Piltch Point (Video)

It is an exciting time to be building a new PC. AMD's new Ryzen 7000 series processors are out, and Intel has released the new Raptor Lake processors, now known as the 13th Generation Core Processors, which have hit the streets. There are currently three SKUs available, the Core i9 13900K, the Core i7 13700K, and the Core i5 13600K. The new Intel chips range in price from about $320 to $589 retail, though the Core i9 is in limited stock and running higher.

The Raptor Lake chips absolutely blow away both the Alder Lake chips from Intel (12th Generation Core) as well as the Ryzen 7000 chips in terms of both gaming and productivity. This is definitely bad news for AMD, who has been keeping ahead of Intel for the last few generations and has done it for less money. Speaking of costs, unfortunately, AMD is failing there, as well.

Ryzen 7000 series chips are much faster than the 5000 series, which is the predecessor, and faster than Intel's 12th Gen in most cases. The new chips also added support for DDR5 RAM and PCIe 5 SSDs (which aren't really out yet), for the first time. But, AMD's new chips do not perform as well as Intel's 13th Generation chips, cost more money, and the rest of the computer is way more expensive, too.

For the processors themselves, Intel is less expensive than AMD. The top AMD chip is the Ryzen 9 7950X which has an MSRP of $699. Compare that with the Intel Core i9 13900K which has an MSRP of $589. Even with the increased price due to stock issues, it still comes in under the AMD equivalent.

For the new Intel chips, you can choose between DDR4 and DDR5 RAM. In fact, the processors work with many older motherboards that are already on the market. Sure, you won't have the latest and greatest on all of your components, but if you want the best processor on a budget, you can pull it off.

With AMD, however, everything is shiny and new, meaning it is more expensive. DDR5 RAM, as of right now, is significantly more expensive. However, with the 7000 series processors, you don't have a choice - it's DDR5 or nothing. Because of this and the new chipset, only the newest boards work. And those boards are not inexpensive. As of this episode, the least expensive board is close to $300 - and they go up steeply from there. Of course, it will not always be this way, but for now, this is our reality.

Now, the cost difference could be justified, if the new and shiny features of the Ryzen 7000 chips were significantly better than the 13th Generation Core processors, but that is also not the case. On the Tom's Hardware Windows 11 test suite, which plays the same games on the same graphics card and system setup, the top chip is the Intel 13900K. AMD's 7000 series chips do not appear on the list until #5, coming in behind all of Intel's new processors and one of their own previous models, the Ryzen 7 5800X 3D, which takes the #2 slot. So, the $699 chip from AMD does not perform as well as Intel's $320 chip. Yikes.

For a company that has made its name on being the powerful, inexpensive competitor, this is not a great place for AMD to be.

Scott is a developer who has worked on projects of varying sizes, including all of the PLUGHITZ Corporation properties. He is also known in the gaming world for his time supporting the rhythm game community, through DDRLover and hosting tournaments throughout the Tampa Bay Area. Currently, when he is not working on software projects or hosting F5 Live: Refreshing Technology, Scott can often be found returning to his high school days working with the Foundation for Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST), mentoring teams and helping with ROBOTICON Tampa Bay. He has also helped found a student software learning group, the ASCII Warriors, currently housed at AMRoC Fab Lab.

Avram's been in love with PCs since he played original Castle Wolfenstein on an Apple II+. Before joining Tom's Hardware, for 10 years, he served as Online Editorial Director for sister sites Tom's Guide and Laptop Mag, where he programmed the CMS and many of the benchmarks. When he's not editing, writing or stumbling around trade show halls, you'll find him building Arduino robots with his son and watching every single superhero show on the CW.

In June, Avram gave us a look at what components you could put into a gaming PC for under $500. The build was decent, and even inspired the build available at STRYKE eSports and Gaming Center. Since that episode, the PC component market has changed significantly. Crypto Winter dropped the value of mining, followed by the change in Etherium mining to move away from video cards, leaving more inventory for gamers at a better price.

