I Bought a $300 Amazon Gaming PC!

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I bought an affordable $300 gaming PC from Skytech Global (not to be confused with Skytech Gaming) on Amazon! Is it any good? Let's take it apart, discuss component choice, and put it through a small mix of games to assess its viability in today's tech market!
Check out this STG gaming PC: geni.us/yiZh
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2x Pixio PX277 Prime 165Hz IPS Monitors: geni.us/bCg4nD
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Audio-Technica AT2035: geni.us/xvQc
Yamaha MG10XU Mixer: geni.us/d4VvGM
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[@JusstDexx]

This is close to my current computer. I have an i5 2400 and a gtx 1650 (the non 6 pin card) along with 8 gigs of ddr3 ram. Runs fine but is diagnosed with asbestos

[@ZackSNetwork]

It’s way more powerful though.

[@iamarabicandiloveamericanp7137]

Mine is i7 2600 and a gtx 750 ti with 8 gigs and still really good at running games at the moment

[@drek9k2]

@@iamarabicandiloveamericanp7137I mean I'm pretty shocked what can be run on pretty piss poor graphics cards, you can still game on a GTX 780m laptop pretty good, I think anything lower though starts skipping so many VRAM, Vulkan API, and Dx problems, but ultimately there's basically little sense in getting something less good than an RX 580. Which is still perfectly fine btw, Like I don't get people's upgrade priorities, I seen some people replace whole systems including the CPU and board, this guy got a 2600 to 7600x rather than a 5600x and then went form 5700xt to 6750xt for instance. Then you got people like this guy who still on a 750ti for some reason. I mean, don't get me wrong when you're going as close to "it was Free" as you possibly can a 750ti is fine. Won't run tons of shit, but you'd be shocked what it'll still do at 1080p. But the thing is it gets to a point where like a GTX 980 is under 100 bucks, a RX 580 is like $80, you can more or less get a new graphics card for a day of flipping burgers or waiting tables at that point it's seriously a huge absolutely massive upgrade. For you like a 580 or used 5500xt or 1650s or GTX 980 or something to that effect would go from having framedrops on really old games, like 30-44fps on Witcher 3, to being able to play The Division 2 online.

[@itsdokko2990]

@@iamarabicandiloveamericanp7137 i take my hat off to that 750ti, HOLY SMOKES that little fella refuses to die

[@waldfruchttee]

i have my i7 3770 overclocked to 4.1ghz(no not the 'k' variant) with 32gb ram and a rx 580 and im happy with it

[@chrishensley8502]

Any pc at this price that can play games at a playable fps is a win

[@Lurch-Bot]

I recently sold a 3770/1650 build for $350 and it didn't have any crappy stick on RGB. But a random GPU tossed in a random old workstation with some random sticks of RAM by someone who is moving large volume is a great way to get a crappy worn out old system. I doubt they spent several hours benchmark and stress testing this PC. So caveat emptor. you don't wanna see what an old Xeon does when it has been running constantly for years in a workstation with insufficient cooling. It isn't pretty. This is probably a B or C grade machine with a cheap remanufactured GPU. I want to know if it will run on stock drivers. I bet it is a frankencard with a mobile chip. ewaste peripherals are for people who hate the environment. Just cancels out any good that comes from repurposing an old workstation.

[@usleadershipareliars]

Especially if you got kids. It's perfect

[@Ssebyt12]

oem ones uhhh

[@JeffDeWitt]

If $300 is all you can afford this is tough to beat. It gives you something you can really play games with plus do actual work, which you can't do on a console.

[@sol-hb8zg]

I would say get a console unless you need to work like you said otherwise yeah this build is fine

[@oneshot1kill158]

Doing work on this would be a terrible idea

[@oneshot1kill158]

​@@sol-hb8zgdoing work on this would be terrible

[@JeffDeWitt]

@@oneshot1kill158 If you are just using Office apps and browsing the web it would do fine.

[@MB-jh7fy]

How? It’s more than powerful enough for browsing, Microsoft office, even video editing wouldn’t be too bad due to the gpu doing the encoding work

[@toufusoup]

Grabbing an i7 Haswell/Devil’s canyon will greatly improve the performance. Friend of mine is still rocking 4790 and a 1070, all he needs for 1080p 75Hz

[@3w3Ch00B]

4770 and 4790 are great chips. Plenty of cheap cooler upgrades over the OEM ones.

