The PC building Thread

[Dirty Hipsters]

For those looking to build a new PC, get advice on parts, or to show off their latest build/mod.

I'll start.

I'm looking to build a new PC relatively soon. Getting $1200 from the government is making it a lot easier. Current budget is between $1200-$1400, and this is what I've currently come up with:

System Builder

pcpartpicker.com

Feel free to critique, give advice, or tell me that I'm stupid and my whole build is wrong and nothing will work together.

 

[hanselthecaretaker]

For those looking to build a new PC, get advice on parts, or to show off their latest build/mod.

I'll start.

I'm looking to build a new PC relatively soon. Getting $1200 from the government is making it a lot easier. Current budget is between $1200-$1400, and this is what I've currently come up with:

System Builder

pcpartpicker.com

Feel free to critique, give advice, or tell me that I'm stupid and my whole build is wrong and nothing will work together.

Ah yes, Cooler Master case and cooler ftw. I’m no expert but everything else looks good too. Also a fan of G. Skill memory and Evga PSUs. I’d personally add a normal, larger drive for storage and what have you; especially if you have a lot of it. OS and programs on the SSD and everything else on the other makes PC life a bit easier.

 

[Phoenixmgs]

Getting $1200 from the government is making it a lot easier.

 

[Phoenixmgs]

System Builder

pcpartpicker.com

Feel free to critique, give advice, or tell me that I'm stupid and my whole build is wrong and nothing will work together.

I actually just built a new PC this Monday but went with the simple solution of the Ryzen 5 3400G with the built-in graphics, which works perfect for the games I play on PC like Divinity and XCOM. I pretty much just did a new CPU, mobo, RAM, and case and reused everything else from my old PC. These new cases are so much better than the one I got like 8 years ago.

There's not much to screw up with a build, you kinda just needed to get fast RAM (as I read that's needed for Ryzens), which you did. I have to overclock the BIOS to get my RAM to run at its 3200 speed but I really didn't see a performance increase and it causes the CPU to run decently hotter so I set the speed back to default. I probably should've got a more expensive MOBO but I'm satisfied so far.

Also, I'm not sure if you by any chance have a Micro Center by you but they have really good prices. For what I was looking for, they had not only better prices but better selection than Newegg. Plus, I could just drive up there and get everything instead of waiting for shipping. And, I just quickly checked your video card and CPU, and Micro Center has the video card for $380 and the CPU for $180, and you save $20 when you buy a CPU and mobo together as well.

Lastly, I totally just imaged my Windows 10 laptop OS drive (as I was still running Win7 on my desktop) and restored the image to the SSD on my new PC because I wasn't about to install Windows 10 fresh ever again and remove all the damn garbage, redo all the registry changes and Group Policy, disable Windows Defender, completely disable Windows Update, disable all the unneeded services, and everything else. Windows 10 can be lean and mean but it takes so much work to get it there. And, the restored image from my laptop is working flawlessly.

 

[Elvis Starburst]

I'll echo having a dedicated drive for games and stuff and a drive for the OS and programs, cause if you plan on playing a lot of games (Especially modern ones) that 1TB drive is gonna fill up very quickly. I have a 250GB SSD for my OS and half of it is full already, and I don't even put my photos, music, or videos on there. Most of that is the programs and system data. Besides that, the build really came together! Looks good

 

[meiam]

Oh Jesus yes, get a dedicated SSD for your OS (250)! Look I know nothing about computer, I just followed a guide to build my last one, but that was easily the biggest difference. It's also super useful cause I had to restore my windows drive but I didn't lose anything that were on my other drives (not reinstalling 1+ TB of game was nice).

Now I have three drive, my windows SSD and two dedicated game drive, a 2 TB HDD for game without long load time and a 1 TB SSD for one with long load time (I don't think I could play totalwar warhammer without that SSD).

Oh also, the only thing you should avoid doing with stimulus check is save it. The point of stimulus is two fold, help people who may literally starve without it and also help the economy whose really reeling right now, so long as you spend the money everything is fine. There's actually a lot of discussion about making any future stimulus in a way that people cannot save the money (like pre paid credit card with an expiration date).

I'm impressed at how long mid range graphic card are holding out now, I bought a GTX 970 in early 2016 (already kinda old at that point) and it's just starting to feel like it's time to replace it.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

I actually just built a new PC this Monday but went with the simple solution of the Ryzen 5 3400G with the built-in graphics, which works perfect for the games I play on PC like Divinity and XCOM. I pretty much just did a new CPU, mobo, RAM, and case and reused everything else from my old PC. These new cases are so much better than the one I got like 8 years ago.

There's not much to screw up with a build, you kinda just needed to get fast RAM (as I read that's needed for Ryzens), which you did. I have to overclock the BIOS to get my RAM to run at its 3200 speed but I really didn't see a performance increase and it causes the CPU to run decently hotter so I set the speed back to default. I probably should've got a more expensive MOBO but I'm satisfied so far.

