What is a good Gaming PC to buy?

[Clambake]

I am looking to buy a gaming PC. I am a complete noob as I have been gaming on consoles my whole life. I am going to get a pre-built PC. My budget is $1200-$1400. Can I get a PC that is better than the PS5 and XSX for that amount? I am looking for high resolution and high frame rates. I would be happy with 1440p and 60FPS. Will a PC for that amount obtain that? Any kind of suggestions or reccomendaations are appreciated.

Edit: This is what I am looking at right now. https://www.cyberpowerpc.com/system/Daily-Deal-i5K-5500XT
and this one https://www.cyberpowerpc.com/system/Christmas-Special-I

It is $300 off and right in my price range. How good is this PC?

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Hi

Seems expensive to me. While the 5500XT is an O.K 1080p graphics card, its not really able to power 1440p especially at high frame rates. The CPU and other components are O.K, but the GPU really lets it down at that price.

I would be looking to have an Nvidia RTX 3060Ti in that price bracket. At the very least a RTX 2060 Super or a Radeon 5700XT and only those because of the terrible availability of newer cards currently.

You could also build something yourself for the same money that would be much faster. Its very easy with plenty of guides available to watch on Youtube to help with the process. Look for Linus or Jayz2cents build videos. I know it can seem intimidating, but once you've done it its really very easy and you'll be able to update it yourself in the future saving even more. Again the problem is with availability of parts currently, hopefully in the new year it will improve and companies will stop gouging.

 

[Clambake]

Hi

Seems expensive to me. While the 5500XT is an O.K 1080p graphics card, its not really able to power 1440p especially at high frame rates. The CPU and other components are O.K, but the GPU really lets it down at that price.

I would be looking to have an Nvidia RTX 3060Ti in that price bracket. At the very least a RTX 2060 Super or a Radeon 5700XT and only those because of the terrible availability of newer cards currently.

You could also build something yourself for the same money that would be much faster. Its very easy with plenty of guides available to watch on Youtube to help with the process. Look for Linus or Jayz2cents build videos. I know it can seem intimidating, but once you've done it its really very easy and you'll be able to update it yourself in the future saving even more. Again the problem is with availability of parts currently, hopefully in the new year it will improve and companies will stop gouging.

Thanks. If I were to build it myself, how do I know what components to use? My biggest concern is that I don't know what the functions are for certain parts (for the most part) so I don't want to get parts that are incompatible with each other. Is there somewhere where I can get a list of parts that would build a good PC that I can use?

 

[Kaamos_Llama]

Indeed there is. But due to the lack of availability its not really possible to give you the best list at the moment. The best price performance value would include an AMD 5600X CPU and graphics card pricing is all over the place from day to day.

Looking at your original question as to whether a PC at that budget will outperform a new console, its honestly a bit close to call. Pure performance wise the consoles offer incredible value at the moment if you can find one in stock. I've seen Digital Foundry Youtube channel comparison videos of quality between PS5 and PC in Assassins Creed Valhalla where they call it as being around the quality and performance settings of an RTX 2070 Super, although this may vary across games and in the future.

The PC vs console argument is a whole thing and if you're undecided I suggest doing your own research into it first. There's a lot of material out there to help you decide which is best for you.

As to a build list. Something like this is compatible and would outperform the PC you linked by quite some way. For example Techpowerup reviews cards by testing them in a suite of 23 games and presenting an average performance table.

Here you can see the Radeon 5500XT is about 41% of the performance of an Nvidia 3060Ti at 2560x1440 resolution.

NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti Founders Edition Review

NVIDIA's GeForce RTX 3060 Ti comes at incredible pricing of $399, yet beats the GeForce RTX 2080 Super in rasterization, and even the RX 6800 in raytracing. In our RTX 3060 Ti review, we found that NVIDIA picked a fantastic cooler that's extremely quiet, yet fits everywhere because of its...