[@subbookkeeper]

but i7s are fare more expensive just for that i7 badge only. Just get Xeon instead. Same or even better performance for a fraction of a price.

[@adriandzwonkowski801]

Yup, just recently I have build PC with i7-4770 and GTX 1660S + 16GB 2400Mhz RAM and it's rocking. But - gtx 1660S is probabvly like the best GPU that this CPU can handle

[@toufusoup]

@@subbookkeeperi7 4790s are usually $30 on eBay. That shouldn’t be too bad

[@corneliusantonius3108]

THIS ! and the mobo can handle 32 GB

[@riovannes5701]

That technically a win in my book, I see pcs like this alot. It's a soso base to start on, lots of *cough* room to grow

[@soccerguy2433]

room to grow how? What better CPU can that mobo support? what kind of RAM can it support? 14:50 Greg even says that criticism points out there is no upgrade path 15:10 greg says you shouldn't prioritize an upgrade path

[@DerpScout]

@@soccerguy2433 WOOOOOOOSH

[@seanlacroix]

I'd grab a used i7-4790k and throw it in there and it would be a way better pairing for that 1660ti.

[@lucifermorningstar2154]

i am aslo thinking the same thing

[@sidharth6062]

Maybe a 4770 you have to keep power supply in mind.

[@b0ne91]

This PC takes the $15 E5 1240 v3. Worth buying and selling the i5 for an equivalent amount.

[@safn1949]

E3-1240 V3, it also has an ATX psu and can be upgraded with an inexpensive adapter cable.

[@Andrew-ky8oc8cq4n]

Please, Crystal Mark disinfo or something similar so we can see the amount of hours used on that hard drive and any smart errors.

[@Pasi123]

That HGST Ultrastar is an enterprise drive so it likely has a lot of hours

[@GregSalazar]

Will do for future videos!

[@phgu]

4:30 - Great placement of the sticker, blocking 90% of the exhaust port.

[@dizy82]

That does not exhaust anything. It is not a turbine video card.

[@miguelmodesto8677]

@@dizy82 Some air will come out there, if you notice the aluminum heatsink at minute 3:45 some aluminum fins are directed towards the GPU backplate. On a 1660 ti it may not make any difference, but if it were a more powerful GPU it could add a few degrees.

[@GregSalazar]

Figured most would know to remove such trivial stickers prior to first boot :-)

[@Blind-Ambition]

A cheap Xeon E3-1230 v3 upgrade would balance this old PC out quite nicely. That being said I literally picked up that HP without the GPU with a Xeon E3-1271v3 for £70, and has a 256GB M.2. SSD and 1TB HDD.

[@MarcoGPUtuber]

The best RGB is shoehorned RGB.

[@BlueSparkzVideos]

I bought one a year ago. Mine had a i7 4770, 16Gb ddr3, 1660 Super, 256SSD, and 3TB HDD for $330 + Tax. As long as you know what you're getting it's fine. I'm primarily using mine as an HTPC. I added a Blu-ray drive and 4TB of SSD storage...and I swapped out the OEM PSU. No complaints.

[@thedungeondelver]

It absolutely has an upgrade path. You could put a Xeon of i7 strength, probably go up to 32gb RAM, definitely newer storage, a 1080ti will run most anything you can throw at it. 4th gen is shockingly solid still, today.

[@drek9k2]

I mean at that rate what good is 32 gigs lol. I mean yeah if you can avoid the CPU bottleneck on old enough hardware that becomes a serious issue, a 1080ti is freaking amazing you can literally play the newest games at 1080p. Not sure how DDR3 is gonna do it for yah, I mean DDR3 is fine, what I meant is 32gb isn't that important for what you're doing.

[@mitsuhh]

4th gen CPU will bottleneck a 1080 Ti so much

[@narwhal9852]

don't waste your money on 32gb of ddr3 there is zero point. you'll max out any cpu of that age gaming before you run out of ram lmao. and a 1650 is more a match for this rig as you could see the CPU bottlenecking the 1660 ti Sure 4th gen was still used when the 1080ti came out but I don't care what argument you have it will bottleneck a 1080ti like no tomorrow unless the game is 99 percent GPU dependent and Windows isn't checking for updates

[@thedungeondelver]

@@mitsuhh I have that same setup and it sure doesn't.

