Non-Gaming build? Mini itx

[Prof. Lucifer]

So I live in China and I want to build a pc that is small and portable so I can bring it cross country becoz I might move at some point next year

 

My budget for the PC itself not including the monitor is 10,000 RMB which is around $1,400, but I'm pretty sure I don't need to spend anywhere near that much.

 

If you want to see where I'm going to buy this from, I'm buying from jd.com

 

If your wondering, yes, I did make a post literally a few days ago asking about a gaming rig, but I need to focus on my study so I decided to try to stop gaming, but ofc gaming addiction is a pain in the ass.

 

I came up with this, dk about case and GPU, budget$1400 USD but definitely don't need that much, use case think grade 8 kid who needs a pc that will last till graduation but doesn't know what to do in life and who might need PC for insane stuff or might only need it for basic stuff.

 

Sorry in advance for being very vague cuz idk what I'm going to do with this PC, just not gaming.

 

Also, I'm gonna get a 4k monitor

[Fasauceome]

cheapest ITX B450 board and Ryzen 3 2200G does any basic browsing and word processing task very comfortably. toss in 8GB of DDR4 2666 or higher and you're set.

[GoldenLag]

13 minutes ago, Prof. Lucifer said:

Also, I'm gonna get a 4k monitor

get a good 1440p monitor instead. like please. 

[Prof. Lucifer]

5 minutes ago, GoldenLag said:

get a good 1440p monitor instead. like please. 

Do good 1440p monitors without 144hz exist? Because that never crossed my mind lmao, thx

[Prof. Lucifer]

8 minutes ago, Fasauceome said:

cheapest ITX B450 board and Ryzen 3 2200G does any basic browsing and word processing task very comfortably. toss in 8GB of DDR4 2666 or higher and you're set.

How about a case? I know the node 202 is good but are there any other good cases? Because sfx psu's are not cheap

[Fasauceome]

2 minutes ago, Prof. Lucifer said:

How about a case? I know the node 202 is good but are there any other good cases? Because sfx psu's are not cheap

I like to recommend the silverstone sugo sg13b because it's relatively shoebox-sized and pretty inexpensve, and it can fit ATX power supplies.

[GoldenLag]

11 minutes ago, Prof. Lucifer said:

Do good 1440p monitors without 144hz exist? Because that never crossed my mind lmao, thx

VA or IPS with at least 350 nits brightness will serve you much better. 

[Prof. Lucifer]

17 minutes ago, Fasauceome said:

I like to recommend the silverstone sugo sg13b because it's relatively shoebox-sized and pretty inexpensve, and it can fit ATX power supplies.

PCPartPicker Part List

Type	Item	Price
CPU	AMD Ryzen 5 3400G 3.7 GHz Quad-Core Processor	$132.50 @ Amazon
CPU Cooler	Corsair H60 (2018) 57.2 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler	$59.99 @ Amazon
Motherboard	MSI B450I GAMING PLUS AC Mini ITX AM4 Motherboard	$128.78 @ SuperBiiz
Memory	Corsair Vengeance LPX 8 GB (1 x 8 GB) DDR4-2666 Memory	$41.99 @ Amazon
Storage	Crucial P1 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive	$95.99 @ Amazon
Case	Silverstone SG13 Mini ITX Tower Case	$57.99 @ B&H
Power Supply	SeaSonic FOCUS 500 W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-modular ATX Power Supply
	Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts
	Total	$517.24
	Generated by PCPartPicker 2019-11-25 08:50 EST-0500

How's this? I might need the CPU for more than just web surfing so I went with he 3400g, I think there definitely are better coolers though, but idk what coolers are good for this case.

[Fasauceome]

1 minute ago, Prof. Lucifer said:

I think there definitely are better coolers though, but idk what coolers are good for this case.

For your needs that's a fine cooler

[Prof. Lucifer]

3 minutes ago, Fasauceome said:

For your needs that's a fine cooler

Do you think I should go with an air cooler though? 

