His love of PCs and their components was born out of trying to squeeze every ounce of performance out of the family computer. Tinkering with his own build at age 10 turned into building PCs for friends and family, fostering a passion that would ultimately take shape as a career path.
Besides being the first call for tech support for those close to him, Ty is a computer science student, with his focus being cloud computing and networking. He also competed in semi-pro Counter-Strike for 8 years, making him intimately familiar with everything to do with peripherals.
Looking at prices for brand-new PC components, it's difficult to see how someone on a budget could put together a new rig capable of high framerates at 1080p, let alone 1440p gaming. Everything is significantly more expensive than it was a year ago, but that doesn't mean it's impossible to put together a decent machine. The pre-owned market was the best way for budget builders to make an entry into PC gaming before the memory crisis, and it still is today. It'll take some patience and a little bit of trust, but it's more doable than you might expect.
Buy the platform pre-owned
And buy it all at once, if you can
There aren't as many folks upgrading from AM4 to AM5 or from an older Intel platform to a newer one, but there are still plenty of people trying to get a few extra bucks for their old CPU, motherboard and RAM. Selling them piece by piece can be tedious, so you'll find a lot of listings on eBay for combos that have all three in the same box. Memory is the main reason why building a PC is so expensive right now, and trying to find someone selling theirs in a bundle is the best way to get your hands on some.
There are tons of listings that have been sold in the last 30 days for Ryzen 5 5600X, Ryzen 7 5800X, and Intel Core i7-10700K bundles that include some memory and a motherboard, and they're usually going anywhere from $250 to $400. At that higher end, it is possible to find a newer platform; I saw an AM5 board with a Ryzen 5 7600 for $400, which isn't an excellent deal, but it's certainly better than paying the brand-new tax.
GPU is where things can get a bit tight
There are only a few real options here
The graphics card is at the heart of every gaming PC, and when you're trying to build a 1440p-capable machine for under $1,000, it's also where things start to get pretty tight. Between Nvidia, AMD, and Intel, there are only a handful of realistic options.
Of the Radeon candidates, the RX 9060 XT 16GB is probably the best bang-for-buck card, but it's also on the more expensive side, coming in at just over $500 at the time of writing for the cheapest available option. It's a great 1440p card, and its 16GB of VRAM ensures that it's not going to become a paperweight in the coming years.
On the Nvidia side of the fence, it's not much better. The RTX 5060 Ti 16GB is not in the discussion, as its current price makes up nearly three quarters of the entire build. For other RTX options, you're basically limited to the pre-owned market. An RTX 3080 has 10GB of VRAM and is still a great 1440p card, but it's a bit pricy at the moment. Most cards are going for well above $350, but that price seems to be the floor.
On Intel there's really only one option, and it's the B580. It's a fringe 1440p card, and at its current somewhat inflated price of $320 at the time of writing, it's a bit expensive when there are better pre-owned options available. All of these cards are capable of 1440p gameplay, some definitely more than others.
Where the rest of the budget goes
SSD, PSU, and case are relatively easy finds
The power supply is the one part I’d never buy used. You can’t meaningfully test one at home, its wear is invisible, and a failing unit can take other parts with it. A quality 650W to 750W unit leaves headroom for a power-hungry chip like the 10700K and a card like the RX 9060 XT, if that's the route you intend to go. If you do end up buying a pre-owned 3080, you'll need a bit more PSU headroom: 800W and above is what I'd feel good running.
Storage is more flexible. A 1TB Gen4 NVMe drive that bottomed out around $55 to $65 in 2024 now runs $100 to $150. Unlike a PSU, though, an SSD’s wear is readable: its SMART data shows how much of its rated endurance has been used. Some combos include a drive, like the Core i7-11700 and Z490 Aorus Ultra bundle that sold for $350 with a 500GB WD NVMe drive. The case and cooler can come from anywhere, as long as the case fits your board and moves air, you're good to go. I'd even try to find these used in your area—cases are the one thing some people will just give away in order to free up some space in their home.
There's always a risk going with pre-owned parts
It's lower than you think, though
When buying pre-owned PC components, there's always a risk. There's almost never going to be a warranty remaining for the parts you buy from a place like eBay, even if the seller has the original proof-of-payment. The used market absolutely has its fair share of misrepresented listings, bent pins, and RAM that throws errors under load. On a budget this tight, one dud wipes out the savings, but it's not a total diceroll.
eBay’s Money Back Guarantee covers items that arrive not as described, even when the seller doesn’t accept returns, as long as you contact the seller within 30 days of the actual or estimated delivery date. A CPU listed as working that won’t boot qualifies.
Thirty days is plenty, because the parts this build buys used are the ones you can test thoroughly in an afternoon. Run MemTest86 on the RAM, stress the CPU with OCCT or Cinebench, inspect the socket pins, and check the BIOS version. The parts with real wear mechanisms, like PSU capacitors, GPU fans, and SSD flash, are either bought new or checked through SMART.