Hi all,

My friend is into music production with Ableton as a hobby and does the recording and production of tracks for a couple of bands he plays in.

He has an old PC that he's looking to upgrade with a limited budget. I've offered to spec and put one together for him and it gives me an opportunity to slip a bit more into the budget as a gift. All in, current ideal budget is £500 (UK based)

[PCPartPicker Part List](https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/sMtwyW)

Type|Item|Price

:----|:----|:----

**CPU** | [AMD Ryzen 5 5600X 3.7 GHz 6-Core Processor](https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/product/g94BD3/amd-ryzen-5-5600x-37-ghz-6-core-processor-100-100000065box) | £104.98 @ CCL Computers

**CPU Cooler** | [Thermalright Peerless Assassin 120 SE 66.17 CFM CPU Cooler](https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/product/hYxRsY/thermalright-peerless-assassin-120-se-6617-cfm-cpu-cooler-pa120-se-d3) | £31.90

**Motherboard** | [MSI B550-A PRO ATX AM4 Motherboard](https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/product/7gxbt6/msi-b550-a-pro-atx-am4-motherboard-b550-a-pro) | £107.99 @ Amazon UK

**Memory** | [Corsair Vengeance LPX 32 GB (2 x 16 GB) DDR4-3200 CL16 Memory](https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/product/W6ndnQ/corsair-vengeance-lpx-32-gb-2-x-16-gb-ddr4-3200-memory-cmk32gx4m2e3200c16) | £55.49 @ CCL Computers

**Storage** | [Crucial P3 Plus 500 GB M.2-2280 PCIe 4.0 X4 NVME Solid State Drive](https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/product/vPpzK8/crucial-p3-plus-500-gb-m2-2280-nvme-solid-state-drive-ct500p3pssd8) | £33.95 @ Amazon UK

**Video Card** | [EVGA 02G-P4-2678-KR GeForce GTX 670 2 GB Video Card](https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/product/gdkD4D/evga-video-card-02gp42678kr) |-

**Case** | [Fractal Design Focus 2 ATX Mid Tower Case](https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/product/gWFbt6/fractal-design-focus-2-atx-mid-tower-case-fd-c-foc2a-07) | £64.98 @ Amazon UK

**Power Supply** | [Corsair RM750x (2021) 750 W 80+ Gold Certified Fully Modular ATX Power Supply](https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/product/6NcG3C/corsair-rm750x-2021-750-w-80-gold-certified-fully-modular-atx-power-supply-cp-9020199-na) | £79.98 @ Amazon UK

| *Prices include shipping, taxes, rebates, and discounts* |

| **Total** | **£479.27**

| Generated by [PCPartPicker](https://pcpartpicker.com) 2025-02-14 17:33 GMT+0000 |

Some points:

• Current intent is to reuse his, albeit ancient, GTX 670 to keep costs down as he's had no issues running Ableton or any other general tasks with it. I did look at sourcing a 1060 6gb on eBay as a backup plan
• He has an older Corsair TX650w PSU (model with the yellow stickers) that's approx. 5 years old from his knowledge but looking in general online it doesn't look as though that one is a particular good PSU so I'm considering the RMx while there is a reasonable deal on the 750w. It's overkill capacity but going off what I understand from the PSU tier list, a decent-tiered PSU of a lower capacity won't be much less than this.
• Case is open to recommendations. Closed is preferable and aesthetics not important as will be under his desk. The Zalman T6 is the cheapest on PCPartPicker at present, but I don't know the brand so I'm going to be looking into that to save on case costs next.

Can I please ask if anybody has any feedback on the build, whether there is notable scope to save or improve at all? I have an identical build with a 5800x that may be better for Ableton due to the additional cores that is slightly over the budget and don't mind stretching to it. I did also look at a 7600 build but it was over £600 which is too much, unfortunately.

This community was invaluable when I built my first system and I'm a little rusty now so wanted to consult before finalising anything. Thank you!