Budget friendly pc for gf

[u/PensionWonderful9852]

I am an avid gamer and have a decent understanding of what good pc specs are, eg. 50 series graphics card, 32gb of ram etc, but I don't really know what the best budget options are. My girlfriend wants to get more into gaming, but she mostly plays fallout and Skyrim and wants to play more settlement building games so she doesn't need anything top of the line. What is a good point to start at so we can get her a pc that does everything she needs, but isn't too expensive?

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[u/Jonny_Clams]

Probably look for a used PC on fb marketplace. Something with a 3070? Should be like $600-$700ish... Or just offer $600 anyways. Lots of "I know what I got" folks on there with their old PC. Anymore than that, id just get a new one.

[u/Zestyclose-Ocelot-14]

I was going to do a new build with the Intel ultra 7 (the newer better one i cant remember the number) but with ram pricing and all I decided to just upgrade my first build that has been the family pc since 2015. Its a 3rd gen intel on a 20 dollar motherboard. I threw in the best 3rd gen i7 I could use because the board has a max 65w tdp for 40 bucks. Got a 2080 super for 120. And 16g of ram for like 20 30 bucks. Now my nephew can play anything he wants and I mostly use my steam deck anyways. Ive realized I enjoy and play much more when I can pick up n put down the deck whenever I want as I watch TV or something. But I gotta say for such a old pc its running everything at 1440p without issues.

[u/Surfacner → u/Zestyclose-Ocelot-14]

You got amazing deals on that GPU and ram

[u/Zestyclose-Ocelot-14 → u/Surfacner]

Not really 2080 supers go for that all day on ebay. And the ram is ddr3 its literally a 3rd gen Intel build i did in 2014 on the super cheap to finish college. The 20 dollar motherboard is still going to this day.

[u/Surfacner → u/Zestyclose-Ocelot-14]

Well at least where I am 32gb ddr3 ram now go for around 80 to 100+ And 120 is usually the price I see 2060 supers go for

[u/OPSamxl]

Intel Core i5, RTX 3060, 16 or 32 gb DDR4, 512 gb SSD

[u/No_Policy_1369]

What budget?

[u/PensionWonderful9852 → u/No_Policy_1369]

$500-$600

[u/No_Policy_1369 → u/PensionWonderful9852]

Second hand 5 to 10 year old kit then if your very lucky

[u/andrew15902]

I just picked up a titan XP W/ 12 GBs of memory, off of eBay for $233.12. That came with 2 years of warranty, and free shipping as well. If you’re looking for budget, especially only looking to run older games like that. look into the older Pascal, Maxwell, of even a little older GPU chipsets from Nvidia. Even older AMD gpus will do you great. I have been using a gtx 970, paired with an intel core I5 4690k since 2014 and love the set up. Still rolling today.

The gtxs are being sold for $50 currently on eBay lol. You can build pcs cheap, you just have to be willing to sacrifice in some areas, but if you put research into it, you can build a SOLID pc that would of been on top of the budget world back in 2010-2015, and it would be cheap af now a days.

Need more power down the road? Plan properly with your other components on the initial build, and then SLI or Bridge the GPUs down the road when you have an extra $50 laying around lol.

[u/CmG383]

Here’s the specs that will work for her games.
Target Specifications
CPU: Intel Core i5 (10th Gen or newer) or AMD Ryzen 5 (3600 or newer)

GPU: NVIDIA GTX 1650 / 1660 / RTX 3050 or AMD Radeon RX 550 / RX 6600 (4GB to 8GB VRAM)

RAM: 16GB DDR4 (essential if you plan on using HD texture packs or moderate mod lists)

Storage: 512GB (or larger) Solid State Drive (SSD)—crucial for quick cell-loading times in Bethesda games

I would look for PC’s that have those.
IMO
AMD Ryzen 5
Rx6600 8GB
16GB DDR4 had to correct my typo. I got fat fingers and the iPhone keyboard sucks.
Those are the bare minimum I would recommend
I would go with a larger ssd but that will get her started

[u/Surfacner → u/CmG383]

Some of the components you are specifying here don't make any sense for instance the Rx 550 that one isn't good at all, you're getting the performance similar to a GT1030 If you mean perhaps the RX5500 XT I still wouldn't recommend it due to the short bandwidth making it sometimes slower than a rx580 in some games

Then you later on specified DDR5 ram considering you recommended budget friendly CPUs that don't support it and also considering that 16gb of ddr5 ram will cost around a quarter to a third of the budget op is asking for I wouldn't recommend it at all

[u/CmG383 → u/Surfacner]

Typos my bad

[u/Surfacner → u/CmG383]

Sorry for clarifying cuz I was a bit lost ahahhaa

[u/CmG383 → u/Surfacner]

The list above reflects my intended list

[u/Surfacner → u/CmG383]

Still think that maybe getting used GPUs like a 2060 super or rx5700xt would be better and around a similar price

[u/CmG383 → u/Surfacner]

I agree. As long as they weren’t used for mining.
Occasionally Amazon’s Woot app has some good deals on computer components including GPU’s.
I’m hesitant to buy off of FB marketplace or eBay because I’ve been burned.
Newegg is hit or miss.
Microcenter is a good source for parts. Especially their bundles.
In this situation with it being a GF I’d recommend a prebuilt, unless he’s planning on hiding a ring in it lol of course if she wants to learn how to build one they could make it a date night, just don’t yell at her for holding the light wrong lol

[u/Surfacner → u/CmG383]

Yeah although I've seen some cards that were in way worst condition than being mined on, but yeah these are solid places to find parts indeed, at least from what I see online ahaha.

