on Newegg that were "recommended" via sorting by reviews.

If you want a modern GPU (and don't we all), this is probably the most expedient way to make that happen without paying scalper prices on eBay.

ABS seems to have some comments about shipping machines that don't work. Probably simple misconfiguration, or RAM that wasn't seated all the way - but something to stay away from if you don't know how to troubleshoot a PC.

I don't see any bad comments about Skytech yet. I'm sure they're fine machines as long as they're assembled correctly, tested before they leave, and packed/shipped with care. It looks like their parts selection is pretty well matched for the price. When they make compromises, they seem to make them very purposefully such that you should be happy. These are compromises I would suggest when selecting parts with a hard budget limit.


For instance, on Skytech's site they have what looks like a pretty decent machine for $1250. It gets a Geforce RTX 3060ti, which is the least expensive new GPU NVidia released this year (that you can't find at retail anywhere), and it has the best price-to-performance CPU from the previous generation for gaming, the R5 3600, which is a good buy.
The compromises are that it's using an older motherboard with what I would consider the bare minimum viable chipset for a new machine, the B450.
It has 16GB of RAM, which is good, but it's slower (3000mhz) than the optimal RAM for that CPU.
It has a 1TB nvme drive, which is great, but the make, model, and performance is not disclosed. Is it a Samsung or Western Digital drive that reads >3.00GB/s, or is it a budget drive like the one on my work laptop that's somehow running at SATA III speeds (0.55GB/s)? (I'm on hold to find out) (Edit: yeah, they said they just put in whatever random 1TB nvme drive they have on hand. It could be a good performer, it could be a bad performer. Who knows??)


Now check out a slightly pricier machine they have at $1550. This one gets the more expensive RTX 3070 (a $100 retail difference), and a slightly better 3600X CPU (a ~$50 difference).
The CPU cooler is upgraded from an air cooler to a sealed water cooler. As long as they used a good cooler with a good coolant, this will be a superior cooling solution. (these are called an AIO - All In One - because in the dark ages of water cooling, you had to custom fit everything. These are just assembled and sealed at the factory like a modern transmission.)
You also get a B550 chipset vs the B450 - which gets you a little bit of PCI Express 4.0 support (you want this).
It gets the same RAM capacity, but it's faster @3600mhz.
It has the same storage capacity, but it's a named drive - a Seagate (Firecuda?) 520 SSD which offers up to 5GB/s read speeds - not the fastest PCIe 4.0 drive, but faster than any PCIe 3.0 drive! That's a $200 drive on Amazon right now, so that's at least another $50 towards the $300 difference between these machines.


Looking at the other Skytech machines, I think the more expensive machines are probably overkill ... you can't improve to an RTX 3080 without upgrading to a more expensive CPU (which is not necessary for gaming) and maxing your budget out before you even get to the peripherals.
The cheaper one, IMO, will lead to you wanting to upgrade the hardware sooner.
If you go with Skytech, I would recommend the Azure I linked second. $100-150 for a keyboard and mouse and $250 for a 1440p monitor just might sneak in under your budget.

 

[The Unrest Cure]

I got a Skytech Legacy rig with an RTX 3070 about 4 weeks ago. All is well so far, and it has run just fine out of the box and VR games quite well. Perhaps all of it isn't entirely what I wanted, but seeing as my wife gifted it to me I'm not gonna look a gift horse in the mouth.

I do wish I had gotten a better monitor though. My iMac may have had serious gaming limitations, but its 5k screen was dope.

 

[Taker597]

 

[TheDeparted]

Got the final piece for my rig (until I upgrade to faster RAM):



I wasn't intending to get a 3090, but it was basically retail +$70, so I said screw it (since the 3080s around here are all marked up $250+ and the 3070 isn't ideal for my 5120x1440 monitor)


"Final" specs:

Cooler Master TD500 Mesh
750W Corsair (?) fully modular power supply
ASUS Tuf Gaming x570-Plus Wifi
GSkill 32 GB (2x16) 3200 CL16 DDR4 (this will get upgraded to low profile 3600 CL16 RAM at some point, but is not really a significant bottleneck)
Samsung 980 Pro 1TB m.2 nvme PCIe 4.0 SSD
AMD Ryzen R9 5950X
Noctua NH-D15 Chromax Black cooler (with one fan replaced with a smaller 140mm fan to clear the ram ...)
NVidia RTX 3090 Founders Edition
Samsung CRG9 monitor, 5120x1440 @120Hz
Das Keyboard 5Q smart keyboard
Logitech G700s gaming mouse
Massdrop X Sennheiser HD 6XX headphones powered by a Drop O2 amplifier
SecretLabs Titan Cyberpunk 2077 edition chair, because whatever

 

[Taker597]

Got the final piece for my rig (until I upgrade to faster RAM):



I wasn't intending to get a 3090, but it was basically retail +$70, so I said screw it (since the 3080s around here are all marked up $250+ and the 3070 isn't ideal for my 5120x1440 monitor)