[@mitsuhh]

Explain how I got massive framerate boosts going from a Ryzen 5950X to a 12700K with a 1080 Ti. Lies.@@thedungeondelver

[@RadNitro]

I enjoy these videos for the nostalgia element. There was a time when I had to "Budget" my computer setups like this one. They did the job as needed. Glad I am much more fortunate now but know a lot of people can't afford custom systems. Happy people have a place that is affordable to jump into my passion for PC's. If all you have is $300, why not?

[@victortorres3776]

Thr bad frame rates could also be a result of mixed ram speeds. Just one ram chip being slower even by just a few mhz could also give you the stutter you experienced

[@coolbusterreal2736]

You know its a good video when Greg buys a PC from amazon.

[@jamesbrassfield8409]

Here we go again down the old rabbit hole of pc lol

[@sunnycorax]

I use to have a PC like that as my gaming rig. Got an old optiplex from Free Geek with i7 4770 in it for around $200 then slapped a GPU in it. Was good to go. I've upgraded far and away since then and converted it into my home server till the motherboard finally died.

[@ORBIT9224]

tip for anyone who buys something this cheap load nvidia control panel go to manage 3d settings go down to max frame rate turn on and limit it to 60FPS. no matter the game you will not see over 60fps and as you seen in the GTA test it will help a lot. some game's do not have vsync or a fps cap and my way will limit them games as well including minecraft. I have my i9 12900k rtx 3080 limited to 144fps the same way because my monitor is 144hz so anymore than that is useless.

[@shadowwolf3098]

i have my games hard limited to 160 fps with gsync on because my monitor tends to get gsync flicker if i go above 160hz. In games like minecraft though, i like to keep my frames unlimited because having the game locked at 160 gives me frame time spikes when i would usually have a buttery smooth 500-600 fps with no latency or spikes my default settings in most games are vsync off but using gsync to hard cap to 160

[@reaper78541]

I did this essentially on my own. I got an old hp workstation from her company, bumped up the cpu to an i7-6700k, Radeon rx 580 and switched the hard disk to ssd. Thing basically runs everything I throw at it. Paid about 280 bucks for everything.

[@TherealBlackheart]

I actually really like the hp prebuilds. My girl games on an elitedesk that came with that cpu. Got it local for super cheap. Does really well for what it is

[@arthilas_]

I'm still using one of my HDDs from around 2013 in my current build as a data sink, and it is doing perfectly fine, showing no signs of nearing the end of its life.

[@arcticfox5118]

Honestly this is dollar for dollar better then my first PC was as a teen if inflation is taken into account. For a teen or someone on a budget looking for a decent rig this is not a bad choice. Its usable in newer titles with some graphics fiddleing and will still rock older titles beside. For $300 you would be hard pressed to find any gaming system console or otherwise on par. Bout the only thing id be leery of is the HDD as that sounded like it was pretty close to going kerdead. And seeing as you can get a brand new 3TB drive for around $40 they shpuld have just upped the system price $20 and done that.

[@michaeldepalma260]

i still own a pc from 2015, still going strong. HP Envy 700 Series with an Intel Core i7 4790, RTX 2060 Super, and 12gb RAM. made some minor upgrades to it and still happy with it

[@paulmoreira6110]

Not a bad deal especially of an e-sports gamer or a younger kid wanting to play Roblox or Minecraft. Will be able to do those tasks for a few years, and it's still a pc to get work done for a job or school. Overall, not terrible maybe replace the hard drive.

[@Miniputt_999]

Nice crunch sound from the mouse. 11/10, would run over it again. Also the pc is pretty nice. for 300 dollars, thats still alot of pc to make use of. Looking forward to the next video.

[@GregSalazar]

Thanks for watching! :-)

[@xXDarthBagginsXx]

main upgrade for this would be a matching 16GB kit vs the random sticks they tossed in, and dropping in a 4770/4790 would open some things up. In all if that's what you have in budget, it's not that bad to get started as a jumping off point.

[@JBrinx18]

SWBF2 really requires 4 cores 8 threads or more, so not surprised

[@floydlooney6837]

This is like a slightly upscaled Optiplex refurbish.

