Build for sister

[Zodiark1593]

Budget (including currency): undecided, but preferably under $600

Country: United States 

Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: Medibang, Krita, FireAlpaca, Minecraft, Rocket League, Stardew Valley, Dolphin (emulator), Beetle PSX

 

Things are definitely a lot different since I built my own PC some 7 years ago. Had a plan to give my sister my reservation for the RTX 3060, however, due to her light demands and single 1080P display, this was omitted. Going pretty basic here. Not even RGB (which was a surprise as I’d thought she’d be all over RGB). 
 

The system is specced to meet her current needs while allowing for easy expansion later, particularly as cheaper components become available. 
 

CPU: Ryzen 5 5600G. $186

Cooler: stock Wraith cooler. 

Mobo: MSI B550M Pro-VDH.  $119

Ram: TeamGroup Vulkan 16 GB 3200 MHz. $56

SSD: Intel 660P 512GB. $59

Case: DIYpc ARGB-Q8-W  $49

Psu: Antek Earthwatts Gold Pro 650W. $79

Additional Fan: Noctua NF-S12A. $19

 

Edit: She does want a GPU sometime down the road. She's just not willing to pay for an expensive card right now. Maybe once we get something reasonable in the $200 range again.

[Fasauceome]

9 minutes ago, Zodiark1593 said:

Ram: TeamGroup Vulkan 16 GB 3200 MHz. $

You could spend a bit extra on the memory to get some improved performance out of the iGPU, since you won't be getting a GPU.

 

Also, I don't recall if that particular motherboard has a BIOS flashback feature, but if not, I highly recommend getting one that does due to how new the G series Ryzen processors are relative to the motherboards. You'll want to ensure that you can get a proper BIOS version.

 

[Zodiark1593]

7 minutes ago, Fasauceome said:

You could spend a bit extra on the memory to get some improved performance out of the iGPU, since you won't be getting a GPU.

 

Also, I don't recall if that particular motherboard has a BIOS flashback feature, but if not, I highly recommend getting one that does due to how new the G series Ryzen processors are relative to the motherboards. You'll want to ensure that you can get a proper BIOS version.

 

On AMD's website, the listed memory speeds specifies "Up to 3200 MHz". Would I be able to push faster on that?

https://www.amd.com/en/product/11176

 

I'm not actually sure if the board supports BIOS Flashback. Will take a look.

 

Edit: Looks like it does have it.

https://www.amazon.com/MSI-B550M-PRO-VDH-ProSeries-Motherboard/dp/B089D1YG11/ref=sr_1_1?crid=WU9SVMUWUIOK&keywords=MSI+B550M&qid=1650342009&sprefix=msi+b550%2Caps%2C175&sr=8-1

[MrBee420]

Probably a 3600 Mhz ram would be better with the cpu's infinity fabric

[Fasauceome]

32 minutes ago, Zodiark1593 said:

On AMD's website, the listed memory speeds specifies "Up to 3200 MHz". Would I be able to push faster on that?

https://www.amd.com/en/product/11176

Yes, however you would actually see some pretty good gains with lower latency too. Look for a DDR4 3200 CL15 or even 14 kit.

[Zodiark1593]

7 minutes ago, Fasauceome said:

Yes, however you would actually see some pretty good gains with lower latency too. Look for a DDR4 3200 CL15 or even 14 kit.

3600 MHz, and CL14?

 

https://www.amazon.com/Patriot-3600MHz-14-16-16-36-Low-Latency-Memory/dp/B09NLBY8XB/ref=sr_1_15?crid=33OODK5Y0MUJJ&keywords=ddr4+cl14&qid=1650348814&s=electronics&sprefix=ddr4+cl14%2Celectronics%2C122&sr=1-15

[Somerandomtechyboi]

You just want the fastest possible rams for your igpus, id suggest grabbing some ballistix 3000/3200 bin and ocing the crap out of em, aim for 4800mhz cl18 kind of oc, and no that pathetic pro vdh wont suffice so get a better board like aorus pro p, b550a pro, even asrock pro4 would work

 

Though if ballistix is overpriced then just get whatever rams are cheapest, hope for some hynix djr, and aim for 4400+ cl19

 

You do not want desync fclk cause apus usually do 2300+

[Morris_lee_9116]

5 hours ago, Zodiark1593 said:

Budget (including currency): undecided, but preferably under $600

Country: United States 

Games, programs or workloads that it will be used for: Medibang, Krita, FireAlpaca, Minecraft, Rocket League, Stardew Valley, Dolphin (emulator), Beetle PSX

 

Things are definitely a lot different since I built my own PC some 7 years ago. Had a plan to give my sister my reservation for the RTX 3060, however, due to her light demands and single 1080P display, this was omitted. Going pretty basic here. Not even RGB (which was a surprise as I’d thought she’d be all over RGB). 
 

