I'm putting together a first PC for my 13-year-old cousin, who is moving over from a PS4. He mainly wants to play Fortnite and Valorant, plus some single-player games occasionally. I'm considering two options: an AM5 system with a Ryzen 5 8600G, 16GB of DDR5-5200 memory, and a B650 motherboard for roughly $370 total, or an AM4 system with a Ryzen 5 5600X, 16GB of DDR4, an A520 motherboard, and a used RX 580 for about $340. The AM5 build would start with integrated graphics and leave room for a future CPU upgrade, while the AM4 build would offer better gaming performance immediately but have a more limited upgrade path. The entire budget is around $450, and the plan would be to add a better graphics card later, probably something around RX 6600 or RTX 4060 performance. Which option makes more sense?
3 Answers
I’d look for a Ryzen 5 7500F or 7600 only if you can find a good used motherboard and still afford a graphics card. Otherwise, the 8600G is a sensible all-in-one starting point: it lets him play Fortnite and Valorant now, then you can add a dedicated card later without replacing the whole system. Make sure the memory is 2x8GB rather than one 16GB stick, because integrated graphics lose a lot of performance with single-channel RAM.
The AM4 build is only attractive if the RX 580 is cheap, tested, and in good condition. It should run the competitive games at 1080p with reduced settings, but it’s an aging card that may need more power and could fail sooner than a newer used GPU. If you can find a used RX 6600 near the price of the RX 580, that would be a much better target. Otherwise, I’d choose the AM5 integrated-graphics build and save for the dedicated card.
For gaming, the graphics card matters much more than whether the processor platform can accept a future upgrade. The RX 580 will give the AM4 system better performance right away, but it’s an old card and its condition, power use, and driver support are worth considering. The 8600G’s integrated graphics can handle esports games at reasonable settings, especially with two matching memory sticks, and the newer platform gives you a better CPU upgrade path later. If he’ll definitely get a graphics card soon, the AM5 build is probably the nicer long-term foundation; if that upgrade might be far away, the AM4 system offers more performance today.
A future high-end graphics card probably isn’t realistic for this budget, so I’d judge the choice based on what he’ll actually use for the next year or two. An RX 6600-class card would be a more meaningful upgrade than spending extra on an expensive processor platform.
The 7500F and 7600 are better processors, but they don’t include usable integrated gaming graphics, and adding even a modest dedicated card pushes the build beyond the roughly $450 limit.