best desktop for £1,000 (or less)

stripey

Member
In the past, we* used to build our own pcs, then migrated to an iMac and OSX - Snow Leopard at the time. However, we are now looking to replace our current iMac and revert back to Windows - see https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/foru...-specification-reverting-to-a-PC-from-an-iMac

What would be an ideal desktop pc system for us, with a maximum budget of £1,000 ? We'll be using office type programmes (Microsoft or Libre Office), a little photo editing, basic CAD, no gaming other than perhaps some flight simulator occasionally. We'd like to have a dual boot system to use Linux from time to time, which we'd like to accomplish via a swappable HDD system - Icy Dock or similar.

The budget should cover the pc, and we're thinking it would be a Ryzen 5 or 7 based system with 16 Gb of memory. The budget doesn't need to cover peripherals such as keyboards or monitors. In terms of the latter we are thinking of one or two AOC 32 " monitors so the graphics output needs to be capable of that








* The royal we, us has ideas above our station does we !
 
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Oussebon

Multiverse Poster
We'd like to have a dual boot system to use Linux from time to time, which we'd like to accomplish via a swappable HDD system - Icy Dock or similar.
Why exactly? Why not just have multiple drives live permanently in the system?

What model of monitor are you looking at? Screen size itself doesn't have anything to do with the PC being (un)able to support the monitor, it's the resolution, refresh rate, and to some degree the inputs
 

stripey

Member
In terms of monitors, we 're thinking of one, possibly two, of these : AOC Q3279VWFD8 31.5 inch LED IPS Monitor - 2560 x 1440, 5ms Response, HDMI, DVI

In the past we have partitioned our primary HDD and run both Windows and Linux from it. We considered doing the same again, or using two M2 drives - one with Windows and one with Linux Mint. However, by having each OS on an interchangeable HDD, neither could interfere with the other. Data would be stored on a third HDD, accessible by whichever OS was installed at the time. We're open to alternative suggestions on that.
 

Oussebon

Multiverse Poster
or using two M2 drives - one with Windows and one with Linux Mint. However, by having each OS on an interchangeable HDD, neither could interfere with the other.
You mean you want to be able to remove the drive with the OS that isn't in use, so that the OS that is in use doesn't interfere with it(?) if I've understood you right.

Having the OSes installed onto two separate drives is fine and they won't 'interfere' with each other. Mine never have. Or never did, actually, until I started plugging and unplugging drives...

The Q3279VWFD8 is a great spec for the money. It also has displayport which is very handy.

Maybe something like


Case
CORSAIR CARBIDE SERIES™ 200R COMPACT GAMING CASE
Processor (CPU)
AMD Ryzen 7 2700X Eight Core CPU (3.7GHz-4.35GHz/20MB CACHE/AM4)
Motherboard
ASUS® PRIME A320M-K: Micro-ATX, AM4, USB 3.0, 6GB/s
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 2933MHz ~ (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
2GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 1050 - DVI, HDMI, DP
1[SUP]st[/SUP] Storage Drive
250GB WD Blue™ 3D NAND 2.5" SSD, (upto 550MB/sR | 525MB/sW)
1[SUP]st[/SUP] M.2 SSD Drive
250GB WD Black™ M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD (up to 3000MB/s R | 1600MB/s W)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
NOT REQUIRED
Power Supply
CORSAIR 550W VS SERIES™ VS-550 POWER SUPPLY
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Processor Cooling
STANDARD AMD CPU COOLER
Thermal Paste
STANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Wireless/Wired Networking
10/100/1000 GIGABIT LAN PORT (Wi-Fi NOT INCLUDED)
USB/Thunderbolt Options
MIN. 2 x USB 3.0 & 2 x USB 2.0 PORTS @ BACK PANEL + MIN. 2 FRONT PORTS
Operating System
Genuine Windows 10 Home 64 Bit - inc. Single Licence [KUK-00001]
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Windows Recovery Media
Windows 10 Multi-Language Recovery Image - Unlimited Downloads from Online Account
Office Software
FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft® Office® 365 (Operating System Required)
Anti-Virus
BullGuard™ Internet Security - Free 90 Day License inc. Gamer Mode
Browser
Microsoft® Edge (Windows 10 Only)
Warranty
3 Year Standard Warranty (1 Month Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 5 to 7 working days
Quantity
1

Price £972.00 including VAT and Delivery

Unique URL to re-configure : https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/amd-am4-pc/gjAEzCFh7e/

It's worth bearing in mind an RX 570 is not all that much more expensive, a lot more powerful, and gives you a lot more scope for extra monitors if you think that might be relevant.
 

stripey

Member
Thanks for the advice. One question (at least, others may follow:) Why the Asus 320 motherboard rather than a 470X offering ?
 