In addition to crypto changes, a new generation of hardware is coming, so manufacturers are trying to reduce inventory on the existing hardware before the new SKUs are released. If you are willing to go all-in on the current hardware, you can build an impressively powerful computer for a low price, including one build that comes in under $500. Of course, in any of these lists, you can always swap out components that you want, as they are simply guides. Also, prices change daily, so it's always possible that these prices have changed slightly since publication. Let's take a look at the updated builds.

With an inexpensive gaming PC, the processor is a good place to save some money, as the video card should be doing a lot of the heavy lifting. As such, this build is based around an Intel Core i3 12000Fprocessor attached to an ASRock H610M-HVS motherboard. Together, they come in under $200, giving us more room for a better video card. In this case, the best way to go to stay within our budget is a Radeon RX 6400 for $149. While the previous build had only 8 GB of RAM, the new one is able to move us up to 16 GB of Silicon Power Value Gaming RAM. The storage is a solid Crucial MX500 500 GB SSD, the PSU is a Thermaltake Smart 500W supply, and the case is a very strangely colored DIYPC DIY-S08-G.

While the processor can be toned down in a budget build, with a bigger budget, improving the processor does have benefits. In this build, the processor has moved up to an Intel Core i5-12400F, moving up a whole category, and placed in a Gigabyte H610M S2H motherboard. The video card also improves, giving an option between the Radeon RX 6700 XT or RTX 3060 Ti. The RAM is still 16 GB, but the quality of the RAM is improved by swapping to the TeamGroup T-Force Zeus. The storage is also doubled to 1 TB through the Silicon Power UD90. With more capacity comes more power requirements, using the Thermaltake Toughpower GX2 600W supply. The case is far less weird in color, and more attractive in the NZXT H510.

There are plenty of ways to improve each of these builds to focus of the part that is most important to you. You can check out reviews and spec on these components, as well as ways to improve each build on the full Tom's Hardware list.

Scott is a developer who has worked on projects of varying sizes, including all of the PLUGHITZ Corporation properties. He is also known in the gaming world for his time supporting the rhythm game community, through DDRLover and hosting tournaments throughout the Tampa Bay Area. Currently, when he is not working on software projects or hosting F5 Live: Refreshing Technology, Scott can often be found returning to his high school days working with the Foundation for Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST), mentoring teams and helping with ROBOTICON Tampa Bay. He has also helped found a student software learning group, the ASCII Warriors, currently housed at AMRoC Fab Lab.

Avram's been in love with PCs since he played original Castle Wolfenstein on an Apple II+. Before joining Tom's Hardware, for 10 years, he served as Online Editorial Director for sister sites Tom's Guide and Laptop Mag, where he programmed the CMS and many of the benchmarks. When he's not editing, writing or stumbling around trade show halls, you'll find him building Arduino robots with his son and watching every single superhero show on the CW.

Kirk has long had an interest in production, and began his journey by joiining Geek News Central as Todd Cochrane's Executive Producer. That brought him into the Tech Podcasts Network CES coverage in 2018. He has become the team's regular technical director and associate producer since 2019. He has since launched his own show with PLUGHITZ Live Editor-in-Chief Scott Ertz, called GNC Week in Review. This is a weekly quick-fire topical show covering the biggest tech stories of the week in a comedic atmosphere.

This week, Avram Piltch discusses some of the best choices for what to look for on Prime Early Access Sales and on other sites.

Scott is a developer who has worked on projects of varying sizes, including all of the PLUGHITZ Corporation properties. He is also known in the gaming world for his time supporting the rhythm game community, through DDRLover and hosting tournaments throughout the Tampa Bay Area. Currently, when he is not working on software projects or hosting F5 Live: Refreshing Technology, Scott can often be found returning to his high school days working with the Foundation for Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST), mentoring teams and helping with ROBOTICON Tampa Bay. He has also helped found a student software learning group, the ASCII Warriors, currently housed at AMRoC Fab Lab.

Avram's been in love with PCs since he played original Castle Wolfenstein on an Apple II+. Before joining Tom's Hardware, for 10 years, he served as Online Editorial Director for sister sites Tom's Guide and Laptop Mag, where he programmed the CMS and many of the benchmarks. When he's not editing, writing or stumbling around trade show halls, you'll find him building Arduino robots with his son and watching every single superhero show on the CW.

