My lad has started to make noises about a gaming computer, so he can play a game called Battleground with his mates.

I am immediately overwhelmed when I start looking, and just don’t know what sort of thing I should be looking at.

Has anyone got any recommendations or suggestions for a computer, mouse, keyboard and monitor?

I have no idea on budget, so I guess something that will do the job rather than the best in the world!

https://pubg.gamepedia.com/System_Requirements#PC_System_Requirements

Minimum
OS 64-bit Operating Systems (Windows 7, Windows 8.1 & Windows 10)
Processor Intel Core i3-4340 / AMD FX-6300
GPU nVidia GeForce GTX 660 2GB / AMD Radeon HD 7850 2 GB
HD Space 30 GB available space
RAM 6 GB RAM
DirectX Version 11

That’s the minimum(assuming that’s the correct game). You’ll be wanting something quite a bit better than that to future proof/ make sure it can run decent, minimum is just that, minimum, ie not the best gaming experience.

Ryzen 5 1600 (easy to overclock)
msi B350 GAMING PRO CARBON mother board
8gb ram (faster the better at least 3000mhz)
MSI AMD Radeon RX 580 8GB GAMING X
500W power supply.
decent case with lots of fans/space for watercooler.
water cooler AIO (keeps it quiet)

If you don’t know much about it, best bet is to decide a budget and get something from a company that specialise in gaming PC’s (i’ve used overclockers.co.uk and chillblast) before and have been happy with both.
Not sure whats currently on offer as i tend to get something relatively future proof and keep for 5 years.
Spent around £1100 both times, although may be a little more now since the fall in the value of the £.

overclockers are not cheap though. buying the bits and building it yourself will save cash.

overclockers are not cheap though. buying the bits and building it yourself will save cash.

given the level of the OP i think we are a bit away from the ability to do that

given the level of the OP i think we are a bit away from the ability to do that

assuming he can use a screw driver and plug cables in there isn’t really any more to building a computer.

I’ll second a water cooler – my son built a gaming machine about 2 years ago, and it takes the heat right out of the back. He runs 4 fans on 50% and the machine is surprisingly quiet and internally cool at full tilt. The heat coming off the water pump radiator at the back is tremendous.

My son and I built up a gaming pc recently.

Ryzen 1500x CPU
MSI B350 Gaming Pro mobo
16gb RAM
GeForce 1070 8gb GPU
600w PSU
250gb SSD
NZXT gaming case

£970 all in

He plays a lot of Minecraft…

1070 for minecraft, does he kill flys with a sledge hammer?

assuming he can use a screw driver and plug cables in there isn’t really any more to building a computer.

otehr than knowing what parts go together , which parts have compatibility issues , which parts are good…..

would be a bit like taking someone off the street and handing them CRCs website and say build a bike.

Thanks for all the advice.

Those that know me will agree I shouldn’t be anywhere near a screwdriver…my most recent experience with home computers was writing out the games from C&VG on the C64 (syntax error in line 3276).

I’ll take all this advice and info into a shop…

Unless there are any great links out there for something off the shelf!

1070 for minecraft, does he kill flys with a sledge hammer?

I was being facetious. After we’d built it he didn’t have any money for new games until payday so he just gave Minecraft a go. Apparently, he went from 30ish fps on his laptop to 6-800! He was quite pleased to say the least.

OP, what’s your budget?

This is my sons;

Mid range scan gaming pcs
Anything from the above will play Battlegrounds with decent framerates, multiplayer games like that are best played with a lot of the graphical settings turned down or off altogether. On top of the price of this you’ll have to factor in a keyboard, mouse, monitor and either speakers or headphones. Most players will be using headphones and a mic to talk to team mates.
Having built all my gaming computers for the last 15 years I’m not convinced that self building is as beneficial anymore, by the time you’ve bought the parts, paid shipping and set aside the time to build it and tweak it and make sure everything is working as intended the slight extra cost of buying pre built guaranteed systems doesn’t seem so bad. Just don’t go to currys or pc world, stick with scan or overclockers or one of the other big online retailers.

Say £800 all in? Or is that wildly optimistic?

https://www.aria.co.uk/Systems/Gaming+Range/Next+Day+Gaming+PCs/

People will probably post up better but that’ll give you a start. 800 will get you something no bother. Might not be top of the line, but we’ll there’s no need for that. Games do have variable graphics settings. So lesser machine you just turn them down, assuming it meets the minimum.