[@Varg84]

Fun video. I personally don't love it for $300. Would rather suck it up and throw a bit more cash at it if I were in such a position. I feel like once you start explaining limitations and showing some performance that the joy of getting a PC is sort of sucked out of the situation.

[@outlet6989]

We all know what HP stands for, Hope and Pray. I love the way the PSU is mounted high in the case and swings outware. You don't need to worry about your apps crashing as this case will crash before that happens.

[@babalonkie]

I mean i will not criticise this pre-built. People can only afford what they can afford. Although, this day an age, for an extra 100-200, you could get a much better newer build that could be upgradable. I don't think pointing that out is a bad thing.

[@pilotbro39]

My son is using this model of pc but it has an i7-4771 cpu and a zotac 1650 that runs off just the bus power. He plays minecraft and roblox so not very demanding. I swapped out the hard drive for a ssd and he's been content with it.

[@subrock99]

Thanks Greg ... this video was really well done and I appreciate the fact you kept referencing that this a budget gaming PC that just gets the job done for the money.

[@gilcanales]

Saw this video. Went on Amazon and found a refurbished Dell comp with keyboard, mouse and two 24” Dell monitors. All for $238 including tax & shipping. Can now play World of Tanks & Eve Online without issue. At this writing the system is still available. 😊

[@Celician83]

Easy upgrade path for this: upgrade platform entirely but keep the 1660TI, then upgrade the GPU later to accommodate the platform upgrade, simple as that.

[@emory2025]

The drive is probably loud because its a data center enterprise type drive, not really meant for desktops.

[@xDownSetx]

I have a slightly newer 4TB HGST Ultrastar and it is very loud indeed. It's fast and has been very reliable, but loud.

[@safn1949]

Upgrade path, 32gb of ram, better psu as this is an ATX and only needs a $20 adapter cable, it will boot off a Nvme in the pci slot using clover boot and it also will run Xeons so you can get 4 cores ,8 threads and 4ghz on turbo boost.Solid and reliable.

[@leeksoup3199]

The stutters with GTA V are not related to the CPU. They are due to a problem with the game engine that GTA uses. When the framerate goes above around 120 FPS, you start to get bad stutters like you saw.

[@kevngeek]

Hey Greg, I love the channel and content! I guess you can talk about upgrade paths although from a prebuilt perspective, check out the Lenovo P520's preowned if you don't know about them already. There is at least some upgrading available. There is a little configuration needed but well worth the price. I had come across this and picked mine up off online for $212 w/o HD, GPU or OS. It was manufactured in 2020. It is Windows 11 compatible as well. It's a Xeon W-2135 6 core 3.7ghz - 4.5 processor with quad channel memory support with a 900 watt platinum power supply. It supports M.2 and PCIE 3.0. I was able to get 32GB ECC DDR4 2666 ram in quad channel included. This was a few months ago so keep this in mind. I paired a Samsung 980 M.2 1TB,$50 on sale and Zotac 1080 card $50 off of online. I know this is a tad over the $300 mark, but worth noting. This is just something to think about that can run AAA titles. If you can or have the means, I would love to see this thing benchmarked with a 4070. Keep up the great content!

[@milescarter7803]

With such a powerful video card you really need some kind of frame-limiting to help keep frame pacing in check. These older games were not run back in the day with draw distance so far or at such high resolutions, so you need a really fast load/decompress to get the assets in quick enough. You may see best results in future by running on Proton/Vulkan/Gamescope because a lot of work is done to get frame pacing even. You know this is the way because with ARC Intel is supporting DX12 native, and then translating everything else to DX12. And it makes a ton of sense, it's way more compatible and much less work.

[@sithil]

Wonder what kind of performance uplift you'd get from spending another $20-$40 on Ebay for a 4770 or 4790. Same TDP, both have hyper-threading so 4 core/8 thread, and the L3 cache is boosted from 6mb to 8mb? Could do a whole nother video...................

[@TheGameBench]

Man... I'm selling an Optiplex right now with a 1660 Super, i5 6600 and 16GB of DDR4 for $250 that I can't get any movement on. Just shoe horned some RGB in it to see if it will get some interest. Maybe I should start selling them on Amazon. And I run a surface scan on the HDD's, as well as benchmark them and check the SMART status. Unless they have some absurd amount of power on hours, I just tell the buyer not to store any information they can't afford to lose. I generally tell them to use it for games storage. But yeah... that drive isn't sounding good. As for this system, it's a 4th Gen i5. The power supply is good quality. I worked for HP around this time as a field tech, and in the four years I worked there, I replaced less than 10 power supplies in these things. Considering the cost of sending someone like me out versus not using a trash PSU, just using a decent PSU costs them less money.

