Obviously, we’re not going for a next-gen PC, nor one designed to move games to 4K resolution with everything on top. We’ll try to find a cheap gaming pc that can deliver decent performance so we can play in full HD resolution without issue, always spending the less money the better, because in the end that’s the essence from who buys on Aliexpress (save money), right?
A cheap gaming PC on Aliexpress, is it feasible?
Before we get started, we feel compelled to give you some advice: Aliexpress is not like big stores, with huge warehouses and thousands of products in stock. This Chinese store is more like a huge showcase where thousands of sellers sell their products, and in this environment there can even be scams.
Therefore, the recommendation and advice we give you is that you always, always look for sellers who sell many products and with good ratings, because that way we can have some certainty that the sale is legitimate.
That said, let’s get started. A while ago we told you that we renewed a PC by buying parts on Aliexpress, and it is that you can really find unique processors that were once very TOP, and although today they do not not so much, if we tell you that you can buy an entire Intel Xeon E5-2630L V3 for less than 14 Euros, well, that’s worth something, right? This processor has 8 cores and 16 threads at 2.9 GHz with a TDP of 55W.
This is a processor that uses the Intel X99 chipset with LGA2011 socket, so it’s not easy to find a compatible motherboard and heatsink…is it? One of the great things about Aliexpress is that you can find discontinued gear without too much trouble. We’re dealing with Chinese hardware, yes, but we found this $81 X99 LGA2011 motherboard compatible with DDR4 RAM and it sure looks good. Attention, because the plate is sent without the CR2032 battery because its shipment from China is prohibited, it will have to be purchased separately (it costs 1$ in any hardware store).
Regarding the heatsink, since the CPU only has a TDP of 55W, almost everything is worth it, so we chose another Chinese brand which costs around 23 $ but has 1 fan and 6 heat pipes, more than enough to keep this processor in good shape. temperatures. As for the RAM, there are several compatible kits on Aliexpress, and we chose 2 units of these 2666 MHz DDR4 RAMs to add 16 GB of memory (what less in a gaming PC, right?). In total, that would be $43 for the 16 GB of RAM.
You can also buy graphics cards on Aliexpress, so we can choose several models depending on the budget. As the principle is to find something cheap but it’s more than enough to play in 1080p, we chose a GTX 1660 SUPER at 157 dollars.
So far we have a Xeon processor, 16 GB of RAM, a heatsink, a relatively modern motherboard with good connectivity and a graphics card, and the shopping cart is around 318$. But what about other hardware components?
Hardware that we do NOT recommend buying on Aliexpress
In fact, being able to build a complete gaming PC on Aliexpress, what happens is that there are certain components that we don’t recommend buying there, such as the box; The reason is that the cheap boxes we found seem to be of very poor quality and without fans, and the decent ones are even more expensive than in Europe (also keep in mind that in transport from China , the box will be hit almost certainly and who knows how it hits you). For this reason it is a component that we would prefer to buy here, since you have many boxes for 50 dollars that are more than decent and valid for our purpose.
Two other components that we do not recommend buying from Aliexpress are the SSD and the power supply. The SSD because, although there are very cheap Chinese SSDs, it’s not worth taking the risk and you have a Crucial 500 GB SSD in Europe for $ 57 with full guarantees, to give an example .
As for the source, we consider it to be too delicate a component to buy it from a “Chinese brand”, and those of a good brand cost the same price on Aliexpress as on Amazon Europe. Buy the one you want, 500W or more, taking into account the chosen graphics… we would take this NOX model, which, although it is not a marvel, is quite cheap and has a good guarantee.
In total, you will have assembled a cheap gaming PC with parts from Aliexpress for around 470$ (keep in mind that prices fluctuate), which isn’t bad at all, right?