Kirk has long had an interest in production, and began his journey by joiining Geek News Central as Todd Cochrane's Executive Producer. That brought him into the Tech Podcasts Network CES coverage in 2018. He has become the team's regular technical director and associate producer since 2019. He has since launched his own show with PLUGHITZ Live Editor-in-Chief Scott Ertz, called GNC Week in Review. This is a weekly quick-fire topical show covering the biggest tech stories of the week in a comedic atmosphere.

Right now is both the best of times and the worst of times for building a new PC or upgrading an existing one. If you absolutely need to build or upgrade one today, then there is no time better, of course. However, if you have the ability to hold off, at least on some components, it should be in your best interest. We expect to see new video cards from both AMD and Nvidia, as well as new processors from Intel and AMD.

Remember, this advice applies specifically to desktop PCS, as laptop hardware is always delayed behind desktop components. All of this hardware will not come out until later 2023 for laptops.

The best advice for video cards is to skip any card that currently costs over $500. The new cards will be announced starting this week, and both AMD and Nvidia are expected to start with the top specification cards and work their way backward. So, the more expensive cards from the current generation are likely to drop in price as their replacements could be out shortly. So, investing in these cards will cost more in the long run than waiting a little while.

In addition, current generation cards are seeing a decline now that Ethereum mining is effectively dead. That means that demand on cards has lowered significantly and availability has not changed. Ethereum moved from proof of work to proof of stake, so video cards are no longer involved. Currently, it would take 20 years to break even on a 3080 using the new technology, before the prices change.

However, if you are in the market for a less expensive card, now is not a bad time to invest. The next generation cards with the lower specifications will likely be longer before they are replaced, so costs will not change significantly in the near term. Also, because the prices are already lower, there isn't as much room for discounts when new hardware is released.

Now, what about CPUs? In the next few weeks or possibly months, new AMD Ryzen chips are coming, as are Intel Raptor Lake chips. They'll be faster than the current generation and older chips will go on sale. However, it's important to note that new AMD chips are not going to work in existing motherboards, so making a change today would be ill advised. A future update is going to require new motherboards, which will come along with a requirement for upgraded RAM. If you're building a powerful computer, that slight delay might be worth considering.

However, if you're looking to build or buy a mid to low cost computer, now would still be an okay time to buy. A $300 CPU is not going to see a significant change in power or price in the next generation. But, if you're looking for a top tier CPU, it would be best to hold off.

Other components, such as CPUs, cases, and power supplies are not expected to change much between now and the release of the new components, so those are not a concern.

Scott is a developer who has worked on projects of varying sizes, including all of the PLUGHITZ Corporation properties. He is also known in the gaming world for his time supporting the rhythm game community, through DDRLover and hosting tournaments throughout the Tampa Bay Area. Currently, when he is not working on software projects or hosting F5 Live: Refreshing Technology, Scott can often be found returning to his high school days working with the Foundation for Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST), mentoring teams and helping with ROBOTICON Tampa Bay. He has also helped found a student software learning group, the ASCII Warriors, currently housed at AMRoC Fab Lab.

Avram's been in love with PCs since he played original Castle Wolfenstein on an Apple II+. Before joining Tom's Hardware, for 10 years, he served as Online Editorial Director for sister sites Tom's Guide and Laptop Mag, where he programmed the CMS and many of the benchmarks. When he's not editing, writing or stumbling around trade show halls, you'll find him building Arduino robots with his son and watching every single superhero show on the CW.

As surprising as this might be after the past few years, it is a great time to buy a new PC. The new chips and video cards will be coming out later this year, but if you don't need to be on the bleeding edge, now is a fantastic time to get great value for your money on a gaming laptop. There is an excess of supply of current generation hardware, so things are going on sale across the industry. The discounts could be more as the year goes on, but you can get a solid gaming laptop for under $1500 right now.

There are some components that you should expect to find in a gaming laptop in this price range.

