The TBG DIY PC Build Guides

Introduction to the TBG PC Build Guides

Welcome to TBG’s DIY PC Build Guides! This is where you’ll find all the best PC builds on the ‘net, from ultra-compact home office PCs to screaming-fast gaming towers. In total, we offer 18 distinct DIY PC Build guides, constantly updated with the latest and greatest components.

The December 2024 Updates

Over the past few months, we’ve seen both AMD and Intel launch their biggest new CPU lineups in years, and they had something strangely in common – neither could clearly pull away from their predecessors, let alone their competitors. What we’re left with is a number of very good processors, a handful that we cannot recommend, and performance levels that are the best we’ll see until the next generation, likely no earlier than the end of 2025.

Overall, we’re going to have a lot of trouble recommending Intel’s new “Arrow Lake” 200-series processors, but in hindsight, they make AMD’s 9000-series look pretty impressive. The Ryzen 9 9950X 16-core processor is definitely at the top of the multi-tasking charts. In the midrange, AMD’s 9900X, 9700X and older 7700X are both solid deals. And AMD and Intel are offering serious deals on their much older processors to fill out the low-end, in lieu of introducing new budget processors. But perhaps our easiest recommendation is for the Ryzen 7 9800X3D, a dedicated gaming chip, which AMD launched on November 7th. While performance may not be a quantum leap over the exceedingly-fast 7800X3D, the 10-20% boost it does provide is on top of an already dominant AMD gaming position, which gives AMD a  commanding lead. The downside to this is extreme demand and above-MSRP prices, at least for while. For productivity, we’ll definitely have our readers stick with the non-X3D 9950X and 9900X, and we still recommend the 7800X3D in many of our top-end gaming systems due to its reasonable price and decent availability.

On the GPU side, we are now in a holding pattern until January 2025, when both Nvidia and AMD plan to release their next-gen GPUs. We expect Nvidia’s first releases in the RTX 9000 series to be at the very high end (read: $1000 and up), whereas AMD is likely to target the mid-range with its RX 8000 series, probably topping out at $500. These will potentially offer performance equivalent to today’s $1000 GPUs, but are unlikely to significantly exceed AMD’s top current-gen offering the RX 7900 XTX.

Using the TBG PC Build Guides

Whether it’s your first, tenth, or hundredth time building a PC, these guides will set you up with the best components you can buy. To find the right PC for you, feel free to browse all of the options below, or alternatively choose specific criteria from our filter browser below, which will display just the builds that meet your needs. You can then click on the “View Specs” button to see a quick view of prices, parts, and dimensions, or click the “View Guide” button to jump straight to the full Build Guide for that build. Happy hunting, and good luck with whichever build you choose!

Our DIY PC Build Guides are updated monthly, and sometimes daily, to ensure you get the most up-to-date info. If you appreciate the work we do on these, don’t forget to use our Amazon and Newegg links to support continued publication of these guides.

We’d like to express special thanks to SilverStone Technology Co., which sponsors the TBG PC Build Guides. Founded in 2003, SilverStone has made major contributions to PC case design, small form factor PC development, and power supply innovation!