The system is specced to meet her current needs while allowing for easy expansion later, particularly as cheaper components become available. 
 

CPU: Ryzen 5 5600G. $186

Cooler: stock Wraith cooler. 

Mobo: MSI B550M Pro-VDH.  $119

Ram: TeamGroup Vulkan 16 GB 3200 MHz. $56

SSD: Intel 660P 512GB. $59

Case: DIYpc ARGB-Q8-W  $49

Psu: Antek Earthwatts Gold Pro 650W. $79

Additional Fan: Noctua NF-S12A. $19

 

Edit: She does want a GPU sometime down the road. She's just not willing to pay for an expensive card right now. Maybe once we get something reasonable in the $200 range again.

here's a list I made

 

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 5600G 3.9 GHz 6-Core Processor  ($186.99 @ Newegg) 
Motherboard: Asus PRIME B550M-A/CSM Micro ATX AM4 Motherboard  ($107.99 @ B&H) 
Memory: Team T-FORCE DARK Za 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory  ($59.99 @ Newegg) 
Storage: ADATA Swordfish 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive  ($79.98 @ Amazon) 
Case: Antec NX200M MicroATX Mid Tower Case  ($59.99 @ Newegg) 
Power Supply: Super Flower Leadex III Super Pro 650 W 80+ Bronze Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply  ($49.99 @ Newegg Sellers) 
Total: $544.93
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2022-04-19 06:29 EDT-0400

[Fasauceome]

8 hours ago, Zodiark1593 said:

3600 MHz, and CL14?

 

https://www.amazon.com/Patriot-3600MHz-14-16-16-36-Low-Latency-Memory/dp/B09NLBY8XB/ref=sr_1_15?crid=33OODK5Y0MUJJ&keywords=ddr4+cl14&qid=1650348814&s=electronics&sprefix=ddr4+cl14%2Celectronics%2C122&sr=1-15

Not a bad price for this kit

[Zodiark1593]

I'd taken some ideas from suggestions posted, and reworked the build somewhat. Here's what ended up being the final build.

 

CPU: Ryzen 5 5600G

Mobo: Gigabyte B550M Aorus Pro

RAM: 16GB Patriot Steel Viper 3733 MHz, CL17

SSD: Adata Swordfish 1 TB SSD

PSU: Seasonic Focus Plus 650w (the shipping costs on the Antek unit made my decision to change this)

Case: DIYpc ARGB

 

As far as overclocking goes, I don't plan on going crazy. The system isn't mine, so stability trumps some extra few percent of performance. Will probably put my focus on overclocking the GPU. As for the CPU, 6 cores at 4.4 GHz Turbo will be more than overkill for my sister, so I don't feel the need to push that further.

 

Can't wait to walk my sister through building the thing.

 

[Zodiark1593]

Build is put together, and for the most part, is working well. However, I am finding that heavy GPU loads are causing the driver to timeout and the game to crash. The RAM is suspect, as dropping XMP seems to resolve the crashing. Running a Memtest on that now. 

[Zodiark1593]

After some troubleshooting, I've concluded that one of the sticks is defective, despite not throwing any errors in Memtest86. I've one stick in there right now, and the driver timeouts appear to have resolved. The other stick being labeled "Sus" with some Amongus drawn, courtesy of my sister. Have requested an RMA from Patriot directly.

[Zodiark1593]

Finally got the replacement kit. Installed, and appears to be stable. As expected, the performance difference between single and double channel is really night and day.
 

Put an extra 100 MHz on the GPU clock (bringing it up to an even 2000 MHz, and netted a few extra fps) and called it a day.
 

She’s quite happy with the system. Slime Rancher and Minecraft both run great.