First of all, the most important feature is the graphics chip. The CPU doesn't matter that much, overall, but the video card absolutely does. In this category, the best card is going to be NVIDIA RTX 3070, RTX 3060, or RTX 3050ti. The higher up that rung you can go, the better. If you want to go with an AMD card, you can usually get a Radeon 6800m, which will have better framerates than the 3060.

1080p resolution is what you can expect and high or ultra video quality within a game, with 40 or so FPS. Changing some of the settings will have an impact on that framerate. Turning on ray tracing will lower the framerate while lowering quality or resolution will increase it. You don't want to go below 30 FPS, as even digital video is 30 FPS standard. Below 30 FPS is barely playable, while 60 or higher is what you're going to want for competitive gaming situations.

All of these laptops will also have a high refresh rate. Most will offer 120 Hz while others can go up to 165 Hz. That rating is the maximum refresh rate possible for the screen, but not necessarily what you will achieve during gameplay. The screens will usually vary to the refresh rate of the game or the video card setting for the video being delivered.

In this price range, what you can expect is an SSD in the 500 GB to 1 TB range. If you go under $1000, you can expect that size to drop significantly to 256 GB. You're definitely not going to want to go that low, as modern games take up a lot of storage space. Some can be over 100 GB, meaning they will use around half of the available space (after the Windows installation).

As for RAM, these systems should come with 16 GB standard. In the lower price range, however, you can expect the RAM to drop in half to 8 GB. Once again, 8 GB isn't going to be enough for actual gaming, so the lower RAM option will want to be a last resort.

Many of the laptops are upgradable, especially for the SSD. If you get stuck with a poor drive, or you're willing to go to the trouble, you can purchase an SSD on the market and swap the included drive with the larger and cheaper drive. Some laptops will also allow you to upgrade the RAM, so take a look at the options on that PC before you decide.

Here are some of the best deals as of the date of publication, but you should be able to find others in case these prices change.

• ASUS ROG Zephyrus 15.6" Best Buy | Amazon
• Acer Nitro 5 Best Buy
• ASUS ROG Strix G15 Advantage Edition Best Buy | Amazon
• ASUS TUF Dash Best Buy

Scott is a developer who has worked on projects of varying sizes, including all of the PLUGHITZ Corporation properties. He is also known in the gaming world for his time supporting the rhythm game community, through DDRLover and hosting tournaments throughout the Tampa Bay Area. Currently, when he is not working on software projects or hosting F5 Live: Refreshing Technology, Scott can often be found returning to his high school days working with the Foundation for Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST), mentoring teams and helping with ROBOTICON Tampa Bay. He has also helped found a student software learning group, the ASCII Warriors, currently housed at AMRoC Fab Lab.

Avram's been in love with PCs since he played original Castle Wolfenstein on an Apple II+. Before joining Tom's Hardware, for 10 years, he served as Online Editorial Director for sister sites Tom's Guide and Laptop Mag, where he programmed the CMS and many of the benchmarks. When he's not editing, writing or stumbling around trade show halls, you'll find him building Arduino robots with his son and watching every single superhero show on the CW.

When you are done with an older computer, there are lots of great ways to properly upcycle it. Organizations across the country will take donations of older computers that can be cleaned up and provided to children who need them for school but cannot afford one of their own. However, before you transfer an old computer to someone else, it is important to remove all of the data from the drive to protect your identity. No matter how much you trust someone, you can never determine the final resting place of that data.

Windows offers an option to reset your PC while removing all data, programs, and settings. However, this does not do exactly what it sounds like. You can remove all of the data from the publicly accessible list of files, most or all of the data is still easily recoverable. Using a consumer tool like EasyUS, nearly anyone can recover the data "removed" using the built-in Windows recovery toolset.

Windows has another tool built in designed to easily wipe a drive. You can do it if the drive is the primary or if it is a secondary drive on your computer.

If the drive is secondary on your PC, things are really easy. All you have to do is open the command prompt on your PC in admin mode. If this is outside of your normal scenario, simply click on the Start Menu (Windows logo), type "cmd" into the search, right-click on the app, and select "Run as administrator." The User Account Control might prompt you for admin access, so select ""Yes" and you're ready to proceed.

