The Best $5000 Dream Machine Gaming PC Build – May 2025

By Ari Altman | Published April 25, 2025 | Updated April 25, 2025

MSI MEG Prospect 700RBuild the Gaming System of your Dreams!

If you want to build a dream gaming system, but can’t stand the idea of having another huge desktop by your side, stop dreaming and jump into a new reality! This build has all the power you could want, packed into an awesome high-end chassis that performs as great as it looks. It’s everything you want in a killer gaming PC!

This Month’s Build, Powered by AMD and Nvidia!

After a six month hiatus, the $5,000 Dream Machine Gaming PC Build is back for May 2025, with the greatest gaming gear you can get! It starts with AMD’s game-conquering Ryzen 7 9800X3D 8-core, 16-thread CPU, which has Intel busy playing dead. And you’ll make use of all of its power, because this system will be pushing out a massive number of frames thanks to the insane Nvidia GeForce RTX 5090 32GB, which is a shocking  30% faster than the already absurd RTX 4090, and draws the power to prove it – 575W, more than most full gaming PCs!

But that’s not all… this build is packing premium gear everywhere else! 64GB of fast DDR5-6000 RAM will assure the CPU has plenty of bandwidth and room to perform. For storage, this system gives you 4TB of blazing-fast storage. To keep things cool, this system uses a high-powered 360mm liquid CPU cooler. Feeding the system is a quiet and ultra-efficient 1300W Platinum-rated power supply. Finally, the system comes together in the sleek and cutting-edge MSI Prospect 700R case, with built-in 4.3″ touchscreen display!

Parting Thoughts

We list all of our top picks to accessorize your Dream Machine in the optional products section later in this guide, although feel free to check out our dedicated Monitor Buyer’s Guide, Keyboard & Mouse Buyer’s Guide, and Headset Buyer’s Guide. To support continued development of this guide, please use the links we provide in the guide. For readers in the US, we list Amazon links, which will auto-convert for readers in Canada, the UK, and parts of the EU, with automated substitutions made by region where necessary.

The DIY Build

  • CPU

    AMD Ryzen 7 9800X3D

    $479
    AMD’s 7800 X3D was impressive enough, easily beating every other CPU ever released in gaming. And despite it still holding the crown after the release of many other CPUs, AMD went and did it again, giving gamers the 9800X3D with enhanced 3D cache technology, redesigned to allow higher clockspeeds and manual overclocking. This CPU is the ultimate gaming processor, regardless of price.

    The Guru’s Tip

    While there are chips that can beat this one in productivity, this 8-core gem is a gamer's dream chip!

  • Motherboard

    Asus ROG Strix X870E-E

    $468
    This X870E board from Asus allows you to tap into the full potential of AMD’s cutting-edge AM5 platform. You get a potent 18+2+2 power design with 110A Smart Power Stage , a PCIe Gen 5 video card slot plus an additional PCIe slot, five M.2 slots (three being Gen 5, two being Gen 4), and built-in WiFi 7. On the back you have 13 USB ports, including two cutting-edge USB 4 (40Gbps) ports. It also has great aesthetics, making this an all-around premium choice!

    The Guru’s Tip

    This model has all the bells and whistles, without going completely overboard!

  • Video Card

    Gigabyte GeForce RTX 5090 Gaming OC 32GB @Newegg

    $3160
    Hail to the king! The absolutely mind-blowing RTX 5090 32GB goes beyond extreme, beating the legendary RTX 4090 by 30%, an incredible gen-on-gen leap in performance. And this model from Gigabyte offers great cooling thanks to the massive yet attractive triple-slot, triple-fan cooler and flow-through fin-stack!

    The Guru’s Tip

    As of our latest update, this GPU can only be bundled with a useless Intel motherboard, so just use it as wall art or a massive coaster!

  • Memory

    G.Skill 2x32GB Trident Z5 Neo RGB DDR5-6000 CL28 EXPO

    $240
    To get the most out of AMD’s latest CPUs, you want fast RAM, and DDR5-6000 is the sweetspot not only in terms of price, but in terms of making the most of the AM5 platform. It allows for the highest overall performance thanks to running in 1:1 sync with the memory controller. And this 64GB Trident Z5 Neo kit from G.Skill is specially designed for AM5, thanks to the extraordinary 28-36-36-96 AMD EXPO timings. It offers tremendous capacity and speed in a single package!

    The Guru’s Tip

    64GB is honestly all you'll ever need, even in a Dream Machine!

  • Solid-State Drive

    Samsung 990 Pro 4TB

    $302
    For serious storage, you don’t just want high-end, you want ultra-high-end, and that means going for the 990 Pro PCIe 4.0. It offers mind-blowing performance, up to 7,450MB/s read and 6,900MB/s, plus blistering random speeds that no other drive can touch. The 990 Pro will go down in history as the drive that truly maxed out the PCIe Gen 4 bus.

    The Guru’s Tip

    In terms of a "gaming" drive, you really can't do better than this model - it offers a tremendous amount of capacity for your extended game collection!