Oussebon

Multiverse Poster
I can't remember what the reasoning was to be honest. Either an oversight, and/or with the requirements elsewhere the budget was already spent. But yes, the X470 Gigabyte or B450 Gigabyte boards would be better options if you need or want the features. The Asus ones are overpriced relative to the features they offer.
 
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Oussebon

Multiverse Poster
1) Because the RAM is in dual channel and can significantly improve performance in some uses especially with Ryzen CPUs

2) Even if it weren't a bad idea to buy single channel in this case, PCS don't appear to sell 1 x 16gb sticks in that configurator anyway :)

A little photo editing, CAD, and flight simulating wouldn't justify 32gb RAM either, if you were thinking 1 x 16 is better for upgrading (which it isn't necessarily)

As a side note, with Ryzen CPUs you will ideally want the fastest RAM you can get, as they apparently can benefit a lot from the frequency.
 

stripey

Member
Ah, so the CPU addresses the memory in parallel where possible then, hence two small sticks can respond faster than a single large stick?
 

stripey

Member
On reflection, and following the good advice on memory and graphics from Oussebon, it seems we have the following points to decide:

1. What motherboard should we use?
2. What CPU do we use?
3. How do we best achieve the dual boot ?

After scouring t'interweb, we're still not much wiser on the differences between the various chipsets, x370, B450, X470 et cetera, and also how the motherboards differ. Most motherboard reviews seem to focus on gaming and overclocking, neither of which seem to matter for our needs. We *think* we need a basic X470 board (so no need to worry about BIOS updates). What we would like is two available M.2 slots, but see item 3. Maybe we don't ?

Regarding CPU, the Ryzen 2700X is the current king of the hill and we can afford it, but do we need it ? If we go for the R2700X we gain a degree of future proofing but if AMD stick with the no.4 socket maybe we can do with the Ryzen 5 2600X and then swap it out in a year or two for the then current best offering ?

On the dual boot front, we like the idea of swapping a SSD drive via an Icy Dock or similar so that whatever OS is running is the only OS physically present in the computer. However, if the M.2 drives are significantly faster, we could have 2 of them installed, each with a different OS and select between them via GRUB (or a better bootloader if recommended)

If only we knew more, understood more...
 

Scott

Behold The Ford Mondeo
Moderator
1. Personally I would choose the X470 Gigabyte offering. It's all down to personal choice though, for your usage I doubt you would see much performance gain. The built in Ryzen overclocking is fairly good though and I believe the chipset handles it so having a mid-range board would probably support this.
2. If you can afford the 2700x then I would suggest sticking with it. It fairs very well frequency wise and offers a lot of grunt over the 8 cores. As much as you could save here I believe you will find yourself able to hold off longer for your next upgrade.
3. I would recommend a compromise. Dual M2 operating system drives would be very nice but if you're going down this route be sure to go with one of the decent offerings. I always air towards the Samsung 970 Evo at the moment. Good drives. A pair of them would be first class. I would install each OS while the other drive was unplugged. That way you can then use the BIOS to boot from whichever drive you wish to. That keeps the installs and MBRs completely separate.
 

Oussebon

Multiverse Poster
1) You don't need any specific motherboard or chipset. You don't need X470. For your uses, it's mostly about the features they offer. The X470 Gigabyte mobo offers USB 3.1 Gen 2 type C as well as a few other goodies for a relatively small bump over the B450, so gets my vote too.

2) Agreed with the 2700x.

3) You don't need both SSDs to be M.2 SSDs.

Also, the Ryzen motherboards that have 2 M.2 slots almost all have 1 of them run at PCIe 2.0 x4 rather than 3.0 x4, i.e. half the speed. These would therefore limit speeds to about half what the faster M.2 NVMe SSDs could offer anyway. IOPS would be unaffected, but it still bottlenecks the SSD.

