Very basic questions around future desktop purchase
Looking for advice please on a few items around a gaming platform I’ll be purchasing soon. My current configuration is an HP laptop purchased in 2014, HDD storage. Basically a toaster. Even graphics-light games must be played on the lowest settings any my FPS stays embarrassing low. Internet bandwidth is not the problem. A few of the possibly more demanding games I am looking to play smoothly include New World Aeternum and the Final Fantasy series. All my gaming is MMORPGs. Viewing at 1080p would be nice, not looking for more than that.
I’m leaning more to an AMD chipset over Intel but not sure if I really need a Ryzen 7 series or Ryzen 9 series.
I’m leaning more to AMD Radeon but not sure if I need 8GB or 16GB.
As far as system RAM, I am leaning more toward 64GB vs. 32GB under the more is better logic. But not sure if it’s really worth it.
I know things may be more complicated than these basic questions, but just looking to narrow down options at this point. My overall budget for the new desktop is around $2,500, not including a monitor. Thanks for any advice.
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Showing 1-15 of 24 comments
64gb RAM is unnecessary for gaming.

Most people will agree 8gb VRAM is not enough anymore.
Do not purchase a desktop, build one. :csd2smile:
Don`t need Ryzen 9 for gaming unless you want to do some video editing or other work on the side too. 32 GB RAM is enough for gaming, again unless you want to do some editing too.
Definitely 16 GB VRAM graphics card.
Something like this:

https://pcpartpicker.com/list/vV6PqH

It will run pretty much anything fine on 1440p so not much point getting the 1080p monitor.
DevaVictrix 2 Aug @ 12:57pm 
As per the first two comments, 32gb is plently, 16gb vram is the better choice and build your own.

Depending on which cpus you are looking at I'd go with a Ryzen 7 because it will be cheaper and plenty capable.
Last edited by DevaVictrix; 2 Aug @ 12:59pm
Originally posted by Phénomènes Mystiques:
Do not purchase a desktop, build one. :csd2smile:
+1 it is not hard at all. You can watch a YouTube video as you go if needed.
_I_ 2 Aug @ 1:17pm 
Originally posted by Phénomènes Mystiques:
Do not purchase a desktop, build one. :csd2smile:
not exactly

cheap, gaming, prebuild
pick 2

at $2500 you can get a good prebuild for gaming

are you near a microcenter?
https://www.microcenter.com/site/stores/default.aspx

if not, something like this is shippable
https://www.microcenter.com/product/692344/msi-aegis-zs2-c7nvp-1446us-gaming-pc
AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D (4.2GHz) Processor
32GB DDR5-6000 RAM
NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070 Ti Graphics Card
$2200+tax

and at $120 you can get a nice 1080p display
https://pcpartpicker.com/products/monitor/#r=192001080&D=165000,600000&G=10000000000,1000000000000&F=558800000,635000000&sort=price&A=4,3,6
16 GB regular ram is still sufficient for most purposes, IMO.
16 GB should be the minimum for vram.
Ryzen 7 or 9 are both great. It depends on your budget and case cooling setup.

I still prefer mid-tower ATX cases, but I wouldn't try to cool a Ryzen 9 in one. Air coolers are too tall nowadays, and I don't know if midtowers have places for AIO radiators.

It's a good time to start learning Linux, so don't bother buying a Windows licence.
Last edited by Electric Cupcake; 2 Aug @ 1:57pm
A lot of these choices depend entirely on your budget, care to share it?

Edit.

Sorry I missed the final line where you gave the budget.
Last edited by DefinitelyNotMonk; 2 Aug @ 5:23pm
pasa 2 Aug @ 2:25pm 
AMD is good choice. You definitely don't need R9. Most likely you don't even need R7, as 6-core R5 is more than good. Especially as lately there are X3D versions or will be soon.

8G VRAM is seriously frawned on these days. Certainly considering that you could go 11 years on low settings, any current entry card will be much better -- but that is the area I would not try to save 50 bucks. Especially as it does not just impact textures but the overall performance. On compares 8G version of the same card has regular drops that can aanifest in microshatters. And if you look for another decade with the new rig why trim it right on.

