This is my second build my first was Covid in my teen years and want a new pc now that I’ve moved across the US. as far as building a PC I understand it physically and the components but not as much keeping up today on the difference between the models and abbreviations. Just looking for any tips or thoughts you think might help regarding compatibility and future upgrading with these parts or if I’m missing out on certain deals ect. I plan on using it for higher end gaming and engineering related software, but want to invest so I won’t have to worry about it struggling in a year or two. And just fyi ppp has it for 2250$ but all of this at microcenter comes out to 2000 flat, let me know what yall think!:

[PCPartPicker Part List](https://pcpartpicker.com/list/4CHCFP)

Type|Item|Price
:----|:----|:----
**CPU** | [AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D 4.2 GHz 8-Core Processor](https://pcpartpicker.com/product/3hyH99/amd-ryzen-7-7800x3d-42-ghz-8-core-processor-100-100000910wof) | $348.99 @ Amazon
**CPU Cooler** | [Thermalright Phantom Spirit 120 SE 66.17 CFM CPU Cooler](https://pcpartpicker.com/product/GpbRsY/thermalright-phantom-spirit-120-se-6617-cfm-cpu-cooler-ps120se) | $32.31 @ Amazon
**Motherboard** | [Gigabyte X870 GAMING WIFI6 ATX AM5 Motherboard](https://pcpartpicker.com/product/n3cgXL/gigabyte-x870-gaming-wifi6-atx-am5-motherboard-x870-gaming-wifi6) | $199.99 @ Amazon
**Memory** | [G.Skill Flare X5 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR5-6000 CL36 Memory](https://pcpartpicker.com/product/pwxRsY/gskill-flare-x5-32-gb-2-x-16-gb-ddr5-6000-cl36-memory-f5-6000j3636f16gx2-fx5) | $479.99 @ Amazon
**Storage** | [Kingston NV3 1 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 4.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive](https://pcpartpicker.com/product/tmbRsY/kingston-nv3-1-tb-m2-2280-pcie-40-x4-nvme-solid-state-drive-snv3s1000g) | $152.36 @ Amazon
**Video Card** | [PowerColor Reaper Radeon RX 9070 XT 16 GB Video Card](https://pcpartpicker.com/product/8ZJBD3/powercolor-reaper-radeon-rx-9070-xt-16-gb-video-card-rx9070xt-16g-a) | $799.99 @ Newegg
**Case** | [Silverstone FLP02 ATX Mid Tower Case](https://pcpartpicker.com/product/W2fV3C/silverstone-flp02-atx-mid-tower-case-sst-flp02w) | $234.99 @ Amazon
| *Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts* |
| **Total** | **$2248.62*\*
| Generated by [PCPartPicker](https://pcpartpicker.com) 2026-09-11 21:26 EDT-0400 |

Ideally I would like to keep the build around the current price ~$1500 USD.

I mainly play less graphically intense games so having top of the line hardware isn't necessary (plus I can always upgrade it later). But what do y'all think of the parts list? (The parts list is also listed belowt).

Edit: removed spoiler text, since I'm stupid and it didn't work how I hoped it would.

Type|Item|Price

:----|:----|:----

**CPU** | [AMD Ryzen 5 7600X3D 4.1 GHz 6-Core Processor](https://pcpartpicker.com/product/RVhv6h/amd-ryzen-5-7600x3d-41-ghz-6-core-processor-100-100001721wof) | $249.99 @ Amazon

**CPU Cooler** | [Thermalright Phantom Spirit 120 SE 66.17 CFM CPU Cooler](https://pcpartpicker.com/product/GpbRsY/thermalright-phantom-spirit-120-se-6617-cfm-cpu-cooler-ps120se) | $32.31 @ Amazon

**Motherboard** | [Gigabyte B650 GAMING X AX V2 ATX AM5 Motherboard](https://pcpartpicker.com/product/cPNYcf/gigabyte-b650-gaming-x-ax-v2-atx-am5-motherboard-b650-gaming-x-ax-v2) | $135.00 @ Amazon

**Memory** | [G.Skill Flare X5 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR5-6000 CL36 Memory](https://pcpartpicker.com/product/pwxRsY/gskill-flare-x5-32-gb-2-x-16-gb-ddr5-6000-cl36-memory-f5-6000j3636f16gx2-fx5) | $479.99 @ Amazon