www.techpowerup.com

PCPartPicker Part List

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 3600 3.6 GHz 6-Core Processor ($219.99 @ B&H)
CPU Cooler: be quiet! Pure Rock 2 CPU Cooler ($39.90 @ Amazon)
Thermal Compound: ARCTIC MX-4 2019 Edition 4 g Thermal Paste ($8.59 @ Amazon)
Motherboard: MSI B450 TOMAHAWK MAX ATX AM4 Motherboard ($114.99 @ B&H)
Memory: Kingston HyperX Fury RGB 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3000 CL15 Memory ($75.99 @ Best Buy)
Storage: Sabrent Rocket Q 1 TB M.2-2280 NVME Solid State Drive ($109.98 @ Amazon)
Video Card: PNY GeForce RTX 3060 Ti 8 GB XLR8 Gaming REVEL EPIC-X RGB Video Card ($459.94 @ Office Depot)
Case: Fractal Design Meshify C ATX Mid Tower Case ($97.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: SeaSonic FOCUS Gold 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Semi-modular ATX Power Supply ($100.98 @ Newegg)
Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Home OEM 64-bit ($108.78 @ Other World Computing)
Wireless Network Adapter: TP-Link Archer TX3000E PCIe x1 802.11a/b/g/n/ac/ax Wi-Fi Adapter ($44.99 @ Amazon)
Total: $1382.12
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2020-12-21 02:37 EST-0500

I assume you realized that the Cyberpower system does not come with a monitor and you would need to buy one seperately or use a TV?

This system uses a 1TB NVME SSD so has less storage. You could add a 1 or 2 TB HDD for storing files and pictures if needed, but games should really be installed to an SSD these days. Its just that much faster. The power supply is of very good quality, something that is negelected in many pre built systems and should last throughout several system upgrades.

You'd need a mouse and keyboard on top I assume which is again a personal choice, and the build can overall be tweaked to be cheaper if you need. PC partpicker is a very good site for checking for stock and basic compatibility.

The case is a matter of taste, I'm not personally a fan of RGB so I cant advise too much if thats a requirement but its only a matter of plugging in cables and watching a video or two if needed.

But like I said if you can wait a while for stock levels to fill out you'll get an even better system. I suggest coming back in a month or two if you can and asking for a list again.

 

[ROFbeddingfield]

The prebuilds dont seem to be worth the time if the price tag goes under 1200.

The HP prebuilds ive seen at walmart put the slowerst processor they can find with a ryzen 5 name, 1600 NOT the beast today,,, and put in the smallest speced GPU they can find. Best one in my local walmart has a 1650 in it.

the BEST prebuild costs twice as much at 1400$ but claims to have a ryzen 7

 

[mtari7396]

You can get an really nice Gaming PC for a high-price and i guarantee you, that it would be much better then the new consoles such as the PS5/XBOX X for sure. Plus most people say that PS5 and XBOX X series will not reach a 120FPS 4K, it would most likely be 4K 30FPS. So if you wanted more power and speed i definitely would recommend an gaming PC any day. The only advantage the PS5 and the xbox X series offer is...exclusives.

 

[McNuggies_108]

Plus most people say that PS5 and XBOX X series will not reach a 120FPS 4K, it would most likely be 4K 30FPS.

Unfortunately I have to Inform you that the PS5 can reach 8K, I own one, you can also look it up. and It most DEFINITELY capable of running 60FPS. I don't know what other people have been going through, but my PS5 Runs up to 8K 60FPS. AND Its is Cheaper than building a (most likely) very expensive PC that you buy new (also expensive) parts every time there is something new. AND Im starting to think you guys are jealous of the Dualsense Controller, with Built in speaker, mic, trackpad, adaptive triggers (feels like you are actually shooting a gun, it awesome.) and haptic feedback.

IMPORTANT: I have no problem with PC gamers, but you guys seem to keep underestimating consoles. The PS5 DOES run 4K, 8K, and 60 FPS, and has decent exclusives, but you guys keep Trash-Talking Console, when in reality, its almost just as good as PC when it comes to graphics, Cost, Easy Installation, and games. We should not be trash talking each others platforms, we should all treat eachother as equals.

 

[oliversteam]

I am looking to buy a gaming PC. I am a complete noob as I have been gaming on consoles my whole life. I am going to get a pre-built PC. My budget is $1200-$1400. Can I get a PC that is better than the PS5 and XSX for that amount? I am looking for high resolution and high frame rates. I would be happy with 1440p and 60FPS. Will a PC for that amount obtain that? Any kind of suggestions or recommendations is appreciated.

Edit: This is what I am looking at right now. https://www.cyberpowerpc.com/system/Daily-Deal-i5K-5500XT
and this one https://www.cyberpowerpc.com/system/Christmas-Special-I

It is $300 off and right in my price range. How good is this PC?

If you have these components installed in your pre-built gaming PC then you are pretty much good to go.
*CPU* RYZEN 3600
*BOARD* X370 ASUS CROSSHAIR VI
*RAM* 16GB DDR4
*GPU* RTX 2060
*KEYBOARD* Anne Pro 2
*MOUSE* Glorious Model O
*MICROPHONE* BLUE YETI
*HEADPHONE* BEYERDYNAMIC DT 990