Now is the time to build a gaming PC.

2019 has been a great year for gaming,

however I think things are about to get worse.

Much worse.

So beside me here I have

two of budget builds from last year,

one $300 system, as well as a $550 system.

Today though, let me show you exactly why now

is such a good time to build a PC

by replacing some of our 2018 builds

for some stuff which is much, much better.

Alright, so today I'm going to be building two gaming PCs.

Or, well, more specifically, one and a half.

So there won't be any fancy camera angles

because I'm by myself.

I miss Ken.

So, with third gen Ryzen around, I mean,

there's a huge amount of value in the high end,

but interestingly a lot of that has actually

trickled down to low end.

Now, not necessarily because you should buy

a third gen Ryzen system at, you know,

five, $600, but instead,

it's pushed the last generation of Ryzen way down.

So, as you'll see in a second here,

we're taking advantage of second gen Ryzen 5,

which is only $130 right now.

Seriously, this is a six core processor,

twelve threads, overclockable, and it's 130 bucks.

I mean, not that long ago, you would've had

to pay five, $600 easily to get this kind of performance.

Now, it's in my $500 budget build.

Something that I think a lot of people are overlooking

is the fact that memory prices, as well as things

such as SSDs, graphics cards, a lot of stuff has

actually come down a lot since last year.

If you're looking at something like 16 gigs of RAM,

it's nearly half the price that it was

this time last year.

SSDs have come even farther.

So it feels like it was not that long ago

that you were looking at three, four, $500

for a 120 gig SSD, whereas now, you could

pick up one for $20.

I've got a 240 gig BX 500 here which was $31.

$31 for a 240 gig SSD.

Like, what are you doing man?

Like, it absolutely makes so much sense right now.

And then of course there are the graphics to talk about.

So this year we've seen pretty major launches

from both AMD as well as NVIDIA,

but, what I really care about is the actual budget side.

So, this has actually really driven a lot of prices down.

So, take this RX 570 for example.

Now this is a couple year old card.

However, for only about $120,

it is absolutely incredible bang for the buck.

In fact we did an entire video rounding up budget GPUs,

and this is my ultimate favorite.

You just can't beat this priced performance.

Not only are memory prices likely to go up soon

because there is a huge oversupply

on the market right now, which is a big reason

why we've seen such cheap prices,

but, there's also the looming threat of tariffs

especially here in the U.S., which could

very easily drive up the price of pretty much

everything on the table right now.

I mean, yeah, sure, things generally do get better

over time, but they also tend to get more expensive.

And this is historically an incredibly good time

to build a gaming PC just because so many components

are so good and especially so cheap.

(upbeat music)

Alright, so the first system is all prepped

and ready to go.

In fact, let me give you a little bit of a closer look.

So, the nice parts about this is that for

just under $600, you're getting

a lot of bang for the buck.

You've got the six core Ryzen processor,

16 gigs of RAM, you've got the 500 gig NVMe drive,

we have our RX 570.

Now at 570 bucks, this is pretty much in the realm

of what most people would consider

a budget gaming PC, however, we can go cheaper,

and we most certainly will.

So, one of our most popular videos last year

was on this, the $300 gaming build

which was surprisingly solid, especially given

that small budget.

However, today, well today, we can do it

just a little bit better.

Okay, so I have my systems done.

It's been a couple days.

However, we now have our new budget

$300 build, as well as our $570 system.

So, last time I built this one,

you guys are fairly familiar, but this one,

this one's actually pretty cool.

So, inside we're taking advantage of Ryzen 3 2200G.

It's a little bit older, however, at only $80

for an unlocked quad core processor

with pretty decent integrated graphics,

this is a killer deal.

So, this entire system with eight gigs of RAM,

we've got a 256 gig SSD around back.

We've got a 430 watt power supply.

Everything here is just under $300.

I think last I checked, it was like 285 on Amazon.

Just don't mind the lack of IO shield.

I lost it.

Oh, so, while Ken was moving this PC the other day,

he dropped it, (clears throat) dropped it,

and so now the front panel is very slightly loose.

- [Ken] Don't make something that looks like a handle.

- (laughs) That actually does come off

a little too easy, doesn't it?

Surprising exactly no one, the new systems

are a lot faster.

So it comes to CPU, while the new budget build

is a decent step up, it is absolutely nothing

compared to the new $570 system,

which completely wipes the floor

with all of these systems thanks to Ryzen 5 2600.

