Welcome to the final gaming pc builds of the month article for the year 2013. December has brought some major price fluctuations in the graphics card department. This makes sense due to AMD’s major graphics card release in the last month or so in that the supplies seem to have been quite low, resulting in inflated prices on both the new and older graphics cards in their respective segments.
I have included two graphics card recommendations in the $1000 and $1500 builds as a result of price changes in my main recommendations, so if you like you can keep checking for price decreases or just go with a graphics card that is one level lower and has thus not changed in prices from where they should be at.
Thank you once again for stopping by and I hope that you enjoy the three builds in the $600, $1000 and $1500 budget ranges. Please, if you have any questions leave your comments or just stop by to say hi.
Monthly Gaming PC Build ( $614 ): December 2013
(Game at Smoothly with Medium – High settings at 1920X1080 resolutions)
Coming out to a total of $614, the $600 for the month of December includes motherboard, graphics card, power supply and case. The motherboard was swapped for an AsRock 970 Extreme 3 as it is a better board then last months and the price of the Gigabyte motherboard jumped from its normal $66 to match that of this AsRock board.
I have included the new Radeon R9 270 graphics card, substituting last months 270x due to minimal differences in performance per cost value this month. If you can find a cheaper Radeon 270X at about $200 and you can afford the price increase, then it may be worth the upgrade. However as things are the Radeon 270 fits this spot perfectly and will allow for great gameplay at 1920×1080 resolutions of gameplay.
The power supply was upped to a 500 watt Corsair CX series to more aptly match the minimum power requirements of both the recommended Radeon R9 270 graphics card and the suggested upgrade graphics card. And finally, the included case this month is the Thermaltake V3 black edition for $39. A nice upgrade over the previous NZXT Source 210.
Upgrades / Alternatives for the $600 Gaming PC Build:
Here you will find some hardware alternatives to the hardware already included in the build above. Keep in mind that these are alternatives and are all compatible with the current build. If you want some more suggestions for alternatives or additions to the current build, you just leave a comment below and I will respond back as soon as I can. These upgrades are some alternatives to the above. If it were me and I had a little extra to spend, I would start with either the AMD FX 8320 processor or the GeForce GTX 760 graphics card. Alternatively you can get 1TB of hard drive space for not much more then the 500GB one already included in the build.
A very nice $1000 build, especially so at only $964. I have left the price at $964 to leave room for the potential substitution of adding in a Radeon 280X graphics card should the prices subside to $300 again. Otherwise, the other reccomended card included in the current total cost of the build is the EVGA GTX 760 card for $249. A great card still and it is definitely worth its cost.
The previous MSI Gamin series GD45 motherboard was substituted again for the Asus Z87 motherboard you see above as the cost of the MSI one shot right up. I did recommend this Asus motherboard back in October, so it is deifnietly still a great buy – has a few neat features such as USB 3.0 boost and a great BIOS.
The case included in the $1000 build this month is new – it’s called the Enermax Coenus and it boasts everything you can thik of for a comfy $69.99 price. To read some more please refer to Enermax Coenus eca3290a-G Review.
$1000 Gaming PC Build Additions / Alternatives
The following hardware are some build alternatives or additions that may be relevant should you have a little more you’d like to spend on your build. For about $124 you could add in an SSD Drive / Boot Drive of 128GB. Or you could increase your graphics power capacity by either SLI’ing another EVGA GeForce GTX 760 or adding in a stronger single card with an MSI GTX 770. Also you can get a higher efficient CPU cooler with a Noctura CPU cooler.
We have a very affordable $1500 gaming pc build this month that actually only comes out to a total of $1430. This is because some of the hardware has in fact dropped in price, although I have also used a slightly cheaper pc case and I have chosen to exclude last month liquid cpu cooler (although you can still refer to November 2013’s $1500 build if you would prefer a liquid CPU cooler).
You may have noticed that I have included two graphics cards in the $1500 builds recommendations. The first is the very same as last months, the MI GTX 770 for $363, however I would recommend the Radeon R9 290 if the price stays at $400 and becomes available again (as at the moment they seem to be sold out everywhere).
The case included in the $1500 build is not necessarily a band new one, however it is a very nice case in my opinion. There haven’t been many new pc cases in the last month so I had to re-visit some older case suggestions. I decided to go with the THOR V2 after talking to an individual who had just purchased a new build going with the THOR V2. The THOR is a nicely sized, very quiet Full Tower case with plenty of expansion potential. You can also read a good review of the THOR V2 at anandtech.com.
$1500 Gaming PC Build Additions / Alternatives
If you have a little extra to spend on the $1500 build, then below are a few suggestions. For those of you who do much more then game, then an Intel core i7-4770K may be a worthy upgrade to ease video or graphics work. Or if you simply want to increase you graphics card potential, then you can SLI another MSI GTX 770 or purchase a single more powerful graphics card such as the GeForce GTX 780 Ti 3GB card. Or for those of you who want to dedicate more storage space solely to your SSD, then perhaps a larger 512GB Samsung PRO SDD is a worthy upgrade.