  • Case

    MSI MEG Prospect 700R

    $380
    Arguably the most advanced case ever made, the Prospect 700R from MSI is simply astonishing. With dual hinged tempered glass doors on both sides and four 140mm ARGB fans and a mesh front panel for extreme airflow, it already has most cases beat for looks and performance. But what really sets this case apart from everything that has come before it is the built-in 4.3″ touchscreen control panel on top, allowing you to monitor and control practically every aspect of your PC’s performance!

    The Guru’s Tip

    You can get bigger cases than the 700R, but you cannot get a better case!

  • Power Supply

    SilverStone HELA 1300R Platinum

    $245
    A power supply is about so much more than just a wattage rating, and with SilverStone’s HELA 1300R, you get it all. Of course it has an incredible 1300W of capacity, but it also offers an impressive Platinum efficiency certification, a fully-modular design, all Japanese electrolytic capacitors, and an ultra-silent 120mm FDB fan with semi-fanless function. It’s also ultra-compact, at just 140mm deep, meaning it offers the most wattage per liter of any power supply on the market! But perhaps most important, and what really sets this unit apart, is the Gen5 12VHPWR PCIe connector, meeting Intel ATX 3.0 specification standard. It means no adapters required when paired with the latest power-hungry GPUs from Nvidia!

    The Guru’s Tip

    This system will pull about 750W at maximum load, so this PSU will have plenty of headroom to spare. And the truth is that future CPUs and GPUs (which we expect you'll eventually upgrade to) will almost certainly draw much more power, so you'll be prepared with this unit!

  • CPU Cooler

    SilverStone IceMyst 360

    $170
    There has been tremendous innovation in the AIO liquid cooler market over the past few years, and the IceMyst 360 is the perfect example of this. Not only does its advanced pump, radiator, and fan design provide a tremendous leap over previous-generation coolers on a noise-normalized basis (which is what counts!), you also have the option of adding up to three 70mm accessory fans to the pump to cool RAM, VRMs, or SSDs. This is a truly unique feature that sets the IceMyst apart and makes it the clear choice among 360mm AIOs!

    The Guru’s Tip

    Mount this radiator to the top of the chassis as an exhaust.

  • Operating System

    Windows 11 Home (USB) @Newegg

    $139
    Windows 11 built on everything people loved about Windows 10, and then took it to 11! It adds significant under-the-hood changes to make it faster and more secure, and of course, the interface is sleek too! Note that we’re linking to Newegg, because Amazon long ago stopped selling this physical USB version of Windows, which is the most convenient one to use.

    The Guru’s Tip

    This is absolutely the OS you want on your system to take full advantage of the advanced platform.

Optional Products

  • The Ultimate Gaming Keyboard

    SteelSeries Apex Pro Gen 3

    $240
    SteelSeries is establishing itself as the king of gaming keyboards with the Apex Pro Gen 3, which builds upon the strengths of prior offerings, but adds even more tech! In addition to incredible build quality and lots of configuration options, it features Hall Effect Switches for the smoothest, fastest response, plus bold RGB effects, and a built-in OLED screen to monitor PC vitals!

    The Guru’s Tip

    This keyboard is almost infinitely configurable!

  • The Ultralight Gaming Mouse

    Razer DeathAdder V3 Pro Wireless

    $110
    Sometimes a product is so far ahead of the competition comes along that it resets the entire industry. So it is with the DeathAdder V3. Featuring the same ergonomic grip as the original from years ago that set the gaming world on fire, this is nonetheless leagues ahead of that classic. Weighing in at a scant 63g, while offering up a 30K DPI sensor, optical switches, wireless operation, and an incredible 90 hours of battery life, this is as cutting-edge as it gets. To have all of this in a mouse that weighs half as much as the best wireless mice from a few generations ago shows you just how far the bar has been raised!

    The Guru’s Tip

    This mouse will keep up with the most fast-twitch games!

  • The 32-inch 4K OLED Gaming Monitor

    ASUS ROG Swift 32” 4K OLED

    $1000
    The 32″ 4K screen size has long been considered the holy grail when it comes to gaming, but as with all good things, it took a while to mature, with other sizes testing new technologies until manufacturers could make them good enough to put them into their reference 32″ 4K models. And that’s what we have with the ROG Swift OLED – a monitor so good it sets a new standard for gaming. This QD-OLED gaming monitor offers the most intense colors combined with an exceptional 240 Hz refresh rate and 0.03 ms (GTG) response time for a truly immersive experience.

    The Guru’s Tip

    A dream machine PC deserves a dream monitor!

  • The Ultimate Gaming Headset

    SteelSeries Arctis Nova Pro Wireless

    $309
    Combining audiophile reference-grade performance with incredible versatility, this wireless headset from Arctis is the finest gaming headset on the market! It features 360-degree Spatial Audio for immersive surround sound, active noise cancellation for the headphone to keep out ambient noises, plus AI-powered noise cancelling for the microphone for the clearest comms. Its breakout control box allows you not only to connect two devices at once via USB or Bluetooth, it also lets you listen to both simultaneously, so you can take calls or listen to music from your phone while gaming.  Finally, the Infinity Power System allows you to how-swap the battery without shutting down!

    The Guru’s Tip

    This isn't just a wireless headset, it's a full wireless audio system!