A friend of mine told me he’s looking to buy a new computer sometime this year. We started chatting and came to the ultimate conclusion, he should build his own PC. I might have said something along the lines, you'd be a complete idiot if you don't build your own computer, it's hard to remember these things. We've been friends since high school and have bonded over many a video game. I’m pretty sure that he’s playing on the same laptop he’s had since college. Poor guy, am I right? Once we started talking price, he asked if it would be possible to build a good PC for $1600. I scoffed and replied, “You could do it for $1000, easy!”
So now I’m hoping to back up my words of excitement during that conversation. Here’s my dream PC build with the only requirements being it should be a great gaming PC and cost around $1000. Like most PC builds, I’m going to assume I’ll still have a mouse, keyboard, and other peripherals, so I won’t be including them in the build. I won't include the operating system either, to leave it up to buyer personal preference (hint: get Windows 7). My process here is to find the parts that I want on newegg.com by looking at prices, reviews, specifications, and referencing a few benchmark comparisons. Then I’ll hop over to PCpartpicker.com to make sure that everything is compatible. I’m also going to be using list prices instead of sales prices. This way the build will stay consistent, and it’s up to the buyer to shop around for deals. I've also heard that waiting to buy your parts one at a time is the cheapest way to build your computer. That’s assuming that you can wait several months to get a new set-up. I'm including pictures of the pretty parts only, because nobody wants to look at a picture of a processor.
CPU Intel Core i5-4690K @ 3.50GHz $249.99: This really is a bang for your buck processor. After looking at benchmark testing, it’s clear that this is one of the highest rated Intel i5 CPUs, and it’s in the top five for processing power/$. It still has a perfect rating on newegg.com after 204 reviews. The main complaint is that the processor tends to run hot and the stock fan is not always adequate (most of these reviewers were overclocking the processor, which I wouldn’t recommend doing anyway). But just in case, you can find inexpensive aftermarket heatsinks for around $30-50. I looked up various graphically demanding games like shooters, graphically dense RPG’s and sandbox games, and more. Games I included in the benchmark are Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel, GTA V, Assassin’s Creed Unity, Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, and the consistently demanding game Battlefield 4. This processor exceeds the recommended processor speeds of every single one of these games.
Video card ASUS GTX650-E-2GD5 2GB $139.99: I was debating between this and the GTX 660 that offered 3 GB. The reviews on this one are great and everyone seems happy (except with dead on arrival’s), but when looking at the highest demanding games, SOME of them required 3 GB of GPU power. I’m trying to keep this build relevant for the next few years, and if you’re into the newest released shooters and high graphics AAA RPG’s, you probably want to look into 3 GB video cards.
Motherboard MSI Z97 PC Mate $109.99: The motherboard is going to be the gateway to upgrading down the road. Whichever components can be added will determined by the capabilities of your mobo. This one features plenty of expansion slots, multiple SATA hook-ups, USB 3.0, and last but not least, four memory slots. My current PC has only 2 expansion slots, and it drives me crazy that I can only upgrade to 16 GB of memory. I don’t know if I’ll ever need more than that, but I like knowing that I have the potential to do so.
Case NZXT Source 210 Elite $49.99: Disclaimer: I don’t give two flying f***s about how my computer looks. I would rather save money, get a durable case that will last for years and more importantly, fit everything inside, be easy to put parts in, and keep all the internal parts at a cool temperature. But this case also comes in white if that floats your boat. The Source 210 Elite has won dozens of awards, has tool-less design (great for first time PC builders), and includes a USB 3.0 port on the front. Just FYI, it's currently sold out on newegg, and the secondary seller has it for about $15 more. I would shop around to find it for the actual manufacturer's price.
Memory G.SKILL Ares Series 16GB (2 x 8GB) $129.99: 8 GB of memory is the MINIMUM I would go for making a gaming build. My current computer has 12 GB, so that’s the lowest we’re going to go here. Luckily, our mobo has 4 RAM slots so it’s upgradable later on. In this configuration, down the road you can buy this set again and get 32 GB of memory! Which even if you never do, it’s nice to know that you can.
Hard drive Seagate Barracuda 2TB $99.99: We’re going to go straight-up disk drive HDD. I decided on at least 2 TB, mostly because of the recovery partitions built into your OS, you’ll only have around 1 TB to actually store data. It’s easy to find decent and inexpensive HDD that fit our requirements, so this one is all up to brand preference and the price being right. Good news from the future! We were under budget at the end of the list, so now we’re going to go back and add SSD! This is for boot systems and commonly used programs to convert your computer into a PC with screaming fast loading times. Here’s the drive we’re getting: $149.99 Samsung 850 Evo-series 250 GB
Power Supply Unit Corsair CSM 750W $119.99: 750W is MORE than enough power for this build, but when you go to upgrade your graphics card to the newest, beefiest one out there, you’ll be glad you got a bigger power supply when you did. I picked the Gold rated efficiency for the PSU because that means that out of the power coming from the outlet, your PC will use over 90% of that. The standard benchmark is 80% efficiency.
And the final total is... $1,049.92! I’ll take it! Here’s the link to the PCpartpicker site which has the cheapest prices for each component. At the time I wrote this, the total there was only $857.54, so it’s probably worth it to shop around and find the good deals. Keep in mind that computer part prices are constantly fluctuating. You might have noticed that I didn’t include an optical CD/DVD drive. Since I first booted up my new PC, I’ve used the optical drive one time, and I don’t even remember what it was for. Some sort of hardware driver that was probably available online. These days, most games/software/media are downloaded to your hard drive. If you feel the need to add a CD/DVD drive, you can easily find a reliable one from a well-known brand for around $20, see here.
Let me know what you would change by hitting the Submit button under my face!