Graphics card prices may have fallen after the halt of the crypto mining hype train, but it is still expensive to build a gaming PC in South Africa.<\/p>\n
New hardware is not cheap, and the price of a mid-range gaming machine is generally above that of a console like the PlayStation 4 Pro or Xbox One X.<\/p>\n
One way to save some money and still build a decent gaming PC, however, is to use second-hand parts to replace your old components.<\/p>\n
Popular classifieds websites such as Gumtree<\/strong><\/a> and Carbonite<\/strong><\/a> are packed with advertisements for PC gaming components – from graphics cards to overclocking hardware.<\/p>\n To see how much a build costs, we outlined an average gaming PC built exclusively with second-hand components.<\/p>\n Using information from Gumtree and Carbonite, we sourced average pricing for decent components listed for sale.<\/p>\n When choosing components, we selected parts which mirrored the performance of the average gaming PC<\/strong><\/a> on Steam for April 2018.<\/p>\n This gives us a good idea of how much you can save when building a second-hand PC compared to a new one.<\/p>\n The list of components and their pricing, sourced from local classifieds websites, is below.<\/p>\n Our research showed that the price of the average gaming PC on Steam should be roughly around R7,050 if you buy used components.<\/p>\n This is much cheaper than the R9,333 an equivalent new build costs.<\/p>\n However, it is really not worth buying all the components second-hand.<\/p>\n Parts like the chassis and motherboard cost roughly the same new or used, and in this case users should buy new components.<\/p>\n Alway check the new component price before buying a second-hand part, as you may not enjoy big savings across the board.<\/p>\n The price of building a second-hand desktop is substantially cheaper than buying new components, but it can be riskier.<\/p>\n Many PC components currently for sale on classifieds websites were previously used to power cryptocurrency mining rigs.<\/p>\n Now that mining is not as profitable, many miners are trying to offload multiple graphics cards, power supplies, and high-capacity motherboards.<\/p>\n Buyers should be extremely careful when considering these offers, as cryptocurrency mining can dramatically shorten the lifespan of a graphics card.<\/p>\n Other components such as motherboards and power supplies can also be adversely affected by the constant high-power operations of a crypto mining rig.<\/p>\n When buying second-hand components, always make sure you know what you are purchasing and physically test the component before completing the purchase.<\/p>\n Whether you are buying a motherboard, graphics card, or CPU, you should inspect it for physical damage, place it in a test system to check if it boots up, and run a few stress tests on it just to be sure.<\/p>\n Additionally, graphics cards which have been used for mining cryptocurrency may not be covered under most warranties, and you should factor this into your purchase offer.<\/p>\n Graphics card prices may have fallen, but it is still expensive to build a gaming PC in South Africa.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":341028,"featured_media":260789,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_threads_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[50889,43544,4854,4694,35,41714,50095],"class_list":["post-260573","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-hardware","tag-carbonite","tag-components","tag-gaming-pc","tag-gumtree","tag-headline","tag-mining","tag-second-hand"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260573"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/341028"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=260573"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260573\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":260787,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260573\/revisions\/260787"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/260789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=260573"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=260573"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=260573"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}PC build<\/h3>\n
\n\n
\n \nComponent<\/th>\n Price<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<\/thead>\n \n Intel Core i3-6100<\/td>\n R950<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n LGA 1151 Motherboard<\/td>\n R950<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 8GB DDR4 RAM<\/td>\n R800<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 3GB<\/td>\n R3,100<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 1TB Hard Drive<\/td>\n R500<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n 450W Power Supply<\/td>\n R400<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Gaming Chassis<\/td>\n R350<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n \n Total Price<\/strong><\/td>\n R7,050<\/strong><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table><\/div>\n<\/div>\n Dangers<\/h3>\n
Now read:\u00a0The coolest PC case I have seen in South Africa<\/a><\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"