Now, even bigger of a jump is going to the graphics side,

where, yes, the budget build, again, is a little bit faster,

but because we now have the budget for

a pretty decent dedicated graphics card,

the budget boy, well, it's budget no longer.

Benchmarks are one thing, though,

but the real test is how do these PCs actually game?

Well to start out with, we have CS:GO

on the $300 system.

- [Ken] Did you just hit it?

- I did hit it.

It's fine, don't worry about it.

With maxed out settings at 1080p,

we're at 45, 50 frames per second.

So, I might want to turn the settings down

just a little bit.

This is very playable, though.

Literally, just by turning the anti-aliasing down

a little bit, where it's 75, 80 frames per second,

and we can easily, if I just crank things down

a little bit more, get up to something like 100, 120 FPS.

But, realistically, with a $300 system,

75 FPS is probably going to be just fine.

To the surprise of exactly no one, what?

What?

Why can't I shoot?

Are you serious right now?

No, no!

Well, I was gonna say performance is better,

except shooting at me was nice.

(laughs)

How'd they do that?

Okay, so, after fixing my control settings,

this is a, well, it's a much better experience.

So, right now we're at 200 frames per second.

And this is with fully maxed out, 1080p.

We've got anti-aliasing on, literally everything.

This is a more expensive system,

but considering that we're only paying

about twice as much, you're getting three, four times

the graphics performance.

We've got more RAM, we've got literally everything.

Oh, wait, why am I playing with the keyboard?

Okay, so, next we have Rocket League.

I forgot to plug in a controller.

I'll be right back.

(laughing) I need a controller.

I literally made it like half a second into the video,

I was like, "Oh, wait, no, this is bad."

So, next we have Rocket League.

Again, we're playing at 1080p,

but this time we are playing on quality settings.

However, 60 frames per second is not too bad.

I mean, for a $300 system, I am legitimately impressed.

Okay, yeah, this is significantly better.

We're literally capped at 250 frames per second.

And meanwhile, we're also having the actual settings

pretty much all the way set up to quality.

Yeah, there's no contest here.

I mean, it's a more powerful system,

but when you jump up to having that RX 570,

it's not the most powerful graphics card in the world,

but you're still getting a completely solid performance

at 1080p, especially in more esports titles like this.

Next up, we have everyone's favorite, Fortnite.

Which, actually should be pretty playable,

even on the $300 budget system.

So, we do have to turn the settings down a little bit here.

So, right now I'm running at 720p on medium.

However, we're fairly close to a 60 FPS lock.

Well, frame rate's great.

Not having a gun, not great.

Yeah, this is totally playable,

and in fact, I actually could probably turn

the resolution up just a little bit

because right now I'm actually averaging

around 75, 80 frames per second.

Dude, this system is totally solid for 1080.

So, Fortnite, just immediately jumping in,

we're in the 70 frame per second range,

and this is with full epic settings at 1080p.

I knew we already went over the 570

in our budget GPU video, but this is a lot of card

for 1080p gaming.

I mean, the fact that we're able to get 60-ish FPS

in pretty much anything we play,

even with maxed out settings, is a really nice feature.

Oh, no, that's bad, that's bad, that's bad.

That's bad, that's bad, that's bad.

I'm running, I'm running, running, running, running.

Nope, nope.

Okay, all right.

Well, that's unfortunate.

Wait, wait.

- [Ken] Go, go, go, go, go, go, go!

Get him, get him!

- [Austin] Okay, what?

- [Ken] Oh, no.

- [Austin] There was nothing there!

He was just shooting me!

- [Ken] No, I mean, yeah.

- We at some point need just a montage

of me sucking at Fortnite.

No, why?

Oh!

Oh, no, no you don't, no you don't.

I got shot in the back.

Kind of speaks for itself, I guess.

I really do think that now is a great time to build a PC.

So, if you look at the budget end at

the $300 option, you're actually getting

a pretty decent level of performance.

So, you can play a lot of games,

at least reasonably well, and importantly,

it is actually fairly easy to not only build,

but you also can do some upgrades later on down the line.

Great for a first system.

However, if you've got a little bit more money to spend,

I do think the mid-range option

is well worth it.

I mean, you're getting a lot here, right?

Six core processor, 16 gigs of RAM,

a decent graphics card, 512 gig SSD, or 500 gig SSD.

I mean, there's a lot going for this,

and for the bang for the buck, I mean,

it's hard to beat.

But, regardless, if you're considering

buying or building a new gaming PC,

I really do think now is a good time.