taggart’s new desktop computer (replaces my old one from Aug 2013)
- ASRock X300 mini PC: includes case, mainboard, heatsink $170
- Ryzen 3400G APU $187
- 2x32GB DDR4 3200MHz $220
- 2x 1tb SAMSUNG 970 EVO PLUS M.2 2280 1TB PCIe Gen 3.0 x4, NVMe $300
Total $877
This config has a CPU with integrated graphics, AMD calls those "APU"s. The other possibility would be to choose something like a Ryzen 3000 (or maybe even a Zen3 based 5000), use a different board, a larger case, and get a dedicated GPU. The graphic performance would likely be much better than the above config at a cost increase of maybe $200-400 and 150W (when using it, not sure how much it consumes at idle) but the above config is already much improved over my 2013 system and I don’t play games on this system.
I have been waiting for AMD to release Zen2 based APUs. They did, but some far only to OEMs. But in researching things, I realized that the sockets will be the same and there is planned BIOS support for them, so I can buy the system today with the last generation CPU (for $187, or only $99 if I was willing to take a less capable one) and then once the new Renoir based ones come out I can upgrade if that makes sense (or wait for the Zen3 based one, which is also expected to be AM4 socket, assuming there is BIOS support). The only downsides to this approach are that the X300 board in this system is PCIe v3 (newer will have v4) and USB 3.1gen1 (5Gbit, newer will have 3.2gen2 10Gbit). I will be using pcie 3x NVMe drives anyway and I don’t own any new USB stuff yet.
