Overwhelmed and need advice please on a new build

Ashes404 · Thursday at 14:30

Greetings everyone - I've used Overclockers maybe 11 years ago to build my old gaming PC, I used to be really techie and I built it myself.
Many years have passed, I'm old now haha and been gaming on a laptop foor the past 5 years or so since my old computer died.
I had such a great experience with Overclockers in the past, Id like to use them again and do a new build PC from scratch

I've watched the stickied videos in this thread on how to build a PC from scratch, but find myself a bit overwhelmed by the choices.
I would like it to be as much of a beast as possible for gaming, able to run things like Rust, Minecraft and Baldurs gate smoothly.
I also would like it to be upgradeable as time goes on if possible.
My budget is £1500-£2000

There's so many options for motherboard, graphics cards and CPU's. Trying to research and figure out which ones work well together is super difficult.
I looked at a prebuilt - the Refract gaming Jade model... The problem is once I look at reviews for the components themselves, lots of people saying they aren't good.
I also read that intel are having instability problems with 13th and 14th gen...

I was wondering if anyone could help me figure out a sort of basic baseline of a few options of motherboard, a few options of GPU and a few options of CPU along with any requirements such as (If you were to pick this one you would need a certain power supply/cooling)
It's really hard to know if what I'm selecting is good for the money, bad for the money, known for being unreliable or powerful etc....

I'm leaning towards maybe just buying a prebuilt -
Any issues with this one?

OcUK Gaming Mach 3 - Ryzen 5700X3D, RTX 4070 Super Pre-Built Gaming PC

Order OcUK Gaming Mach 3 - Ryzen 5700X3D, RTX 4070 Super Pre-Built Gaming PC now online and benefit from fast delivery.

www.overclockers.co.uk

Thank you in advance for any advice you folks can give! I appreciate your time

Gray2233 · Thursday at 15:15

Do you need peripherals (keyboard, mouse, monitor etc)?

If you have a monitor, what resolution and refresh rate does it have?

RT123 · Thursday at 15:17

With the budget, I’d be looking at doing an AM5 build (£1299 for an AM4 based build, even if it’s an X3D, isn’t a great deal)

I’d suggest waiting until we know more about the new GPU launches (both AMD and NVIDIA are announcing the new GPUs on the 6th/7th) - I’d also suggest going the request a custom build quote route from Overclockers if you don’t want to build (it’s what I’ve done, since I can’t build - it actually ended up cheaper than their prebuilt options)

As a general idea, something like a 4070Super or 7800XT requires a minimum of 750W PSU (though I would suggest an 850W PSU)

If you decide to wait, come back after the new GPUs have been announced and someone can help with a parts list.

The information Gray has asked for would be useful.

Ashes404 · Thursday at 15:18

Gray2233 said:
Do you need peripherals (keyboard, mouse, monitor etc)?

If you have a monitor, what resolution and refresh rate does it have?

I don't need peripherals. I have a gaming mouse, mechanical keyboard, and a nice monitor. I can always get another monitor with better refresh rate a bit further down the line.

Ashes404 · Thursday at 15:21

RT123 said:
With the budget, I’d be looking at doing an AM5 build (£1299 for an AM4 based build, even if it’s an X3D, isn’t a great deal)

I’d suggest waiting until we know more about the new GPU launches (both AMD and NVIDIA are announcing the new GPUs on the 6th/7th) - I’d also suggest going the request a custom build quote route from Overclockers if you don’t want to build (it’s what I’ve done, since I can’t build - it actually ended up cheaper than their prebuilt options)

As a general idea, something like a 4070Super or 7800XT requires a minimum of 750W PSU (though I would suggest an 850W PSU)

If you decide to wait, come back after the new GPUs have been announced and someone can help with a parts list.

The information Gray has asked for would be useful.

Thank you for your reply! I will perhaps wait until the new GPU launches. Will this bring down the price of previous gen ones?

