Good Desktop PC for around £2k
Discussion
Suggestions please for a decent spec Desktop PC for all round use.
Up to around £2000.
Ideally min 64meg ram, SSD for main drive, and 4TB HD, half decent graphic card. Windows operating system. etc.
No need for monitors or accessories, I just need the main box. Doesnt need to look fancy, just function.
Is it best to buy from say Dell, or another recommended builder?
Thanks
Up to around £2000.
Ideally min 64meg ram, SSD for main drive, and 4TB HD, half decent graphic card. Windows operating system. etc.
No need for monitors or accessories, I just need the main box. Doesnt need to look fancy, just function.
Is it best to buy from say Dell, or another recommended builder?
Thanks
64 MB of RAM should be enough for anyone 
£2K is plenty for a decent box.
For £2K consider building it yourself. PC Part Picker is a good starting point for suggestions and you can use the builder tool to make sure everything is compatible
https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/guide/
Otherwise you can get pre-built PCs from various stores. I usually recommend Scan but other vendors are available.
https://www.scan.co.uk/3xs/custom/gaming
£2K is plenty for a decent box.
For £2K consider building it yourself. PC Part Picker is a good starting point for suggestions and you can use the builder tool to make sure everything is compatible
https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/guide/
Otherwise you can get pre-built PCs from various stores. I usually recommend Scan but other vendors are available.
https://www.scan.co.uk/3xs/custom/gaming
Not sure you'll find many with 64Mb of RAM!
For £2k you will get an absolute beast, so unless you have a very specific use case, anything will do, buy whatever you think will look the best on your desk, or whatever is the quietest etc. If you don't have a specific use case then it won't matter what you buy, unless you want to spend less.
Half your budget will get you a very very good machine off a local gamer that is upgrading to the latest thing and it's a lot like cars in that the newer end of the second-hand market is where the best value is.
For £2k you will get an absolute beast, so unless you have a very specific use case, anything will do, buy whatever you think will look the best on your desk, or whatever is the quietest etc. If you don't have a specific use case then it won't matter what you buy, unless you want to spend less.
Half your budget will get you a very very good machine off a local gamer that is upgrading to the latest thing and it's a lot like cars in that the newer end of the second-hand market is where the best value is.
paulrockliffe said:
Half your budget will get you a very very good machine off a local gamer that is upgrading to the latest thing and it's a lot like cars in that the newer end of the second-hand market is where the best value is.
Yeah just be aware that a lot of gaming stuff now is covered with RGB lighting. It depends what you want the machine to do.
If you want to game in 4k then you're looking at an RTX5080, that'll take up half your budget minimum. 64GB ram is alot, what is your use case for requiring so much? Hard drives of all variety are cheap enough these days, I'd get a 2TB m2 drive, then a few 4TB sata drives, you should struggle to fill those.
If you want to game in 4k then you're looking at an RTX5080, that'll take up half your budget minimum. 64GB ram is alot, what is your use case for requiring so much? Hard drives of all variety are cheap enough these days, I'd get a 2TB m2 drive, then a few 4TB sata drives, you should struggle to fill those.
For self build I'd start here and work backwards:
Windows 11 is £100
A good quality case is £100-£150
A decent modular power supply around £100
32Gb RAM is about £50, or £100 if you really want 64Gb
1Tb NVMe drive for the OS and programmes is about £60
Couple of 2Tb SSDs around £120 each
I would say that's a very decent starting point for a PC and it comes in at around £650-£700
Then it's just a case of motherboard, CPU/Cooler and graphics card at which you could throw as little as £120.00 or up to £2000 and beyond.
Windows 11 is £100
A good quality case is £100-£150
A decent modular power supply around £100
32Gb RAM is about £50, or £100 if you really want 64Gb
1Tb NVMe drive for the OS and programmes is about £60
Couple of 2Tb SSDs around £120 each
I would say that's a very decent starting point for a PC and it comes in at around £650-£700
Then it's just a case of motherboard, CPU/Cooler and graphics card at which you could throw as little as £120.00 or up to £2000 and beyond.
Why on earth would you be spending all that money when something quarter of the price will do everything you need unless you are playing the latest GPU-heavy game titles and/or 4k video editing? Total waste of money. Even a grand would get you something that will comfortably do all the above.
Turtle shed said:
A good quality case is £100-£150
£150 on a case ! Tisy said:
£150 on a case !
My recent build has one of these, which was something over a hundred IIRC. Unless your PC is living totally out of sight I'm happy to pay a bit more for something that doesn't look like it was designed by a six-year old.
https://www.fractal-design.com/products/cases/nort...
