Advice on best pre-build for £1000

Bloodrayne · 10 Jul 2022 at 09:56

Hi all,

I have an old PC, I used to keep up-to-date with things but then I had a child and free time and money went missing...

So, my current spec is:

Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor
Asrock Z68 Extreme4 Gen3 Intel Z68 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard
Corsair Builder Series CX 600W V2 '80 Plus' Certified Power Supply (CMPSU-600CXV2)
BitFenix Shinobi Gaming Case - Black
Kingston HyperX Genesis Grey 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX1600C9D3X2K2/8GX)
Corsair A50 High-Performance CPU Cooler (Socket AM2/AM3/LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366)
MSI GTX 980 Ti Twin Frozr 6G 6 GB Gaming Graphics Card
HDD is a combination of HDD/SSD, system was originally built when SSDs were expensive so I used to run a smaller SSD with OS and all games on a 1TB HDD; but now have a 500GB SSD and the 1TB HDD... I don't think this is much on an issue though.

Essentially, given the age of this, I am now of a mind to change the case (BitFenix Shinobi cases get some unpleasant stickiness on the 'soft touch' part), and downgrade it to a PC for my son to use for school work (oh, and maybe Minecraft...)

My issue is that I'd like any new PC to probably come in at around £1000 , is there either a strong candidate for something that would be a decent starting point and step-up from the above that can then aim to improve smaller parts of (RAM, etc) to ensure it'll still run games on reasonable settings? It's not like I play much cutting edge stuff (this build lasted me through Witcher 3, which was probably the last 'new' game I played), but it's good to have something that can handle more strenuous things (for example, I tried to play Kingdom Come: Deliverance on the above, and it was horrendous and even struggled on low settings).

Thanks

Bloodrayne · 11 Jul 2022 at 09:25

Excellent - thank you, I think I could stretch another couple of hundred to ensure I get a decent cooler and PSU (recommendations welcome!); but really useful to know that it's a good starting point.

Bloodrayne · 13 Jul 2022 at 19:53

@Joxeon - no issues with building myself, I did my current PC myself (well, actually it started as an Evesham computer, but then...), but I am older and time poor and it just seemed easier to start again with a pre-build and then tinker with that.

I'm more tied to Nvidia (have the Shield for TV streaming - which works well after the Steam Link started lagging horribly on the same connection) than Radeon though.

@Audioboxer

Whenever you're going to invest in a new system the core questions are what is my absolute budget and am I strict to it, what am I going to use my system for and how long do I hope this new build is going to last me. Answer those honestly and you can quite quickly suss out what you can likely aim for.

Good point - I'd say £1,200 tops for this, thought about upgrading what I had, realised I'd just need to build a new system and when I first had that thought graphics cards were gold dust... after another 10 months or so (I don't rush things it would seem) the market looks a bit better?

Anything would be an improvement on what I have, so it's just a case of pitching a nice PC that offers more performance, as well as the ability to upgrade without another massive over-haul in a few years time.

Bloodrayne · 14 Jul 2022 at 20:44

@Haz123 - excellent, thank you - I would think that if I went for a better motherboard (and took the cost hit) that would make future upgrades less of an ordeal as it would be a solid base to build on? That's the logic that used to work for me anyway... Also thanks for the GPU feedback, good to know!