I want to escape consoles and finally build a gaming pc but I’ve seen the prices…

Everything is really overwhelming for me and I have no clue what I should go for and everyone is giving me differing answers so I ask you.

Is building a PC ACTUALLY cheaper than buying one?

What specs would I even need? All I wanna do is play arc raiders comfortably at high settings and play heavily modded Garry’s mod.

    • octobob@lemmy.ml
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      2 hours ago

      Just throwing it out there but why not go DDR4? Your motherboard and CPU might be slightly older but I’ve literally used the same mobo for like 10 years. Currently I have a Ryzen 5800x, Radeon 9070xt, 32gb ddr4. I upgraded the CPU in 2020 and the GPU this spring, selling my 6700xt to make up some of the hurt from GPU prices.

      I can play cyberpunk on like max settings. The rig works great on Linux. I don’t know how much of a difference DDR5 really makes since I’ve never had it but I feel like it’s getting into diminishing returns for PC gaming, it can’t really be noticeable that frames load 5-10% faster or whatnot.

      On top of that, the 5800x3D is still regularly recommended despite being 4 years old. For arc raiders and older titles, some slightly older hardware could do wonders for you. I’d probably go this route than dropping $2k on a pre-built unless you really want Nvidia for some reason.

      I’m very pleased with the specs I listed, like I said I can play the newest titles on max settings. You can prob build it for somewhere around $1k, mostly due to GPU prices. And if you build it yourself you get a better power supply, cabling, case, etc.

    • SynonymousStoat@lemmy.world
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      20 hours ago

      I’m not sure if this is still true, but in the very recent past you could find better deals on DDR5 RAM when buying it in a bundle with a CPU. A lot of stores did this as a way to try to prevent scalping.

    • artyom@piefed.social
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      18 hours ago

      Prebuilts often cut corners all over the place. Especially Walmart. Typically in the power supply, wiring, and other small things that no one looks at on a spec sheet. And the prices usually aren’t much lower. Plus building a PC is fun, educational and will help you troubleshoot inevitable issues and failures in the future.

      If you’re feeling overwhelmed, PCPartPicker has a bunch of good builds at very price points and resolutions.

      Arc Raiders is not a terribly demanding game.