Gaming PCs Thread...time for a sticky / running thread?

[Jinx]

MissChief said:

Supply has tanked due to the lockdowns in China. Many factories shuttered completely and some haven’t reopened yet either. Lower supply means price rises sadly.

Probably an increase in demand as well as everyone is trying to fill their time in lockdown.

[DuncsGTi]

Jinx said:

MissChief said:

Supply has tanked due to the lockdowns in China. Many factories shuttered completely and some haven’t reopened yet either. Lower supply means price rises sadly.

Probably an increase in demand as well as everyone is trying to fill their time in lockdown.

That all makes sense I suppose.

Unfortunately for me, the systems location in my sons bedroom means that I'm not getting much access to it at the moment. Homeschooling rather than boarding means it is being utilized for bloody algebra rather than fun stuff

[DuncsGTi]

The case arrived today, GPU temp under heavy load has dropped by 5 degrees to 74.

[chow pan toon]

chow pan toon said:

https://www.3dmark.com/3dm/21904041

New Firestrike score with my new Vega 64. Very impressive card at 3440x1440 with Freesync. Not too noisy with an undervolt either.

https://www.3dmark.com/3dm/46835069

Still have the Vega until the new Nvidia & AMD cards at the end of the year but have recently upgraded from my 4770K to a 3900X with the new MS flight sim in mind. The physics result has gone from 13,153 to 29,550 with the new chip at stock compared to a 4.8GHz overclock on the 4770K. Hopefully with a decent new card it will be ready!

Edit to correct link

Edited by chow pan toon on Friday 15th May 14:31

[GeorgeStorm]

Anyone here into the benchmarking side of things on hwbot.org?

[In the sticks]

Just found this thread - very topical.

Sons birthday in a couple of weeks and he wants a pc for games and the odd bit of school work. Rather than buying a pre-built, I thought it would be nice if we could build something together.

I don't want to go base spec, nor spend a stupid amount - in short, something that will work well and keep him happy. So, this is what I have come up with and it is pretty much at max price. Any thoughts, suggestions, comments really appreciated.

https://www.scan.co.uk/wishlists/f6d0ea1f-f782-408...


Thanks so much in advance.

[RobDickinson]

I don't think you'll need the thermal compound?

Also the b450 board is quite old I think and have a new one coming soon would be worth waiting for

[MissChief]

In the sticks said:

Just found this thread - very topical.

Sons birthday in a couple of weeks and he wants a pc for games and the odd bit of school work. Rather than buying a pre-built, I thought it would be nice if we could build something together.

I don't want to go base spec, nor spend a stupid amount - in short, something that will work well and keep him happy. So, this is what I have come up with and it is pretty much at max price. Any thoughts, suggestions, comments really appreciated.

https://www.scan.co.uk/wishlists/f6d0ea1f-f782-408...


Thanks so much in advance.

You don't 'need' a 3700X, if there's a bundle with a 3600 it'll likely be better value. The MSI B450 Tomahawk max is just about the best value board out there so price one of them up with the 3600 and see what you get price wise.

As above, no need for thermal compound, it'll likely come with some with the cooler pre-applied or in a wee sachet.

No need for such an expensive PSU.

Avoid Retail Windows, buy a grey key from Ebay for £10-£15. I did and have had zero problems. You'll get 64 bit Premium/Professional easily.

I'd go for a bigger NVME and then a smaller HDD but there's no much in it price wise but use some of the savings above to get a bigger NVME drive. You'll want your Windows and most played games on it.

Try this system:


Add this cooler, which has stellar reviews, although on pre-order: https://www.scan.co.uk/products/arctic-liquid-free... it's better than some coolers at nearly double the price. It should be a far better, more stable and cooler system.

[RobDickinson]

B550 boards with pci-e 4 etc will be out July or so says google.

[MissChief]

RobDickinson said:

B550 boards with pci-e 4 etc will be out July or so says google.

True, but what use is PCI-E 4.0 at the moment? There are NVME drives that support it but that's about it.

[RobDickinson]

Yeah its not a huge upgrade should run lower power etc too. Just pointing it out.

[FourWheelDrift]

Hold your upgrade thoughts, AMD Zen 3 processors will now be supported on B450 and X470 motherboards. - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=emtRzJW7yrg

But once flashed to the Zen 3 processors they will lose Zen/+/2 support due to bios size in ROM. Once flashed you cannot go back, so only update when you have a Zen 3 CPU to install.

[RizzoTheRat]

In the sticks said:

Just found this thread - very topical.

Sons birthday in a couple of weeks and he wants a pc for games and the odd bit of school work. Rather than buying a pre-built, I thought it would be nice if we could build something together.