Gray2233 · Thursday at 15:28

The 4070S and 7800XT cards would run fine on a good 650W PSU, 750 is recommended because people often buy cheap/poor quality power supplies. Nothing wrong with over-speccing the PSU a little however, especially in terms of longevity for future upgrades.

Here's a solid build example for gaming at 1440P in general titles:

My basket at OcUK:

1 x Asus TUF Gaming 850W 80 Plus Gold Power Supply (SKU: CA-060-AS) = £89.99
1 x AMD Ryzen 5 9600X Six Core 5.40GHz (Socket AM5) Processor - Retail (SKU: PRO-AMD-02677) = £229.99
1 x Corsair Vengeance RGB EXPO 32GB (2X16GB) DDR5 PC5-48000C36 6000MHz Dual Channel (SKU: MEM-CRS-00997) = £89.99
1 x WD Black SN770 2TB SSD M.2 2280 NVME PCI-E Gen4 Solid State Drive (WDS200T3X0E) (SKU: HD-58G-WD) = £104.99
1 x Asrock B650M PG Riptide (Socket AM5) DDR5 Micro-ATX Motherboard (SKU: MB-18Y-AK) = £154.99
1 x Aerocool Dryft Mini v2 Micro-ATX Case (SKU: CAS-AER-00607) = £54.99
1 x Sapphire Radeon RX 7900 XT Pulse 20GB GDDR6 PCI-Express Graphics Card (SKU: GX-3A7-SP) = £629.99
1 x Thermalright Aqua Elite 240 Black ARGB V3 All In One CPU Cooler (SKU: COO-TLR-03254) = £39.95

Total: £1,406.87 (includes delivery: £11.98)

You have a very healthy budget, I would suggest waiting for the new Nvidia cards launching this month. It's largely speculation at the moment, but the upcoming 5070 Ti looks like it could be a very interesting option and should come in safely within your budget.

A X3D chip would be better than the 9600X, but they're grossly over priced and difficult to find in stock right now.

Blinged it up a little, and went M-ATX as that's my personal preference. Obviously if you wanted something a bit less flashy or a larger case that's easily adjusted for.

MissChief · Thursday at 15:30

Gray2233 said:
The 4070S and 7800XT cards would run fine on a good 650W PSU, 750 is recommended because people often buy cheap/poor quality power supplies. Nothing wrong with over-speccing the PSU a little however, especially in terms of longevity for future upgrades.

Here's a solid build example for gaming at 1440P in general titles:

My basket at OcUK:

1 x Asus TUF Gaming 850W 80 Plus Gold Power Supply (SKU: CA-060-AS) = £89.99

1 x AMD Ryzen 5 9600X Six Core 5.40GHz (Socket AM5) Processor - Retail (SKU: PRO-AMD-02677) = £229.99

1 x Corsair Vengeance RGB EXPO 32GB (2X16GB) DDR5 PC5-48000C36 6000MHz Dual Channel (SKU: MEM-CRS-00997) = £89.99

1 x WD Black SN770 2TB SSD M.2 2280 NVME PCI-E Gen4 Solid State Drive (WDS200T3X0E) (SKU: HD-58G-WD) = £104.99

1 x Asrock B650M PG Riptide (Socket AM5) DDR5 Micro-ATX Motherboard (SKU: MB-18Y-AK) = £154.99

1 x Aerocool Dryft Mini v2 Micro-ATX Case (SKU: CAS-AER-00607) = £54.99

1 x Sapphire Radeon RX 7900 XT Pulse 20GB GDDR6 PCI-Express Graphics Card (SKU: GX-3A7-SP) = £629.99

1 x Thermalright Aqua Elite 240 Black ARGB V3 All In One CPU Cooler (SKU: COO-TLR-03254) = £39.95

Total: £1,406.87 (includes delivery: £11.98)

You have a very healthy budget, I would suggest waiting for the new Nvidia cards launching this month. It's largely speculation at the moment, but the upcoming 5070 Ti looks like it could be a very interesting option and should come in safely within your budget.

A X3D chip would be better than the 9600X, but they're grossly over priced and difficult to find in stock right now.