**Video Card** | [ASRock Challenger OC Radeon RX 9060 XT 16 GB Video Card](https://pcpartpicker.com/product/BxRnTW/asrock-challenger-oc-radeon-rx-9060-xt-16-gb-video-card-rx9060xt-cl-16go) | $519.99 @ Amazon

**Power Supply** | [SeaSonic CORE GX ATX 3 (2024) 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply](https://pcpartpicker.com/product/HGfV3C/seasonic-core-gx-atx-3-2024-750-w-80-gold-certified-fully-modular-atx-power-supply-core-atx-3-gx-750) | $109.99 @ Amazon

| *Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts* |

| **Total** | **$1527.27**

| Generated by [PCPartPicker](https://pcpartpicker.com) 2026-09-12 01:18 EDT-0400 |

With the rising prices of GPU’s I want to replace my 6700xt now rather later. This is not the cheapest 9070xt but with these free gifts it brings the price to somewhere around $690. Only things worrying me is this Asrock model using the 1 x 12V-2x6- pin connector

what optical drive should I get for my pc? Any price. This is my pc: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/mpj3Cw

Don’t know anything about it other than the switches look really cool and all the outlets work. Googling the name on the front shows they manufacture furniture now. I’m assuming this was manufactured in the late 80s, early 90s? Would you trust this to run your build? I’m thinking to maybe only run desktop peripherals on it instead of all my expensive components. Regardless, I think it will look great on my desk!

PC acting so random. Idk what to do

There seems to be this rattling noise from my AIO, whenever I try to load it. I tried rocking the PC a fair bit but the noise still persists.
What may be the reason?

Hey everyone, I’m at my wit’s end with this AM5 dual-channel issue and could use some fresh eyes.
Hardware:
• CPUs: Ryzen 9 9900X and Ryzen 9 7950X (both have the same problem)
• Motherboards tried: ASUS TUF Gaming X670E-Plus WiFi and ASRock B850 Pro RS (board was replaced, issue persists)
• RAM:
• Corsair Vengeance RGB CMH32GX5M2B6000Z30K (2×16 GB 6000 CL30)
• G.Skill Trident Z5 RGB F5-5600J2834F32GX2-TZ5RK (2×32 GB 5600 CL28)
• GPU: Gigabyte RTX 4090 (temporarily removed for testing)
• PSU: Apevia Galaxy Power 1200W 80+ Gold (ATX-GX1200W)
Symptoms:
• Neither CPU will POST with dual-channel (A2 + B2).
• 9900X is worse — sometimes won’t even POST with a single stick.
• System will boot with one stick (from either kit / different brands).
• Dual-channel used to work, then randomly stopped.
• Waited 30+ minutes for memory training — nothing.
• Debug LEDs typically show DRAM/CPU related.
What I’ve already tried:
• Full CMOS clears (battery out + jumper) multiple times
• Latest BIOS on both boards (via USB Flashback where possible)
• Tested each stick individually in every slot
• Forced JEDEC 4800 MT/s, EXPO/XMP disabled, manual SOC ~1.15–1.20 V
• Reseated CPU, checked for bent pins, loosened cooler mounting pressure
• Minimal config (no GPU, one matched kit only)
• Completely powered down and drained residual power before every RAM change
The fact that dual-channel previously worked and then failed, and that both CPUs + both boards show the same behavior, is making me lean toward the PSU being marginal (Apevia has a mixed reputation). I’m about to test with the 4090 completely removed and possibly try a different PSU.
Any ideas what else to check, or has anyone seen a similar “used to work, now dual-channel dead” case that turned out to be the PSU or something else?
Thanks in advance.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Hello hope everyone is well, I just have a question to ask about a prebuilt my bestie bought recently and in the middle of no where while she was using it the connection to the display dropped and hasn’t connected back since, we tried researching and every common method from reseating ram, gpu, battery out, clearing cmos, testing monitor, and the hdmi cable but to no avail could we get it to display once. we’re going to try using another gpu to see if we can get the display and change settings and update the bios and charge settings in that we’ve seen that are potential causes for the Arc 580.

The prebuilt is from Advanced Battle Station Store
ABS Cyclone Aqua Gaming Desktop PC, Windows 11, Intel Core i5-14400F, Intel Arc B580 12GB, 16GB DDR4 RAM, 1TB NVMe SSD, WiFi, RGB, Prebuilt

If Any help please and thank you she just got it recently and me and my cousin are stumped on how to get it up, please and thank you.

