If you've been building PCs for years, picking the right components for a budget and knowing what specifications to look for can be second nature. For new PC builders, however, things might not be so obvious the first time around. Choosing the core components for a gaming PC might seem simple, especially with the help of sites like PCPartPicker, but you need to think about much more than compatibility and value for money.

Some purchase decisions can cost you a lot, considering you won't always identify the problem in time to return something. More than the financial impact of buying the wrong component for your build, the headaches and regret you'll deal with can ruin the whole experience. I'll exclude PC cases from this discussion — unless you're picking the cheapest one possible or one that's too small for your components, you'll probably be fine.

7 Ignoring the SSD specs

Go deeper than Gen4 vs. Gen5

You might already have a great Gen4 or even Gen5 NVMe SSD in mind for your gaming PC, but dig deeper and compare the most important SSD specs when picking the best SSD for your gaming PC. Similar to many Gen3 SSDs that weren't always rated for the maximum read/write speeds of the interface, not all Gen4 and Gen5 SSDs are made the same. Your shortlisted Gen4 drive might only reach up to 5,000 MB/s against a similarly priced drive rated at over 7,000 MB/s.

Such discrepancies are also seen on Gen5 drives, but they don't matter as much due to the already high transfer speeds of all Gen5 SSDs. Another feature to look for is a DRAM cache, which might not show any significant results in gaming workloads, but is good to have for large file transfers, especially if an SSD with DRAM doesn't cost you any more than a DRAM-less drive.

Lastly, you should also try to find the random IOPS (Input/Output Operations Per Second) of the SSD you're about to buy. Instead of the sequential read/write speeds you see advertised on the SSD product page, random IOPS are more indicative of how well the drive will perform in gaming and other day-to-day operations such as opening multiple applications simultaneously. Generally, more expensive drives tend to feature higher IOPS.

6 Buying an insufficient or incapable PSU

Don't put your entire PC at risk

It's no news that the power supply is a critical component of any gaming PC. Unlike an office or home PC that rarely sees any significant load, a gaming PC features components that can really stress the PSU. This makes it essential that your PSU is up to the task, both in terms of wattage capacity and build quality. Calculating your PC's power requirement is fairly simple, thanks to online PSU wattage calculators, but you also need to choose a reliable unit to protect all your precious components.

A power supply is only as good as its internals and the manufacturer's quality control. To help users pick the right PSU, rating systems such as 80 Plus, Cybenetics, and PPLP assign various tier ratings to most models based on their efficiency and power delivery. Manufacturers who get their PSUs rated by participating in these programs provide users with the peace of mind that their PC will not be at risk of random shutdowns, or worse, catching fire.

You can limit your search to reputed manufacturers, 80 Plus Gold PSUs (if you have the budget), and models that are featured on reliable PSU tier lists. Newer PSUs with ATX 3.0 certification or the latest connectors will not always be included in the PSU tier lists, but you can still make a reasonable decision regarding their reliability based on their efficiency rating, brand reputation, and customer reviews.

5 Skimping on RAM

It's not worth the trouble to cut corners here

For years, 16GB of RAM was all you needed on your gaming PC, with a small percentage of people opting for 32GB. However, 32GB is now the sweet spot for gaming, thanks to the latest games eating up RAM like never before. Plus, multitasking and occasional productivity workloads are also helped by having a generous amount of RAM. Buying a single 16GB stick of RAM can introduce several unnecessary problems on your gaming PC.

First, you'll lose out on the benefits of dual-channel RAM, even with DDR5 memory. Many games will see a 10-15% increase in FPS by using two DIMMS instead of one. Plus, it isn't going to cost you much more to buy a memory kit instead of a single DIMM anyway. So, why save a few bucks and lose out on 10-15% of gaming performance?

Buying a single stick of RAM and adding one a year or two later might also not be a good idea, since you might struggle to get the exact same stick. Also, the price of buying two individual sticks separately might come out to be more than buying a kit of two DIMMs in the first place.