[@nocturnalmayhem0]

does it have a m.2 slot?

[@TheCatherineCC]

@@nocturnalmayhem0 way too old

[@TheGameBench]

@nalmayhem0 Yep. Gen3x4. All Optiplex systems from the 40 series on up have m.2 slots. It is worth nothing that the 3040 did not. The pads are there, but they didn't solder the connector in. The 3050 did include the m.2 connector though. If you're asking if the 800 G1 in the video does, nope. You're not going to find an OEM system with an m.2 slot from the 4th Generation.

[@TheCatherineCC]

6th gen intel is not 4th gen. m2 slots on desktops for storage were effectively non existent at this time, and wouldn't be part of a prebuilt

[@TheGameBench]

@@TheCatherineCC Um... yeah, obviously. Where did I say 6th Gen was 4th Gen? As for m.2, I never brought it up. Someone asked me if the system I'm trying to sell has m.2, and yes it does. All Optiplex systems from the 40 series on up have m.2 slots, save for the 3040. No, the 4th Gen systems, outside of the Micro systems, did not. In fact, do a Google image search of the 7040 MT motherboard. Take a look between the memory slots and the front I/O. That is an m.2 Gen3x4 slot. So, before you make a comment that's so confidently wrong, perhaps you should fact check yourself first.

[@smartin23964]

3 of my sons got cheap optiplex systems, upgraded their PSU (with some mods) and added GPU. All have i7 4790 with 1080 Ti, and play pretty much anything they want. Maybe $300 in on each machine.

[@99mage99]

I would be interested in seeing a follow up "here's how it is after 6 months", but only if it was from the perspective of being gamed on a respectable amount each day. 2-4 hours, which probably isn't really feasible with your schedule.

[@poproxxx8287]

I have done this multiple times and came out on top BIG TIME. No issues what so ever in any components. I need to do something like these videos.

[@GrandmasterBBC]

I have one upgrade which would make a pretty significant impact in gaming performance. Chuck that i5 and spend $40 or so one an i7-4770, or even better a 4790. It will have slightly higher clocks out of the gate, and the added hyperthreading can make a pretty big difference in CPU performance when gaming. It also has I created L3 cache (8MB vs 6MB). I did something similar in two of my older Haswell systems and it gave them new life. 4 cores without hyperthreading just does not as not cut it anymore.

[@stacyromanchuk]

Even with AM4 (in Canada) a ATX board and cpu bundle is around $200. Then RAM, case, and video card and you're well over $700.

[@MarinosMysteries]

Really enjoy these videos. I thought I was getting a great deal when I was getting a desktop for around $200 until I started to play games. Keep up the great work and thanks.

[@GregSalazar]

Glad you like them!

[@ewasteredux]

Hi Greg! I appreciate videos like this not just because it's better to re-use older equipment when possible but also because most people looking for something to game on are on a budget. I mean, my son is happy running roblox and minecraft and something like this would be perfect for those titles.

[@mikigameplays]

I am still super super surprised with gpu Usually in pre builds like this You 90% have cards like rx 580 or 480 etc... if lucky 8gb version rx 580

[@Jules_Diplopia]

I think that you are right. PC tech changes so fast these days, that "upgrade paths" are largely imaginary. My system is 4 years old. i3 9100F and GTX 1650 Super. Now that I wanted to upgrade, I had thought that the GPU would be the route, but any GPU update would cause a CPU bottleneck. Updating the CPU would require a new motherboard, probably new RAM etc. There often is no update path other than a new rig.

[@jrose-xp6tf]

Beggars can't be choosers, decent entry rig.

[@greenboots5823]

I feel like Greg really wanted to show us his truck.