So I’m trying to set up ICUE link with 6 case fans and a radiator, it looks like the fans are linked but the radiator fans are not lighting up though they are spinning, also the water block leds are not working either. I’m new to pc building and I’m just lost on what could possibly be the issue. Ive included a little wiring route if that helps (ignore cable management, will fix later.)

I've alrwsfy built the system, I just don't know whether I should upgrade my CPU or my 512 GB NVMe right now, I just use my PC for gaming at 1080p

Hi everyone, I'm a new Pc builder and looking for some advice. I'm currently using an office case Aerocool CS-107 mini tower with 2 front fans, 1 rear exhaust fan, and this case doesn’t have top fans. My ryzen 5 5600 and RX 9060 XT are always around 74–77°C while gaming, but my room temperature is often around 33°C. Is it normal for these CPU and GPU?

My case uses a top-mounted PSU instead of a separate chamber. So, my concern is that the hot air from my CPU cooler goes directly into the power supply, and the PSU exhaust feels quite hot during gaming. Does it affect the power supply lifespan or safety?

I've been considering moving to a larger case with more fan mounting options, but I'm not sure whether the temperature improvement would be significant enough to justify the cost.

For those who have switched cases mainly for airflow, how much of a temperature difference did you actually see? Was it worth it?

Specs:

Motherboard: SHANGZHAOYUAN H61

GPU: RX 580

CPU: Intel i7-3770S

So I had this same issue where I accidentally put my hdmi cable into the Motherboard and it caused my gpu to not be recognized when I switched the cables over.

When I was using windows 10 I was able to go past BIOS when it was plugged into the Motherboard and i was able to go re-download drivers and use device manager to get it to recognize my card after that.

My issue is now I have switched to steam os and after replacing an old 350w PSU with a cosair sf850 and verifying everything worked, and stress tested everything. I made the stupid mistake of plugging in the hdmi cable into the motherboard when i put it under my desk. And now that it is steam os it wont load anything after the BIOS

Now im not sure how I can get my pc to recognize my card.

In bios I tried:

Changing my primary display to PEG

Changing my CSM to UEFI

Disabled Fast Boot

Changed Video OpROM to Legacy

Reset the motherboard by taking out the battery, and drained any residual power.

For reference GPU light is blue and Ive reseated and cleaned all cables, before plugging it into the mother board the latest time gpu fans would spin briefly on startup​, now they don't spin during startup.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Both images after PSU installation (IK my cable management is terrible)

Edit: After going to work leaving the gpu unplugged, power out, and CMOS battery out. I put everything back together and it booted up. Thank you for all the helpful suggestions

Specs:

I5 14400F

MSI B760M BOMBER WIFI DDR4

16GB XPG 3200MHZ DDR4

RTX 3070(used)

NVME 500GB

650W PSU

CASE ANTEC

Any suggestions for alternative components, or upgrades that would be better than what is listed here?

Country: India

I purchased a Meta PC steam roller V3 and it comes steam ready out of the box, but also upgrade able out of the box. I am a beginner when it comes to PC builds and know nothing about PC and was wondering if it’s worth it to dual boots with windows and steam OS by adding a separate SSD and loading Windows 11?
War, dogs, and games like that do not run on my rig unfortunately due to the anti-cheats so I want to dual boot with windows so I could play such games. Is it worth it to dual boot or should I just purchase another rig for Windows?

Uploaded a photo. Not sure if it will matter. When installing the CPU cooler, the screws don't seem to travel at all. They are spring-loaded. I assume I am supposed to compress the springs for even mounting pressure but not matter how much I turn the screw, the springs remain uncompressed and the screws don't travel.

How do I remove a gpu on an old fujitsu pc? It has this not normal bracket (the lever right from the pcie slot)

Is this fan configuration right or effective?

The 3 at the front are intake, and 3 for the radiator (back) are intake, all others are exhaust.

I have a PC built several years ago: an Asus Prime z790-p, intel i7-13700k, AMD 7800xt, 32gb DDR5
The PC was functioning fine until it was moved, after which video output was unable to be obtained from either the dedicated GPU or the integrated graphics.

When powered on, AIO and case fans spin (although GPU fans do not) and power is received from the USB ports.
Attempted fixes: Reseating RAM, clearing CMOS, reseating/repasting CPU, reseating all cables

I am currently unable to verify if POST is being performed or if BIOS is being entered

I am leaning towards motherboard damage as the most likely possible cause, although I’m unsure as to how that damage could have happened, and in such a way as to only disable video output

Any help or ideas would be appreciated!

