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My gaming PC has met it's end, bought from PC Specialists in 2015. I only ever used it for ms flight simulator not much else except as a pc.
Is it risky buying one from eBay secondhand? Refurbished? Bought one off eBay for Zwift and it seems fine but this is set up in the cave if pain.
Modern gfx cards are really heavy, if there isn't expanding foam or similar inside the tower they can wreck themselves and the mobo in transit. Decent PC building companies will pack appropriately. Mostly. Second hand... Who knows.
I've just build a gaming rig up from new/used parts. It's genuinely easy these days with YT how tos and online compatibility checkers. You'll get exactly the build you want too and save money.
I've just bought the parts to build a basic gaming pc for my lad. CCL online - £490 for the lot. That's for a Ryzen 5 5600/GTX 1650 build. Basic, but gives him something to build from.
How has it died, and what are its specs? There's a decent change you'll be able to reuse bits of it to keep costs down if you self-build. Also, what resolution screen are you planning on using, if you're going to be at 1080p and 60hz there's no point getting crazy spendy on a graphics card, although even the low end ones are eye wateringly expensive these days.
Ms flight sim is, from what I hear, REALLY demanding so I'd be maximising where my money goes. Basic won't cover it sadly.
On that there are plenty of pigs on pokes on eBay. i7 2.9GHz? Nice! Till you find out its several (past 10) generations old.
What happened to your old one? PSU fry the lot? Because that's the only time I've scrapped an entire system.
If you want to see what new looks like I'd price up a new system using Logical Increments as a guide and PC Partpicker for actual shopping. FWIW if you want 4K or WQwhatever3440x1440is an AMD 7850XT is the card to go for, Sapphire natch.
It’s genuinely easy these days with YT how tos and online compatibility checkers. You’ll get exactly the build you want too and save money.
... And you switch it on and... it doesnt work. Where next ?. Maybe you've connected something up wrong, or not at all and having zero experience you have nobody to turn to.
Then you can spend another week trying to work out what went wrong, and you'll obviously need a 2nd system to access YT or whatever, and then reassemble and hope you have got it right this time, or you haven't fried anything.
I would recommend buying new. You always have the warranty should there be a problem.
Whats the top end budget ?
Something with oomph ?
@dyna-ti the chances of that happening are genuinely small and certainly not worth spending whaleware money on. I presume the Op has said other means of communicating anyway.
"Met its end" how?
dyna-ti
… And you switch it on and… it doesnt work. Where next ?. Maybe you’ve connected something up wrong, or not at all and having zero experience you have nobody to turn to.
Indeed, that can happen but none of us have built our first PC until we've built our first PC. It was much harder in the 90's/ noughties. Written guides with pictures at best and a knowledgeable mate if you were really lucky. Now you have YT and countless forums on your mobile, or a second pc to refer to.
If you are methodical and use a checker to make sure of compatibility it really is within the scope of most people with even a small technical ability. YT is full of guides that will cover all the usual noob errors and once you've built your first PC you are unlikely to ever buy a pre built again. It's satisfying, cheaper and also gives you a far better insight into diagnosing faults further down the line.
All that being said, pre builds have their place and are absolutely the right route for people that have zero interest in building their own rig.👍
I did my recent PC as a step by step upgrade over ~2 years. Started with a motherboard/ram/cpu bundle from AWD-IT where you can choose a MB + CPU and then configure how much/type of RAM. Found better deals on PSU and fan cooler elsewhere. All went into existing case - which I checked the dimensions of to make sure the parts would fit!
Next was SSD upgrade, and eventually, once GPU prices had calmed down quite substantially, a new GPU.
I had neglected to research power draw of the GPUs I was hoping to buy when I bought the PSU, so had to upgrade that again.
So that's another route if existing components still have some life in them yet.
GPU prices are suposed to be falling again in the new year so maybe wait a little for that component.
A good i5 cpu board and bundle will be enough for most gaming these day with the right gpu . 16 gig of mem and as much as it pains me the Radeon cards offer much more bang for buck in the fps stakes that the Nvidia offerings of late . Do you have a budget in mind ?
Tried a boot disc, windows from scratch etc. Good advice - I'll go back to PC Specialist again. This one lasted 8 years.
sobriety
Free Member
Without shopping around, PC specialist are about £200 more expensive than buying the parts and self building for a £2740 PC. So you’re paying a chunk for the convenience, up to you to decide if it’s worth it.
Yep and more too be saved if going second hand on some parts.
Ive got a s-hand CPU, gfx card, NVME and factory refurb PSU.
Again,
What’s wrong with it? What symptoms are you seeing?
The cup holder broke ok!
Switch it on fails to boot up windows. Go into BIOS and force it to use disc with windows. Nothing. Force it to boot from flash. Nothing.
Tip. New PC.
Ms flight sim is, from what I hear, REALLY demanding so I’d be maximising where my money goes. Basic won’t cover it sadly.
The latest flight sim is over 3 years old now. It really isn't that bad, I run it fine on a 1650 super @ 1080p. It absolutely requires an SSD and a fast internet connection. But who on earth is running a pc without an SSD if they play games.
If that was the only thing I wanted to play though an XBOX would be a better option for the money.
Switch it on fails to boot up windows. Go into BIOS and force it to use disc with windows. Nothing. Force it to boot from flash. Nothing.
Tip. New PC.
My PC did this recently, after I’d been messing around with different OSs etc. it was just a BIOS and windows boot loader configuration issue.
I wouldn’t assume that what your seeing means New PC time, and even if something is borked it will likely just be one single part such as the motherboard.
Do you have someone local who knows their stuff who could give it a once over?
A great thing about PCs is that they’re really modular - you could probably get it back up and running and even significantly upgraded by just changing out a few parts rather than a complete new PC.
Here’s an idea - could you list out the full specs here of the current pc here, and what games / programs you want to use it for?
If you’re planning on junking the PC, then maybe offer it up here as a non runner. If I it’s local to be for example I’d consider buying it, repairing and replacing whatever is needed then either using it as a Zwift PC or passing it on to someone who needs it. (I’m based near Daventry by the way should you decide to go this way)
As a slight aside, re "Zwifting" PC's - there is a great facebook group set up specifically around the topic of building budget PC with a "good enough and as cheap as possible" approach to run Zwift.
Search for "ZPCMR" group "Zwift PC Masters and Rides" - there's a wealth of information and expertise in there (a bit like STW itself)
Adding to what Poopscoop said, my son's gaming PC (from CCL - nice company) arrived with the GPU borked, and CCL put it down to transit-bashing despite the expanding foam inside.
They did a tidy build, FWIW, and took care of GPU failure well.
Switch it on fails to boot up windows. Go into BIOS and force it to use disc with windows. Nothing. Force it to boot from flash. Nothing.
"Fails" how?
"Nothing" how? Black screen?
I/we can help you try to fix it. If you've no interest in fixing it and are going to toss it in the bin, I'll take it off your hands for postage. I can always use parts.