I suppose we can leave out Windows 11 since we'll put SteamOS on it.

edit: bonus points for no microcenter

here's some of the builds people posted (ai summary, my apologies if it messed up, but it at least gives a good description of the parts that are used)

Budget Ryzen 5500 / RX 7600 Build

• Author: Brunark
• Link: pcpartpicker.com/list/cHfYNp
• CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 5500
• GPU: ASRock Challenger OC Radeon RX 7600 8 GB
• Memory: 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3200
• Storage: 512 GB NVMe SSD
• Cost: $827.73

Mid-Range i5-12400F / RX 9060 XT Build

• Author: shaniril
• Link: pcpartpicker.com/list/7b3fyF
• CPU: Intel Core i5-12400F
• GPU: Gigabyte GAMING OC Radeon RX 9060 XT 8 GB
• Memory: 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3200
• Storage: 1 TB NVMe SSD
• Cost: $1,007.02

Ryzen 7500X3D / RX 9070 Build

• Author: CreepinCreepy
• Link: pcpartpicker.com/list/GBBQPf
• CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 7500X3D
• GPU: ASRock Challenger Radeon RX 9070 16 GB
• Memory: 16 GB (1 x 16 GB) DDR5-6000
• Storage: 512 GB NVMe SSD
• Cost: $1,060.84

High-End Ryzen 9600X / RX 9060 XT Build

• Author: MK2396E
• Link: pcpartpicker.com/list/rXPbLy
• CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 9600X
• GPU: ASRock Challenger OC Radeon RX 9060 XT 16 GB
• Memory: 24 GB DDR5-7200
• Storage: 1 TB NVMe SSD
• Cost: $1,450.60

Intel Ultra 5 / RTX 5050 Build

• Author: ArchusKanzaki
• Link: pcpartpicker.com/list/twh6Dw
• CPU: Intel Core Ultra 5 225F
• GPU: Gigabyte WINDFORCE OC GeForce RTX 5050 8 GB (*steamos doesnt support nvidia yet)
• Memory: 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR5-6000
• Storage: 512 GB NVMe SSD
• Cost: $1,071.91

I’ve had my 3080 Ti for a long time now and I keep thinking about upgrading, but every time I look at what it would cost I just can’t justify it.

I play at 4K on a 55 inch OLED and the card still does fine. Obviously a 5080 would be faster, but then I start looking at the price of the card and whether I should just do a whole new build, and suddenly I’m spending a few thousand dollars to make games that already run pretty well run better. I was looking at a $2800 system recently and almost talked myself into it, then backed off.

I know the 3080 Ti is old at this point, but it still feels like one of those cards where if you already own it, upgrading is harder to justify than the benchmarks make it look. I’ll replace it eventually, but right now it still feels good enough.

Hey everyone,

I've been half my life wanting to build a PC, but I never had the budget. This year I got my first job and the plan was simple: move to a more stable place in 2026 and finally build my first gaming PC. But the universe said NOPE. RAM prices absolutely skyrocketed out of nowhere and now I'm not sure about what to do.

Should I wait and hope prices drop again? Should I just accept that the extra cost is the new normal?

Any advice would be really appreciated. Thanks!

I’m seeing 4090’s going for $2000 and 5090’s at like $2500…

I know AI BS but wouldn’t that affect the 24gb 3090 and 3090 ti as well?

Edit/Update: Ok this blew the fuck up…

I knew the answer probably had to do with AI but not why when the 5090 exists.

Also should out to the guy who said “Supply and demand” like I’m not literally asking where the demand is coming from…

Well the main answer I had to get from GamersNexus… the price of all 5000 series GPU’s is trending down slightly, ACCEPT for the 5090, which is actually up, and over $3300 now… this explains why a used 4090 is still $2000 as that is actually a better price to performance value.

So AI etc is driving the price of the 5090 way up making the 4090 the next best thing.

Others in here have stated that the 4090 can either be brought into China legally now where the 5090 can’t and/or is being brought in illegally as you can modify them to use 48gb of VRAM, something that can’t be done to the 5090 or hasn’t been figured out yet.

Quick recap: my Asus STRIX RTX 4090 (24GB) had a vapor chamber failure. ASUS and the retailer acknowledged it was a hidden defect. The 4090 is out of production/stock, so I went to Turkey's consumer arbitration board and got a court ruling for replacement with a defect-free equivalent.

It's been more than 9 months since i initially sent my card to the RMA service center and nine months in, this is ASUS's latest answer: a refund, or one of three RTX 5080 16GB models.