If you are looking to wipe out a primary drive (the one running Windows), the preparation is a little more in-depth. You'll need a Windows installation flash drive, which you can generate from your computer. Open the Start Menu (Windows logo) and search for "recovery," then open "Recovery Drive." This wizard will allow you to make a recovery disk. Or, you can use the Windows installation media tool to create a full installation drive.

Once you've got a flash drive all setup, you'll need access to the command prompt. From Windows Recovery, you'll select command prompt. But, from installation media, you'll need to hit Shift-F10. This command prompt will run in admin mode, so you're good to go.

Now that you're prepared and in the command prompt, you're ready to wipe the drive. Type diskpart at the prompt, and after a moment you'll get a new prompt that says DISKPART. At this new prompt, type "list disk" and hit Enter to show all of your disks. Usually your target drive will be disk 0, so you'll likely need to type "select disk 0" and hit Enter. Then type "clean all" and hit Enter.

This process can take a while, so feel free to walk away and wait for completion. The most important part of this is that it works for both standard hard drives and SSDs, so nothing to know or worry about here.

It's possible that a professional data recovery facility can still get around this process, but it is a great way to protect against most data theft.

Scott is a developer who has worked on projects of varying sizes, including all of the PLUGHITZ Corporation properties. He is also known in the gaming world for his time supporting the rhythm game community, through DDRLover and hosting tournaments throughout the Tampa Bay Area. Currently, when he is not working on software projects or hosting F5 Live: Refreshing Technology, Scott can often be found returning to his high school days working with the Foundation for Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST), mentoring teams and helping with ROBOTICON Tampa Bay. He has also helped found a student software learning group, the ASCII Warriors, currently housed at AMRoC Fab Lab.

Avram's been in love with PCs since he played original Castle Wolfenstein on an Apple II+. Before joining Tom's Hardware, for 10 years, he served as Online Editorial Director for sister sites Tom's Guide and Laptop Mag, where he programmed the CMS and many of the benchmarks. When he's not editing, writing or stumbling around trade show halls, you'll find him building Arduino robots with his son and watching every single superhero show on the CW.

When it comes to interacting with your computer, we know that the way your items come is not always the best way to use them. Avram has some great ideas on how to improve your experience. Best of all, his suggestions can all come in under $50.

Your computer has a lot of items that sit on your desk. This includes your keyboard, mouse, headphones, and more. This can take up a lot of space, and require a lot of interaction. This is a great place to improve your experience.

There are several ways to improve your keyboard experience. Of course, buying a good mechanical keyboard is a great start, but that will usually cost above $50. Right now, however, the EVGA Z15 is running only $39.99 (regularly $129.99). A deal like this is the point at which you should really consider an upgrade because it completely changes the typing experience.

Once you have your mechanical keyboard (or if you aren't able to get a deal), one great upgrade you can make is the keycaps. You might not consider the plastic pieces you touch to be a big part of the experience, but they are. Different designs and styles, as well as heights, can dramatically change the typing experience. Avram uses and recommends the Hyekit Keycaps, which have a great design and come in under $50 at $47.99.

If you've already upgraded these items, you can still improve your typing with a wrist rest. It's the part of the experience that we most often ignore, but it's a small change that can make a big difference. Check out the HyperX wrist great, which has a cooling gel inside and reduces strain on your wrist. Best of all, it runs only $15.99 right now (normally $19.99).

A great pair of headphones is an essential, and likely something you've already got. But, keeping the headphones in good repair and out of your way can make things better. There are a ton of great headphone holders that can make it better. Some stands are cool, offering USB ports and RGB effects, like the Monster Gaming Stand ($34.39). You can also get one that hooks onto your desk, giving you a lot more space on your desk. They range in price, but are usually under $15.

Now that you've got all of your USB devices, it's time to plug them in. A great way to do this is with a solid USB hub. It sits on your desk and gives you access to extra ports without having to reach under your desk. Avram's personal favorite is the Sabrent 7-port hub for a couple of reasons. First, it costs just $38.99 and gives you 7 extra ports. But, it also offers a power switch for each port, so if you have speakers and headphones plugged in, you can easily switch between them by simply turning them on and off.

