I built a PC for World of Warcraft years ago but stopped playing. Now I'm planning to return, probably starting with WoW Classic and eventually moving to the next version when it releases. I considered buying a Steam Deck or Legion Go 2, but at those prices I'm wondering whether building a new small-form-factor PC would make more sense.
I already use a PS5 for demanding AAA games, so this PC would mainly be for WoW and possibly some strategy games. I'm in the UK and initially aimed for around £1,500, although the current parts list comes to roughly £1,771. I already have a monitor, keyboard, and mouse. Is this build unnecessarily powerful or expensive for what I need?
The proposed parts are a Ryzen 7 9800X3D, Thermalright AXP120-X67 cooler, ASRock B850I motherboard, 32GB of DDR5-6000 CL28 memory, a 500GB NVMe SSD, Radeon RX 9060 XT 8GB, Fractal Design Terra case, and a Corsair SF750 power supply.
3 Answers
You may be able to save money on the motherboard and power supply. A 650W unit should be enough for this combination, and there are often discounted boards available. That said, the small-form-factor requirements make ITX motherboards and SFX power supplies considerably more expensive than standard parts.
You could reduce the cost by choosing a Mini-ITX case that supports a larger and more capable CPU cooler. That would give you more flexibility with cooling and may open up cheaper or better-balanced parts. I’d also think about whether you might play more GPU-intensive games later, since that could affect the graphics card choice.
The 9800X3D is quite a powerful processor to pair with that graphics card, so it could be considered overkill for many games. WoW is a bit unusual, though: it can be heavily CPU-limited and generally benefits more from the extra 3D V-Cache than many other titles. If WoW performance is the priority, the strong CPU is defensible.
Exactly—the compact case is the reason the motherboard and PSU prices are higher. Standard ATX alternatives would be cheaper, but they would not fit this build.