The Master Gaming Rig

[Hawkeye]

Ok, I'm more of a console player but I had a bit of a gaming rig before I invested in my consoles. My current PC desktop is about as useful as a paperweight andI'm looking at building myself a new rig with more current gaming specs. Does anyone have any suggestions on which brands and specs are good at this current time for more of an mid range start build, which options to upgrade when extra funds become available.

 

[igyman]

I can't give you specific component models to looks at, since I myself haven't really looked at them recently (with the exception of my graphics card, my other components are 5+ years old and still run every latest title on max details), but I can point you in the general direction. You may already know most of the stuff I'm about to write, but I'm writing it anyway, as it can serve as a solid guide to anyone interested So, here it is:

Motherboard: I've gone with Asus as a MB manufacturer for years and they haven't let me down so far. Choosing the motherboard is the crucial part and where most of your attention should go, as other components connect to it. So pay attention to:
- the processor socket, since that limits which CPUs you can choose from
- the supported RAM type (DDR3, DDR4,...) and the maximum amount of RAM you can hook up to the motherboard, as well as the max supported working frequency of RAM.
- Power supply connector. 24-pin is the usual standard, but as there are exceptions and it can limit your power supply choice, pay attention to this one.
- PCI Express slots - this is a minor consideration as all MBs will have at least one PCI Express x16 slot to which you will hook up your graphics card, but still something that shouldn't be overlooked completely. Modern graphics cards use PCI Express 3.0 slots, but they can work perfectly on PCI Express 2.0 too (I have a setup like this), with possibly a barely noticeable performance impact, since the data transfer rate is slower on PCI Express 2.0.

CPU: Go with Intel as a manufacturer. This is not to say that AMD should be avoided at all costs, but their processors tend to heat up a lot more than Intel, so if you go with an AMD, it would be a good idea to consider additional cooling options and not rely on the stock cooler fan that comes with the CPU. Also don't go below 4 cores and 3GHz when choosing a model.

RAM Memory: Kingston as a manufacturer, or alternately Transcend does a solid job too. Don't go below 8GB, but I highly recommend going with at least 16GB, as RAM helps out a lot with gaming performance and can improve it even if some of the other components are a bit older.

Power supply: Chieftec is the go-to manufacturer for power supply units. As for the PSU strength, I'm guessing you will need at least 650-700W.

Graphics card: For the actual card manufacturer, again I tend to go with Asus, but manufacturers like MSI do solid work too. Now, for the actual GPU, the choice is highly subjective. Some people prefer nVidia, others AMD (former Ati). I have tried both and have had a much more positive experience with AMD/Ati. My current graphics card is an Asus AMD Radeon RX 580 with 8GB DDR5 GPU RAM. For the GPU RAM, I would look at models with at least 4GB, but if you can afford it, go with 8.

Hard disk: classic, magnetic drives are much cheaper than SSDs and mostly won't affect your gaming experience. The best option is to combine the two - get a smaller SSD just for the operating system, drivers and essential programs and get a larger-capacity (at least 1-2TB) classic HDD for all games and other installations. For the manufacturer, if you're buying an SSD, Kingston is once again the best around. For the classic HDDs, Western Digital and Seagate are good choices.

Needless to say, don't look at the latest, just-released hardware, as those initial prices are always ridiculously high. Go with stuff that has been around for at least six moths to a year, as the prices are much more affordable and you won't really miss out on anything performance and feature-wise.

That's it. Hope this guide helps you out (and anyone else interested) and good hunting!

 

[jigos]

I have an upgrade process, and I'll outline it here:

What I do is to have a look at a local price aggregator website with product popularity rankings, and just have a look at the most popular components in each category. That'll give you a very good idea of where the market is at any given point, as consumers almost always go for the value-sweet-spot for every category. From there, you can decide whether to go above or below that market average for your build. I actually like to have a look like this periodically (every year or two), just to keep up with the scene.

Then if I don't recognize the parts or technologies, I just do a quick google to find out about them. E.g. for a graphics card I'm unfamiliar with, I'll just have a look at some benchmarks, and also compare it to my current card to see how it's different.

Then it's a matter of ensuring interoperability between the parts (CPU chipset and socket for mobo and cooler; sufficient PSU capacity, etc).

Regarding brands: I don't have set choices; I just know of the pool of reputable manufacturers, and know that anything I get from them is pretty much certain to be great. The one component where this is an iron rule is of course PSU's.