There are ways to improve your experience from under the desk too, either inside of the computer or its power.

If you are using a laptop, a GaN charger can change your experience. Anker's USB-C charger runs $59.99 but often includes a $10 coupon (make sure to click it). It makes it easier to carry, as the charger is far smaller and lighter, but also takes less space under your desk.

As Avram has discussed before, certain components can speed up your experience and can be inexpensive. For example, you can get a good second SSD for under $50. For example, the SP 512 GB SSD runs $34.99. You likely don't want it as your primary, but is a good second drive.

You can also speed up your system with some extra RAM. If you've got extra slots in your PC, you can add 16 GB of Patriot Signature RAM for $47.99. You can also speed up your internet connection using a UBIT AX210 Wi-Fi 6E card for only $35.

Extra case fans for a desktop computer is a good idea, too. It can help to keep the system cool, speeding up operations. But, you can also add RGB to make the case more interesting. Lots of options exist, many under the $50 price point.

Scott is a developer who has worked on projects of varying sizes, including all of the PLUGHITZ Corporation properties. He is also known in the gaming world for his time supporting the rhythm game community, through DDRLover and hosting tournaments throughout the Tampa Bay Area. Currently, when he is not working on software projects or hosting F5 Live: Refreshing Technology, Scott can often be found returning to his high school days working with the Foundation for Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST), mentoring teams and helping with ROBOTICON Tampa Bay. He has also helped found a student software learning group, the ASCII Warriors, currently housed at AMRoC Fab Lab.

Avram's been in love with PCs since he played original Castle Wolfenstein on an Apple II+. Before joining Tom's Hardware, for 10 years, he served as Online Editorial Director for sister sites Tom's Guide and Laptop Mag, where he programmed the CMS and many of the benchmarks. When he's not editing, writing or stumbling around trade show halls, you'll find him building Arduino robots with his son and watching every single superhero show on the CW.

For some products, an annual refresh is expected. One of those products is Lenovo's workhorse productivity laptop, the ThinkPad X1 Carbon. This year marks the 10th generation of the laptop, and the company has made some changes to the core components while keeping the heart and soul of the computer intact.

The important parts of the X1 Carbon are still in place. This includes the always important thinness (coming in at just 0.6 inches in thickness) - a big part of why people love the laptop. Despite the thin body, it still comes with 2 USB-A ports, a full-size HDMI port, as well as 2 Thunderbolt 4 ports. Usually, by going thin, we lose ports, but not with the X1 Carbon.

Another important aspect of the laptop is the keyboard, and Lenovo does not disappoint. The keyboard on the new model has great travel and good spring back on typing. This is important for typing, as it is a physical indicator that the key has been pressed successfully. With the keyboard is the traditional track pointer, for those (like Avram) who love it, and a great trackpad for those who do not.

Some of what has changed is for the best. Some leave us with more questions than answers. But, for sure, there are a number of changes.

One of the biggest and mouse impressive changes comes in the screen. It changes from a standard 16:9 aspect ratio to a 16:10 (or 8:5 for our math friends) aspect ratio. This means there is more vertical real estate on the display than previous models. The core screen has a 1920x1200 resolution with 405 nits of brightness. The model can be customized with a 2K OLED screen or a full 4K display. These upgrades will likely cost you in battery life, though, so that is something to consider.

Another change that affects battery life is the processor. The 10th Gen X1 Carbon comes with a 12th Generation Intel Core processor, either in an i5 or i7 flavor. These Alder Lake processors went in a new direction, moving from the previous u-series processor to a p-series processor. This means that the processor uses more electricity than previous models. The u-series runs at 15 watts, while the p-series uses 28 watts. This is nearly double the amount of power required, meaning that the battery life has suffered.

The previous models of X1 Carbon have averaged in the 12 to 14 hour range, while the 10th Generation is currently clocking in between 7.5 to 8.5 hours. This represents around a 33% decrease in the newest model of computer, which is going to be something to consider. Add to that the extra loss with an OLED or 4K screen, and you could really see a difference form the past.

