When should I buy a new computer?

[Semper_fidelis]

Hello everyone!

I've recently been looking to upgrade my home set-up big time. It started out with a laptop I needed for school back in September. And now I'm looking to do the entire home setup: New 3 monitor setup, new Ryzen 5 based desktop with a RTX 3070, new peripherals, mouse keyboard and headset.

How ever, about 2 weeks ago Linus mentioned that "now" would be a bad time to buy pc hardware in the "How to build a PC without getting ripped off!" video. And with everything that's going on, I fully understand that. Especially the new RTX 3070 is something I don't mind waiting for, I can still use my old card for a while. At least until the new cards are available here in Europe and the pricing is reasonable. How ever I would like to know how long that wait will be, and when I should start looking for which parts.

Personally I feel the screens are needed most, since the biggest issue I currently run into is productivity while doing school work. And that's with 2 monitors already. But would it be a big mistake to buy 3 new monitors right now? For 3x 144Hz, 1ms, 27" QHD monitors I'd pay between €900 and €1100 if I were to buy them right now.

And when would be a good time to start looking for the actual PC parts? What kind of savings am I looking at in that suggested waiting period?
Hardware wise I was looking to get: Ryzen 5 3600, 32GB 3600MHz, B550 AORUS PRO, Cooler Master MWE 850 Gold V2, Noctua NG-D15S Black, Fractal Design Meshify C, Samsung 970 EVO 1TB M.2 (Currently priced at €1041,64)

Thanks in advance for the advice and greetings from the Netherlands!

[TetraSky]

5 minutes ago, Semper_fidelis said:

And when would be a good time to start looking for the actual PC parts? What kind of savings am I looking at in that suggested waiting period?

Probably around the end of February.

 

It's not so much about "savings". It's about STOCKS. There are none of the newer hardware available and even the older hardware is being sold at a markup now. The used market is ridiculous as well due to scalpers and no availability of products.

It has come to a point, where buying a CyberPower or IbuyPower PC is sounding like a good idea, just to get a Ryzen 5000 CPU and Nvidia 3000 card

[Coolmaster]

Now is a really bad time to buy a pc. By spring the shortages should be over. Some things have been hit harder than others, so CPU, GPU, PSU, Cooler prices are generally up.

[Quackers101]

never!

If all go smooth in the tech world new features might be around the corner, or it could be some years to.

[Semper_fidelis]

1 minute ago, Quackers101 said:

never!

If all go smooth in the tech world new features might be around the corner, or it could be some years to.

Yeah, but nope. Not upgrading is not a option for me. My current system just isn't capable enough

[Quackers101]

you can get away with 650w or lower if you want less future proofing.

3600 is not the best for gaming, but depends on what you want or can afford.

else the 3060ti can be the decent GPU for 1080p or lower RTX cards in the future.

Else do what you feel like going for

[Semper_fidelis]

6 minutes ago, Quackers101 said:

you can get away with 650w or lower if you want less future proofing.

3600 is not the best for gaming, but depends on what you want or can afford.

else the 3060ti can be the decent GPU for 1080p or lower RTX cards in the future.

Else do what you feel like going for

Gaming is a big part of it, but I mostly need need it for some 3D rendering, schematic drawings, MS office, webbrowsing and maybe I'll get back into streaming if I have the right setup? Idk, but would be nice if I have the ability.

[PeachGr]

It's a bad time to buy because of the prices, but you are about to spend on a third monitor...

I don't see a way to run a third monitor on 144, most probably on a lower settings. New cards will be out in a month or two, but they will be close to the current ones.

3D rendering, in my car gains benefit both on CPU and GPU, so focus on cores and check benchmade to see if 3060/3070/3080 is the most suitable for you. For example there are many blender benchmarks, that is a3D rendering program

[TylerDurden!]

54 minutes ago, Semper_fidelis said:

greetings from the Netherlands!

don't know how the used market is there, but I would being looking at used stuff if I "needed" a computer right now.  Does not make sense to spend such a high premium on "new" stuff.  The only thing that seems cheaper now than before is RAM.  GPUs CPUs are really up, MB's are ok if you do not mind the reduced selection.

[unsorted]

1 hour ago, Semper_fidelis said:

Noctua NG-D15S Black

Instead of this, I would get a cheap SNOWMAN cooler from AliExpress, etc Search YouTube for Snowman cpu cooler. SNOWMAN (and many other Chinese brands) make 4-heatpipe and 6-heatpipe designs without the overmarketed, overpriced boutique puffery (and sticker-shock) associated with brands like Noctua.

 

I'd also consider looking for second-hand bargains if money is tight. In that spirit, I would buy components as deals pop up rather than all at once. For graphics cards, I would wait as long as it takes to get reasonable prices (again if money is important). If not, buy whenever you feel is best.

 

You may also decide to donate to the Feed-A-Scalper fund. It is a noble cause.

 

 

[Mark Kaine]

yeap wait until spring, summer next year... nobody knows how it'll develop but things should be a bit more available and affordable then... 

As for what you will save waiting, hard to say but likely a few hundred eurinos or whatever you'd use over there, minimum... 

 

Wait, did someone bash Samsung SSD's? 

 

10 minutes ago, Caroline said:

Samsung SSDs are just.. plain bad

hey, sounds like you had some bad experience maybe? I do remember the Evo 840 had issues (a decade ago?) but eventually was fixed... but my point is, I don't know about your experience, but I have a Evo 850 in my ps3 since basically it (the Samsung) was released... it works just fine... pretty sure the Evo has auto trim and trash collection, which is both a godsend since the ps3 obviously doesn't have this functionality... 

