I'm planning to build my first gaming PC and would like some opinions before buying anything. My budget is about €1,500 in France, and I mainly want to play Forza, possibly Gran Turismo through whatever platform is available, and future games such as the next GTA. A friend suggested a build with a Ryzen 9 7900X, 360 mm liquid cooler, B850 Wi-Fi motherboard, 16 GB of DDR5-5200 memory, a 500 GB NVMe SSD, an RX 9060 XT 16 GB graphics card, and an 850 W power supply. The list comes to roughly €1,700 before any changes. Is the CPU and cooling setup suitable for gaming, or would I be better off changing parts to get more performance and storage within my budget?
3 Answers
The parts list is missing a case, so remember to budget for one and check that it supports the motherboard and graphics card. The memory choice also looks poor: 16 GB is becoming limiting, and DDR5-5200 CL40 is relatively slow. Aim for 32 GB, ideally a 2x16 GB kit around DDR5-6000 with decent timings. A 1 TB SSD would also be much more practical than 500 GB for modern games.
For a gaming-focused build, the Ryzen 9 7900X isn’t necessarily bad, but it’s not the best value here. A gaming-oriented X3D processor would generally deliver better results in CPU-heavy games, while costing less or a similar amount. I’d also replace the expensive 360 mm liquid cooler with a good tower air cooler and put the savings toward the CPU, graphics card, or other components.
The graphics card should handle Forza well, but Gran Turismo is primarily associated with PlayStation, and the next GTA is still too far away for anyone to make reliable performance claims. For your current budget, prioritize a balanced gaming CPU, 32 GB of RAM, and more storage rather than spending over €200 on liquid cooling. An air cooler around €40–€60 should be enough for most sensible gaming CPUs.
I’m in France and my budget is about €1,500. Is the 7900X really that unsuitable for gaming?