The Mainstream / Mid-Range Build

The Mainstream/Mid-Range Build

Here, we are shooting for around the $700 USD price point. For this amount of money, you can get a very capable gaming system aimed at anything from 1080p to 1440p with decent storage, a nice case, 16GB of RAM, and – crucially – a solid CPU platform.

CPU – AMD Ryzen R5 3600 (or R5 2600/1600AF) or Intel Core i5 9400F.

I am sure many will be surprised to see the 2600 and 1600AF on here when the R5 3600 (review) is available for – in some places – just $40 more. The R5 2600 is still a truly exceptional product for ~$110. With a relatively easy overclock to 4Ghz on all 6 cores, plus some RAM optimisations, the 2600 is a very relevant product even in 2020, a full 2 years after its 2018 release.

A brief note about the 1600AF. It is, effectively, a Ryzen 5 1600, but manufactured on the 12nm process used for Zen+. The 1600AF, essentially, is the 2600 with better RAM support and marginally lower clocks. For the official $85 asking price, it is a steal and worthy of your consideration. Moving onto the 3600, though, it has support for faster memory, sports improved higher IPC, and features higher out of the box frequencies. It is the ‘everyman’ CPU of the moment, and may well remain so for some time, though we will have to see how Intel’s 10th Generation i5’s perform against the 3600.

Of Intel, their 6C/6T i5 9400F remains a solid CPU for a gaming system in 2020. Whilst it lacks hyperthreading (which will hurt performance in some modern titles), it clocks high and I would pair it with any GPU up to the RTX 2060 or RX 5700. However, the more consistent 1% and 0.1% low frame rates provided by the R5 CPUs (due to their thread advantage) make the AMD chips my preference. My recommendation, therefore, is the Ryzen 5 3600, or the Ryzen 5 2600/1600 ‘AF’ if the former is either unavailable or just too exp

Motherboard – AsRock B450M Pro 4 or Gigabyte B365M DS3H

Our AMD recommendation remains unchanged, here. This board will be perfectly adequate for the Ryzen 5 3600 and provides us additional money to spend elsewhere. Simple. The Intel recommendation comes down to money, ultimately. We want to avoid the H310 chipset, but – at the same time – spend as little as possible on a board that will simply suffice for the 9400F. The Gigabyte board will do just that, with 4 RAM slots, Gigabit ethernet, and a decent I/O.

RAM – AMD, 16GB DDR4 3200-3600Mhz (CL16) or, Intel – 16GB DDR4 2666Mhz.

Our AMD recommendation remains unchanged, here. This board will be perfectly adequate for the Ryzen 5 3600 and provides We all know, by now, that Ryzen likes faster memory. However, Zen 2’s memory controller means that the sweet spot is now DDR4 3600 Mhz, CL16. This is far in excess of Zen 1 and Zen+, so – if buying a Zen 2 CPU – you should look to get 16GB of memory according to this specification. If you are having to go for the older Zen processors, then you should aim to buy DDR4 3200Mhz (CL16 as a base) and go from there. With modern BIOS revisions and the now mature 12nm node from Global Foundries, current Zen+ processors should be able to handle 3200Mhz memory without much trouble. As for brands… any will do, I would argue. Whilst your mileage may vary, I have an R5 2600 running Hynix modules comfortable at 3200Mhz, CL14. It ran flawlessly using the default XMP profile and is now running even tighter timings with a nice boost to performance. If you are buying Intel, here, then your choice is very easy. 16GB DDR4, 2666Mhz, ideally CL16-18.

Storage – 512GB Team Group MP33 NVMe M.2 SSD

M.2 NVMe drives are very accessible nowadays, and whilst this is not comparable to the ‘best of the best’ of M.2 storage, it is fine for the majority of users wanting to buy an SSD for their gaming PC. I acknowledge that whilst 512GB might be on the ‘light’ side, it is enough for the OS and your initial run of games. After that, you have the scope to expand with additional SSDs or HDDs (MP33 review).

PSU – minimum 500W 80+ Bronze, ideally min. 550W 80+ Bronze & semi-modular

At the moment, a 500-600W 80+ Bronze semi-modular PSU is available for c. $60, and it would be my choice – at this time – for a build of this calibre, i.e. $700-900 USD.

GPU – …it’s getting complicated.

Initially, when writing this guide, I settled on the ‘base’ recommendations of either the Radeon RX 5700 (as the primary choice) or the RTX 2060 (both for around $300). My arguments in favour of the 5700 were simple, 1) the 5700 is c. 10% faster, 2) it costs the same as the 2060, 3) it has 2GB extra VRAM. I then became aware that my recommendations skipped what I would call the ‘lower-mid’ tier of GPUs. Your GTX 1660, 1660 Super, and RX 5600XT. Originally, I was going to mention these as a way of cutting around $100-50 from the budget, alongside the associated loss in gaming performance.

I then noticed a problem.

The current GPU market is so poorly segmented that recommending one tier of card over the other quickly leads to the problem of not having to spend ‘much more’ to get a card that is around 10-15% faster. What do I mean by this? Take the 1660, Nvidia’s ‘low-mid’ tier GPU. It has no real competition from AMD and is priced at around $200-220. The 1660 Super, on the other hand (with decent models being priced at around $240) is a stack below the RTX 2060 but has to compete in or around the price range of AMD’s much faster RX 5600XT (albeit the cheaper models of said card). Another $40-50 up the price stack and you find AMD’s RX5700 and the aforementioned Nvidia RTX 2060.  

It is a nearly impossible task, to separate and actually recommend GPU in this ‘mid-tier’ category. For the sake of argument, however, we can blanket cover the $200-300 price point, and say the following. If we assume the above ‘base’ computer (i.e. the CPU, motherboard, RAM, and storage) is solid, then your GPU budget should be as follows:

• $200: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 (review)
• $230-240: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 Super (review)
• $260-270: AMD Radeon RX 5600 XT (review)
• $300: AMD Radeon RX 5700 (review)
• Honorable mention, GTX 2060 (review)

I will stop at $300. Why? Well, the next ‘tier’ up lands us at around $390-400, and I cannot in all good consciousness call that ‘mid-tier’ money. Right, onwards to our high-end build.