CPu CooLER
AMD Wraith
Stealth /$ 0
CPu
AMD Ryzen 3
2200G /$ 87
Ah, the Wraith series. AMD’s stock
coolers for Ryzen processors are a lot
more effective than the vast majority
available (looking at you, “near-
silent” stock Athlon cooler). While
the Stealth might be the ugly duckling
of the Wraith series—if you can find
one cheap on ebay, we recommend a
Wraith Prism or Spire RGB—it does
the job effectively, and isn’t difficult to
install, its small profile meaning that
it fits in almost any case, and won’t get
in the way of your DIMM slots.We contemplated a few different
processors for this build. Intel was
obviously a contender here, with
the K-series Kaby Lake and Coffee
Lake CPUs as distinct possibilities.
Integrated graphics were a must, of
course, and ultimately we decided
on AMD, but then we were left with a
dilemma: Use one of the cheaper new-
model Athlons, or a G-model Ryzen
chip. We eventually plumped for the
quad-core Ryzen 3 2200G; perhaps not
the cheapest processor we could have
chosen, but a high-quality offering
that comes packaged with one of
AMD’s Wraith Stealth coolers.maximumpc.com aug 2019 MAXIMUMPC 27
STEP-By-STEP GuiDED