4 Picking the wrong CPU cooler

It's more important than you think

Most gaming PCs might not need an overkill CPU cooler, but you still need to take various factors into consideration before choosing one — and performance is just one of them. For starters, the CPU cooler is a huge determinant of how your PC looks. An AIO liquid cooler might provide the minimalist aesthetic that many users prefer, while a bigger air cooler will go better with other builds.

Next, you also need to ensure the noise and temps of your shortlisted cooler will be acceptable to your standards. Check reviews of the air or liquid cooler you wish to purchase to find this information. Lastly, your case might not be big enough for a beefy air cooler, leaving you with an AIO liquid cooler as the only option.

Another scenario where liquid cooling might be the only solution is when you're overclocking a mid-range or high-end CPU. Air coolers can keep up with modern CPUs in most workloads, but CPU overclocking might be too much for even the best air coolers. Considering some high-end CPUs are prone to thermal throttling even at stock settings, it might be worth the few extra bucks to go with a powerful 360mm AIO cooler, especially if you may upgrade your CPU down the line.

3 Buying the cheapest motherboard possible

Avoid boards with questionable build quality

Buying expensive motherboards for your gaming PC is mostly a bad idea, since you end up blowing your budget without any performance improvement. However, you should also not jump to the other extreme of picking the absolute cheapest motherboard you can find. There are a few must-haves when it comes to a gaming motherboard — all necessary ports and expansion slots for your components, compatibility with your specific memory kit, and decent build quality.

That last feature is something that is often missing on cheap motherboards, manifesting in incapable VRMs, overheating, or even a flimsy PCB. If you're hoping to run the latest games or indulge in even minor overclocking, the cheapest motherboards should be out of your consideration. Fortunately, you don't need to spend hundreds on something decent either — a $150-$200 motherboard will be good enough for most gaming PCs (unless you specifically want the features on something that's more expensive).

2 Overspending on the CPU

Gaming only needs so much CPU horsepower

It's easy to pick a budget CPU when building a budget PC — someone with a $1000 budget isn't going to consider a $300 CPU. However, when you have a more generous budget, you can often fall into the trap of buying more CPU than you really need for gaming. Suppose you've chosen a high-end graphics card like the RTX 4070 Ti Super, and you're now selecting the right CPU to pair it with. You might be tempted to buy an 8-core CPU simply because you've bought other high-end components.

Even in late 2024, modern games are heavily dependent on fast cores instead of more of them. Single-core performance almost always benefits your FPS more than having additional cores. Once you have a 6-core CPU, every additional core doesn't justify the premium you pay for it. Except for a select genre of games and a few modern titles, 8-core CPUs don't improve gaming performance all that much.

Hence, for most users, it's always better to spend only as much as needed on the CPU — currently, this happens to be a capable 6-core CPU such as the Ryzen 5 7600 or the Core i5-14600K. These CPUs won't hold your GPU back, not even an RTX 4090, so don't worry about sub-60 FPS performance or bottlenecking in your favorite titles. An 8-core chip has its benefits, even in games, but for the next few years, you don't necessarily need one to enjoy your games to the fullest.

1 Compromising on the GPU

The GPU should be the MVP of your build

Perhaps the biggest blunder you can make when building a gaming PC is buying an underpowered graphics card. I've been guilty of the same — I built a PC in 2017 with the Ryzen 5 1600 and the GTX 1050 Ti. Pairing a budget graphics card with one of the best gaming CPUs of the era was a blunder, but I didn't realize it at the time. Even the $200 price tag of the GPU against the $250+ I spent on the CPU didn't ring any alarm bells for me.

The graphics card should be the most expensive component of your gaming PC. It's responsible for driving the bulk of the gaming performance, supported by the CPU, memory, and storage. For budget builds, this is all the more important, since saving every dollar counts. You could even climb up a GPU tier by making smart buying decisions for all other components.

If you end up buying a graphics card that's inadequate for the level of performance you need, you'll probably be stuck with it for a while. Hence, always configure your build around the graphics card once you've figured out which model you need.

Buy right, buy once

It's far better to spend a lot of time in the pre-purchase stage instead of building a gaming PC and regretting it later. By carefully assessing your desired performance, comparing component specs, and spending only as much as you need on every component, you can successfully craft the perfect gaming PC on the first attempt.