Blinged it up a little, and went M-ATX as that's my personal preference. Obviously if you wanted something a bit less flashy or a larger case that's easily adjusted for.

Solid build this.

Ashes404 · Thursday at 16:03

Thank you very much! I will take a look.

sx_turbo · Thursday at 16:07

Ashes404 said:
Thank you for your reply! I will perhaps wait until the new GPU launches. Will this bring down the price of previous gen ones?

Unlikely, Nvidia will release small quantities of new chips to get rid of old stock and keep the prices at a suitable level.

AMD have already discounted and will likely not go too much less if the last gen is anything to go by.

But the new prices might be similar to current prices so may be worth waiting for the new chip release

Ashes404 · Thursday at 16:13

Oh, I see! So it's not that the old gen will be cheaper particularly, but that the new gen will be better hardware for a similar price, at least initially?
I'll keep an eye out for the 5070 Ti

sx_turbo · Thursday at 16:18

Ashes404 said:
Oh, I see! So it's not that the old gen will be cheaper particularly, but that the new gen will be better hardware for a similar price, at least initially?
I'll keep an eye out for the 5070 Ti

Yeah there will be a small premium. Also they tend to release in stages, traditionally the 90 card is first out the blocks, it could be upto 6 months for the next card to be released, depending on stock levels of the old cards

Ashes404 · Thursday at 23:41

I bought a PC!

Asus TUF Gaming 850W 80 Plus Gold Power Supply	£74.99	1	£74.99
Corsair Vengeance RGB EXPO 32GB (2X16GB) DDR5 PC5-48000C36 6000MHz Dual Channel	£74.99	1	£74.99
WD Black SN770 2TB SSD M.2 2280 NVME PCI-E Gen4 Solid State Drive (WDS200T3X0E)	£87.49	1	£87.49
Asrock B650M PG Riptide (Socket AM5) DDR5 Micro-ATX Motherboard	£129.16	1	£129.16
Aerocool Dryft v2 Midi-Tower ATX Case	£49.99	1	£49.99
Sapphire Radeon RX 7900 XT Pulse 20GB GDDR6 PCI-Express Graphics Card	£524.99	1	£524.99
Thermalright Aqua Elite 240 Black ARGB V3 All In One CPU Cooler	£33.29	1	£33.29
AMD Ryzen 5 7600X Six Core 5.30GHz (Socket AM5) Processor - Retail	£157.49	1	£157.49

Ashes404 · Thursday at 23:42

Kind of impulsive I know, but I figured I can always upgrade it down the line when the new cards have been out a while! Thank you so much for your build advice. After researching all of the parts, I was really happy with all of them

Ashes404 · Thursday at 23:51

Given the specs above, could you guys maybe recommend a good monitor to get the most out of my new hardware?

MissChief · Friday at 00:10

Ashes404 said:
Given the specs above, could you guys maybe recommend a good monitor to get the most out of my new hardware?

A High Refresh 1440p or Ultrawide will be perfect. The Alienware AW3423DW OLED would be perfect (OCUK don't sell it), or https://www.overclockers.co.uk/msi-...s-a-sync-e2-gaming-monitor-mon-msi-02659.html but if that's too rich, https://www.overclockers.co.uk/cool...165hz-freesync-mini-led-hdr-wi-mo-005-cm.html

Gray2233 · Friday at 14:30

The PHILIPS Evnia 34M2C6500-34 (OLED) can frequently be had for under £500 and is a fantastic option if you get on with ultrawide screens.

There's also the AOC Agon PRO AG346UCD-34 inch OLED for around the same price, which I believe uses the same panel.

One thing to note about these OLED panels, they require you to cycle your screen (aka more or less turning it off and on again) every 4 hours and will remind you about it, the reason being is to prevent burn in damage. Some can find that annoying, personally it doesn't bother me and setting up sleep settings in Windows for when you're away from the PC takes a few minutes if that's a concern.

The image quality and extra real estate in width is game changing in my opinion, properly utilised HDR can make a massive difference in games and that really shines with OLED monitors.