The Alder Lake processor does give some additional benefits, though. In particular, it has those split cores, with some being for power and some being for efficiency. Unfortunately, even with those efficiency cores, it's still a big downgrade in battery life.

The 10th Generation X1 Carbon is available now starting at $1319.

Scott is a developer who has worked on projects of varying sizes, including all of the PLUGHITZ Corporation properties. He is also known in the gaming world for his time supporting the rhythm game community, through DDRLover and hosting tournaments throughout the Tampa Bay Area. Currently, when he is not working on software projects or hosting F5 Live: Refreshing Technology, Scott can often be found returning to his high school days working with the Foundation for Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST), mentoring teams and helping with ROBOTICON Tampa Bay. He has also helped found a student software learning group, the ASCII Warriors, currently housed at AMRoC Fab Lab.

Avram's been in love with PCs since he played original Castle Wolfenstein on an Apple II+. Before joining Tom's Hardware, for 10 years, he served as Online Editorial Director for sister sites Tom's Guide and Laptop Mag, where he programmed the CMS and many of the benchmarks. When he's not editing, writing or stumbling around trade show halls, you'll find him building Arduino robots with his son and watching every single superhero show on the CW.

When building a new computer, installing Windows can be a big challenge. You could be hampered by not owning a copy of the operating system yourself, or it could be because you have specific needs for your machine. Luckily, Avram has some ways to get Windows 11 for cheap and to install Windows without the usually required Microsoft Account.

For most, Windows comes with your existing computer. However, if you build your computer yourself, where does Windows come from? Microsoft would like you to pay $129 to buy Windows, but that's a lot of money. You could be building a $500 PC, but if you have to add another $129 for the OS, there goes the budget. What we know is that HP and Dell spend a lot less than that, so why can't you?

Everyone can download Windows and create a bootable USB drive to install it. However, without a product key, you'll get a message in the corner of the screen and you won't be allowed to change your wallpaper (without tricks). Luckily, that's not a huge problem, but it can be annoying. An easy way to get a product key is to grab it off of an older machine. If you don't have an old copy of Windows, you can purchase in the OEM market, from sites such as Kinguin, for $18-30 for Home and $35 for Pro.

There are requirements to install Windows 11 on your computer, such as TPN 2.0, Secure Boot, and 4 GB of RAM. However, you can bypass these requirements by making a small addition to the system registry. To do this, press ctrl-f10 in the setup process and edit the registry by typing regedit. Then, head to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE -> SYSTEM -> Setup. Here you will add a new key called LabConfig. From here, you can add new values to bypass certain checks, such as TPMCheck, SecureBoot, and minimum RAM.

However, what if you don't want to skip connecting a Microsoft Account to your machine and just use a local account? For example, what if you're building it to give away to charity, a friend, or to sell? It's not an obvious process, but it can be done.

When you get to that screen, remove the internet connection to the computer. You can do this by disabling your wifi card, unplugging an ethernet cable, or unplugging your router or modem. You can also go back to the command prompt to release your IP address by typing ipconfig -release.

However you accomplish it, once you've gotten rid of the internet connection, you can then go back and enter local information. You will hit the back arrow and enter a name and password without the need for a Microsoft Account. You can also enter [email protected] as the email address and any password and you can create a local account, though that could change in the future.

All of this currently works for Windows 11 Pro, but that feature is planned to be retired in the next major version.

Scott is a developer who has worked on projects of varying sizes, including all of the PLUGHITZ Corporation properties. He is also known in the gaming world for his time supporting the rhythm game community, through DDRLover and hosting tournaments throughout the Tampa Bay Area. Currently, when he is not working on software projects or hosting F5 Live: Refreshing Technology, Scott can often be found returning to his high school days working with the Foundation for Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST), mentoring teams and helping with ROBOTICON Tampa Bay. He has also helped found a student software learning group, the ASCII Warriors, currently housed at AMRoC Fab Lab.

