People might suggest you buy the best pre-build gaming PC to end the discussion about whether to build a PC or buy a new one. However, the fact is that building a PC by assembling components of your own choice is always more rewarding. Building a gaming PC by yourself means you are the one responsible for choosing from the exact model, motherboard, GPU even the CPU cases to the number of RGB fans you want.
It is not just that you will build a PC of your choice but also will end up saving a few hundred bucks for you. Those savings are important and can help you upgrade your PC in the future. For example, building a mid-range gaming PC HP Omen Desktop will cost you about 1000$. But buying a prebuilt HP Omen Desktop with similar specification to that 1000$ PC build will cost you about 1360 – 1400$.
In this article, we will be guiding you on how to build a very nice mid-range gaming PC that cost you around 1000$. This PC build will be able to keep up with most titles and will offer some nice productivity performance. First of all, we will take you through all the parts quickly and will tell you why we choose them for this build.
Table of Contents
CPU
AMD Ryzen 5 5600
Undoubtedly, the Ryzen 5 5600 is perfect for this budget. It is a 6-core 12-thread processor that comes with a capable cooler allowing you to save money on an aftermarket one. Although it comes with a slightly lower clock speed the fact is that there is only about a two to three percent performance difference between the X and the non-X version when it comes to gaming. That is why it doesn’t make sense to spend an extra 30 for the X version.
Intel Core i5 12400
Another good CPU option for this price point is the Intel Core i5 12400 which offers similar performance at the same price. It is the best choice for those looking to jump onto the DDR 5 train with PCI generation 5 support. However, the price of DDR 5 memory and motherboards don’t make sense for this price range until Zen 4 gets released. Zen 4 might get released later this year and is expected to support PCI gen 5 and DDR 5 memory.
So if you are very patient and still saving up money to build a PC, we suggest you wait until the second half of this year to see how the new Ryzen 7000 CPUs perform. In the meanwhile, the Zen 3 prices are also expected to fall. However, if you are looking to build a PC right now then continue watching this video.
Motherboard
Since we are doing a micro ATX build, we suggest you opt for the GIGABYTE B550M AORUS PRO-P. The reason for choosing this motherboard is that you don’t want to be cheap out on the motherboard. Most budget B550 boards don’t even have dedicated VRM heatsinks and offer the bare minimum features. So we suggest you pay a little extra and grab a better-looking board with beefier VRM heatsinks, two M.2 slots, and a USB Type-C port in the back. You get all of that while supporting Ryzen 5000 series CPUs right out of the box without having to flash the Bios. However, if you have to flash the Bios then you can do that by using the Q-flash feature right behind the motherboard without using any of the older generation CPUs.
Another reason we picked this board is because of the fan headers. You get four additional fan headers excluding the CPU header up top. So you can plug in your cooler and up to four additional fans which are awesome. If you are a fan of RGB, well this board still has you covered. It offers four RGB headers in total, you get two of each, 5 volts 3 pins, and 12 volts 4 pins.
Memory
Moving on to memory, it is well-known that Ryzen loves fast memory. It is also important to find the right speed and not overpay for something that doesn’t bring any additional performance. We believe the G.Skill Ripjaws V series is the perfect choice for this build. There are several reasons to believe that this memory is right-fit here. First of all, it is a pretty fast 16 gigabyte kit with a 3200 megahertz frequency and a CL-16 timing.
Secondly, it is on the GIGABYTES QVL list for the motherboard. QVL stands for Qualified Vendor List. It is a list showing all the qualified parts that work with a motherboard. This has been tested and confirmed by the motherboard manufacturer. Thus these sticks being on the QVL list guarantee that there won’t be any system instabilities. You can also run the XMP profile in the Bios without any issues.
XMP Profile
Remember, if you don’t enable the XMP profile in the Bios that means your RAM is running at half of the speed by default. It means you are not taking advantage of the extra performance. Many pieces of research show that about half the people have not enabled XMP in their Bios. You can check it yourself if you want. All you need is just right-click on the taskbar, go to the task manager and click on performance. Then underneath the memory tab look for the speed in the bottom right corner. If that speed is half of what your frequency should be, then you don’t have XMP enabled.