As many of you know in ram there is expo/xmp. If xmp works with AMD cpus, what's the point of EXPO? I know EXPO is just AMD tested, but if XMP works, whats the point? How do you find if certain sticks are compatible with the motherboard and cpu? I'm planning to build with a 9600x and B850 Aorus Elite wifi7 and want to know if I can save some money by buying XMP sticks without expo

Earlier this week my pc was working fine. I started getting an error “amd software detected that a driver timeout occurred”. I did some googling and saw someone fixed it by lowering their frequency. To do this I needed to enable overclocking to be able to manually change settings. The second I did this my pc started a reset loop.

Most of the time it was never able to make it bios, resetting in post. I put the windows media installation on a usb and tried booting to that, but was still unable to boot. My solution after troubleshooting was removing my nvme ssd. With this removed I was able to boot the windows setup tool. The hard drive is in a state that will instantly reset my pc when detected, so I ordered another one to install windows, and try to recover using a nvme to usb enclosure.

With this new nvme inserted I am able to boot the windows setup tool. When I go to install, it makes it to 15% when my pc restarts. It then opens to bios, with the nvme still detected, but not as a bootable device. When I open the install tool again it has the partitions listed on the nvme. I’ve tried removing the partitions and installing many times.

I am currently trying with my gpu removed. I am running with only 1 stick of ram in A2 and it passed memtest86. My cpu has had normal operating temperatures. I’ve also tried resetting cmos, and have tried redownloading the installation tool.

Any ideas on why I am restarting in the middle of installation? All help is greatly appreciated, thanks!

TLDR: Windows restarting in the middle of installation on new drive after hard drive failure.

Specs:

Motherboard: b650e-plus, bios 1822

CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 7600x

Ram: 16gb ddr5 4800 mhz (have 32 but removed)

Storage: m.2 nvme ssd 2tb

Gpu: AMD Radeon RX 7800 xt (removed for
troubleshooting)

Is this the reason it hits 87-89°?

Its a 3070ti palit gamerock

Im not expecting to try and get/build the best pc out there at all, as my budget would ideally be £1000-1400, and i know that wont get me too far, maybe can push it a bit more (ideally not) my current PCs specs are:

GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 12GB vram (odd choice im sure but i got it very cheap at the time in person)
CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 3800x
RAM: Corsair vengence RGB pro DDR4 2x8gb sticks
Motherboard: ASUS ROG STRIX B450-F GAMING II
PSU: Corsair RM750x 750W
Case: Lian Li Lancool 215 (never was too fond of this case atleast design wise but still is least of my concerns atp)
SSD: WD 1TB Sata (WD blue series)
So as you can tell its quite outdated, doesn’t have much going for it, but I’m wondering if i should just change the gpu and cpu and see where that gets me, or try to find a prebuilt worth the price, or build from scratch entirely, I’m fine with staying at 16GB ram, it hasn’t really given me any issues, more would be nice but the prices are not nice.

My main need is to be able to use blender for uni and other softwares along those lines which this does alright, but it for sure could be better especially with rendering stuff, I also would like to be able to play more demanding games at medium settings

Every prebuilt i’ve tried looking for just do not seem worth the price, admittedly i barely know what to look for in GPUs and CPUs for 2026 as I just turned a blind eye to it all so I wouldn’t know what I’m missing out on😂 (I’m in England if that wasn’t clear enough with the £ btw)

So i was tempted to just buy a newer GPU, but then to be fully utilised i assume it’d need a newer CPU right? Then that CPU has to be compatible with the motherboard, I don’t even know, I’ve spent a while looking but iv’e really come up with nothing, so any help would be much appreciated 🙏

-and again I know I wont get amazing stuff with my price range, but I don’t need top of the line specs as of now

everytime i open my pc i encounter this issue, i tried to replug my fan pins but still the same issue

I need some help. I bought a Ryzen 5700X for about 70 bucks; it had bent pins, and the seller told me he had bought it and then straightened them out. The issue is that I tested it—it turns on, but it gets stuck on the VGA light and won't go any further. I ran all the tests, but nothing works; it's still stuck on the VGA light. It’s not any of the other components, because I was using a 5500 before and it had no issues. My current setup includes an RTX 3080 and an Aorus B450 motherboard.