• PROART-RTX5080-O16G
• TUF-RTX5080-O16G-GAMING
• PRIME-RTX5080-O16G

The refund is the original invoice amount from 2024. Using Turkey's official inflation calculator, that money is worth less than half of what I actually paid. (not even counting the overall GPU price increases that we saw during the last 2 years, thanks to AI)

So I'm asking honestly: is a 16GB 5080 an equivalent replacement for a 24GB STRIX 4090? I use the card for local AI models and CUDA rendering, where VRAM is very important. As far as I can tell the 4090 beats the 5080 on VRAM, raw performance and compute. The only current card at or above 24GB is the 5090, which they won't offer.

I'm not here to discuss my experience with them against rule 7, i'm solely asking a hardware question, should i take the 5080 against a 4090, is it worse all across the board or have some merits to it?

New to PCs, coming from consoles where I can expect 5-6 years before the next gen

I have a 5070 ti / 7800x3d / 32gb DDR5 RAM build. How
long will this spec last realistically before I will need to upgrade it?

I’m hoping longer than 5-6 years considering how things are going today + it’s still 4x the cost to build over console.

Putting aside that she was talked down to about her purchase. Can we talk about thermal paste for a minute?

I really don't think the claim of every 6 months is accurate or reasonable. I maybe blow out all the dust from my PC 2 times a year, but with that idea my schedule should also include thermal paste.

I'm not anywhere close to knowledgeable regarding PC builds so maybe I'm wrong but how crazy is this?

I try to give people credit though which is why I'm bringing it up.

Obviously heat is something that everyone is trying to get rid of and building efficiencies into your system has a compounding return. But if someone were to actually change the paste every 6 months, what kind of return would that get you?

In my HTPC im running a 13 year old 125W CPU that cranks out the heat vs modern equivalents. It's a "new to me" system and Is the reason I was buying thermal paste as it needed it as part of my complete disassemble and clean. Obviously I can't see how good of a job I on my reapplication but I would have expected that to last a few years at least if I managed my heat in other more traditional ways.

Idk. There's lots of reasons to maybe do this.

I know I'm not going to be changing the paste anywhere near that often.

Just got curious about this because I see many posts of people asking something along the lines of “can this build get me 1440p 60fps?”

I’ve been PC gaming for 10 years now and I can honestly say that 60fps is not enough for me. Obviously people have different preferences but I will sacrifice graphic quality in almost any game to get 100+fps. To me the difference is substantially noticeable. And luckily most games these days still look great at lower quality settings.

What’s everyone’s performance/quality preference?

I’m fairly new to PC building and I’m curious how long a solid build can realistically last before you start feeling the need to upgrade.

I’m currently considering something around a RTX 5070 Ti, Ryzen 7 7800X3D and 32GB DDR5. My main use would be gaming, and I’m not expecting it to run every future game at max settings forever.

I’d be happy lowering settings over the years as long as games still run well and the PC doesn’t start feeling outdated too quickly.

For those who have had a similar level of build, how long did it take before you actually upgraded something major?

I’d be more interested in your actual experience than the typical “upgrade every 2–3 years” advice.

After years of putting money into savings, I thought I finally had enough for something high end. I had around 1500$ saved up for the build, and was expecting most of it to be going towards the GPU. Little did I know what was happening to ram. Seriously, what the fuck?? It’s costing nearly as much as the gpu itself.. and my dream build is suddenly 500 dollars more expensive. Is there anything we can do?? I keep trying to find anything discounted, but it’s like the second I find a solid deal it’s gone within no less than a minute. This is both a rant and a question, because I genuinely don’t know what to do. I spent so much time saving up thinking that I’d finally get something high end, but that doesn’t seem possible. Is there anyone else in a similar situation? I’m not sure what to do at this point, just bite the bullet and buy the older gen ddr4 ram? the problem is if I do that I'd have to buy an AM4 motherboard, and then I'm locked out of the newer gen CPUs...

For the last couple months I’ve had it in my head that my GPU needs replacing. I kept watching benchmarks, checking prices, comparing cards and convincing myself that my PC was getting old. But when i think of it i only play games like minecraft, roblox and my prize games like this and yeah... I felt like an idiot lol. Most of my time has been spent on games my current GPU barely breaks a sweat running. The handful of newer games I play are still perfectly fine too. I’d somehow gone from “a new GPU would be nice” to “I NEED a new GPU” without there being a problem to fix.