[@TriforceOfCourage97]

hard drives have unlimited life. as long as they are use good and thrown around. I have hard drives I still use from when Sata first began, nothing wrong with them, I use them as storage

[@citanulthelunatic]

Honestly, I thought the front RGB was really charming. It's not sleek and modern but that wouldn't fit the rig anyway. The way the front panel diffuses it almost looks like it was made for it, I agree it was a good choice. They didn't just chuck an RGB bar somewhere on the case and call it a day, some actual thought went into it. My "rig" is an Asus G551JM laptop turning 10 this year. It has an i7-4710HQ and a GTX 860M, I upgraded it from 8GB of RAM to 16GB a while ago. 128GB SSD boot drive and 1TB HDD. I think it cost over 1000€ new, but it has served me well for many years. When it started slowing down I opened it up to dust it and reinstalled Windows, started running almost good as new. I've since learned more about computers and intend to actually take apart the cooler and clean it properly and reapply new thermal paste to see if that might help it more. But I have still been regularly gaming on this, Warframe runs pretty smooth at 60fps and it does actually run BG3 on low graphics averaging around 35fps (sometimes even going up to the 75fps limit of my monitor), which I think is pretty impressive given its age. (Though in act 3 it drops to 11fps at times, but act 3 seems to have performance issues in general.) My only real gripe now is it being a laptop since the RAM and harddrive are about the only things I can upgrade, but a laptop is what I needed when I got it. All this to say, you shouldn't discount older rigs for gaming, they might surprise you. If you just want a computer that is able to run games and won't break the bank, something like this could work just fine. For $300 this is not bad at all.

[@FalconX88]

that GPU has the power plug facing to the front! Some weird company no one ever heard of before gets it correct while the big players still put the plug facing towards the side panel...

[@franzbeckenbauer242]

Adding xeon with 8 threads to this build may do ressurection.

[@cyphaborg6598]

I had a GTX970 in a Medion prebuild that also didn't have MSI branding but it did show up in hardware info as MSi (SuperTechGroup)or something like that. I guess it's pretty common to find hardware that's none descriptive and yet still mysterious when you dig deeper.

[@benjamintrathen6119]

As far as dead platforms go everyone loves AM4, I went the 2nd hand Intel B560 route and got an i3 10100, an Aurous B560M Pro AX motherboard, EVGA 600GQ, 64GB (32GB x2) DDR4 3600 Patriot Viper, Silverstone NAS case, and a couple of Optane SSD on fire sale, Oh and don't forget the ARC A380 LP from ASRock, A beast of a server/NAS for quite cheap. Even got a google TPU in the wifi slot. For Storage I went with high capacity CMR HDD's, high-capacity consumer SSDs, and mid capacity HET enterprise SSD's along with an industrial SSD, a 32GB m10 Optane and a 118GB P1600X Optane. I bought all slowly when everything was on sale or second hand/ EOL products. I can upgrade to 10 cores on the same Skylake architecture, or I can upgrade to Rocketlake with gen4 PCIE + extra lanes and AVX 512 support. Not bad for a dead platform.

[@danielsidaway719]

Gee, my go to PC is an FX 8370 with a GTX 1660 super and 16 GB of ram which I value at waaaay more than $300. Never disappointed me since the day I built it.

[@thebutterflybuddhas]

I just want to point out: I was able to buy a Trident 3 (9400F with GTX1650) for $200 locally. Deal absolutely can be found while it does put this to shame, I got really lucky here. I will say, you can consistently find 6000/7000 intel series CPUs on prebuilts for around this price point- so while it might sound bad, the leap from a 4590 to say a 6500 (aside from ram) isn't gonna be too big a difference in many cases- so anything decent with a decent GPU under $300 is technically a steal of a deal.

[@gustavhoo]

I would love to see you try cheap components from “strange/small” brands. Like for example Thermalright, huge brand in Taiwan, but here on the west side of the world no one is using them. I don’t know why, cause their products are really good and really affordable. I’m using a 360mm AIO and fans from them, no complaints from me at all! The aio was ~$50 and the argb fans where ~$3.33 each.

[@Bobby12many]

Not sure why, c but did NOT expect Greg to be driving as TRX RAM lol Nice truck, dude!

[@peterkarlsson1825]

I bought a used Dell Optiplex 9020 SFF with a Intel 4590, 8 GB Ram, Samsung 860 256 GB SSD and 1 TB HDD for about 30$ at a Swedish trading site. I pretty good deal i think.

