Joining the PC gaming master race!

[Chimpzy_v1legacy]

My general advice is to pick parts manually and then have someone in the store assemble it for you.

Since the idea of the exercise is so the OP's son can learn about the inner workings of a pc, I'm going to have to disagree there.

Partly because having someone else assemble it would more or less defeat the purpose, partly because building a pc is nowhere near as complicated as it appears at first glance if you do some research and prep work. I'm not technically inclined at all, but I was able to build, with no prior experience, a gaming pc in an afternoon, with only one slip-up[footnote]Finished building and tried to boot it. Nope. Turned out I forgot to run a power cable to the CPU. Whoops, such a brainless oversight.[/footnote]. It actually surprised me how quickly it went. Between the included manuals and the abundance of online guides on building a pc, there is little stopping someone from doing it themselves so long as they can read and use a screwdriver.

And besides being a rewarding experience, going hands on yourself is so much more educational. I learned more about pcs in that one afternoon than I did in the 20 previous years of buying pre-builts or picking parts and having someone else put them together.

 

[bjj hero]

You know, it's entirely possible to own a gaming computer without throwing around the master race stuff. Remember when people talked normally about things? I think that might've been before the internet, but even then this gets ridiculous.

I think most people use it as tongue in cheek humor now, at least that's the vibe I'm very much getting from this thread and the OP (not saying that there aren't those douches out there that treat pc gaming as ultra s3r10us bus1n3ss) so I would consider it pretty normal and friendly in this thread?

I can only apologise. No offence was intended and I quite enjoy my console. It was a banner on this site as I was posting so I went with it without malice.

 

[bjj hero]

Thankyou for your help every one.

What do people think of the $500 build on this site:

http://blog.logicalincrements.com/2016/07/building-pc-beats-xbox-one-s/

Apparently it will far out perform the new xbox 2.0.

 

[Cowabungaa]

Thankyou for your help every one.

What do people think of the $500 build on this site:

http://blog.logicalincrements.com/2016/07/building-pc-beats-xbox-one-s/

Apparently it will far out perform the new xbox 2.0.

It will, but it'll get relatively outdated pretty soon, especially that CPU. You'd be better off stepping up a little more on the CPU so that'll last you a good long while. I'd recommend going somewhere between the Great, Superb and Excellent builds on here [http://www.logicalincrements.com/]. A really good price-quality combo is the Intel i5 6400, RX 480 and 8GB of RAM. The other parts you can go cheaper on to balance it out so you won't end up paying $800+. You could get it down to around $700, I think. Especially if you still have to save up a bit, which will see a price drop in the RX 480 as its price is inflated a little right now thanks to supply shortages.

I think that while it's more expensive than a $500 build, the amount of time it'll stay powerful enough will probably make it cheaper in the long run.

 

[bjj hero]

Or this:
https://www.overclockers.co.uk/ocuk-tech-labs-amd-apu-micro-atx-gaming-pc-configurator-fs-011-tl.html

Id buy the parts, rather than the pc and I know they will work as its sold as is. I can also shop around and save a bit doing it myself.

 

[bjj hero]

Thankyou for your help every one.

What do people think of the $500 build on this site:

http://blog.logicalincrements.com/2016/07/building-pc-beats-xbox-one-s/

Apparently it will far out perform the new xbox 2.0.

It will, but it'll get relatively outdated pretty soon, especially that CPU. You'd be better off stepping up a little more on the CPU so that'll last you a good long while. I'd recommend going somewhere between the Great and Superb builds on logicalincrements.com. A really good price-quality combo is the Intel i5 6400, RX 480 and 5GB of RAM. The other parts you can go cheaper on to balance it out so you won't end up paying $800+. You could get it down to around $700, I think.

I think that while it's more expensive than a $500 build, the amount of time it'll stay powerful enough will probably make it cheaper in the long run.

Thank you. Everthing im reading says I need at least 8gb ram. Am i looking at the wrong part?

 

[Cowabungaa]

Thank you. Everthing im reading says I need at least 8gb ram. Am i looking at the wrong part?

No prob, I updated the post with a direct link by the way. That might be a bit more clear. As for the RAM, yeah with operating system requirements and all that jazz 8GB of RAM is pretty much the sweet spot for gaming right now. Seems like I made a typo there.

Anything else over 8GB won't give you much extra performance in games, it's more for video editing, graphical stuff and other creative work. If your son's into drawing it'd be worth to buy 2X 8GB RAM and save up for a drawing tablet afterwards. That might be a fun alternative use for that computer.