Custom PC - UK (2020-02)

FEATURE/ ANALYSIS

MIDRANGE

If you’respendinga littlemoremoneythenyoumightaswellgiveyourself

atleasttheoptionofCPUoverclocking,sojumpinguptoanIntelZ390

motherboardis thewaytogoforIntelCPUs.Whilewe’rewaitingfora

budget500-serieschipsetfromAMD,yourbestbetforAMDCPUsis a

boardbasedonlastyear’sB450orX470chipsets– again,though,youmay

needa BIOSupdatetorunthe

latestCPUs– asktheretailer

aboutthisbeforepurchasing.

TOPDOG

Youcanpaytopdollarfor

high-endmotherboards

thatcomewithsome

mightyfineextras.

Again,though,if gaming

performanceisyourmain

concern,there’sverylittle

init.However,if moneyis

lessofanobjectthen,for

AMDsystems,we’djump

uptoanX570motherboard,

suchastheMSIX570ACE

we’veusedforourtesting.

MOTHERBOARDS

There’sa prettysimplerulewhenit comestobuyinga motherboard
fora systemthat’sprimarilyaimedatgaming:theydon’treallymatter.
If youwanttorunmultipleGPUs,thenyou’llneeda motherboardthat
supportsSLIforNvidiaGPUsorCrossFireforAMDGPUs,but
otherwisetheonlyonefactorthataffectsgamingperformanceis
overclocking.Somemotherboardchipsetsallowyoutooverclock
yourCPU,whileothersdon’t.If you’renotinterestedinoverclocking,
thenbuyinga motherboardbasedona cheaperchipsetisa greatway
tosavemoney.
Thereis,ofcourse,alsothequestionofjusthowwella
motherboardmayoverclocka processor,withfactorssuchasthe
powercircuitryandcoolingcapabilitiescomingintoplay(especially
fortherathertoastyX570chipset).However,thisvariesgreatly
betweenboards– yourbestbetistoreadourmotherboardreviews
tofindoutwhichonesoverclockbetterthanothers.

ESSENTIAL
Optingfora motherboardthatdoesn’tsupportoverclockingis a greatway
tosavesomecash,especiallyif you’rethinkingofbuyinganIntelboard.A
B360-basedboard,suchastheGigabyteB360HD3,offersallthefeatures
you’llneedandcostsunder£90incVAT.AsforAMD,buyinga slightlyolder
B450boardandpairingit witha modernRyzen3 processoris a greatbet
(andyoustillgetoverclocking),althoughyoumayneedtoupdatetheBIOS
first.TheMSIB450TomahawkMaxis a goodbuyforunder£100.

STORAGE

If you’re still booting your system and running games from a hard

drive, just go out and upgrade to a solid state drive (SSD). You can

get highly capacious SATA SSDs for very little outlay these days, so

there’s no need to be burdening yourself with the minute-long load

times and mid-game stutters of using a hard drive.

However, when it comes to upgrading to faster SSDs, the picture

is less clear. We’ve said it before and we tested again here to be

sure, and the results are conclusive: in terms of game and level

loading times, there’s no benefit in upgrading from a decentSATA

SSDtoa lightningfastNVMeSSD.However,it’sworthgettingan

M.2SSDjustforconvenienceandtidin

drive

gan

andtidin s – youcanremove your

drive sand have fewer cables getting in the way.

NVMe SSDs aren’t essential for gaming
but they’re compact and convenient

Your choice of motherboard doesn’t have a

huge effect on gaming performance

ESSENTIAL

Even just a few months ago, SATA drives were still slightly cheaper

for any given capacity compared with their NVMe siblings. These

days, though, there’s so little in it that you might as well get the

convenience and speed of an M.2 NVMe drive. The WD Blue SN500

costs just £70 inc VAT yet offers 500GB of capacity, which is ample

for a basic gaming system.

MIDRANGE

Splash a little extra cash and you can get a larger capacity that

will ensure you can store more of your games on the one drive.

The 960GB Corsair MP510 costs just £110 inc VAT and, outside

of gaming, it also offers lightning fast sequential read and

write performance.

TOP DOG

The one disadvantage of M.2 SSDs is that their capacities top out at

2TB, so you’ll need a motherboard with two M.2 slots if you want to

store large volumes of data on these convenient tiny drives. In terms

of price and performance, you won’t see much benefit in gaming

from spending big, but the 2TB PCI-E 4 Corsair MP600 offers the

fastest performance you can get on an X570 (3rd-gen Ryzen)

system for £390 inc VAT.