Also, I'm not sure if you by any chance have a Micro Center by you but they have really good prices. For what I was looking for, they had not only better prices but better selection than Newegg. Plus, I could just drive up there and get everything instead of waiting for shipping. And, I just quickly checked your video card and CPU, and Micro Center has the video card for $380 and the CPU for $180, and you save $20 when you buy a CPU and mobo together as well.

Lastly, I totally just imaged my Windows 10 laptop OS drive (as I was still running Win7 on my desktop) and restored the image to the SSD on my new PC because I wasn't about to install Windows 10 fresh ever again and remove all the damn garbage, redo all the registry changes and Group Policy, disable Windows Defender, completely disable Windows Update, disable all the unneeded services, and everything else. Windows 10 can be lean and mean but it takes so much work to get it there. And, the restored image from my laptop is working flawlessly.

I do actually have a microcenter nearby, and was planning on getting my cpu there, since it's about $20 cheaper. Unfortunately they don't have the motherboard I want in stock, so I won't be able to take advantage of that promotion.

I do intend on getting another SSD, but prices on storage aren't very good right now, so I'm going to get the single M2 SSD right now, and then get another SSD later on once prices are more reasonable. I can live with the 1TB of storage for a while. I don't really want an HDD. After using SSDs for so long I can't go back to HDD load times, plus I don't like the additional noise it causes.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

Well I haven't lost my job yet, so my essentials are taken care of. Better pump that money back into the economy...Taiwan's economy.

 

[The Rogue Wolf]

I quit building my own systems when I tried to replace my CPU fan and it literally tore the CPU out of the motherboard and ruined both. Now I'll let someone else do the job.

 

[Elvis Starburst]

I do intend on getting another SSD, but prices on storage aren't very good right now

You weren't kidding, holy shit. The SSD I'd wanna get is $50 more on average now than it was a few months ago. Insane... I wouldn't mind doing what you plan on doing and get another SSD for my storage instead. The thing sits idle when not in use, and once I do anything that needs the data on it the thing takes a few seconds to rev up before it starts working, and it's kinda noisy when doing it. Wouldn't mind closing that gap of time and getting rid of the noise and desk vibrations it makes, considering the efforts I'm going to now to silence my build

 

[Phoenixmgs]

I'll echo having a dedicated drive for games and stuff and a drive for the OS and programs, cause if you plan on playing a lot of games (Especially modern ones) that 1TB drive is gonna fill up very quickly. I have a 250GB SSD for my OS and half of it is full already, and I don't even put my photos, music, or videos on there. Most of that is the programs and system data. Besides that, the build really came together! Looks good

As long as you partition the SSD with only Windows and programs on C: that's all that matters. I always just shake my head when I get on another person's PC and they only have a C: drive and nothing else, I guess you just wanna lose all your data then. I don't even get why Windows makes a documents, music, video, pictures folders, you should never put any data whatsoever on your C: drive. How many programs do you have installed? My Windows partition is set at 36GB and I'm using 30GBs of it.

I do intend on getting another SSD, but prices on storage aren't very good right now, so I'm going to get the single M2 SSD right now, and then get another SSD later on once prices are more reasonable. I can live with the 1TB of storage for a while. I don't really want an HDD. After using SSDs for so long I can't go back to HDD load times, plus I don't like the additional noise it causes.

A 2nd SSD is mainly just for luxury. As long as you have your OS, programs, and games (currently being played), that's really all you need it for. Playing videos and music off your normal HD works plenty well enough.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

As long as you partition the SSD with only Windows and programs on C: that's all that matters. I always just shake my head when I get on another person's PC and they only have a C: drive and nothing else, I guess you just wanna lose all your data then. I don't even get why Windows makes a documents, music, video, pictures folders, you should never put any data whatsoever on your C: drive. How many programs do you have installed? My Windows partition is set at 36GB and I'm using 30GBs of it.


A 2nd SSD is mainly just for luxury. As long as you have your OS, programs, and games (currently being played), that's really all you need it for. Playing videos and music off your normal HD works plenty well enough.

Yup, it is just for luxury. I'm totally willing to pay the extra $80 for a 1tb ssd over a 1tb HDD in order to not have to hear it spinning up, not to mention the load times.

HDD works, and if you're on a tight budget it'll get the job done, but it's antiquated at this point, and not something that you should WANT to have to use. The load times on my PS4 annoy me so much when I'm playing because I'm used to everything being on an SSD. Thankfully PS5 is supposed to have an SSD in it.

 

[Elvis Starburst]

As long as you partition the SSD with only Windows and programs on C: that's all that matters. I always just shake my head when I get on another person's PC and they only have a C: drive and nothing else, I guess you just wanna lose all your data then. I don't even get why Windows makes a documents, music, video, pictures folders, you should never put any data whatsoever on your C: drive. How many programs do you have installed? My Windows partition is set at 36GB and I'm using 30GBs of it.

