£600 Budget (Now or Wait?)

Rowan88 · 18 Oct 2020 at 20:23

Hi,

Looking to build a gaming PC for a friend for around £500-600. Got a rough idea of parts I would look at for the price but should I be waiting for the new Ryzen lineup to release or is that more high end parts coming out? Which if I was looking at Ryzen 5 3600 just now would be the 5600 version.

Cheers

Charlatan · 18 Oct 2020 at 21:14

You aren't going to get a Zen 3 system with a £600 budget. TBH, you'll be lucky to get a 3600 based system for that

mickyflinn · 18 Oct 2020 at 21:15

Rowan88 said:
Hi,

Looking to build a gaming PC for a friend for around £500-600. Got a rough idea of parts I would look at for the price but should I be waiting for the new Ryzen lineup to release or is that more high end parts coming out? Which if I was looking at Ryzen 5 3600 just now would be the 5600 version.

Cheers

Your going to pay a premium for zen 3 5600, with such a low budget it mite be worth building now.

There could be some price drops when the new cpu hits the market .

List the parts your thinking of and cost.

Rowan88 · 19 Oct 2020 at 08:24

Yeah noticed that after a bit of researching last night... Seems for his budget he will be looking at:

Ryzen 3 3100
GTX 1660

Are these a nice pair capable of 1080P 60FPS gaming?

The parts I picked for him worked out around £560 so I told him he could "trim" some bits (swap out ssd and hdd for just a 500gb ssd etc) but obviously spending the extra would be the better option.

I mentioned for gaming at least £200 of the budget should be on the GPU. I'm not 100% on the actual parts yet but heres a breakdown of how it has been looking:

CPU: Ryzen 5 3100 (£120)
MOBO: still looking at what one (£70)
RAM: 16GB DDR4 3200MHZ (£60)
PSU: 500W (£50)
SSD/HDD: 500GB SSD M.2 (£50)
CASE: personal pref but told him this should be entry point (£40)
GPU: read below (£200)

TOTAL: £590

As for the GPU what is the best one for around the £200 mark??, from what I've seen it seems to be the 1660 SUPER. Only others around this price range seem to be the RX590 or 5500XT

mickyflinn · 19 Oct 2020 at 10:40

3100 can be had for £95.

1660 super is king at £200.

Rowan88 · 19 Oct 2020 at 11:52

Cheers,

So looks like thats the benchmark for budget, if we do have a bit more wiggle room what would be the next card up to look into post £200, the 5600XT?
And if the CPU was to upgrade the next step would be the 3600? (I checked the 2600 and its an older chip but the performance looks similar to 3100)

mickyflinn · 19 Oct 2020 at 12:35

Rowan88 said:
Cheers,

So looks like thats the benchmark for budget, if we do have a bit more wiggle room what would be the next card up to look into post £200, the 5600XT?
And if the CPU was to upgrade the next step would be the 3600? (I checked the 2600 and its an older chip but the performance looks similar to 3100)

The 2600 has 6 cores , the 3100 and 3600 is newer.

5600xt is the next step up over 1660 super and is on average 15% faster.

Budget psu always concern me but on a tight budget it's understandable.

Rowan88 · 19 Oct 2020 at 12:45

So the extra core count from 3100 to 2600, although its an older chip generation technically is better, you would pay more for a faster but older chip, or you would need to jump up to a 3600. There is no "new gen" middle ground between a new 3100 and 3600?

I'll mention the 15% difference but I can see them sticking with the 1660 SUPER at £210ish

I wont be getting a budget PSU in terms of manufacturer, it will be non modular etc but as long as its 500/550w and a known brand I'm sure £40-50 should cover it.

mickyflinn · 19 Oct 2020 at 13:11

3100 is slightly faster the extra 2 cores will be useful in games the a use more cores and if you stream.

£50 you will be getting a budget psu no doubt even though it maybe from a reputable manufacturers it components will be lower quality. Look for a psu with 5 years warranty.

Rowan88 · 19 Oct 2020 at 13:21

What takes priority in the CPU, the core clock or the cores/threads, I just assumed the 2600 would have been faster in general.

mickyflinn · 19 Oct 2020 at 13:26

Rowan88 said:
What takes priority in the CPU, the core clock or the cores/threads, I just assumed the 2600 would have been faster in general.

It's a combination clock speed is important especially for single core performance but you need enough cores to run the application.

Rowan88 · 19 Oct 2020 at 13:31

Cheers for the info,

And in terms of modern gaming how many cores/threads is the maximum you should "need".

Also is the 3300X worth looking at?

mickyflinn · 19 Oct 2020 at 13:50

Rowan88 said:
Cheers for the info,

And in terms of modern gaming how many cores/threads is the maximum you should "need".

Also is the 3300X worth looking at?

More like what's the minimum 4 cores if on a tight budget 6 to 8 would be better.

3300x is a higher clocked 3100 and performs better, longevity in a pc 6 core makes sense.

Rowan88 · 19 Oct 2020 at 14:08

So 2600 (6 core but older chipset)/ 1660 SUPER is the sweet spot for the price. It gives us the clock speed needed and 6 core to help it last longer.

If we have any extra budget to play with go for the 3600 first choice as 3100/3300X although slightly faster clock has less cores/threads, then the 5600XT second?

mickyflinn · 19 Oct 2020 at 15:27

Rowan88 said:
So 2600 (6 core but older chipset)/ 1660 SUPER is the sweet spot for the price. It gives us the clock speed needed and 6 core to help it last longer.

If we have any extra budget to play with go for the 3600 first choice as 3100/3300X although slightly faster clock has less cores/threads, then the 5600XT second?

Yep sumed it up well.

turbot1984 · 19 Oct 2020 at 15:30

mickyflinn said:
3100 can be had for £95.

1660 super is king at £200.

Or s/h gtx 1070 which is a tad quicker.