Moreover, you don't need a pair of NVMe SSDs anyway. Just get a 970 Evo / WD Black for the OS you use the most, and a decent Sata SSD for the other one.

On the dual boot front, we like the idea of swapping a SSD drive via an Icy Dock or similar so that whatever OS is running is the only OS physically present in the computer.
You might like the idea, but there's no practical advantage to it to be honest. Just do what The_Scotster suggests and install the OSes with only 1 drive present at a time - and use the order in the BIOS to manage what you boot from.
 

ubuysa

The BSOD Doctor
Ah, so the CPU addresses the memory in parallel where possible then, hence two small sticks can respond faster than a single large stick?

Not faster, but with double the bandwidth. Single channel RAM will use a 64-bit wide data bus, but dual channel RAM will use a 128-bit wide data bus (reading both RAM sticks at the same time), so you obtain more data per read operation and that's where the performance boost comes from. :)
 

stripey

Member
Many thanks for the further advice from all, it is much appreciated.

Regarding hardware, it seems the way to go is with the Gigabyte X470 board and the Ryzen 2700X CPU, two 8Gb sticks of fast DDR4 memory and a Samsung M.2 drive on which to install Windows 10 as my main OS.

I'll see if I can get hold of a copy of the motherboard BIOS manual and that will help me settle on the dual boot system. Depending upon how the BIOS works (I haven't used Windows / a pc for years so need to refresh my memory) , I can envisage setting a an optical drive as the primary boot, an interchangeable SSD as the secondary boot and the internal M.2drive as the third boot option. That way, most of the time, there will be nothing in the optical or SSD at boot up and so the Windows drive will boot. If I want to use Linux, I'll put the SSD in the swappable drive and that system will boot with priority over Win 10. The optical drive will give me the option of installing new systems or running a live distribution from disk.

An alternative would be if there was a menu screen available at power up which allows an OS to be selected and booted. If that were the case, I'd look at putting Linux on a second M.2 drive.
 

Oussebon

Multiverse Poster
In the BIOS there's a section for boot order. You tell the PC which device to boot from in turn e.g.
1) SSD 1
2) Blu Ray Drive
3) SSD 2
4) HDD 1

And it tries to boot from each of those devices in order until it boots something.

---

If you have an OS installed on SSD 1 and SSD 2 but you want to boot from SSD 2, press F8 as you power the PC on and it brings up a menu of devices and you just pick the drive you want to boot from.

It's that easy.


an interchangeable SSD as the secondary boot and the internal M.2drive as the third boot option. That way, most of the time, there will be nothing in the optical or SSD at boot up and so the Windows drive will boot. If I want to use Linux, I'll put the SSD in the swappable drive and that system will boot with priority over Win 10.
You seem quite keen to have some kind of hotswap bay, but frankly I think this is overthinking the situation (overengineering the solution?) when the above will just work and achieve the same thing. As long as you install the OSes with the other drives unplugged, you'll never need to plug/unplug drives after that - until/unless you do any clean installs ofc.

It might not seem as elegant, but it's ultimately far easier, cheaper (no need to buy a bay) and means you don't need to keep physically handling the drives too.

The optical drive will give me the option of installing new systems or running a live distribution from disk.
It is much more common these days to make install media on USB drives rather than DVDs. It's a lot faster.

I can envisage setting a an optical drive as the primary boot
As above, you wouldn't do this, you'd just have your SSD with Windows as the first boot device on the list and if you ever need to boot from another SSD or a USB pen, just select that by pressing F8 / going into the BIOS and picking it from there.
 

Stephen M

Author Level
Agree with Oussebon, although the key for getting the boot order can vary, it is f7 on my machine but i do not know for sure with the system you are getting so very likely Oussebon has given you the correct option with f8.

Another option instead of dual-booting is to use your other OS via Virtual Box: https://www.virtualbox.org/
 

stripey

Member
Additionally, would this set up be okay with standard CPU cooling, or is there any advantage to be gained by water cooling ? Overclocking isn't a goal but quiet operation is desirable.
 

Oussebon

Multiverse Poster
Quiet isn't just down to the CPU cooler.

if you're willing to spend more on as quiet a system as possible, I'd suggest the Noctua CPU cooler, Fractal S / R6 case, and the RM850x PSU (which unlike the others is semi-passive). This does start getting more expensive of course.
 
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