The radeon looks better bang per buck unless you look for raytracing. but beyond that general statement there are too many options and variants and significant differences by games.

Ram is now available in 24G modules so you can go for 48 too. For just games 32 is well enough for most and 64 is excessive. However keep in mind that while most mobos have 4 ram slots, 4-stick configs tend not to work or restrict to low speeds. except very specific modules, if you plan for such upgrade look at mem compatibility list right ahead.

On YT many channels show good gaming builds for different budgets with options to extend.
_I_ 2 Aug @ 2:30pm 
Originally posted by DefinitelyNotMonk:
A lot of these choices depend entirely on your budget, care to share it?


Originally posted by steve.stadelman:
My overall budget for the new desktop is around $2,500, not including a monitor. Thanks for any advice.
You shouldn't need 64 GB of RAM. That being said, adding more DIMMs to current DDR5 platforms will result in needing to drop the RAM speed. The good thing is, this doesn't impact the performance of X3D CPUs as much as it does others, but you could go for 48 GB (2x 24 GB) if you want to have extra. But RAM is cheap so it's not like going with 64 GB would be excessively wasteful anymore. Just be aware that you probably won't need it any time soon.

If MMOs are your prime concern, I'd get a Ryzen 7 X3D CPU of some sort. MMOs are CPU bound and most of them get large boosts from the extra cache. If you end up building (this isn't me saying you should), the 7800X3D has come down in price a lot, so while the 9800X3D is the fastest CPU right now, the 7800X3D is a bit better of a value.

Ryzen 9s should be avoided if all you're doing is gaming (or general desktop stuff). The advantage of Ryzen 9s is more cores, but games don't need that amount of cores right now. Unlike with RAM, the extra cores (at least with Ryzen) can be a performance deficit if you don't need them. This is because Ryzen 9s have their cores spread across different CCDs (different physical chips) and communication incurs latency penalties, which means... lost performance in "real time" applications like games. But that latency cost doesn't matter as much in stuff like rendering or infinitely parallel productivity stuff where the gain from the extra cores is much higher. In other words, unless you NEED the extra cores for that sort of workload, a Ryzen 9 is a poorer choice. This applies especially to the x900 tier.
Thanks all. The advice helped narrow things down. Probably going with the setup below. It may not show due to embedded hyperlink, but it's a combination of all the advice. https://xoticpc.com/cart
_I_ 2 Aug @ 4:57pm 
Originally posted by steve.stadelman:
Thanks all. The advice helped narrow things down. Probably going with the setup below. It may not show due to embedded hyperlink, but it's a combination of all the advice. https://xoticpc.com/cart
link to your cart doesnt help

can you link components, or use pcpartpicker and share the permalink
https://pcpartpicker.com/list/
Maybe this will work (good olde cut and paste):

Chipset:AMD X870.
Chassis.:Black
Processor.:AMD Ryzen™ 7 9800X3D 4.7 - 5.2GHz 8 Cores
Graphics card type:AMD Radeon™
Graphics card.:AMD Radeon™ RX 9070 16GB
Motherboard.:MSI MAG X870 TOMAHAWK WIFI
Power supply.:CORSAIR 850W GOLD
DDR5 DIMM memory.:32GB DDR5 6000MHz T-Force Delta RGB (2X 16GB)
Desktop memory special.:FREE XPC RGB mousepad
Operating system drive.:2TB NVME SSD GEN 4
Storage drive:Show all options.
NVMe SSD (slot 2).:1TB NVME SSD GEN 4
Desktop storage special.:FREE XPC Gaming Mortar Mouse
Enhanced controls & displays.:No Screen
Cable type.:Black Stock Power Supply Cable
Cooling type:Closed loop water.
Closed loop AIO water cooling.:CPU AIO 240MM Water Cooler
Fan color:Black.
Fans.:Standard Black
Thermal compound.:1 x ARCTIC MX-6: CPU (SKU: 11803SERV)
Operating system.:Windows 11 Home
Operating system options.:64GB USB Windows Recovery
$2,573 USD
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