 

Also, do you think his build would be usable for basic programming or maybe light Photoshop? Or maybe some basic CAD, because I'm thinking about taking design.

 

Also, do you think I should downgrade the CPU to is the 3400g good 

[Prof. Lucifer]

5 minutes ago, Fasauceome said:

For your needs that's a fine cooler

Also, for the cooler, is the h80i v2 or kraken m22 Overkill? Because they are more expensive than the h60

[Fasauceome]

7 minutes ago, Prof. Lucifer said:

Do you think I should go with an air cooler though?

Because of size constraints, using a small water cooler makes a lot of sense here

 

7 minutes ago, Prof. Lucifer said:

Also, do you think his build would be usable for basic programming or maybe light Photoshop? Or maybe some basic CAD, because I'm thinking about taking design.

Basic programming and light Photoshop are barely demanding, much the same as web browsing. For cad the 3400G does quite well, but maybe get 2x4GB of ram to improve the workflow.

 

5 minutes ago, Prof. Lucifer said:

Also, for the cooler, is the h80i v2 or kraken m22 Overkill? Because they are more expensive than the h60

The H80i V2 is a very large cooler, and since you're not cooling a very demanding chip, the cheaper option in this case is better

[Prof. Lucifer]

3 minutes ago, Fasauceome said:

2x4GB of ram

If I want to get 2x4gb of ram, I have to change the ram from 2666mhz to 2400, would you recommend this?

[Fasauceome]

1 minute ago, Prof. Lucifer said:

If I want to get 2x4gb of ram, I have to change the ram from 2666mhz to 2400, would you recommend this?

Again, since your needs are fairly basic, high speed memory is not gonna make a big difference.

 

However if you did want to take the cad work more seriously, faster memory would be worth spending extra money on.

[Prof. Lucifer]

3 minutes ago, Fasauceome said:

Again, since your needs are fairly basic, high speed memory is not gonna make a big difference.

 

However if you did want to take the cad work more seriously, faster memory would be worth spending extra money on.

Thanks for all the advice.

 

Do you think if I ever needed a more performance from this PC, I would be able to upgrade it? I highly doubt I'll ever need to upgrade this but better safe than sorry.

 

Also, final note, is the sg13b easy to build in, because I've never built a PC before so I know how to build a PC in theory but not in practise.

[Fasauceome]

4 minutes ago, Prof. Lucifer said:

Do you think if I ever needed a more performance from this PC, I would be able to upgrade it? I highly doubt I'll ever need to upgrade this but better safe than sorry.

Ryzen will see yet another release in 2020 for the same socket. No worries there.

 

4 minutes ago, Prof. Lucifer said:

Also, final note, is the sg13b easy to build in, because I've never built a PC before so I know how to build a PC in theory but not in practise.

For an ITX case it is pretty workable.

 

As a general rule, of course install everything into the motherboard first and then put it in the case, so that if something is dead on arrival you tested it before building to avoid having to disassemble it. Using an m.2 SSD will help you a lot to reduce cable clutter. The water cooler might give you some trouble so give it a couple tries to route the tubes the best way possible.

[Prof. Lucifer]

1 minute ago, Fasauceome said:

As a general rule, of course install everything into the motherboard first and then put it in the case, so that if something is dead on arrival you tested it before building to avoid having to disassemble it. The water cooler might give you some trouble so give it a couple tries to route the tubes the best way possible.

How do you get a PC to power on without installing it in a case?

[Fasauceome]

1 minute ago, Prof. Lucifer said:

How do you get a PC to power on without installing it in a case?

You can touch a screwdriver to the power on pins and it'll work the same way as a button

[Prof. Lucifer]

2 minutes ago, Fasauceome said:

You can touch a screwdriver to the power on pins and it'll work the same way as a button

Thx for the help dude, I guess you can go on and help someone else now lmao.