Doing this for New Zealand, where I am, using a website called PriceSpy (which is excellent, and is available for a number of countries) yields this list.
Now, for as long as I've been aware of it, the price of a decent gaming PC (including accessories) in NZ has always been about $2,500 NZD ($1,672 USD; £1,285 GBP). I can see that this hasn't changed. What it will be for your country will be dependent on the economy there (economies of scale; geographical remoteness; taxes). But this is just using the most popular parts. I can tailor this up or down depending on what I care about/how much I want to spend.

The next main thing to consider is if you want to use anything from your previous rig. For me, I've decided I can actually use the case, PSU, CPU cooler, all the disk drives, the WiFi adapter, and all accessories. That's pretty much the whole thing, except for the CPU, mobo, GPU, and RAM.

With that, I've got this list, which is half the price and very doable. I can probably go even less, as I think I'll be fine with a slightly lesser mobo and GPU.


So that's my upgrading process. Hopefully there's something helpful in there for you.

 

[Rebel]

I'll approach this from a bit of a different direction, the cost:

The Motherboard will set the quality, the quantity, and the tone for everything else you attach to it. If there is anything that you should be willing to "go big of go home" on, it's the motherboard. There are a lot of good "cheap" mothersboards out there that can run you $50-$100. This isn't to say "don't buy one of those" it's to say "you get what you pay for". Generally speaking, I advise people to look at motherboards in the $250-$400 range. This will usually get you last-years, or the year before's model, because like cars these things drop is price dramatically after the first couple of years. If anything, you want this component to be strong, solid and long-lasting. There are also some "sizes" to MOBOs, but just get the full-size ones and ignore the rest.

Your next big price point is going to be the CPU. No argument: Intel is good. But you're also paying for the Intel name. There are quality AMD chips with comparable processing power at dramatically lower price points. (We're talking $300-$400 price differences). Now, there's sort of a chicken and the egg issue here. When building your computer you need to decide: "Am I going AMD or Intel?" because your motherboard will support only one or the other. So you might take this moment to compare CPUs and decide if you want to go Intel or AMD. If you're on a budget, you can save substantial money going AMD, but as others mention, AMD tends to run hotter than Intel, which means factory cooling may not suffice.

Your third and final big price point is going to be your graphics card. In the past, these items have declined dramatically after the release of new generations of cards and it was fairly easy to pick up last-years model for substantially less. Thanks to bitcoin mining, graphics cards, especially the good ones, are holding their prices for years. Even older cards have gone up in price. Here I will take a stand, I recommend NVidia. The end. I moved from ATI to Nvidia about two years ago from comparable cards and the difference was night and day. The specs on graphics cards can be rather confusing, but expect to open your wallet again. For a good graphics card for modern-day gaming you're going to be looking at $300-$500. There are plenty of cheap alternatives, but like a motherboard, you're looking for a durable, long-lasting, powerful part you wont have to replace when the next big title comes out, and one that won't fail on you.

So at this point, if you're looking at AMD, you're probably right around $1100. If you're looking at Intel, you're looking at about $1500-1600. Now's when you really start noticing that Intel/AMD price difference.

The reason I address these first is that much of the rest of your system exists to support these elements. Your processing power and graphics capability can be limited by a lack of memory. As above, these days I wouldn't run anything less than 16GB. Go 32GB if you can. If your board supports more, go ahead, but there's no need to fill up those slots right from the start. There are a variety of good memory companies on the market and honestly their prices are pretty comparable. But your motherboard will determine what kind of memory you have to buy. Generally speaking, I assume I'm getting a fairly good part when I spend ~100per 8GB of memory.

Secondly, your MOBO, your CPU, your GPU will determine what level of power supply you need. Most basic builds can make do in the 650-750 range but that leaves a very narrow window for expansion and upgrade. Power supplies (PSUs) are not terribly expensive, and unless you're running multiple graphics cards or some other crazy thing, you aren't ever going to need more than 1000. Frankly, I suggest most people just get something in the 850-1000 range anyway because the price isn't that much higher for a good one, and it leaves you plenty of room for down the road. An important thing to note is that PSUs, unlike almost every other element in your computer, can be removed and placed in a new machine later. If you decide to build a cheap machine today, invest the extra $50 so you don't have to get a new PSU tomorrow.

Now we're down the road to hard-drives which is a mixed bag I don't really care to get into. I advise a solid state for your operating system, and then the rest just go with whatever as long as it's got an RPM of 7500(7200? I always forget because I care that little). You might get one other fancy drive for your main game drive, which I recommend not being a solid-state drive for longevity reasons.