 

 

and the 860 in my pc which I use as OS drive *and* basically a cache for Shadow play recording almost 24/7 is after two years still at100% health! So nah, I can't confirm this at all, especially when the 860 was barely more expensive than a Kingston or crucial... 

 

 

 

[Semper_fidelis]

17 hours ago, PeachGr said:

It's a bad time to buy because of the prices, but you are about to spend on a third monitor...

I don't see a way to run a third monitor on 144, most probably on a lower settings. New cards will be out in a month or two, but they will be close to the current ones.

3D rendering, in my car gains benefit both on CPU and GPU, so focus on cores and check benchmade to see if 3060/3070/3080 is the most suitable for you. For example there are many blender benchmarks, that is a3D rendering program

Not a 3rd monitor. I'm looking to get 3 new monitors. I currently have a 28" 4K samsung display and 1 very old BENQ 24" 1080P display. They don't really align well at all since neither has height adjust, the brightness and color tone don't match either. It's just not a pleasant setup.

So my plan was 3 new monitors just so I don't run into any of those issues by having the exact same screens. And the 144Hz is to enjoy some competitive gaming once in a while, even though I realize I won't be able to run all 3 of them at that frequency. Or at least they don't need to. 

 

17 hours ago, TylerDurden! said:

don't know how the used market is there, but I would being looking at used stuff if I "needed" a computer right now.  Does not make sense to spend such a high premium on "new" stuff.  The only thing that seems cheaper now than before is RAM.  GPUs CPUs are really up, MB's are ok if you do not mind the reduced selection.

Secondhand stuff is pretty bad over here. Mostly because of outrageous pricing, they ask just below current MSRP. So at best you save like 10% between brand new or second hand. And that doesn't even have anything to do with the recent shortage and situation. They haggle with you for day un ended if you really want to get a better deal. I don't have time for that 

 

17 hours ago, unsorted said:

Instead of this, I would get a cheap SNOWMAN cooler from AliExpress, etc Search YouTube for Snowman cpu cooler. SNOWMAN (and many other Chinese brands) make 4-heatpipe and 6-heatpipe designs without the overmarketed, overpriced boutique puffery (and sticker-shock) associated with brands like Noctua.

 

I'd also consider looking for second-hand bargains if money is tight. In that spirit, I would buy components as deals pop up rather than all at once. For graphics cards, I would wait as long as it takes to get reasonable prices (again if money is important). If not, buy whenever you feel is best.

 

You may also decide to donate to the Feed-A-Scalper fund. It is a noble cause.

 

 

I've sworn off ali-expres and those kinds of websites. I've tried it a few times, had some bad experiences. And also heard of a lot of stories about my local custom's agency charging you for importing stuff right as you take delivery. 

And money isn't really tight, I just don't want to be the fool that spends €2000 now to realize I could have saved €500 by just waiting 2 months for example. I do occasionally check second hand websites, but there just aren't any good deals to be honest.

[whm1974]

Well short answer will be, when you actually need too. As Said PC is too old to be used for Modern OSes and Applications. The longer answer would which Applications do you need to use, along with other ones do you want do want to use?

 

This would be both newer Versions of your current ones. The Higher End Software like Blender/CAD/Rendering as Higher Workloads will be latter.

[Semper_fidelis]

1 minute ago, whm1974 said:

Well short answer will be, when you actually need too. As Said PC is too old to be used for Modern OSes and Applications. The longer answer would which Applications do you need to use, along with other ones do you want do want to use?

 

This would be both newer Versions of your current ones. The Higher End Software like Blender/CAD/Rendering as Higher Workloads will be latter.

Software: Eplan, Inventor, Autocad, Trikker, and the generic stuff like MS office and a lot of chrome tabs.
Games: Rainbow 6 siege, GTA 5, Squad, City skylines, F1 2020, Mount and blade II bannerlord, Life is feudal and a lot of lighter games.

Most of it runs on the current system "okey". With inventor I just don't work with large files or assemblies. The other software stuff runs just fine. And with the more demanding games I just turn down everything to be able to run them.

[PeachGr]

1 hour ago, Semper_fidelis said:

Not a 3rd monitor. I'm looking to get 3 new monitors. I currently have a 28" 4K samsung display and 1 very old BENQ 24" 1080P display. They don't really align well at all since neither has height adjust, the brightness and color tone don't match either. It's just not a pleasant setup.

I m not judging you, but won't be better to buy an ultra wide like samsung G9 or some other? Better uniformity, connectivity and borderless experience

[Semper_fidelis]

11 hours ago, PeachGr said:

I m not judging you, but won't be better to buy an ultra wide like samsung G9 or some other? Better uniformity, connectivity and borderless experience

For productivity reasons I'd prefer 3 monitors and have the side ones vertically. Which will hopefully allow me to have 5 open windows at once, 2 on each side and the main thing I'm working full sized on the centered display. With a utlra wide it will be though managing 5 windows at once.

And then for gaming reasons I don't think I'll be able to get high refresh rates and 1ms pixel response time on a ultra wide. And as far as I'm aware is the ultra wide support limited in games. I don't really plan on playing games on 3 screens, maybe I'll try it with a racing game or a flight sim once or twice. But not really a goal.

And lastly, I'll probably be adding a laptop dock to my setup. So having multiple displays gives me more versatility in what screen I'll be using on what device.

[Semper_fidelis]

-accidently responded to my own message instead of editing it-