Need to factor in extras keyboard mouse, monitor headphones etc.

this is mine.

Ryzen 1700 OC 3.9
16GB ram
RX480 OC 1400gpu 2250 memory
cryorig A40 ultimate CPU cooler

Overclockers do prebuilt, but obviously you pay for it.

Have a look here
https://forums.overclockers.co.uk/threads/new-pc-1k-budget.18795647/

I’d buy him an Xbox one and put £600 in a savings account for when he wants a car next year 😉

But that’s just me…

Play PUBG on high (ultra is a push) with a PC same spec as this at 2560×1440 resolution (better than HD):

https://www.currys.co.uk/gbuk/computing/desktop-pcs/desktop-pcs/pc-specialist-vortex-core-ii-gaming-pc-10158596-pdt.html

16yr old son has same spec too but is wasted on him, doesn’t even know what fps stands for.

That’s with no monitor though.
Really you need a minimum of a current gen i5, a gtx 1060 6gb and an SSD for gaming at 1080p, 1440 resolution and you need to be looking at vega gpu’s or gtx 1070.

That’s with no monitor though.
Really you need a minimum of a current gen i5, a gtx 1060 6gb and an SSD for gaming at 1080p, 1440 resolution and you need to be looking at vega gpu’s or gtx 1070.

Really? Son is currently banging away with a 3rd gen I5 and a 750ti at 1080 no problem.

I was once an avid pc hanger and built/updated many a PC.

Don’t game anymore though, think it’s my age, just can’t get back into it.:-(

Anyway…

My biggest advice is just remember that it’s a money pit.

As your son moves on to other/newer games be prepared to get an ear bending about poor frame rates etc. You don’t have to listen to him but I’m just saying.lol

That said, as a gaming platform a PC cannot be beaten.

Luckily my lad went the Xbox route some years back which is way cheaper…. Even if the games aren’t.

As your son moves on to other/newer games be prepared to get an ear bending a

you’d imagine at 16, and forking out a fair whack on a machine, any further upgrades would be his financial responsibility! 😆

Really? Son is currently banging away with a 3rd gen I5 and a 750ti at 1080 no problem

Yeh but if buying new it’s cost prohibitive to buy an older generation cpu and gpu 2nd hand, simple maths.

Ok given you seem to have no idea about this stuff … I’m assuming your son is talking about this game: https://playbattlegrounds.com/

It sort of depends on how much money you have to spend. If it were me, I’d be looking for:

Intel i5 processor (AMD is sort of ok, but I’ve always stuck with Intel / Nvidia and never regretted it)
8GB ram minimum
An SSD
GeForce GTX 1060 minimum

About a grand should get you that stuff plus a monitor, keyboard, mouse and headset. That’ll play all the latest and greatest games (including the one your son wants to play) reasonably well. Spend more than that and you’ll definitely get a better machine, but IMO it’s diminishing returns past that point. Kinda like bikes really.

Also bear in mind it’ll be obselete and fairly worthless in 5-10 years time, so don’t count on any resale value it probably won’t have any.

https://www.cyberpowersystem.co.uk/category/gaming-pcs

An excellent company. Pick a one and then configure it as you want, or just ring them and get them to do it for you. Highly recommended

It’s a great game and I think out on Xbox one early December

My son’s is an i7 4790k (upto 4.4ghz) with 16GB and a GeForce 970 from a couple of years ago. SSD as the boot drive, plus 2 x 2GB drives. He does have a 27″ monitor and 2 x 24″ for wrap round gaming and it still plays all the games at high resolution/frame rates. By the time he was finished he was looking over £1500.

As said, an i5 with a 1060/1070 if you can stretch it. The 1080’s are frighteningly expensive for not much more oomph.

The 1080’s are frighteningly expensive for not much more oomph.

They are more for gaming on a 4k monitor, or a 1440p high refresh (144hz) as frame rates can really suffer.. if your happy keeping resolution at normal HD, and regular 60hz refresh rate then yes they won’t do much for you.

Buy him a Pentium from gumtree, and a new bike instead?

I think quite alot has changed since I built mine last year. I finished mine just as Ryzen was being released and before the Etherium thing kicked off with GPU pricing.