I think I'm gonna get rid of my Corsair AIO and go back to air.

I feel like my old air cooler actually performed better, was quieter, and yet still gave off less ambient heat (I haven't actually measured this but just going by how my room feels).

Plus I'm so sick of this Corsair iCUE software.

Anyone else ditch the liquid for air?

I think I am keeping my PC with 16GB DDR4 RAM much much longer than expected. Anyone else delaying a new build?

Hey all,

First world problem coming in hot. In all seriousness though not looking for hate or negative comments just genuine advice and feedback.

So for some context I’ve been refreshing my setup I started by getting a 9800X3D CPU I got at a discount then upgraded my oled monitor from an Alienware AW 3423DWF to an MSI MAG 341CQP X28 both monitors are ultra wide 3440x1440 QD oled but the new MSI one is a more up to date panel with serious QOL improvements for me.

Afterwards I kind of just said fuck it and grabbed a 5080. 5080 cost a total of 1735 at micro center it was 1450 before tax. Due to some clearance issues with my mATX build the PSU and GPU were getting in the way of each other so I had to order a new SFX PSU but for some reason it took some time to get here.

Finally had a chance to slot in the 5080 and play some games but to be honest idk I feel like the upgrade just wasn’t worth it in the end. My 3080Ti can already ray trace reasonably well, it can path trace if I really wanted it to as well. All it really unlocks is better RT and PT but it just felt kind of mid. It unlocks more playable 4K gaming but the 3080Ti does fine with some reduced settings and I also hardly even game at 4K

The price wasn’t really the issue it was within my means despite being super overpriced but I guess that time between not being able to use it due to needing a new PSU was enough for the hype of the upgrade to die down and when I got around to playing some games it kind of made me realize the amount I overpaid by wasn’t really worth the performance gain and it definitely felt like an early upgrade.

I thought about the 5070ti since the 5080 is still within the return window but that one wasn’t appealing either it’s still over a thousand dollars for less of a performance bump.

Ironically the only GPU that would make sense is a 9070XT despite not being a good performance uplift I do use Linux and I’ve used it for the past 2 years so it’ll at least make my Linux experience basically friction free.

Also because some might ask, the underwhelming performance wasn’t due to using Nvidia on Linux. I dual boot windows and ran it there since there are quirks with Nvidia in Linux like DX12 performance bugs

I’ve been saving for months to get the Corsair dominator 64GB CL30 kit. It was about $280 when I looked. Fast forward today on pcpartpicker, they want $547 for the same kit? A nearly 100% increase in a couple months????

It feels like regardless of whether it's a £1000 AM4, every dollar matters build or a no holds barred rocket sled, half the posts recommend ditching whatever cooler the poster has chosen for a Thermalright Phantom spirit/peerless assassin. I get that it's an excellent air cooler for the money - so good, in fact that it's hard to recommend anything else in it's price category.

And there's plenty of completely legitimate reasons to use an air cooler - they're cheaper, significantly easier to mount, and have fewer points of failure - worst comes to worst, you've got a massive block of aluminium and copper strapped to the processor even if the fan kicks the bucket, and it's not going to leak. When building PCs for other people, I will often recommend an air cooler if I know they're likely to be lax with maintenance.

However, many posts claim that it cools as well as as an AIO. It doesn't. Even a 240mm radiator will have significantly lower full load temps, and quieter operation. A 360mm isn't even close. There's also the benefit that you can actually access your motherboard - those dual towers in particular block access to almost everything, and have a habit of fouling the RAM.

For someone rocking a high end build, where absolute bang for buck starts to lose ground to aesthetics, noise or raw performance, I would absolutely recommend a AIO, and I'm surprised I don't see it more. I use an AIO for both my 5800X3D and 9800X3D - in fact, I replaced a Be Quiet Dark Rock 4 Pro with a Pure Loop 2 when I swapped out from a 2700X as it just could not handle the 5800X3D at temps I was comfortable with even with an undervolt.

Hey guys and girls,

i've made the grave mistake by building a pc now. i have everything except the RAM. i need ddr5 and as far as you know... well you know. (there is now ram)

What should i do? Wait with a half finished pc or return everything.. is there a possibelity to get some ram?

I know it is talked a lot about, but I wanted some insights, becaus im really sad about it

UPDATE:

After long thinking i bought 2*16 GB (Well, rather i found some. In Germany its not that easy). It arrived and im more than happy. Thanks for all your input!

