Hello all,
The PC I’m currently using is a 9 year old Dell with an i7 processor I bought new. It is the only PC I have ever bought that I did not put together myself… beyond that I’ve been building my own since the 1990s’. While this one has served me well, it probably should have been replaced years ago for playing WoW.
I’m just starting to scratch the surface of looking which way to go. I definitely want to get something that will be good for the next 5+ years that will easily handle WoW (it’s the only game I play… been here since vanilla… everything else I do on the pc is mostly websurfing and some other hobby related things which is minimal).
I’ve looked into Alienware, but some folks here seem to think they are very overpriced and you can build something better for much less. I will admit though, their cases and hardware is pretty slick.
I’m also looking at building, but frankly I haven’t looked at PC specs in a very long time and there is a lot more out there since I have built a PC 15+ years ago. While I have no doubt I can easily handle assembling one… it’s making the right choices on motherboard, power supply, memory, video card, cooling choices (liquid? air?) and so on. I see intel vs rhyzer… lots to re-learn, especially when it comes to building a system around gaming. I’ve never even really had a PC intended for gaming but I’ve been wanting one.
Just trying to figure out where to start! Thoughts? Suggestions? Maybe some good guides out there?
I can budget up to 2k USD… does that get me anywhere in the world of gaming pc’s?
There are tons of guides on youtube. Paul’s hardware, bitwit, jayztwocent and many more.
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Building it yourself -
Pros: You know what parts is going in, and since you don’t have to pay someone to build it for you. You can put the money towards better parts.
Cons: Any problems you run across, you’re basically on your own.
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Pre-built
Pros:
Ease of mind. They warranty the whole thing rather than individual parts.
Cons: You pay for the service, which can easily run $100+. Depending on who you go with, you’re at the mercy of whatever part selection they use.
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Middle ground if available for you…Paying a shop to build it for you. Assuming they charge you $50 or less.
Right now its really between intel 10x00 series and ryzen 5xxx.
Intel is more readily available and depending on where you live can be the better option.
Ryzen 5xxx is in high demand and has little to no stock anywhere.
Same can be said for GPUS.
Nvidia Rtx 3000 series are experiencing the shortage of supplies.
AMD 6800/6800xt/6900xt are coming out next week and expected to be on short supply.
PcPartPicker is a good place to start out because for the most part it will guide you through the parts selection.
2k can easily net you a full blown build. Mid to high end + peripherals with left over for a steak dinner.
Sample Build - Note these parts are just selected for availability purposes. There are newer CPU and GPU that is hard to come by.
PCPartPicker Part List: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/x7zVwz
CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 3600 3.6 GHz 6-Core Processor ($194.99 @ Newegg)
CPU Cooler: Corsair iCUE H100i RGB PRO XT 75 CFM Liquid CPU Cooler ($106.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: MSI MPG B550 GAMING EDGE WIFI ATX AM4 Motherboard ($159.99 @ Amazon)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance LPX 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-2400 CL16 Memory ($65.99 @ Best Buy)
Storage: Crucial MX500 1 TB 2.5" Solid State Drive ($106.27 @ Amazon)
Video Card: PowerColor Radeon RX 5700 XT 8 GB Video Card ($389.99 @ Amazon)
Case: Fractal Design Meshify C ATX Mid Tower Case ($77.98 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: Corsair RMx (2018) 850 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply ($144.99 @ Best Buy)
Total: $1247.19
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2020-11-11 16:02 EST-0500
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Use some of that money to treat your eyes to a new display. 27"-34" 1440p with at least a 100Hz refresh rate (especially widescreen) will be such a huge upgrade (along with the new system). And a nice display will likely last you even longer than the computer will.
Building your own has it pros and cons as does buying a pre-built, there is never a right or wrong answer to how to get your gaming PC. If you want an alienware PC then buy one. If you want to build your own I would suggest looking at anandtech’s best gaming CPU & GPU lists, along with PCgamer’s lists, toms hardware hierarchy lists for best gaming CPUs and GPUs and logical increments PC tier lists (they also have an older WoW build page). The idea is not necessarily to get a list of parts (you end up building someone else’s PC) but rather an understanding of the parts and their performance. Also avoid the youtube personality guys, their objective is often to be controversial and entertaining rather than be informative.
While I agree the youtube tech channels all have their agendas, I still think they’re good resources because they physically show you how to assemble a PC compared to just written articles.
Perhaps do your own research regarding individual parts selection, but generally speaking the major Youtube tech channels will help you get a hands-on understanding of how parts get installed.
Those guys do provide a valuable service. I was speaking more of the guys who spend 20 minutes ranting about why AIO is better than air coolers or play with hair while going off topic every other minute.
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Personally can’t stand Paul’s Hardware or Nitwit anymore; Jayztwocents is getting close to that realm also.
HUB is still okay despite their bias and sometimes faulty logic, but presentation is the easiest to digest among all of the channels.
Gamers Nexus is often too much useless information for most people, and often easy to fall asleep listening to, but he’s one of the more accurate (although less broad in terms of game testing).
Tech Deals is great for the objective described here, showing you how to build a PC. But I disagree with him more often than not on parts selection/decision making. A lot of his recommendations are pretty arbitrary and one-dimensional.
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After a certain point, none of the popular tech personnel are good watches anymore.
I really only watch Optimum Tech and hardwarecanucks for their showcases.
I think Gamernexus and Buildzoid are the only mainstream ones that I truly watch when I need to know something.
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I like hardware Canucks although he’s never met a case he didn’t like.
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Thanks everyone for the great suggestions! I like the pcpartpicker site, that is quite helpful to know what will and won’t work together when you start to look to put an order together.
I’ll certainly do some more reading and looking around.
A new monitor would be nice! I’ll have to see what I can squeeze into the area I have to work with.
Certainly some good reading to do while waiting on rarespawns in Icecrown over the next week or so!
Thank you everyone!
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Decided on my Logitech G413 partly because of their review on it.
My favorite is actually Tech Yes City because it’s amusing.
Optimum Tech and Tech Yes City are my favorites
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I have a Alienware R8 that I bought for 1400.00 two years ago. 89.00 was for like a year warranty with online support or something like that.
The only thing that I have upgraded was the GPU to a XFX 5600 XT. It came with a RX 560. The CPU is a i5 8400 and is liquid cooled. I have had zero issues with it since I bought it.
Yes, building one yourself would be somewhat cheaper. I bought mine out of necessity. You can of course build a Alienware PC on Dell’s site in case you didn’t know. You pick it, they build it.
When you build your own PC you usually save money and you get to pick the quality of your parts. Pre-builts almost always come with an MSI GPU because it’s the cheapest. I prefer eVGA.
$2,000 USD is a great budget for a PC. You can build a pretty awesome PC for that price.
https://pcpartpicker.com/list/vr6P3Z
This is a build close to what I want to do but I’m waiting for the new AMD CPUs to become available. Also, add $500 USD to that final price for the 3070 gpu.
Comes out to about $1800 USD just for the tower.