I don't want to go base spec, nor spend a stupid amount - in short, something that will work well and keep him happy. So, this is what I have come up with and it is pretty much at max price. Any thoughts, suggestions, comments really appreciated.

https://www.scan.co.uk/wishlists/f6d0ea1f-f782-408...


Thanks so much in advance.

Take a look at PC Partpicker, it lets you build a system and tells you which suppliers have the parts at the best prices, and compatibility checks as you go as well as having reviews of components. I ended up buying all my bits from 3 different suppliers as some places had cheaper prices and some stuff was only available from specific suppliers.

[DuncsGTi]

Lockdown boredom has struck..........

My wife is currently stuck working from home. She has a decent office style chair but is using her laptop on the dining room table. She said on Sunday that she needs a desk to make it more comfortable sitting there all day so I suggested there wasn't much point unless we got a pc to go with it. The spec isn't quite as high as I'd like but it's as high as I could get the wife to agree with the budget.
Spec as follows

My son got a new case last week so I've got his old one.
Ryzen 5 3600
Zotac RTX 2060
Msi B450 Carbon gaming pro ac
16Gb Corsair 3600MHz
2Tb Seagate Barracuda
500Gb NVMe Samsung 950 Pro from my laptop
Seasonic focus GX 650w 80+ Gold modular PSU
27" Acer 1440p IPS monitor

[Mr E]

14 year old over the road wants to build one and was asking for a steer.

I’ve not built a gaming pc for a while. And not on a tight budget (£650 quid or so).

AMD seems to be the pick for CPU (R5 3600?)
What GPU gives best bang for buck for ~£160 ish?

(He’s like to play ms flight sim at 1080p)

Edit - had a play. A 3600 Bundle plus an RX580, case, PSU and drives is about £700.

Edited by Mr E on Tuesday 19th May 16:13

[FourWheelDrift]

Have you got that already? As it says on MSI's site B450 gaming pro carbon is only compatible with memory up to 3466Mhz, so the 3600Mhz will run at 3466Mhz - https://www.msi.com/Motherboard/B450-GAMING-PRO-CA...

If you haven't yet, just buy 3200Mhz (oddly cheaper than even 3000Mhz from some places) you will not see the difference and save a few pounds.

[DuncsGTi]

FourWheelDrift said:

Have you got that already? As it says on MSI's site B450 gaming pro carbon is only compatible with memory up to 3466Mhz, so the 3600Mhz will run at 3466Mhz - https://www.msi.com/Motherboard/B450-GAMING-PRO-CA...

If you haven't yet, just buy 3200Mhz (oddly cheaper than even 3000Mhz from some places) you will not see the difference and save a few pounds.

Not got it yet but strangely, 3600Mhz was only about £5 more than 3000 so even if it down downclocks to 3466 I'll still be happy.

[RobDickinson]

Mr E said:

14 year old over the road wants to build one and was asking for a steer.

I’ve not built a gaming pc for a while. And not on a tight budget (£650 quid or so).

AMD seems to be the pick for CPU (R5 3600?)
What GPU gives best bang for buck for ~£160 ish?

(He’s like to play ms flight sim at 1080p)

Edit - had a play. A 3600 Bundle plus an RX580, case, PSU and drives is about £700.

Honestly I would look at the new 3300x chip its plenty good enough for a budget gaming box.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vD8Yk7JrBL8

[In the sticks]

Thanks for all your responses - really helpful. A bit of a schoolboy error on my behalf, monitors- forgot about those. Ideally something around 24 inch( maybe a bit bigger ). Wants g-sync, 144 min refresh rate and low response time. Oh, and not too much. Is this possible?
Any suggestions really appreciated

Thanks so much.

[FourWheelDrift]

In the sticks said:

Thanks for all your responses - really helpful. A bit of a schoolboy error on my behalf, monitors- forgot about those. Ideally something around 24 inch( maybe a bit bigger ). Wants g-sync, 144 min refresh rate and low response time. Oh, and not too much. Is this possible?
Any suggestions really appreciated

Thanks so much.

G-sync specific monitors are expensive, you need to find a cheaper freesync monitor that is g-sync compatible. Google the product number when you find one.

This is a good one for £338, 27", 1440p, 165hz refresh rate, 1ms response - https://www.scan.co.uk/products/27-asus-tuf-vg279w...

It says freesync but ASUS's own product description says it's G-sync compatible - https://www.asus.com/Monitors/TUF-Gaming-VG27AQ/

I notice they do have a specific G-sync on offer at £319, 24.5", 1080p, 144hz, 1ms - https://www.scan.co.uk/products/245-acer-predator-... no idea how good it is, check online reviews.

Overall though, tough to find a G-sync monitor under £400 - All G-sync monitors - https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/products/monitor/#A=1&...


Ps, other retailers are available