Building a PC for Gaming
It is both easier, but more difficult. The standards make it simple to ensure that components will work, but the gamut of options are
If you’ve been following the saga so far, you are aware that I am now in the position where I need to build a replacement PC for my gaming and other uses.
I have ordered all the parts, and I ordered from Newegg a mid tower case from NZXT, a motherboard from Gigabyte (the X670 chipset for an AM5 socketed Ryzen 7 series CPU), an AMD Ryzen 7 7350X3D CPU, 64G Ram from Corsair, an AIO liquid cooler for the CPU, and two 2TB NVMe SSD’s. I added a Corsair 850W low noise power supply to round it out. Micro Center is cheaper, but they do not do much shipping, and the closest store being in Tustin, California1 it was not a serious option.
I didn't want to order from Amazon, my last batch of computer components I bought from Amazon were like shopping at Fry’s in the late 90’s, a lot of opened box returns and issues that occur too often.
I already have a Nvidia 4070Ti GPU2 that will be the centerpiece of the build. Of course, the case, and various components are imbued with all the multicolor programmable LED’s so I will have all the flashing lights and light show automation. Not sure how I like that.
One benefit from using Newegg is that they do a lot of aggressive bundling, that means if you buy 2 or more components, you can save $5, $10, or even more on the total. My $1,800 tab became $1,574 after the bundling (I also added a license for Windows 11 Pro3).
Another thing that is nice is that Newegg will let me direct the shipment to a local UPS Store, so a) I don’t have to be home to sign for the shipment, and b) I can collect the goodies when they are ready without having to ensure that I was around. It is likely that the bulk of the goods will be shipped in two or even three parcels. Collecting them all at once is a huge plus.
Now, I play the waiting game.
While I wait I have been reading on what to expect, and it is clear that a lot has changed since the early days of the hobbyists assembling systems. Motherboards are mostly standard (size, mounting holes, and the like), this makes it far less daunting to assemble. I toyed with the idea of buying a Micro ATX board, but the smaller form factor makes it difficult to build, and limits the features. I selected a full size ATX motherboard. It has 4 mSATA drive connectors, of which I will use 2. It has a ridiculous number of USB ports4, like 13 total, onboard audio, 10G ethernet (overkill for my cable connection), onboard WiFI6, and Bluetooth, and tons of things that used to require additional cards.
If I am being honest, I am excited to roll up my sleeves and to try to make it mine. The last computer I built had 3 spinning rust hard drives, tons of cables, and it looked like a rat’s nest. I will take pictures of the process and write a chronicle of it.
it is 366 miles door to door, I doubt that the $100 that I would save on the whole shebang is worth the trek!
This is a good compromise. My monitor is a 32” 2k screen (also known as a 1440p) and the nearly $1,000 price differential to the 4090 is just a waste of money.
In the 1990’s there was rampant piracy of Windows. I think I bought one version of Win95, and I must have installed it on 5 or six builds, including more than one for friends and a roommate. I am not proud of that, but to be honest, Microsoft wasn’t too upset, as this helped cement their dominance in the home PC world.
I am also a Mac person, and my main beef with Apple is the skimpy number of USB ports. Of course, you can buy a hub, but that makes the desk - messy