[@rodhester2166]

Those prebuilt computers are awesome for surfing the net, watching videos, downloading and storing drivers for other builds, email, retro games, going to not so secure sites etc. Just never enter important data and burn a disc with all the drivers for simple restoration when needed. I have some hard drives that are 20 plus years old that are still running. Just back up data on optical media or thumb drives. build one for the kids and let them play and learn the ends and outs of pc building, maintenance, etc.

[@Mike81111]

Nice PC for the price. V-sync is must have option for systems like this. I use it even in my RTX 3060 Ryzen 5 5600 build. FPS is SO stable.

[@DIYRepairHour]

There are 3D-printed universal I/O shields for motherboards that you can buy, mainly from eBay. Takes a while to snip the holes for ports, but at least you have something there rather than nothing, and the cost is a price of coffee (maybe 2 coffees, the second one for you to drink while snipping)

[@lexluthermiester]

@GregSalazar I think you nailed the conclusion. Spot on in my personal and professional opinion. Although, I will say, in this particular case, that HP does have a few upgrade options. For example an i7-4770 is not expensive and would give a reasonable boost to performance. Also, even though this system is very CPU bottlenecked, an RTX card like a 2070 or 3060, would be doable as the workload would mostly be on the GPU. A bigger and faster SSD and HDD would be possible too. Each of these upgrades could be done over time and would be inexpensive. Last point, that HDD is fine. Many of the HGST line up sound like that. They work fine. I have a 6TB model that "sounds" even worse. Been running it for years, no issues.

[@bryans8656]

I upgraded a Dell Optiplex SFF 7010 to be a modest gaming system like this one performance wise. I'm not worried about an upgrade path. It plays my Steam library and that's all I care about.

[@adam12o8]

I kind of agree but i think you can get similar profomance by skipping the graffics card and buying a modern rizen chip that has integrated grafics and buy a grafics card down the line. I would have to look at prices and benchmarks i could be completely wrong

[@Shadepariah]

I own a bunch of those HGST drives. I use them in my NAS. Good drives, just loud.

[@kgonepostl]

Thank you for covering stuff like this Greg, always interesting, and always a pleasure.

[@nbrowser]

Alternate title of this video, "Florida Man drives over PC Mouse with his Ram TRX in the name of destruction." :)

[@avgjoesgamin9935]

I have an all new respect for Greg. We need more destruction in videos. Start a poll and you will see most will agree

[@Jefgith1]

I have something similar, but with an i7. Currently running all my homelab docker containers.

[@MrTechnofuzz]

At this price point - any 2011 or 2011-v3 platform would be miles ahead of this. Cheap CPU upgrade options ($10-50). Dell Precisions, you can snag a 1620v3 variant for cheap around $100-150. Slap in a used GPU and you're miles ahead of a system this old. You should try a "build your own" $300 budget and see what happens. I will also point out that some of these precisions come with a 685w or 825w PSUs and can be heavily upgraded. This is granting people feel comfortable installing a GPU (and storage) into a PC.... Dell Precision 5810 (2011-v3) or T3610 (2011)

[@ReverseCity777]

Best youtube tech chan so under rated

[@annettesurfer]

The i5-4590 has an average CPU mark of 5367 on passmark which is about the minimum for gaming but the best part of the system appears to be GTX 1660 Ti which has a respectable average G3D mark of 12946.

[@AndyMitchellUK26]

I recently sold my Ryzen ITX system for £250. MSI B450i, R5 2600x, GTX 1650 Super and 16GB DDR4 RAM. Oh and a 256GB NVMe on the board itself for the OS. You can definitely get better systems on places like marketplace if you're there at the right time but the one you just picked up is surprisingly good (and at least it isn't a dam GTX 1030 or worse for once!)

[@ypoora1]

Knowing that my 4690K and GTX 980 played GTA V completely fine on high settings, it surprises me to see it struggle like that.

[@gt8200-0]

Unfortunately it got much more demanding with updates

[@mbwatson1000]

Having pointed out the unwelcome noises coming from the hard disc, you didn't explore it's behaviour any further - looking to see it if is close to failing - from its SMART data. I would not trust a PC shipped with failing components, so that would remove any possible benefits seen elsewhere.

[@jasonwoodhead9187]

Im surprised this ran with so many stutters. I ran an i5 4590 with a 1050ti for years without a problem in an old Optiplex 3020. GTA V, Forza Horizon 4, and The Masterchief Collection all ran at higher settings with a locked 60fps. As for upgrades, im still.using it, but now with an i7 4790 and GTX 1070, and it still plays new games great, albeit at lower settings. For a system that cost me about £250 as it stands, i can't really complain.

