Custom build desktop specs for UE 5.3

Greetings!

I’m planning to build a custom mid-range desktop pc (around $1500) and would greatly appreciate it if some veterans could check my build specs for UE 5.3 and let me know if it’s adequate and if there are any potentional issues.

CPU: AMD Ryzen 7 5700X3D 3 GHz 8-Core Processor

CPU Cooler: Cooler Master Hyper 212 Black Edition 42 CFM CPU Cooler

Motherboard: MSI B550M PRO-VDH WIFI Micro ATX AM4 Motherboard

Memory: Patriot Viper 4 Blackout 64 GB (2 x 32 GB) DDR4-3600 CL18 Memory

Storage: (2) Western Digital Black SN770 2 TB M.2-2280 PCIe 4.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive
(Two NVME Solid State Drives - one for the OS and one for storage)

Video Card: MSI VENTUS XS OC GeForce GTX 1660 Ti 6 GB Video Card

Case: Asus Prime AP201 MicroATX Mini Tower Case

Power Supply: be quiet! Pure Power 12 M 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply

Monitor: (2) Asus VG248QG 24.0" 1920 x 1080 165 Hz Monitor
(Two monitors - side by side)

Operating System: Microsoft Windows 10 Pro 64-bit

Much thanks in advance!

P.S. I’ve already taken a look at the Hardware / Software Specs page

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Greeting! Some notes, see if they make sense:

5700X3D

The 3Ds often show no benefits in a development environment. On the contrary, outside gaming, they generally perform worse than the non-3D variants; by a somewhat negligible factor, though - only worth considering if you must squeeze every penny and every ounce of performance.

MSI VENTUS XS OC GeForce GTX 1660 Ti 6 GB Video Card

Do consider something a bit newer, this GPU stands out. Look for one with no overclock (you want stability), aim for minimum 8GB vRAM. Perhaps you can get your hands on a used 3060 12GB vRAM?

Western Digital Black SN770

A big red flag atm but you’re getting Win 10, so no flag. :person_shrugging:

be quiet! Pure Power 12 M 750 W

This system does not need 750W PS, 550W would be plenty sufficient. Perhaps that’s where the GPU budget can be found?

165 Hz Monitor

If this is for development, then it’s utterly unnecessary. How about 2x IPS screens that can actually reproduce colour accurately?


around $1500

Excluding $300 for the screens (eyeballing), how did you arrive at $1200 with this setup?

Greeting! Some notes, see if they make sense:

Much appreciated for your speedy reply!

5700X3D

The 3Ds often show no benefits in a development environment. On the contrary, outside gaming, they generally perform worse than the non-3D variants; by a somewhat negligible factor, though - only worth considering if you must squeeze every penny and every ounce of performance.

Thank you for enlightening me on this. I was reading somewhere that the L3 memory cache (about 96MB) on the 5700X3D would be more utilized than the 5800X (which I was comparing it with) for game development so I thought it might be better.

MSI VENTUS XS OC GeForce GTX 1660 Ti 6 GB Video Card

Do consider something a bit newer, this GPU stands out. Look for one with no overclock (you want stability), aim for minimum 8GB vRAM. Perhaps you can get your hands on a used 3060 12GB vRAM?

I thought maybe 6GB could scrape by but you are right and it is an older graphics card so I'll heed your advice and go for the minimum 8GB. Or if I can find a decent used 12GB, I'll certainly try for that.
Just to note, I am still a very green newbie to the world of game development so I was thinking of just starting off with creating simple 3D games that are not so graphic intensive and I am not thinking about MMORPGs or anything huge at the moment so I thought the lower specs might be ok. First, I just want to learn the Unreal Engine and create graphically uncomplicated games that do not require so much CPU/GPU power. But I would like a machine that can at least run the Unreal Engine 5.3. I did consider maybe learning Unreal 4.0 on a slower machine but I thought it would be better to just go with the latest 5.3 version and know all the features rather than having to learn 4.0 and then 5.3.

Western Digital Black SN770

A big red flag atm but you’re getting Win 10, so no flag. :person_shrugging:

Prior to Windows 10, I've been on Windows 7 Pro for a long time because it seemed the most stable. I'm not a big fan of Windows 10 either but Windows 11 just crashes too much so I think maybe I should stick to Windows 10 Pro until something more stable comes along. If I was better at Linux, I'd want to install Linux instead of Windows but I'm not versed enough to do all the builds and troubleshooting on my own to do work arounds.

be quiet! Pure Power 12 M 750 W

This system does not need 750W PS, 550W would be plenty sufficient. Perhaps that’s where the GPU budget can be found?

I thought it might be good to have extra power if I wanted to add another graphics card later so I opted for a bit more juice.
By the way, is it worth it to add another graphics card (probably the same series) to this later or is it better to just get ONE good graphics card?
165 Hz Monitor

If this is for development, then it’s utterly unnecessary. How about 2x IPS screens that can actually reproduce colour accurately?

I didn't think about that. I thought maybe getting a color correction tool on the monitor like the Spyder gadget would work but maybe I'll look into getting the 2x IPS screens as you suggested.

around $1500

Excluding $300 for the screens (eyeballing), how did you arrive at $1200 with this setup?

It's been a long time since I've built PCs so I used pcpartpicker.com to help me get started. My original build went well over $2,000 and did have the specs you suggested earlier (Gigabyte GAMING OC Radeon RX 7700 XT 12 GB Video Card, AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D 4.2 GHz 8-Core Processor, Gigabyte B650 AORUS ELITE AX ATX AM5 Motherboard, etc) but I do not want to spend so much initially until I learn the world of game development by first creating simpler and less graphic intensive games.

You can run UE5 on this, no problem, ignore UE4 if you can. The issues will only manifest when you scale things UP. Lumen will be sluggish on that GPU. And 6GB, while fine for now, is not future proof at all. 1660ti is what now, 5 years old? And it was mid-tier back then…

You could also have a look here:

in order to get a rough idea about balanced builds. At $1200, I feel you should be be looking at a better GPU tbh. These are gaming-oriented, though, so double the RAM and throw that HDD into the bin. :person_shrugging:

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Thank you. I will do what you suggested and go for a better graphics card (12GB), get a less powerful power supply and opt for an IPS monitor. I will keep the 64GB memory and get a 1GB NVMe SSD for the OS (instead of 2GB) and maybe a regular 2GB SSD for the storage. 

Much appreciated for your wisdom and suggestions!
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