First build in 5 years, looking for fresh pair of eyes

[NCoe]

As title says, my first build in five years. Unfortunately I haven't been keeping up to date with the hardware world so don't know whats good anymore, a knowledgeable opinion on any obvious bottlenecks or cheap but significant changes would be great. PC will be used mostly for gaming, budget is ~£1,200 max. Much thanks!

Case
PCS SR-620C MID TOWER CASE
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™ i5 Six Core Processor i5-9400 (2.9GHz) 9MB Cache
Motherboard
ASUS® ROG STRIX Z390-F GAMING: ATX, LGA1151, USB 3.1, SATA 6GBs - RGB Ready

FREE Gamesplanet voucher code worth £25* w/ Select ASUS Motherboards
Memory (RAM)
8GB Corsair VENGEANCE DDR4 2400MHz (2 x 4GB)
Graphics Card
8GB NVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 2060 SUPER - HDMI, DP - VR Ready!
1st Storage Drive
250GB SEAGATE BARRACUDA 2.5" SSD, (upto 560MB/sR | 530MB/sW)
2nd Storage Drive
2TB SEAGATE BARRACUDA SATA-III 3.5" HDD, 6GB/s, 7200RPM, 256MB CACHE
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
PCS FrostFlow 120 Series RGB High Performance Liquid Cooler
Thermal Paste
STANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING
Extra Case Fans
2x 120mm Black Case Fan (configured to extract from rear/roof)
Sound Card
ONBOARD 6 CHANNEL (5.1) HIGH DEF AUDIO (AS STANDARD)
Wireless/Wired Networking
WIRELESS 802.11N 300Mbps/2.4GHz PCI-E CARD
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 [KK3-00002]
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
Firefox™
Warranty
3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
TIMED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND - MON-FRI (BEFORE 2PM)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 10 to 12 working days
Promotional Item
FREE Gamesplanet voucher code worth £25* w/ Select ASUS Motherboards

 

[Oussebon]

What price did the spec above come to?

What monitor are you gaming on?

Any particular games or kinds of games? So you stream at all?

Initial thoughts are that the mobo is expensive but the CPU and RAM are mid-range, and that the GPU might be overkill (i.e. wasteful rather than futureproof). But depends on the above

 

[NCoe]

Hey, thanks for the feedback! Like I said it’s been a while since I was familiar with pc hardware.

The above cane to just over £1200 with vat, which I would like to lower slightly.

As for use it’ll mainly be used for gaming, graphic heavy open world games to be specific. The likes of your Witcher games, heavily modded Skyrim, Just Cause 3, and some MMOs.

Do you think it’d be worth moving to a slightly cheaper graphics card and mobo to put more into the cpu and ram?

 

[Oussebon]

I'm thinking probably a build around a Ryzen 5 3600, 16gb fast RAM, and possibly a cheaper GPU.

All depends on the monitor you're gaming on As you need the system to be a solid match for the monitor's spec.

What monitor are you using?

 

[Scott]

As above, the core system will probably be something like I'm attaching but the GPU is going to be monitor/output dependant.

You can save £20+ if you don't need the WIFI.

Case
FRACTAL FOCUS G BLACK GAMING CASE (Window)
Processor (CPU)
AMD Ryzen 5 3600 Six Core CPU (3.6GHz-4.2GHz/36MB CACHE/AM4)

Get 3 Months of XBOX Game Pass for PC w/ select AMD Ryzen CPUs
Motherboard
ASUS® PRIME B450-PLUS (DDR4, USB 3.1, 6Gb/s) - RGB Ready!
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE RGB PRO DDR4 3200MHz (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
8GB NVIDIA GEFORCE RTX 2060 SUPER - HDMI, DP - VR Ready!
1st Storage Drive
2TB SEAGATE BARRACUDA SATA-III 3.5" HDD, 6GB/s, 7200RPM, 256MB CACHE
1st M.2 SSD Drive
512GB ADATA SX6000 Pro PCIe M.2 2280 (2100 MB/R, 1500 MB/W)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
NOT REQUIRED
Power Supply
CORSAIR 550W TXm SERIES™ SEMI-MODULAR 80 PLUS® GOLD, ULTRA QUIET
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
WIRELESS 802.11 AC1200 867Mbps/5GHz, 300Mbps/2.4GHz PCI-E CARD
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 [KK3-00002]
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 Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 12 to 14 working days
Price: £1,212.00 including VAT and Delivery

Unique URL to re-configure: https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/amd-am4-gen3-pc/0WsWjwxVvP/

 

[NCoe]

Thanks both for the input, between here and r/buildapc I think I’ve got a much better idea.