Want a CD/DVD/Blu-Ray drive? Don't? Yeah sure whatever. Want a fancy case? Go for it. Don't forget to buy your copy of Windows! Quite possibly the most irritating mandatory piece of "hardware" (and I only call it that because like your MOBO, unless you're going Linux, you gotta buy it) you'll ever have to buy. Why? Because there's only 1 version, you have to buy it, and it's Windows.

As mentioned above, if you go AMD, expect higher heat output from your MOBO, so you'll want a cooling unit. I find air cooling works fine for the average gamer and I'm no plumber so you'd have to ask someone else about water cooling. Again you'll run $50-$100 and this will be the ugliest element you buy for your PC, but in this case, function over form matters.

So where does that leave us? Right around the $1700k AMD to 2200k Intel mark when it's all said and done. Notice how all those last elements only brought us up a couple hundred bucks? Yeah. That's why we do them last and I don't go into much detail on them.

 

[Lynk Former]

@Hawkeye First question... what is your budget? How much you are willing to spend is the first step before anything else.

What I mean is, what is the final product you want? Because there's no point saying, "I'll go mid range then work from there."

You may as well just get the exact type of computer you want from the start. What are we aiming for ultimately? I'm assuming something that will last you for a long time.

 

[Hawkeye]

Overall the budget not much of a question, but it more of spreading the cost over time. I have built a pc in the past and I know what it costs to build. I've gone to londons last runing computer fair today, to have alook around. However the computer fairs of past have gone the way of the dodo.... I' liked the fairs for the interaction of the dealers, you could find out alot more information from them then you could if you were looking for parts online.

I want something to game with, but something that can be upgraded with time... maybe a starting budget of £700 to £800

 

[jigos]

What can you reuse from your current rig?

 

[Lynk Former]

The only thing I can recommend then is that you get 16GB of ram at the very least and use an SSD as your OS drive and the drive you launch your games from.

And if this is an "upgrade as you go" thing then don't skimp on the motherboard and processor.

Personally, I'd go:

• Processor: Intel i7 8700K (best to get an unlocked processor so you can get the most out of it)
• Motherboard: A high end motherboard that has excellent power management for overclocking... don't worry, it's super easy these days.
• RAM: 16GB DDR4 2400MHz (this is a minimum at this point)
• GPU: RTX 2080 Ti (so you don't have to upgrade for a long time and saves you money in the long run... GPU is always the first thing that needs upgrading, so may as well go for the top on this)
• PSU: Around 650W - 750W (single gpu is the way to go, no need to get fancy)
• SSD: x2, one for OS drive, one for game drive.

It'll cost you to get all of that, but as for the mice, keyboard, monitors, etc... you can just reuse the ones you have and upgrade THOSE as you go. Makes a lot more sense to do it that way since new monitors, mice, keyboard, etc, do actually start to add up the cost.

 

[Hawkeye]

So your an intel man? I've been more of an AMD in the past, what the intel's like these days?

 

[Bob Lion54]

Intel is very good these days. They've upped their game considerably the past few years.

Basically, Intel cornered the market back in the 90s and their processors were in everything. At one point, if you had a computer, it probably had an Intel Pentium processor. They got a bit lazy and relied on name recognition and deal making with computer manufacturers.Then AMD came along and provided processors that were better for cheaper. The people "in the know" became AMD people and Intel saw their name meaning less.

A few years ago, they decided to compete with AMD on product performance and theses days people that aren't simply loyal to AMD are usually going to recommend Intel.

AMD is all about raw power and getting their numbers has high as possible. Intel relies on better optimization and less on raw numbers. Consequently, Intels tend to run cooler and develop fewer problems. Intel's numbers are lower but the performance is actually the same. Think of it like a big muscle car that can go really fast in a straight line versus a little sports car that can corner really well. They'll both get you there just as quick, but in a slightly different way and the sports car is less likely to blow a gasket or whatnot.

 

[Lynk Former]

@Hawkeye You're going for a pure gaming rig, which means Intel is the better option.

There are arguments to be made for either side, but in terms of optimisation for video games specifically, Intel still edges out AMD.

 

[Hawkeye]

that Fine Lynk, what Bob said kinda remind me of why I choose AMD back when I last built my PC all thoses years ago, looks like I have to redo my shopping list for the Intel options