Tisy said:
Why on earth would you be spending all that money when something quarter of the price will do everything you need unless you are playing the latest GPU-heavy game titles and/or 4k video editing? Total waste of money. Even a grand would get you something that will comfortably do all the above.
Indeed, why so little! My last purchase was the Be quiet! Dark Base Pro 901 Full Tower at £279. Horses for courses and all thatTurtle shed said:
A good quality case is £100-£150
£150 on a case ! Tisy said:
Why on earth would you be spending all that money when something quarter of the price will do everything you need unless you are playing the latest GPU-heavy game titles and/or 4k video editing? Total waste of money. Even a grand would get you something that will comfortably do all the above.
The OP was looking at spending up to £2,000 on a PC, and spending around 5-7% on a case isn't unreasonable. They are pretty much the only thing in a build that won't go out of date. No reason why the thing shouldn't be good for two decades, as upgrades come and go.Turtle shed said:
A good quality case is £100-£150
£150 on a case ! This kind of thing for example:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Fractal-Design-Flexible-T...
Edit to add regarding the comment about looking fancy, the one I linked to isn't "fancy", it's just quality.
Edited by Turtle Shed on Thursday 5th June 22:51
Bugger me! £35 https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B08LW3SC1X/ref...
Over £200 on a case......!?!?!? well I be......
It sits under my desk - easy access to the insides, good fan options, who gives a f
k about anything else. A fool and his money.....
OP
- £2k is insane unless you plan on 4k gaming with high refresh rates..
- You want 32Gb of ram (only really if gaming). 16Gb is plenty otherwise
- SSD and HDD? ditch the idea of a HDD now. Forget it, for ever. You don't need one. You don't want one.
Over £200 on a case......!?!?!? well I be......
It sits under my desk - easy access to the insides, good fan options, who gives a f
k about anything else. A fool and his money.....OP
- £2k is insane unless you plan on 4k gaming with high refresh rates..
- You want 32Gb of ram (only really if gaming). 16Gb is plenty otherwise
- SSD and HDD? ditch the idea of a HDD now. Forget it, for ever. You don't need one. You don't want one.
Turtle Shed said:
The OP was looking at spending up to £2,000 on a PC, and spending around 8% on a case isn't unreasonable. They are pretty much the only thing in a build that won't go out of date. No reason why the thing shouldn't be good for two decades, as upgrades come and go.
This kind of thing for example:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Fractal-Design-Flexible-T...
How about knocking £100 off thatThis kind of thing for example:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Fractal-Design-Flexible-T...
https://www.amazon.co.uk/MSI-FORGE-AIRFLOW-Mid-Tow...
Griffith4ever said:
Yes, that would be fine. I did edit my post to read 5-7% and that's the amount I'd allocate to a case at the OP's budget.davek_964 said:
So just to be clear :
From some of these comments, £2K would be enough for a PC capable of playing modern games at 4k with high refresh rates?
That's less than I would have expected.
Which comments do you get that from? As far as I can see everyone is saying that £2K is more than enough for a decent gaming PC unless you want to game at 4K.From some of these comments, £2K would be enough for a PC capable of playing modern games at 4k with high refresh rates?
That's less than I would have expected.
For anyone to give any meaningful advice the OP really needs to set out more specific details of what they want to do with the PC.
To actually answer the OP's question...
- If you are in to building your own PCs, have the skills and the time, then spec it out and answer the thousands of demanding questions in the posts above. You'll save a bit doing this, maybe 10-25% spec for spec. But it takes time and if anything goes wrong its on you.
- If you just want a PC then Dell or HP is fine. You seem to have no particular niche or extreme need, so something like the below will do. That's a fairly decent PC and there's not much you wont be able to do with that - general PC use, web, most normal person gaming, photoshop, video editing.
If you're not in a rush then there's always a Dell sale around the corner, although be wary that these tend to push the older CPUs.
- If you are in to building your own PCs, have the skills and the time, then spec it out and answer the thousands of demanding questions in the posts above. You'll save a bit doing this, maybe 10-25% spec for spec. But it takes time and if anything goes wrong its on you.
- If you just want a PC then Dell or HP is fine. You seem to have no particular niche or extreme need, so something like the below will do. That's a fairly decent PC and there's not much you wont be able to do with that - general PC use, web, most normal person gaming, photoshop, video editing.
If you're not in a rush then there's always a Dell sale around the corner, although be wary that these tend to push the older CPUs.
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