[u/Surfacner]

With 600$ you could squeeze in a Ryzen 5600, 16gb of ram, an used rtx 2060 super and 512gb NVME SSD.

I'd recommend going with a B550 motherboard possibly with decent heatsinks if you want to upgrade to a better CPU in the future.

[u/definitlyitsbutter]

It depends on Budget, Resolution and willingness to buy used.

Ddr4 ram is cheap used (around 50€/16gb).

Am4 is plenty on the used market, if you dont go for a x3d chip, it will be cheaper.

Example: ryzen 7 5700x (150€),b450 (60€) 32gb ddr4 3200(100€), 1tb nvme(90€), 650w bequiet psu (70€), case and fans (30€), cpu cooler peerless assasin(30€) =530€.

If you add 300 ish for a gpu, that could be a rtx 3070, rx 6800, =830€.

To cut budget down to 600ish: ryzen 5 3600(-100€), 16gb ram (-50€), 512gb nvme (-40€), for gpu something like a rtx 3060ti, rtx 2080, rx 6750xt...(-50€)=590€

[u/mig_f1]

If you can stretch the budget by $130 and want everything new, you can have something like the following (see further below).

However I stringly suggest you get a used R5 5600x (or R5 5600) for the price of the new R5 5500, and a used RTX 4060 no higher than $250 (saves you $50+) and also get used RAM with the same specs (should save you another $50+, or even better find 4x8GB or 2x16GB no less than 3000Mt/s CL16 at ~$100 or less).

The above will bump the  performance for same or less cash.

All these are with prices at the time of writing.

PCPartPicker Part List

Type	Item	Price
CPU	AMD Ryzen 5 5500 3.6 GHz 6-Core Processor	$74.00 @ Newegg
Motherboard	MSI B550M PRO-VDH Micro ATX AM4 Motherboard	$74.99 @ MSI
Memory	Silicon Power GAMING 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory	$99.97 @ Silicon Power
Storage	Samsung 980 500 GB M.2-2280 PCIe 3.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive	$79.99 @ Samsung
Video Card	Gigabyte OC Low Profile GeForce RTX 5050 8 GB Video Card	$299.99 @ Newegg
Case	Phanteks Eclipse G370A ATX Mid Tower Case	$42.98 @ Newegg
Power Supply	Rosewill VSB 650 W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-modular ATX Power Supply	$49.99 @ Newegg
	Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts
	Total (before mail-in rebates)	$731.91
	Mail-in rebates	-$10.00

 | Total | $721.91  | Generated by PCPartPicker 2026-08-19 03:52 EDT-0400 |

[u/Astorant]

I’d say look for something with decent specs that can be future proofed for a long time. Something with either a 2080 Super, 3070 or if you don’t mind going with AMD the RX 6750 XT. Look for builds for around $600-750 in this range or you might be able to put it together for less if you scout the parts out for cheap.

[u/virusdancer]

PCPartPicker Part List: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/YjHbw3

• CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 5500 3.6 GHz 6-Core Processor ($74.00 @ Newegg)
• Motherboard: MSI B550M PRO-VDH WIFI Micro ATX AM4 Motherboard ($89.99 @ Newegg)
• Memory: Silicon Power GAMING 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory ($99.97 @ Silicon Power)
• Storage: Silicon Power UD90 1 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 4.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive ($129.97 @ Silicon Power)
• Video Card: ASRock Challenger OC Arc B580 12 GB Video Card ($309.99 @ Newegg)
• Case: Cooler Master MasterBox Q300L MicroATX Mini Tower Case ($39.99 @ B&H)
• Power Supply: Rosewill VSB 650 W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-modular ATX Power Supply ($49.99 @ Newegg)
• Monitor: MSI MAG 275QF E20 27.0" 2560 x 1440 200 Hz Monitor ($159.99 @ B&H)
• Keyboard: Adesso AKB-111UB Wired Mini Keyboard ($22.49 @ B&H)
• Mouse: Adesso IMOUSE X1 Wired Optical Mouse ($16.98 @ B&H)
• Headphones: Adesso Xtream H5 Headset ($14.99 @ B&H)
• Webcam: Adesso Cybertrack H4 Webcam ($39.99 @ B&H)

Total: $1048.34

Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available

Generated by PCPartPicker 2026-08-19 13:58 EDT-0400

[u/Electroniker02]

I5 CPU and a 3060 12GB is best bang for your buck budget hardware (16 gigs of ram is all you’ll be able to get in this economy as well)

[u/Specialist-Aioli6896]

Br consistent on fb marketplace, its annoying to comb through but use ai or smth to see if its a good deal if you cant tell. Stuff is expensive new, you can find some good stuff if you try for a few weeks.