"Final" specs:

Cooler Master TD500 Mesh
750W Corsair (?) fully modular power supply
ASUS Tuf Gaming x570-Plus Wifi
GSkill 32 GB (2x16) 3200 CL16 DDR4 (this will get upgraded to low profile 3600 CL16 RAM at some point, but is not really a significant bottleneck)
Samsung 980 Pro 1TB m.2 nvme PCIe 4.0 SSD
AMD Ryzen R9 5950X
Noctua NH-D15 Chromax Black cooler (with one fan replaced with a smaller 140mm fan to clear the ram ...)
NVidia RTX 3090 Founders Edition
Samsung CRG9 monitor, 5120x1440 @120Hz
Das Keyboard 5Q smart keyboard
Logitech G700s gaming mouse
Massdrop X Sennheiser HD 6XX headphones powered by a Drop O2 amplifier
SecretLabs Titan Cyberpunk 2077 edition chair, because whatever

Where you get a 3090? Been hunting anything down. 6900XT Red Devil or a 3090.


Also... Hunting for a G9 too.

 

[TheDeparted]

Where you get a 3090? Been hunting anything down. 6900XT Red Devil or a 3090.


Also... Hunting for a G9 too.

I bought it off a guy who got it off Best Buy's site a week or two ago. I used FB Marketplace (Craigslist is the worst for GPUs right now ... I found some good deals on FB Marketplace, like a Zotac 3070 with an $8 markup ... but the Zotac isn't really a great card as far as 3070s go). I paid about $70 over the cost of the card + tax, because my time is worth way more than that to me. Considering the frustration I went through on various launch days and even trying to secure a deal for other cards this week (I was looking at a 6900XT for retail+tax and it disappeared within a day), I just don't have time to play that game. This guy was, supposedly, buying it for a friend who balked at the price. Was completely sealed and brand new - he even gave me the code to redeem some COD game. He easily could have kept that.

Considering 3080s and 3060tis are listed for >$250 over cost+tax, and I didn't want to pay $400-1000 for a used last gen card, I just bit the bullet. The 3080 was the target, but a 3090 with a 4% markup was a lot more palatable than 50% for a 3060ti, even if that's a grand less, or $1200-1400 for a 3080.

Yeah, I really want an Odyssey G9 for the 1000R curve, but I saw the CRG9 pop up on Craigslist for $600 in basically new condition and I couldn't say no. I've seen the G9s on Amazon for $1350, which is way under msrp - but they disappeared a month before Christmas.

 

[Taker597]

I bought it off a guy who got it off Best Buy's site a week or two ago. I used FB Marketplace (Craigslist is the worst for GPUs right now ... I found some good deals on FB Marketplace, like a Zotac 3070 with an $8 markup ... but the Zotac isn't really a great card as far as 3070s go). I paid about $70 over the cost of the card + tax, because my time is worth way more than that to me. Considering the frustration I went through on various launch days and even trying to secure a deal for other cards this week (I was looking at a 6900XT for retail+tax and it disappeared within a day), I just don't have time to play that game. This guy was, supposedly, buying it for a friend who balked at the price. Was completely sealed and brand new - he even gave me the code to redeem some COD game. He easily could have kept that.

Considering 3080s and 3060tis are listed for >$250 over cost+tax, and I didn't want to pay $400-1000 for a used last gen card, I just bit the bullet. The 3080 was the target, but a 3090 with a 4% markup was a lot more palatable than 50% for a 3060ti, even if that's a grand less, or $1200-1400 for a 3080.

Yeah, I really want an Odyssey G9 for the 1000R curve, but I saw the CRG9 pop up on Craigslist for $600 in basically new condition and I couldn't say no. I've seen the G9s on Amazon for $1350, which is way under msrp - but they disappeared a month before Christmas.

The mark up is crazy.

I'm in the process of trying to get a 5900X, G9, and a GPU.

I think I'll have my monitor months before the rest.

I'll check out FB marketplace. I'm just gonna stake out the G9 drop on BestBuy on Thursday.

 

[TheDeparted]

The mark up is crazy.

I'm in the process of trying to get a 5900X, G9, and a GPU.

I think I'll have my monitor months before the rest.

5900X hits a real price to performance sweet spot and all-arounder. What kind of cooler are you planning on using?

I hope you can find all your parts soon. The GPU tariffs accelerated my decision to buy. It won't be long until it trickles into the secondary market.

 

[Taker597]

5900X hits a real price to performance sweet spot and all-arounder. What kind of cooler are you planning on using?

I hope you can find all your parts soon. The GPU tariffs accelerated my decision to buy. It won't be long until it trickles into the secondary market.

Yooooooo... G9 just went in stock on bestbuy. Phone died before placing order.

Out of stock now.

I got the EK Elite AIO with Uni Fans.

Bought the Elite right before they announced the EK Basic. Which I would prefer.