Stopgap solution

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Hi all, first-timer here. :) I hope you can help and give advice.

Best timing for a laptop to stop working so my plan to update to a new PC has to be done earlier. I do have a keyboard and a mouse and I thought to get a machine with some basics and upgradeable parts later this year. I do have the budget to go for AMD 5700 or Nvidia 2070 cards but just do not the see the point at the moment.

MB: MAG X570 TOMAHAWK WIFI (AMD AM4) DDR4 X570 ATX Motherboard
CPU: Ryzen 7 3700X Eight Core 4.4GHz (Socket AM4) Processor - Retail
CPU-Cooler: SCMG-5100 Mugen 5 Rev.B CPU Cooler (Not it stock at the moment :( )
HDD: 2TB Barracuda 5400RPM 2.5" Internal Hard Drive - PC and PS4 (ST2000LM015)
SDD: MX500 2.0TB 2.5" SSD SATA 6Gbps 7mm Solid State Drive
Case: Eclipse P300 Air Midi Tower Case - Black Window (the provided fan will be installed on the top. Decided to take this one after watching reviews at Gamers Nexus.)
PSU: Straight Power 11 550W 80 Plus Platinum Modular Power Supply
GPU: Radeon RX 580 Arez Dual OC 8192MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card
RAM: Team Group Edition 32GB (2x16GB) DDR4 PC4-28800C16 3600MHz Dual Channel Kit (looks like a good alternative to the high priced G.Skill B-Die RAMs)
Case fans: 3x P14 PWM PST Black Fan - 140mm (Not it stock at the moment :( )
Monitor: a cheap 20" for now as I am thinking it is better to wait and buying an ultra wide monitor together with a newer GPU in autumn/cyber monday.

I have a room which gets dusty fairly quick and also warm during summer, which influenced my choice of case.
Mostly playing Hearts of Iron 4, Stellaris, World of Warships, Avorion, Empyrion in multiplayer with friends and the C&C remastered for now.

Would this build be alright/smart for now to get a running gaming PC? It has been six weeks now. :(

Thank you. :)
 
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28 Jul 2019
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The build looks good, a GPU upgrade will slot in nicely. For the monitor, you might want to consider getting one that you can VESA mount (or at least comes with a stand that allows rotation). That way you can use it as a vertical secondary monitor once you get your new one in, it'll be nice for having documents on while doing work on the main display.
 
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Thank you all for taking your time and reviewing it. :) I am glad that the build is OK. I had to look up what a VESA mount is though xD and will take it into consideration. Thank you for the tip Mr Blobby. Time to order now. :)
 
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Before you go ordering anything is this a pre built pc or individual components that you are going to build up into a pc yourself? If the latter then I would change the psu as Bequiet psu's tend to be very overpriced so you could save some money there to spend elsewhere. Bequiet only give their best psu's a tight fisted 5 year warranty as well and lag well behind the likes of Seasonic, EVGA, Corsair and many others. The Bequiet Straightpower 11 550w Platinum is a whopping £115 on here which is a ridiculous price for a 550w psu. For much less than that you could get the Seasonic Focus GX-550w Gold rated fully modular psu for £88 which has double the warranty at 10 years and saves you a rather large £27. Yes it's gold rated compared to the Bequiet's platinum but you are never going to make the energy saving in the lifetime of the psu to make it worthwhile paying the extra cost.
 
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GPU: Radeon RX 580 Arez Dual OC 8192MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card

I have a room which gets dusty fairly quick and also warm during summer, which influenced my choice of case.
Mostly playing Hearts of Iron 4, Stellaris, World of Warships, Avorion, Empyrion in multiplayer with friends and the C&C remastered for now.
As much as I like polaris, in stock configuration (i.e. not undervolted) the power consumption is hefty and they're not easy to keep cool. If this is a serious problem in the summer, I'd consider a 1650 super or 5500 XT (the Sapphire's cooler reviews really well). It would mean paying more and getting half the memory mind, so you'd be stuck at 1080p.
 
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As much as I like polaris, in stock configuration (i.e. not undervolted) the power consumption is hefty and they're not easy to keep cool. If this is a serious problem in the summer, I'd consider a 1650 super or 5500 XT (the Sapphire's cooler reviews really well). It would mean paying more and getting half the memory mind, so you'd be stuck at 1080p.

Is it this one then: https://www.overclockers.co.uk/sapp...ddr6-pci-express-graphics-card-gx-395-sp.html ?
I do not mind to play on 1080 only at the moment and to be on the safe side to monitor the temperatures over summer before upgrading the GPU and monitor later this year.

Thank you pastymuncher for you tip on the PSU; looks like a solid option. I will order most of the parts on here and would also add a 256GB MLC SSD for running the operating system on it. Would Samsung be a good choice for that?
 
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OK, from what is available I have finalized my basket. Since the Mugen is rarely available and nowhere near the price here, I opted for the Noctua instead which looks solid. I have an unused MX-4 thermal paste from Arctic as well and an external HDD which I will use for data at the moment.
Total: £1,023.60 (includes shipping: £11.70)


Lets hope it won't take any longer after reading about the stock situation in the Tomahawk thread. xD​
 
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Since most psu's are out of stock on here now out of the remaining ones left the Silverstone SST-ST55F-PT 550w (what a mouthful) is a excellent psu. At £99.95 you are getting a Platinum rated 550w psu with all of it's 550w available on a single 12v rail and it's fully modular. The downside is that you only get a typically tight fisted warranty from Silverstone of only 3 years. At £7 more expensive is the Seasonic Focus PX 550w which again is Platinum rated, fully modular and has 540w on a single 12v rail. The big difference is that you get a 10 year warranty. It is a lot of money for a 550w psu though and I would shop around to see what other retailers have available.

When building to a budget it's always worth a look in OCUK's B-grade section and you can get some very good deals in there. You can also make a offer for items by posting a message to NikTheShnik who runs the B-grade thread here. One thing that caught my eye was in the heatsink section and is the Rajintek Mya RBW Rainbow LED CPU Cooler 120mm at a substantial reduction from £54 down to £35. It's B-grade so is most likely a customer return. It may have been briefly used but all of the fittings should be there and there is very little that can go wrong with a heatsink. I had a Google to see if it was any good and found this review where it actually beats the Noctua that you have picked so it seems to be a decent cooler. If you don't like RGB then don't plug the power lead to the lights into the motherboard. Personally I hate RGB but this doesn't look too bad. It's worth considering anyway.
 
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I'd suggest going for the 3600 at the moment and then upgrading to a 4070/4070XT when available. 6c/12t depending on your usage should be good enough for now and save you at least £100.

Cannot fault the mobo and ram options though as that is what I have also got purchased.
 
Soldato
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Ah well. Too late and missed that GPU offer, Joxeon. That looked good. I plan to give the card to my brother or father when I upgrade. Adam123, I changed the CPU as well as I am mostly gaming with it and the extra clock speed is not that noticeable, so I have read.

Updated my basked. Thank you so very much for your help and patience with me.

My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £1,006.59 (includes shipping: £11.70)
 
Soldato
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I would try get atleast 50 quid off the Gpu as I've seen these b-grade models go for £100-120 and he can only say no.

New cards are rumoured to be quite high on power draw so I think 650w minimum if intend to go for a high end one later on.
 
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