[@ViewlessSquid]

That RGB on the first start up had me blown away.

[@jimlev]

I have the HP Z240 Workstation which I bought almost two years ago and the only thing I did was upgrade the installed 16GB to newer 32GB Ram and it's running smoothly... I'm not a gamer, I'm a person who prefers to browse, chat with family and watch videos. I can watch 4K videos without issue... I just bought a Blu-ray external drive to watch movies on my computer... Oh. I know I can't upgrade the Win 10 Pro on my system to Win 11, however I did just buy the Win 11 Home from Vip-SCDKey using the 'SKGS' discount code. I got my discount and my product key when I'm ready to upgrade to a new system. Even though a new system will come with Win 11, but if it ever crashes or get a virus or hacked and have to reinstall Win 11, I have the Key to get me up and running again... Thanks Greg...

[@JaySee5]

I'm shocked you didn't use any SMART utility to read the age and wear of the HDD. Even though it was made in 2012, it might never have been used.

[@RQUKOfficial]

Dear Lord, your truck sounds like it could eat raw steak when you rev it up. Love it.

[@watercannonscollaboration2281]

The 1660 super/Ti is still relevant, but that CPU needs an i7 upgrade, and at that point the value proposition might come into question Still, a surprisingly okay prebuilt package. I was expecting this to rip people off with like a 1050Ti or something

[@sith_gamer1010]

8:20 bro's just casually flexing his TRX 😂

[@dlsisson1970]

I agree you shouldn't think about an upgrade path too much at this price point. But I would try to avoid systems that use proprietary components. Even being able to reuse a case would help in the future. Admittedly at that price point you probably stuck with a pre built from Dell or HP or something similar. Your only other option is to buy used stuff. Might be fun to see you try to put together a budget system from ebay/facebook marketplace. A lot could be learned from it.

[@duby149]

The msi 1660 ti card were actually very good cards, the only problem I ran into was the 6GB of memory. A good mixture of low and medium setting and a frame lock of 60, I was able to play the last of us and a fee other game with surprisingly no lagging or stuttering.

[@Wizk306]

Can you guys do a video of budget game controllers for PCs? (Currently I'm looking at one called Fantech gp13 pro but I don't know if it's good or bad. PS I've never had a PS or a Xbox this will be my first time using a controller)

[@brandon_gb]

How about buying cheap pc components and a case that would work fine for roblox and youtube videos. I've been wanting to find out if buying a prebuilt or looking for cheap or used pc parts and building a pc would be the best route for Roblox/ youtube pc for my 7 year old daughter.

[@typicalthrill]

I know this changes depending on location, but if you're in this price point, I would suggest buying uses and buying a GPU for around $100. You may even be able to spend $200 on a nicer GPU and $100 on the rest of the system and get a lot more bang for your buck. Either way, this is a great starter for the money. Thanks Greg!

[@ddforrester]

Greg, did you SMART test the hdd to see how many hours and how many power cycles it had on it?

[@Pasi123]

Probably a lot of hours (likely 40k+) but not many power cycles since it's an enterprise drive

[@andrewmutavi590]

The Graphics card is the MVP of the entire build,with an OEM case one could actually build something Abit faster than that,say a Ryzen 4500 or 3600 for $60,used mobo for $40,16gb 3600mhz for $40,the same 1660 for $80,1tbsata SSD for $50,n a used 500watt PSU for $30

[@Pandamonium004]

Honestly pretty good for the money, if this system was to ship with an i7 4790 or 4770 I bet it would be hard to beat in terms of value. The extra threads would probably unlock the rest of that 1660ti and help prevent those stutters when the cpu was maxed out

[@elia04_]

Kingfast makes okay-ish ssd:s. I've ordered a few from aliexpress and they're a fine, low cost option for testbenches. IDK about the 512gb one, but the 250gb can often be found for around 13€

[@Isabel369]

In order to make that the perfect budget gaming PC all you have to do is put in an I7 processor and upgrade the SSD to a 2 TB and you’ll be good to go

[@pettigrew95]

This would probably work very well as a budget e-sports PC. League of Legends, DOTA, CS:GO etc.