Buying/Building computer advice?

I want advice from the experts. My brother wants to buy and or build a desktop computer. I have SOME experience building a computer but my knowledge is limited and I really should fix that…
Anyways! My brother wants a desktop to video game any type of game ,be able to record , potentially stream(not mandatory), and it should be in small form factor, if possible. He’s fine with using AMD EVERYTHING since IM just favoring team red, 8 core count and of course cost. I’ve heard many times that its best to build computers as it will always come out cheaper but there are those occasions. Cost, $1000 but $1500 max.
Advice, tips, helpful anything would be greatly appreciated!

Cookie cutter 6-core build:
Ryzen 5 3600 + B450 board + 16 GB 3200 MHz RAM + 1660 Super :smiley:

If you need 8 cores swap the 3600 for maybe a 2700X (don’t know if those are still around) or 3700X?
Want more umph in games, swap the 1660S for a 2060S or 2070(S).
The Nvidia cards just make it easier to stream from my understanding.

Ofc, if you can postpone the purchase, you can wait for Ryzen 4000 series.

Small formfactor you mean preferable itx?
Or would m-atx also be small enough?
With the new lineup of B550 boards there are some options.

I would say if you can hold on for Ryzen 4000 and next gen GPUs - beat wait…
If not - well, there are a lot of options there…
Does your friend have a monitor, cause that’s kinda important…

I thought Ryzen 4000 would be fall 2020 personally. If you are willing to wait that long then do that. Otherwise, the build suggested by @Zszywany looks great and you could probably upgrade the 1660 super to a EVGA 2060 KO for better gaming performance.

We really don´t know yet.
There been rumors around Ryzen 4000 series.
But it´s still not really clear when they will eventually being launched.
I personally expect them to be delayed to somewhere next year.

I’m on my first ITX build and it’s a jenga game that’s pretty complicated if you’re trying to hit a specific budget because the cheaper component might not fit physically inside the build.
So if you’re patient and want to buy parts that can fit together as soon as they come at a good price you can absolutely do it. If you just want to grab good priced parts off the shelf and put together a PC ITX is not the way, at least in my experience.

Another option you have it’s going “fake” ITX and getting those small towers that an fit basically anything and are limited to an ITX motherboard.

If you’re going AMD for the CPU I’d get a B550 board. I think B450 it’s not worth anymore in 2020 and the extra investment is nice for the wider options when it comes to connectivity. Maybe on ITX doesen’t matter as much as it does on an ATX board, but that’s my opinion.
A 3600 is a good starting point, a 3700X is the next step up. With a 3600 he’ll be able to do everything you said already, but obviously a 3700X can do it a bit more easly.

Regarding the GPU, to stay in the 1000$ budget, a 5700 will do great. If I have to suggest a brand I think Sapphire is the one to go when it comes to AIB AMD cards, and the Pulse is well made and doesen’t cost too much. It even fits in some ITX cases (be mindful of the height of that card’s PCB).
If you can find a similarly priced 2070 that would be faster IIRC, but be mindful of the ultra cheap coolers.

Regarding the rest of the parts get a memory kit that’s validated to work on the motherboard you get (you can get the QVL list from the motherboard manufacturer page), get a low profile cooler and an SFX PSU if you’re building an ITX build, for storage I still don’t believe too much in the benefits of an NVME drive so I think a larger SATA SSD will do very well for every possible need and get a mechanical drive for games and bulk storage.

Sorry for the long reply lol

When it comes to picking your parts, it really depends on how urgent your brother needs his computer and the types of games + graphic settings he wants to play.

If he cannot wait, then go with a b550 board and pick up the 2060 ko as @JediAcolyte suggested. The 2060 will fetch you decent frames at 1080p medium-high settings.

If you have time and want to save some money, look around your local craigslist and r/hardwareswap to see if anyone is selling a non super 2070/2080. That’s how I bought my 2070 without directly supporting Nvidia. The guy was from my club’s discord he was upgrading to a 1080ti.

Can confirm, the new nvenc (having all the video data transfer from the gpu to the gpu hardware encoders rather than having the video data transfer from the gpu to cpu and then back to the gpu for the hardware encoders really increased the efficiency) on turing cards + work with obs devs have really made streaming a lot less intensive when gaming. Really makes me wonder how they are going to top it off on ampere from turing

I can play overwatch and valorant at 200+ fps at 1080p, 144hz, high graphics settings while streaming 1080p 60fps @6000 bitrate on my 2070.

typically you would center the parts choice with what you plan on doing with your system, be it graphic intensive games and applications you would go for high end hardware and memory.
overclocking to any extent required durable components and efficiently adequate cooling.
while my uses are primarily centered on server and client side usage I do not require high end graphics other than my media center system…
your best way is to list what your most resource intensive tasks are ad chose components that are up to the task.

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