Affordable DCS Gaming Rig (non-VR) - UK

[ILoveRice]

Hey, UK based DCS world player here (non-VR). Last time I played DCS was in version 1.5 on a gaming laptop on low graphics settings. I'm now looking to get back into DCS with a £2,000 budget (UK) - can anyone recommend any ready-to-use desktop PCs and what sort of graphics settings they would offer? It will also be my main PC, used for Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop. 

Alternatively, I was looking at PC specialists for a custom-built PC and this is an idea I came up with looking through this forum, does it look ok? Anything that stands out as being particularly ****? 

• i5-12600
• Asus TUF Z790
• 64gb RAM (Corsair Vengeance DDR5 5600mHz)
• Nvidia RTX 4070 Ti

Many thanks in advance! It's been too long since I last hopped into an aircraft in DCS so looking forward to finally have that chance again. 

[skywalker22]

Buy 13600K CPU instead. And make sure for a good cooling system, I would suggest an AIO water cooler for the CPU. Also go with a higher ram speed if possible (6000-6400MHz).

[Knock-Knock]

I run a i5-12400F, 64Gb DDR4, RTX 3080 on a 4k display, nearly maxed out settings, incl terrain shadows on default, shadows high, view distance ultra and 2xMSAA, and dont have any  performance problems (60+ fps). Multithreading runs great for me .

A good thing with that 12400 is that it barely requires any cooling. Is rare that it goes over 40 watt. Best budget CPU if you ask me. A lot of bang for the buck.

Edited August 2, 2023 by Knock-Knock