Avram's been in love with PCs since he played original Castle Wolfenstein on an Apple II+. Before joining Tom's Hardware, for 10 years, he served as Online Editorial Director for sister sites Tom's Guide and Laptop Mag, where he programmed the CMS and many of the benchmarks. When he's not editing, writing or stumbling around trade show halls, you'll find him building Arduino robots with his son and watching every single superhero show on the CW.

Over the past year or so, building a PC has not necessarily been easy. This has been in part because of the higher cost of components, but mostly because of the limited availability of graphics cards. That limitation has been caused by a pair of major factors: manufacturing constraints because of global lockdowns and higher demand thanks to crypto mining. Luckily, in recent weeks, supply chain issues have eased and crypto mining has become less valuable with the crash of the crypto market. Now, with supply returning to normal, it's possible to build a decent gaming PC for under $500 - with and without a GPU.

For both of our builds, with and without a GPU, there are a number of common components, such as RAM, storage, case, and power supply. It's important to note that prices may vary based on the date and time of your reading.

A pair of 4 GB sticks of Crucial RAM is the start - and will only set you back $29. Together these sticks will give you a workable 8 GB of system RAM, though we do recommend spending a few more dollars to double the quantity. 8 GB is enough to work, but 16 GB is the minimum we recommend for a truly usable system.

For system storage, you can make a workable system with a TEAMGROUP 512 GB SSD. In this case, the drive is an M.2, meaning it has the potential to be lightning fast for a price that won't break the bank - $42. As with the RAM, we recommend upgrading the storage by double for less than double the price, though it is not required.

There are a few decent quality cases that are inexpensive, but the CORSAIR Carbide Series 175R happens to be a great case that is running just $44. This is the one component that is likely to be a timing issue for our readers, though, as the case is on sale at time of writing. Fortunately, there are other good cases in the same price range, including a few from Rosewill.

Our power supply (PSU) is the Thermaltake Smart 430W, which runs $29. While this is a great PSU (we use them in Mission Control), there are other options in the event the price on this one changes. Most PSUs in this power range tend to run in the same price range.

The best system we can build with a GPU involves a specific processor, motherboard, and GPU.

The CPU we chose is a modern Intel Core i3 processor - the 12100F. Despite being of the current generation, the price is only $106. Tom's Hardware considers this the powerhouse of cheap gaming processors, so it is a great deal for a great processor. To go along with the processor is a compatible motherboard - the MSI Pro H610M-G DDR4. The board supports 2 sticks of RAM and our chosen processor.

For our GPU, the most expensive component in the build, we've got the XFX Speedster SWFT105 Radeon RX 6400. The card has 4 GB of GDDR6 RAM and plugs into the PCI Express 4.0 port on our motherboard.

Without a GPU, the only additions to the core components are a processor and motherboard.

In order to skip the GPU, we need a processor with a built-in GPU. In this case, we went with the AMD Ryzen 5 5600G, a 6-core processor with Radeon Graphics onboard. With a different processor, we need a different board. Avram looked for a board that supported 5000 series processors out of the box, and we went with the ASRock B450M-HDV R4.0, which says it ships with support. This is important because the more modern processors need a firmware update, which is a major challenge.

Scott is a developer who has worked on projects of varying sizes, including all of the PLUGHITZ Corporation properties. He is also known in the gaming world for his time supporting the rhythm game community, through DDRLover and hosting tournaments throughout the Tampa Bay Area. Currently, when he is not working on software projects or hosting F5 Live: Refreshing Technology, Scott can often be found returning to his high school days working with the Foundation for Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST), mentoring teams and helping with ROBOTICON Tampa Bay. He has also helped found a student software learning group, the ASCII Warriors, currently housed at AMRoC Fab Lab.

Avram's been in love with PCs since he played original Castle Wolfenstein on an Apple II+. Before joining Tom's Hardware, for 10 years, he served as Online Editorial Director for sister sites Tom's Guide and Laptop Mag, where he programmed the CMS and many of the benchmarks. When he's not editing, writing or stumbling around trade show halls, you'll find him building Arduino robots with his son and watching every single superhero show on the CW.