Dammit, I step away from the screen for two months and suddenly I’m drowning in a sea of new hardware. I honestly had zero clue that AMD and NVIDIA dropped new GPUs while I was out living my life.
Look, you're basically a woman standing in a shoe store right now—you don't even know what you want. If you're dropping like $3k on a card, just grab a 2060 and call it a day. But if you've actually got a $4k budget, then yeah, you can easily aim for a 2070.
Look, if your rig has a maintenance hatch on the back, you're golden—you won't void the warranty. But if you actually have to crack the whole chassis open just to swap parts? Don't be a hero. Just take it to an authorized service center to get it installed.
Upgrading the RAM is a total breeze if you actually bother to look for it. Honestly, 8GB should get you through the door just fine. Cooling isn't half bad either.
Intel Core i5-9400F H310M (honestly, don't bother with anything pricier since you can't/won't be overclocking anyway) 8GB DDR4 RAM Kingston A400 240GB SSD EVGA 850 Gigabyte RTX 2060
Total: $2338 for the card (if you split it into 12 monthly payments, you grab a 3% discount) So basically $2267
Pick whatever case you want; it doesn't really matter. It could even be some cheap junk. This build isn't exactly going to turn into a space heater. Even if it does, you’re ten times better off sinking that cash into a decent cooler rather than a fancy case. The only thing you actually need to check is that everything physically fits inside and that the power supply isn't just dangling out of nowhere. That's mostly for cable management, but honestly, even that isn't a huge deal.
You can easily slap in an extra 8GB of RAM later down the road when you actually need it. There is zero point in buying a GPU that's 50% weaker just to get an extra stick of RAM.
so $2333you grab an RTX 2060 paired up with a Ryzen 1600x or 2600 honestly, Intel processors in that bracket aren't even worth looking at right now. you'd basically be throwing an extra 500-$200 out the window just to get more or less the same performance
Look, you aren't exactly making a mistake by picking that power supply, but I was mostly just pointing out that since you aren't planning on overclocking, you could probably grab something a bit cheaper or maybe step up to something slightly higher quality for the same buck.
As for the CPU, if you're staying within the factory settings and not messing with clock speeds, that stock cooler is going to be totally fine—you won't regret grabbing the Ryzen 5 2600. If it were my money, though? I’d personally lean toward the 1600X paired with an Arctic Freezer 33. It’s basically just better value for the exact same price. You end up getting the same performance but with a chip that runs a hell of a lot cooler and quieter.
goldenpanther said:Well, excuse me for crashing the party here 😁 For my gaming PC, I’m capping out at $2333—basically what I’d spend on a few trips to Denny's. Still deciding if I want to use credit or just drop the cash. Anyway, $700 is the limit for card payments. If I pay cash, I can shave off about 10%. Honestly, looking at Best Buy, their prices seemed the cheapest? What do you guys think about this:
ryzen 5 1600x arctic freezer 33 (those two together cost about as much as an r5 2600—the processor is basically identical, but the arctic freezer 33 absolutely destroys the stock cooler you get with the 2600)
I wouldn't touch a Patriot SSD; I'd go with a Kingston A400 if that's the budget we're working with (And skip the mechanical hard drive entirely. I'd rather grab a 500GB SSD, though I guess that's just personal preference)
You could probably get away with a weaker power supply. 650W feels like total overkill for a build with such low power draw; 500W would be more than enough
I wouldn't buy a single 16GB stick of RAM. Better to grab 2x8GB modules instead
Don't drop $2,800 on that monitor. 😁 Seriously, we're talking about tech that's already three years old. You can definitely find something way better without emptying your bank account.
Total comes to: $1347 That’s basically enough to snag a used GTX 1060 3G. Look, if that feels steep and you're trying to pinch pennies, don't bother swapping out the motherboard. Seriously, just ditch the HDD for now and grab one down the road when you aren't bleeding cash.
I wouldn't blame the CPU. Honestly, an i5-6300HQ is plenty beefy enough to run Konami games on max settings without breaking a sweat. It’s a bit of a stretch, but there's a good chance his PC is just overheating. If he's thermal throttling, that processor probably won't even push past 2.7GHz.
Look, we’re talking about monitors in the exact same ballpark here. Dell is charging a bit more just because they’ve got that big-name status, but honestly? There isn't a massive difference in the actual panels. If you’re looking at certifications or extra bells and whistles, the HP model actually edges them out slightly. On the flip side, if you care about aesthetics, the Samsung or the Dell look a lot cleaner on a desk. At the end of the day, you're basically looking at the same thing regardless of which one you pick, so it really just comes down to your vibe.
1. Just grab the one that looks best to you. 2. Or, you know, save some cash and go with the cheaper option.
If I were in your shoes, I'd snag that HP for $300. It’s a total steal right now, especially since it usually retails for over $180 everywhere else. I don't see the point in dropping an extra $75 or $133 on something that doesn't actually give me anything extra. That said, it’s not all about the panel specs, color accuracy, or raw performance—sometimes you just want something that looks good and fits the setup. 😁
Dell is hands down the superior choice if you’re actually trying to do photo editing. The panel is better and the resolution is higher, which basically means you get colors that don't lie and an image that isn't a blurry mess. Why on earth would you tell your wife to drop the same amount of cash on a WORSE monitor? 😁 Seriously, why are we even having this debate in the first place? 😁
My wife has her own $667 setup specifically for her monitor, so there’s zero excuse for her not to grab the high-end one. The price point is basically the same anyway—Dell is actually $50 more expensive. And honestly, when it comes to Photoshop and color grading, you can really feel the difference.