Thank you for tuning in the final gaming pc builds of the month article for the year 2013. It’s been a great year in hardware release and a pretty successful year here at Newb Computer Build – with so much feedback and inspiration happening on the blog it’s great to see both new and older faces.
I hope you enjoyed this months article and that you keep tuning in for gaming pc build of the month articles in the coming 2014 year.
Happy holidays and a happy new year everyone 🙂
December 2013’s Gaming PC Hardware Overview Video:
Hi Corey, I have a question that I cant seem to find a concrete answer to on the internet. I just want to know if 3GB VRAM is enough to game comfortably on a single monitor at 1440p? Also, will it last a while? I would like to purchase an MSI GTX 780 TF 3GB but am nervous about the VRAM being a hindrance in only a year or so. Someone told me that I should pick up an MSI GTX 770 4GB and grab another one in SLI at a later point when I need the extra power. Does it even make sense to go less powerful on the card to secure more vram? Sorry, as your site states…I’m a Newb! Any input would be much appreciated.
If it were me I would go with the single 3GB GTX 780 TF if I could afford it at the moment, as I can almost guarantee it will outperform the 770 (even if it’s 4GB) and you would have no problems using a 1440p monitor gaming. As I can’t predict the future I can assume that the 780 would perform well for as long as most cards do anyhow. And you might as well get more performance now, instead of waiting to maybe upgrade to an SLI GTX 770. Heck – you could SLI the 780 in a couple years when they shoot down in price (which can happen).
I wouldn’t worry about the extra vRAM as 1440p isn’t terribly consuming of it and you are running a single monitor setup.
Processor Alternative: AMD FX-8320 Eight-Core Processor Black Edition AM3+ FD8320FRHKBOX ($175.30)
Alternative PC Case: NZXT Guardian 921 RB ATX Mid Tower Case, Black 921RB-001-BL($69.99)
Graphics Card Alternative: EVGA GeForce GTX760 w/EVGA ACX Cooler 2GB GDDR5 256bit, Dual-Link DVI-I, DVI-D, HDMI,DP, SLI Ready Graphics Card (02G-P4-2763-KR) Graphics Cards 02G-P4-2763-KR ($249.95)
WD Blue 1 TB Desktop Hard Drive: 3.5 Inch, 7200 RPM, SATA 6 Gb/s, 64 MB Cache – WD10EZEX ($59.99)
Add a SSD Boot Drive: Samsung Electronics MZ-7PD128BW 840 Pro Series 2.5-Inch 128GB SATA 6Gbps Solid State Drive= (+ $124.99) –
Upgrade your graphics card: MSI Computer Corp. Video Graphics Card N770 TF 2GD5/OC ($363)
SLI with another GTX 760 – EVGA GeForce GTX760 w/EVGA ACX Cooler 2GB GDDR5 256bit, Dual-Link DVI-I, DVI-D, HDMI,DP, SLI Ready Graphics Card (02G-P4-2763-KR) Graphics Cards 02G-P4-2763-KR Price:+$249.99
Noctua 6 Dual Heatpipe with 140mm/120mm Dual SSO Bearing Fans CPU Cooler NH-D14 – Retail (Price: $84)
Intel Core i7-4770K Quad-Core Desktop Processor 3.5 GHZ 8 MB Cache BX80646I74770K ($324.99) – Ideal for anyone who does video / graphics work etc. on top of gaming
Get a better single Graphics Cards: EVGA GeForce GTX 780 Ti, 3GB, 3072MB,GDDR5 384bit, Dual-Link DVI-I, DVI-D, HDMI,DP, SLI Ready Graphics Card (03G-P4-2881-KR) Graphics Cards 03G-P4-2881-KR($699.99) –
Comments 2
Hi Corey, I have a question that I cant seem to find a concrete answer to on the internet. I just want to know if 3GB VRAM is enough to game comfortably on a single monitor at 1440p? Also, will it last a while? I would like to purchase an MSI GTX 780 TF 3GB but am nervous about the VRAM being a hindrance in only a year or so. Someone told me that I should pick up an MSI GTX 770 4GB and grab another one in SLI at a later point when I need the extra power. Does it even make sense to go less powerful on the card to secure more vram? Sorry, as your site states…I’m a Newb! Any input would be much appreciated.
Author
Hello Charles,
If it were me I would go with the single 3GB GTX 780 TF if I could afford it at the moment, as I can almost guarantee it will outperform the 770 (even if it’s 4GB) and you would have no problems using a 1440p monitor gaming. As I can’t predict the future I can assume that the 780 would perform well for as long as most cards do anyhow. And you might as well get more performance now, instead of waiting to maybe upgrade to an SLI GTX 770. Heck – you could SLI the 780 in a couple years when they shoot down in price (which can happen).
I wouldn’t worry about the extra vRAM as 1440p isn’t terribly consuming of it and you are running a single monitor setup.
Hope this helps.