Its got 5 case fans on it set low so still quiet. (I tried turning them all to 100% with speedfan and it sounds like a jet, but even on intensive games, they dont really go much above 50%

heres a piccy of my build parts using a Pentium G4560 CPU

Cost me about £650

runs most games on full whack no problems

If you’re going in with details to a shop don’t let them fleece you…

You’ll currently pay more for an AMD graphics card for the equivalent Nvidia one due to crytocurrency mining, the effect still hasn’t died down on sales.

It might be worth having a look at 2nd hand rigs on facebook pages. You’ll get something with a decent spec that’s already pre built for quite a cost difference, just like selling 2nd hand bikes, 2nd hand computers depreciate quick too.

Yeh for a mid range graphics card the gtx 1060 6gb is the one to go for, the amd rx580 are artificialy higher priced as they are better crypto mining cards, but there’s not that much difference in game performance, not enough to warrant the money anyway.

That said ive just checked ocuk and in stock they have a 8gb rx580 for £250, and 6gb gtx 1060 for £240, so the rx580 can be had for sensible money.

I paid 150 for my 8gb rx470.
Im surprised how much the prices have hiked for AMD.

Maybe i need to start mining!

You can pick up GTX1060 builds for around £600 https://www.awd-it.co.uk/awd-z1-intel-i5-7400-3.5ghz-gtx-1060-6gb-ddr5-vr-gaming-pc.html?gclid=CjwKCAjw7frPBRBVEiwAuDf_LUwS7zP4JUU2ElIrcxj5XxmCCvCuAMWqBFI81-x9C2-YPa7mlL92hRoC1kEQAvD_BwE

Battlegrounds isn’t actually that demanding unless you play at high resolutions + high quality graphics settings. If you play at 1920×1080 and reduce the quality it will play well on a £750-1000 system. I spent a fortune a few months ago on a new gaming PC and although I play at 1440 res I’ve actually turned the quality down a fair bit (not for performance but so enemy players are easier to spot).

Key points:
Get a CPU one or two models below the top of the range. I stuck with Intel myself but the AMD Ryzens are pretty good. I wouldn’t get something you need to overclock now to get decent performance but it’s worth getting something that has some headroom to overclock in the future.

16GB RAM – and if you do overclock make sure it speed matches the CPU overclocking. Battlegrounds likes 16GB+

SSD – Get a decent sized SSD drive (or an M.2 if you can afford it). 250GB minimum really. Make sure the OS goes on that + your most played game. For everything else get a separate 1TB+ 7200rpm drive.

Graphics card – Get the best Nvidia card you can afford, ideally a 1070 or better. A 1060 runs battlegrounds fine at 1920×1080 but a 1070 gives you a bit more headroom (without paying the ridiculous premium for a 1080Ti).

Cooling – a CPU water cooler is nice but mostly just to reduce fan noise if you’re not overclocking. They’re around £100 so IMO difficult to justify on a sub £1k build.

Case – unless you have space restrictions get a decent size one so there’s plenty of room in it.

Monitor – sub-£1k budget I wouldn’t worry about >60Hz monitors (and Nvidia G-sync is a bit of a rip-off IMO). You can get a decent 1920×1080 60Hz monitor for not much more than £100. Check reviews of models you shortlist to make sure it’s decent for gaming.

In your position I wouldn’t look to self-build but would probably buy a pre-built base-system (i.e. no monitor, keyboard or mouse) and then add a monitor etc. of your choosing. When I was looking ebuyer had a good selection + decent prices. Overclockers.co.uk were really pricey IMO (my previous system was from them and I have no complaints about it but at the end of the day it’s just someone assembling off the shelf components). Some places (like OCUK) seem to base their systems off the packaged retail pricing for all the components + a charge for assembling it all – ebuyer prices at least seemed like you were getting the components a bit cheaper.

I actually bought 95% of my parts from Aria PC and self-assembled. They were fine (and cheap) but I had some issues (dodgy motherboard and possibly CPU) and have been left out of pocket so I wouldn’t recommend self-building to anyone for a sub-£1k build – you just don’t save enough to make up for the risk of having multiple warranties/faff if something goes wrong.

If you do look at pre-built then it’s still worth going to https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/ and putting in all the components and see what it *should* cost (IMO you shouldn’t really be paying more than a £100 premium for a pre-built over the cheapest retail prices for all the components, possibly a bit more if it’s a good on-site warranty)