Need help making some decisions/trade-offs

[Lee989]

Budget (including currency): £800 (possibly up to £900)

Country: UK

Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: Overwatch, Detroit become human, cyberpunk 2077, ark survival evolved.

Other details Upgrading from a Phenom II X4 965 and a Radeon HD 5770 

 

Trying to put together a budget build for my sister. Everything she has is over a decade old. I've started by throwing in some components that I used in my own build along with a cheap(ish) case and couple of extra budget fans, to get an idea of how much money I have left for the GPU (list is below sans GPU). But I might be doing that backwards, maybe I should be adding a GPU and seeing what I have left for the CPU since she'll mostly be using it for gaming?

 

Storage I just went with the same thing I have in my PC. Might be able to save £30 or so there with a 256 nvme for the OS and a 1tb 7200rpm for game library.

 

In terms of expected performance, she's never had "gaming PC" so average will do. 1080p @ 60fps on medium to high quality settings maybe depending on which game it is? (I'm not really a gamer so please tell me what you think is reasonable). 

 

Here's the kicker though. The monitor she has is an old 22" Samsung BX2235. 2ms response, 60hz refresh, might be OK until she saves up again to replace it? but it only has DVI input, no HDMI. So I either factor a new monitor into this build. or I think I can get a HDMI->DVI adapter.

 

She also has a PS2 mouse and keyboard! But I'll just buy those myself for her as an early xmas present.

 

She has saved £800 for it, but I think I can risk planning for a little higher in the hope some good deals drop over black friday period. If i'm wrong, i'll have to find a cardboard box and cut some fan holes into it

 

PCPartPicker Part List

Type	Item	Price
CPU	AMD Ryzen 5 3600 3.6 GHz 6-Core Processor	£180.00 @ Currys PC World
Motherboard	MSI B450 TOMAHAWK MAX ATX AM4 Motherboard	£89.99 @ Amazon UK
Memory	Crucial Ballistix 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3600 CL16 Memory	£69.59 @ Amazon UK
Storage	ADATA XPG SX8200 Pro 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive	£116.85 @ Amazon UK
Case	Fractal Design Define S ATX Mid Tower Case	£54.97 @ Laptops Direct
Power Supply	Corsair TXM Gold 650 W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-modular ATX Power Supply	£78.99 @ AWD-IT
Case Fan	be quiet! Pure Wings 2 61.2 CFM 140 mm Fan	£10.49 @ Amazon UK
Case Fan	be quiet! Pure Wings 2 61.2 CFM 140 mm Fan	£10.49 @ Amazon UK
	Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts
	Total	£611.37
	Generated by PCPartPicker 2020-11-18 11:55 GMT+0000

 

[Ankh Tech]

3 minutes ago, Lee989 said:

Budget (including currency): £800 (possibly up to £900)

Country: UK

Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: Overwatch, Detroit become human, cyberpunk 2077, ark survival evolved.

Other details Upgrading from a Phenom II X4 965 and a Radeon HD 5770 

 

Trying to put together a budget build for my sister. Everything she has is over a decade old. I've started by throwing in some components that I used in my own build along with a cheap(ish) case and couple of extra budget fans, to get an idea of how much money I have left for the GPU (list is below sans GPU). But I might be doing that backwards, maybe I should be adding a GPU and seeing what I have left for the CPU since she'll mostly be using it for gaming?

 

Storage I just went with the same thing I have in my PC. Might be able to save £30 or so there with a 256 nvme for the OS and a 1tb 7200rpm for game library.

 

In terms of expected performance, she's never had "gaming PC" so average will do. 1080p @ 60fps on medium to high quality settings maybe depending on which game it is? (I'm not really a gamer so please tell me what you think is reasonable). 

 

Here's the kicker though. The monitor she has is an old 22" Samsung BX2235. 2ms response, 60hz refresh, might be OK until she saves up again to replace it? but it only has DVI input, no HDMI. So I either factor a new monitor into this build. or I think I can get a HDMI->DVI adapter.

 

She also has a PS2 mouse and keyboard! But I'll just buy those myself for her as an early xmas present.

 

She has saved £800 for it, but I think I can risk planning for a little higher in the hope some good deals drop over black friday period. If i'm wrong, i'll have to find a cardboard box and cut some fan holes into it

 

PCPartPicker Part List

Type	Item	Price
CPU	AMD Ryzen 5 3600 3.6 GHz 6-Core Processor	£180.00 @ Currys PC World
Motherboard	MSI B450 TOMAHAWK MAX ATX AM4 Motherboard	£89.99 @ Amazon UK
Memory	Crucial Ballistix 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3600 CL16 Memory	£69.59 @ Amazon UK
Storage	ADATA XPG SX8200 Pro 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive	£116.85 @ Amazon UK
Case	Fractal Design Define S ATX Mid Tower Case	£54.97 @ Laptops Direct
Power Supply	Corsair TXM Gold 650 W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-modular ATX Power Supply	£78.99 @ AWD-IT
Case Fan	be quiet! Pure Wings 2 61.2 CFM 140 mm Fan	£10.49 @ Amazon UK
Case Fan	be quiet! Pure Wings 2 61.2 CFM 140 mm Fan	£10.49 @ Amazon UK
	Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts
	Total	£611.37
	Generated by PCPartPicker 2020-11-18 11:55 GMT+0000

 

Good list but I'd replace the ssd to a mp510 500gb and add a 2tb hdd,

also, that psu isn't that good, get a rm750x

[Lee989]

2 hours ago, Ankh Tech said:

Good list but I'd replace the ssd to a mp510 500gb and add a 2tb hdd,

also, that psu isn't that good, get a rm750x

Thanks for the feedback, I'll check the PSU tier list, I think I just threw in that PSU based on a build recommendation for someone else on here. Thanks for the advice on the mp510 i'll check that out (I knew splitting storage would save a little money but I hadn't a clue which cheap SSD to use if I did that).

 

Currently thinking either an rx5600xt or rtx 1660 super for the GPU. Both seem to be solid 1080p GPU's. The 1660S looks to be £40+ cheaper and doesn't seem that far behind the 5600xt on performance so unless the BF deals change that I think i'll be buying my first Nvidia card in 15 years.

 

I did consider dropping down to the 2600x with 3200mhz but not sure if the ~£60 saving is worth it. I'd be removing most of the upgrade headroom if she ever wanted to upgrade to a 5700xt or possibly even better in future.

 

One thing is certain, spending someone else's money makes me strangely more anxious than spending my own!