Help Choosing a Pre-built Gaming PC Please

Hey friends, it looks like one of my hard drives – the one with the games in it – might be close to failing. Win7 has given me some disk failure alerts, and it’s acting slow, even though Disk Management says it’s healthy. I’m gonna scan it for errors, but if it is failing, the PC itself is so old, it’s not worth replacing.

So I might be in the market for a new PC sooner than I expected. I want a pre-built one this time, so I’m hoping you guys can help me choose one from a reputable company.

I have a budget of around $3,000, and am hoping for something that will both support VR and last several years before needing to be replaced.

Might y’all have any recommendations as to what I should be looking for in terms of CPU, GPU, motherboard and so on?

Thanks in advance for your help.

Not sure who’s good for prebuilt. For thinking about individual components, this kind of thing might be in the right ballpark. Nvidia are also due to announce their next cards shortly… What resolution are you thinking of?

Just 1080 at the moment, I can update my monitor later.

Definitely wait for the GTX1180/2080 wtf its called, in like 2-3 weeks.

I hope I can.

I bought a system from ibuypower in 2011 and it’s still kicking. Now I just use it for recording, streaming and other random nerd stuff.

The system I replaced it with is from CyberPower and I’m actually quite happy with it. The wiring was done well, it was reasonably fast and it might be a weird thing to be happy with, but they also actually managed to set the ram speed appropriately in the bios. I like that, since it’s an easy thing to screw up and I didn’t have to fix it.

With the sale they had at the time I saved some money and was able to get a free m.2 drive for my boot drive. We’ll see how it goes long term, but so far I’m very pleased.

If you happen to live within driving distance of a Microcenter, I’d advise getting them to build one to your specs. I’ve been very happy with them.

I think you’d be hard pressed to spend close to 3k on something to game at 1080 on. I think you could spend quite a bit less and put the money towards your eventual next monitor or VR setup? Even with some GPU future-proofing you should have plenty left over IMO.

I’m sorry, but I have to admit to being confused. What’s wrong with 1080?

I basically wanna buy a beefy computer that I won’t have to upgrade for a while, but am happy with my monitor for now, so I’d rather spend the money on the machine.

Does that make sense or am I being silly?

Nothing wrong with it at all. Some of the high end stuff coming out will drive 4k though.

There’s no need to spend anywhere near $3k. Like, maybe half that. Any more gets you into such minimal gains for your dollar that it’s not worth it.

And if you are near Microcenter, I’d also recommend their PowerSpec series as a viable prebuilt option. I would personally look at something like the G351 but you may want the G461 (assuming you can’t wait for the nVidia refresh)

My vote is also for iBuyPower. I got mine in 2010, and except for memory, and SSD and a graphics cards, mine is still going.

Also, I vote against trying to future proof your machine too much. Just save your money and buy the stuff when you need it later on for less.

I’m sadly not near a Microcenter.

So basically I don’t have a ton of room for a larger monitor, the 27 inch I have takes up most of the desk. Would it be worth it then to get a similarly sized monitor at a higher resolution?

Under your circumstances, I would totally go the Stusserbeast route:

Buy a nicely-specced Dell (or some other good off-the-shelf brand name).
Install your current video card, and maybe a nice PSU.
Then, when the new video cards come out, grab a nice one.

With your budget, you could also then buy a nice 1440p or 4K 27" monitor, and I’ll bet you’ll still be well beneath $3,000.

My current video card is a GTX 770.

I’ve bought at least half a dozen dell systems for family in the past ten years and I’m pretty sure I’m just done with them. Their services are ok, but they cut corners like a drunk surgeon and I’m tired of random shit of theirs breaking.

The two other pre-built places I’ve gotten my last two use real off the shelf parts that you can choose and if something goes tits up I can just replace it and know it will work.

It’s only temporary, until the new video cards come out in a few months.
Or, possibly a good off-the-shelf unit will come with a good enough video card that will hold you over until the new crop of video cards is released.

Either way, the idea is that you need a new machine right now, but the new vid cards will be coming soon, but not yet, so my solution would be to hold you over until then.

Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Yeah, I edited my post to include other brands, because I remember reading something to that effect here on Qt3 before.
Although the 2 rigs I bought previous to my current one were both Dell-based StusserBeasts, and I had no problems with them, it’s entirely possible I was just lucky. The last one I did that way was bought in 2009 or 2010.

My current rig is also sort-of-Dell though, and I’m extremely pleased with it. It’s an Alienware Aurora R5 that I picked up about two years ago for $1,500, and I didn’t need to upgrade anything. It came set up for gaming, and performs wonderfully. Came with a 1070.

I’d recommend something like that (or some other brand), but it would kind of be a waste if a person is going to end up just replacing the video card with a brand new one in a few months. That’s why I recommended getting a new machine without a video card, installing his old one temporarily, and then getting the latest thing whenever they come out.

I have an Auroa R6 that is running great. Used to build them back in the day, but can’t be bothered now.