I was refreshing like a mofo, and never even got it to say "add to cart." jumped from "notify me" to "out_of_stock."

I want to build one eventually when I have the money, but I’m afraid I’ll destroy something even with a tutorial haha. I have the basic knowledge such as “this part is a CPU, this is a GPU, their function is this, etc.” but even then I’m afraid I’ll fry something. Forums like this make it look so easy though! Where did you learn to build them so flawlessly?

I'm not an "Intel fanboy". I'm not an "AMD fanboy". I'm a fanboy of my bank balance. People, none of these companies care about you; they care about their profits and their stakeholders.

Now on to the topic. YES, Ryzen is an EXCELLENT platform. It really is, and it really has brought the competition that benefits the end user. But this does NOT mean we should be saying "oh there's like no competition, Ryzen is better value hands down". This is NOT true.

The 3600 vs 10400 vs 10400F is an excellent mid-range example of this.

If I posted on this subreddit and asked for a mid-range build, most people would recommend a Ryzen 3600; and that's great! It really is an excellent value CPU. But what people fail to realise is that so is the i5 10400F. Both are 6/12 CPUs and both offer VERY similar gaming performance, indistinguishable to the to the end user if you played a few games using both CPUs.

The problem with recommending only a 3600, and not pointing out that the 10400F has very similar performance, is that people will not even bother checking the price of a 10400/10400F. If the 10400F is cheaper than the 3600, why would you not get it?

Sincerely, from someone whose friend bought a 3600 over a 10400 for video editing on Adobe Premiere Pro because "AMD is better for productivity". For those who are unaware Adobe Premiere Pro greatly benefits from Intel QSV in both timeline scrubbing and rendering times. A 10400 will destroy a 10400F and a 3600 in Premiere Pro (with HW acceleration ofc). Worst part is, the 10400 was on sale on $299AUD where I live, compared to the Ryzen 3600 costing the normal $349AUD.

Edit: number of downvotes really speaks for how much people don't like listening to logic and sticking with the AMD good Intel bad mentality.

Edit 2: Wow this blew up

Edit 3: Yes if the Ryzen 3600 is cheaper than the 10400F, then get that! That's my point, they both perform the same, get whichever is cheaper.

Edit 4: I'm honoured my gold award cherry has been finally popped

I’m seeing so many posts about getting a 3090 for gaming. Do some more research on the card or at least wait until benchmarks are out until you make your decision. You’re paying over twice the price of a 3080 for essentially 14GB more VRAM which does not always lead to higher frame rates. Is the 3090 better than the 3080? Yes. Is the 3090 worth $800 more than the 3080 for gaming? No. You especially don’t need a 3090 if you’re asking if your CPU or PSU is good enough. Put the $800 you’ll save by getting a 3080 elsewhere in your build, such as your monitor so you can actually enjoy the full potential of the card.

Maybe I’m just getting old but I don’t understand how $1k+ GPU are selling like hotcakes. Has the market just moved this much that people are easily paying $2k+ on a system every couple of years?

So, I'm giving my cousin the pc I'm using for free since I'm buying a new one. But now they met this guy who says my PC is bad and to buy a new one from him but like I'm giving it to him for free why waste money when all he is going to play is Minecraft and roblox.

My PC:

• CPU: Intel Core I7 10700K
• Motherboard: MSI MPG Z490 ATX
• GPU: RTX 2070
• RAM: Corsair Vengeance RGB Pro 16 GB DDR4 3200 MHZ
• PSU: Corsair RM750x
• 5 Corsair Fans
• AIO: Corsair Hydro Series H150i

The only thing he has to buy is the case and the monitor. Now, my uncles are accusing me of trying to give him a bad computer because some guy said the PC I'm giving him is trash but like I think is enough for a 13 year old. He only says roblox, south park, and Minecraft. Literally only that. That PC should be good enough for 1080p.

There is no component today that will provide "future-proofing" to your PC.

No component in today's market will be of any relevance 5 years from now, safe the graphics card that might maybe be on par with low-end cards from 5 years in the future.

Build a PC with components that satisfy your current needs, and be open to upgrades down the road. That's the good part about having a custom build: you can upgrade it as you go, and only spend for the single hardware piece you need an upgrade for

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edit: yeah it's cool that the PC you built 5 years ago for 2500$ is "still great" because it runs like 800$ machines with current hardware.

You could've built the PC you needed back then, and have enough money left to build a new one today, or you could've used that money to gradually upgrade pieces and have an up-to-date machine, that's my point