Yup, I make sure all that stuff that is super important is on my D: drive. I don't have a lot of programs, but some of them are a bit heftier than others. Doing some digging, it seems a lot of my data on my C: drive is D&D session recordings I gotta offload onto the D: drive still, plus some game files that I have on here are hanging around as well, like Minecraft server world backups, a few little indie things that have their own installers I kept loaded on here and forgot to put to the D: drive, etc. I probably could free up way more if I re-did my file locations for some stuff. But I'll do that when I get a 1TB SSD for my secondary drive. It's working fine enough for now

 

[Phoenixmgs]

Yup, I make sure all that stuff that is super important is on my D: drive. I don't have a lot of programs, but some of them are a bit heftier than others. Doing some digging, it seems a lot of my data on my C: drive is D&D session recordings I gotta offload onto the D: drive still, plus some game files that I have on here are hanging around as well, like Minecraft server world backups, a few little indie things that have their own installers I kept loaded on here and forgot to put to the D: drive, etc. I probably could free up way more if I re-did my file locations for some stuff. But I'll do that when I get a 1TB SSD for my secondary drive. It's working fine enough for now

I keep my system drive as lean as possible for periodic images (keeping backups to under 15 GBs) and before/afters of the 2 big Windows updates each year (the only time I update). It's so easy to restore an image if something goes wrong, faster than reverting the update. And, of course, that makes system restore completely pointless, which can eat up quite a bit of space. Same thing with regards to an anti-virus; got a virus somehow, restore an image, faster than running the damn anti-virus.

 

[gorfias]

I have a 250 Gig Samsung SSD for the OS and a 4 TB X7200 WD for games n stuff. And an external 4 TB to copy files to in case my hd crashes. Resumes, docs, pictures.

Looks to be a great graphics card TC is looking at (RX 5700) for a great price.

I actually just built a new PC this Monday but went with the simple solution of the Ryzen 5 3400G with the built-in graphics, which works perfect for the games I play on PC like Divinity and XCOM.

I bet 10 years from now, a separate graphics card will be as typical as a sound card is now (though, I still got one). Those APUs just keep getting better. Surprised I'm not seeing them in laptops much yet.

 

[Phoenixmgs]

I bet 10 years from now, a separate graphics card will be as typical as a sound card is now (though, I still got one). Those APUs just keep getting better. Surprised I'm not seeing them in laptops much yet.

That would be pretty nice and a gaming PC will look like the HP Mini Desktops...

 

[gorfias]

That would be pretty nice and a gaming PC will look like the HP Mini Desktops...

Special! I want one now!

 

[Elvis Starburst]

Special! I want one now!

Holy hell that video was a faff and a half. Looks neat though, tiny form factor PCs always had my attention. Makes me regret buying a full ATX MOBO for my most recent build, should've gone Micro or Mini

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

Anyone want to educate me on M2 ssds?

I'm trying to figure out what the difference between these 2 is:

Western Digital Blue 1 TB M.2-2280 Solid State Drive

pcpartpicker.com

Crucial P1 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive

pcpartpicker.com

Looks like they have different connectors, but according to PC part picker both would work with my motherboard. Somehow I don't trust that.

 

[SupahEwok]

Anyone want to educate me on M2 ssds?

I'm trying to figure out what the difference between these 2 is:

Western Digital Blue 1 TB M.2-2280 Solid State Drive

pcpartpicker.com

Crucial P1 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive

pcpartpicker.com

Looks like they have different connectors, but according to PC part picker both would work with my motherboard. Somehow I don't trust that.

NVMe is basically a connector on the SSD that communicates to the motherboard. It's a technology made for SSDs that, essentially, read and write to the motherboard faster than if the SSD doesn't have it. I looked at the original part list you linked in the OP, and looked at your mobo on Newegg. It says that the M.2 slot is compatible with an M.2 with NVMe. Said slot can also support a regular M.2 SSD, which I believe is pretty standard. It's the same philosophy as USB slots: older USB devices can plug into newer slots, but they'll only run as fast as their old specifications allow. Backwards compatibility.

If you want more details you should just google the technology and read a few articles because I'd just be copying and pasting from them. The bottom line is that either of those parts you linked will work.

Edit: the first SSD linked is out of stock on Newegg. I prefer buying through Newegg when I can because I've had an excellent experience with their returns department in case of defects/breakage in shipping, and the prices are usually great. Phoenix up there says that Microcenter is cheaper, but I know that the last couple of times I've PC built I wasn't getting better prices from Microcenter or Fry's (all the ones I remember looking for, retail was actually more expensive) for the parts I wanted than from Newegg. And it's easier to find/wait for sales on Newegg with their emailed newsletters.