New Gaming PC

Hello again! Now that I have my son’s Chromebook taken care of within the next month or so I’d like to get a good gaming PC. Is it even possible with all the chip shortages? I built my last PC, which I’ve had for a long time with one motherboard / CPU upgrade and 2 video card upgrades. My current PC is an Intel Core i7 6700K, NVidia GTX 1070, 16 GB RAM.

What is a good purchase these days? I don’t need top of the line everything, but I do want something a big step up from what I have that will hopefully get me many years of great gaming. I play a lot of genres, including demanding first and 3rd person games.

I prefer something out of the box, but if I need to a will buy the components separately. If I could keep it under $1500 that would be preferable, but if I need to spend a bit more to get something quite a bit better I will.

Suggestions? Thanks!

It is indeed possible, starting early August I was able to get every part I needed to build my own, waited for the GPU first then the remainder. I am sure ready built systems are going to be more available as school starts soon.

If possible I’d aim for system with a RTX 3070 or better to last you a few years.

You might be ok just sticking a more modern GPU in there and leaving everything else. 6700 is not new but it’s not ancient. What res will you be looking at…?

Right now I have a 1080 monitor, but upgrading isn’t out of the question.

If I get a good bump in performance by getting a new system I’m up for that. My wife or son will probably inherit my current pc,

Upgrading the GPU will provide the biggest bump , but then you go down the rabbit hole of is your PSU strong enough for a current gen card, and is 16 GB of ram you have enough, if not can you find compatible ram to add to the existing system.

Also anything higher than a RTX 3070 would start to get bottlenecked by the older cpu.

Newegg have their ABS range…

If you’re staying at 1080, I would think much above a 1660 would be overkill. 3060 and 3070 are great cards though. You’ll certainly notice a bump from a 1070 :)

Definitely pay a premium on Alienware stuff. Yikes!

This isn’t bad at $1400. The mobile 3070 is basically the same as a desktop 3060ti or desktop 2080 Super. A capable 1440p gaming GPU, maybe up to 4k with DLSS. And it just so happens to be roughly equivalent to modern console GPUs so you’ll get a couple years of usage out of it.

https://store.acer.com/en-us/nitro-5-gaming-laptop-an515-45-r9fu

At NZXT BLD I just put together a desktop with a 5600X, 16GB DDR4-3600, 512GB NVMe SSD, and a 3060ti for $1904 plus tax and shipping. So that’s a $500 premium and it’s a desktop so you don’t get a monitor, keyboard, trackpad, display, or built-in UPS. Also 2 fewer CPU cores.

How much do you think you saved building vs getting prebuilt? Plus you get the exact parts you want so I get that is a perk too. Wanna share your build?

Do you know if they have a good reputation?

Are they a good company? I don’t keep up on this stuff. I’m thinking I’m going to need to up my budget if I can.

What specs should I make sure I hit: CPU, video card, amount of RAM, etc…?
I have always gotten Intel, but its mainly out of habit because decades ago I remember AMD sometimes had compatibility problems.

LordKosc said I should try for a RTX 3070. For a CPU I see there is also a core i9 now. Overkill? core i5 plenty? I’m at an i7 now. I guess AMD is also an option. Is 16 GB still good enough? I was thinking I’d need to go up to 32 by now.

NZXT BLD is fine, yes. But that’s $500 more than the laptop I linked and it won’t be any faster.

You only need a 3070 if you want to game at 1440p 120+ FPS or 4k60. The 3060ti is fine for 1440p gaming in general-- it’s basically a 2080 Super.

You want a 6 core CPU with SMT minimum. Core i5 is fine, in fact core i3 is fine. 16GB RAM is fine.

I saved $1072.32 in parts costs due to below MSRP deals and credit card rewards. And my time and labor was free an additional $1 million dollar savings. I’ll PM you the details. More of my build journey is documented here in the thread I hijacked. :P

So, after 10 good years I think it might finally be time to retire my gaming PC and buy a new one. I’d like to stop playing Old World on minimal settings, and treat myself to a medium-settings or even a high-settings game.

What’s the current state of the art in terms of buying a PC? Should I just go to NewEgg and pick something reasonable from them? Are we still in this situation where graphics cards are in short supply, and if so is that likely to change in the next few months or is that just the situation for years going forward? I’m hoping to spend $2K-$3K, give or take, more or less.

Thank you in advance for your wisdom.

So just upgrading the graphics card then?

(I’ve been wanting to replace my 10-year-old rig for a while now, but the prices won’t cooperate.)

This seems like a relatively good deal.

It is indeed. Add some RAM and a SSD yourself and you’re GTG.

Would you recommend something like this or try to put together my own? How long do you think it would take to land a GTX 3080 card on it’s own? Does Dell / Alienware still use proprietary motherboards and stuff or is it stock stuff that can be purchased retail?

My current monitor is 1080P, how much would it cost to land a good 1440 or 4K monitor?

Just for comparison purposes, a 3080 alone is often selling for $1800 these days (which is utterly bonkers) and getting your hands on one through regular means can/will take months.

If you could buy the GPU at MSRP I would say build your own, but that is a very difficult proposition. They aren’t retail boards but I believe they are standard form factors.

For a 1440p 27" gaming monitor, Gigabyte M27Q is around $300.

I’d only get one at ‘normal’ prices through a standard retailer like Amazon, Best Buy, New Egg, etc…

Would you go 1440 or 4K? Big price difference?

Well I would go 4k, but the monitor I’m waiting for doesn’t exist yet. When they release a 4k 32" VRR IPS/OLED monitor with HDR600+ support for <$1000, I’ll buy one.