How significant is the gpu ‘matching’ the monitor? Both my monitors are fairly old , two LG E2411s, 1080p. Wasn’t planning on replacing them anytime in the next year or so to be honest, though would probably move up to 144hz eventually.

I’ve had a lot of people irl tell me that the motherboard is a bit over the top in terms of what I need, and pricey to boot. Would anyone here agree with that?

Again thank you all for the help 💜

 

[Oussebon]

How significant is the gpu ‘matching’ the monitor?

It's pretty much the whole point of a gaming PC.

Since the GPU is the part most responsible for gaming performance, and the monitor is what you experience the game on.

Buying a £500 GPU for a budget, 1080p, 60hz monitor that will bottleneck the experience is no good. Overspending on the GPU is somewhat pointless rather than being "futureproof" too as by the time you get to a point where games need a monster GPU to run well at 1080p 60hz, there will be better GPUs available for a lower price, with newer technologies.

Same point applies with 1440p - buying a '1440p' GPU for a monitor you're not gonna buy for a year will also see your GPU go obsolete by the time you get in a position to really use it.

 

[Oussebon]

The build above by @The_Scotster is good, but wasted on those monitors.

Also you could save £30 by dropping the RAM to the 3000MHz non-RGB.

 

[NCoe]

It's pretty much the whole point of a gaming PC.

Since the GPU is the part most responsible for gaming performance, and the monitor is what you experience the game on.

Buying a £500 GPU for a budget, 1080p, 60hz monitor that will bottleneck the experience is no good. Overspending on the GPU is somewhat pointless rather than being "futureproof" too as by the time you get to a point where games need a monster GPU to run well at 1080p 60hz, there will be better GPUs available for a lower price, with newer technologies.

Same point applies with 1440p - buying a '1440p' GPU for a monitor you're not gonna buy for a year will also see your GPU go obsolete by the time you get in a position to really use it.

Right I’m with you, I hadn’t budgeted for new monitors really. My preferred size has always been 24”, so I feel like 1080p is a fine resolution for me. I would be open to moving up to a 144Hz monitor though to actually get the use out of those higher frame rates. Definitely something to consider.

 

[Oussebon]

Tbh for your uses I'd have recommended 1440p 60/75hz over 1080p 144hz. Especially since for Skyrim you won't want to run the game over 60fps anyway thanks to the physics engine. Also it's gorgeous in higher res, as is W3.

The price is about the same too, being ~£200 for mainstream entry level models.

Make sure to buy something with Freesync, now that Nvidia let you enable that on their GPUs.

 

[NCoe]

See that was my train of thought too, considering I spend half of my RPG experience staring off into the distance at pretty landscapes. A lot of the internet seems to be against 1440p on 24” monitors though. Which were you seeing for £200?

 

[Oussebon]

There's nothing wrong with 1440p at 24" exactly, but 27" is probably more of a sweet spot in letting you appreciate the resolution more.

The extra resolution lets you 'fit' more on the screen. So nevermind gaming, if you have 2 web pages or a web page and a word document side by side, the extra resolution lets each window display more across and up and down the screen, as there are more pixels. 27" avoids those extra pixels being squashed into too small an area and so is more comfortable / easy to view at that resolution for most people, hence why 27" seems to be the standard size for 1440p.

 

[Scott]

Just noticed I selected the 3600x by accident, drop that to the 3600, it's an expensive "X".

 

[NCoe]

So say I was using a 1440p 60Hz monitor then, would the build The Scotster posted be able to run high end open world games to that level? Meaning getting consistent 60FPS or higher on that res. I’m trying to keep in mind that this’ll be the PC I’ll be playing the likes of Cyberpunk on in the coming year.

 

[Oussebon]

It should as long as you're not an idiot with the settings, yes. If you play AC:OD and turn literally everything to ultra and then turn up resolution scale to 200%, you're gonna have less than 60fps...

Remember that higher resolution is a setting itself. If it's a choice between Ultra at 1080p or Very High at 1440p, 1440p gives you almost twice the number of pixels and a wildly sharper, and more detailed image. Whereas many settings high > very high > ultra are a bit of a placebo and do little other than tank performance.

Which I say as someone who recently upgraded from a 1080p monitor to 1440p

Also note that if you get a monitor with adaptive sync (freesync) a constant 60fps or not isn't a big deal. Because adaptive sync will adjust your monitor's refresh rate to the GPU's framerate, within the adaptive sync range (usually 48-75hz for a budget 1440p 144hz monitor).