The performance difference between 3600 megahertz and 3200 megahertz isn’t substantial enough to make the extra investment. even with FCLK enabled, it just doesn’t make sense to pay extra for minimal gain. That is why we believe these memory sticks are perfect for this specific build.
Video Card / GPU
The GeForce RTX 3060 is the best choice and can fit very comfortably in this budget build. With RTX 3060 you can game comfortably over 100 FPS in most titles. According to 12 game average, FPS between this card and the RX 6600 from AMD are both neck and neck in terms of performance. However, the RX 6600 is much cheaper to buy coming in at just 325 after a mail-in rebate.
Again, your personal preferences matter for the GPU. If you want to save the extra 70 dollars, go with the RX 6600 which offers the same gaming performance as an RTX 3060. You can put that extra money towards a better cooler, more storage fans, or whatever you want for your PC. However, in the end, the NVENC encoder is an absolute must for you. It is because if you’re streaming or capturing the video then definitely you should go with the RTX 3060. Apart from other RTX features like DLSS, the big one is the NVENC encoder.
Storage
Let’s talk about storage. We suggest you keep it simple with a single one terabyte M.2 SSD from Intel. The Intel 660p has proven to be one of the faster M.2 SSDs compared to other drives within the same price point. One terabyte is plenty for your operating system and all of your games. Since you are running on really fast read and write speeds that means your PC will boot up faster as well as loading applications and games a lot faster too. Of course, there is room to add more storage since the motherboard comes with four SATA ports.
PC Case
Let’s talk about the case. We suggest you go with the THERMALTAKE MICRO ATX which costs around 60 USD. This case looks good and offers tons of room for cooling and expandability is a plus. It also features a power supply shroud with additional USB ports in the front. In addition to a single USB 3.0, you get two additional USB 2.0s as well which is awesome. However, our favorite feature of the case is the side panel that swings open. It makes your access inside very easy to swap parts or diagnose your PC. These cases even come in the white color. You shouldn’t be asking more than this nice complete package for only 60 bucks.
Fans for PC Cooling
The above-mentioned case only comes with a single 120-millimeter fan in the rear which is not enough. So we suggest you pick up three additional fans to neutralize the air pressure inside the case. Adjust the two intake fans in the front and one additional exhaust stand on the top. You can get a set of three nice-looking high airflow fans for only eleven dollars. They are also available in white color but the price might be 2 -3 USD higher than black ones. So, if you’re doing a white-themed build, the white fans will pair nicely with the white case.
Power Supply
Finally, powering everything is the Aries gaming power supply; an 80 plus bronze certified 650 watts’ power supply for only 50 bucks. We have used these power supplies in so many different budget builds and they’ve never disappointed us. They are proven to be the best choice when it comes to budget builds.
Total Estimated Cost
Let’s look at the cost of every part we have picked and see where we are in terms of budget. Remember this PC budget build has to be about 1000 USD.
Component | Selection | Price ($) |
CPU | 179.99 | |
Motherboard | 149.99 | |
Memory | 54.99 | |
Storage | 84.97 | |
Video Card | 468 | |
Case | 69.99 | |
Power Supply | 42.99 | |
Fans | 120mm Case Fan for PC Computer Case Cooling 3-Pack (12WT3-3) | 10.99 |
Total | 1061.91 | |
List of components and models for $1000 budget PC Build
Final Thoughts
This is an impressive thousand dollars gaming PC build. You will observe that you’re averaging about 100 FPS on the more demanding titles and way above the 144 FPS threshold for some of the lighter titles. You will take a five percent performance hit recording with OBS using the NVIDIA and NVENC encoder. It takes most of the stress off the CPU and puts it on the GPU. This helps improve the performance anywhere between 3 to 15 FPS depending on the game you’re playing. So your actual FPS will be a lot higher if you’re not using any type of encoding or recording software.
Convincingly, this is one of the best budget gaming PCs you can build for 1000 USD. Thus budget build can easily and smoothly handle 1080p gaming. It will also offer ideal performance for 1440p gaming. Furthermore, it can even offer decent performance in 4k gaming.