Building on a budget
A step-by-step guide to putting the perfect $900 budget PC together
01 CASE UNBOXING
So here we have it, our Phanteks Eclipse P300. What Phanteks has achieved here is impressive. We loved it back in 2018, and it’s still one of the better budget cases out there. For the low price you still get support for up to a 280mm AIO cooler in the front, a tempered-glass panel, full-size PSU cover, ample cable management, a fleck of RGB, and fairly good airflow too. It’s not perfect, but at this price, it kind of is.
Where does it fall down? Well some of the materials used on the inside are prone to fingerprints, it can be a bit tight to work in, and of course it only comes with a single 120mm fan as standard – but then again, it’s $99.
02 CHASSIS STRIPDOWN
This is a piece of advice we continually tout when it comes to building PCs, and with good reason, as it makes things so much easier. Strip down your case – the first thing you should always do is remove as much of the chassis as possible so you end up with a hollow skeleton. Not only does it mean you won’t damage the panels, but it’s also far easier to get your hands into all those tight nooks and crannies.
It’s also a good opportunity to shave weight and improve airflow by removing things such as the hard drive cages and caddies, and unnecessary disk bays and things like that. Just remember where you put them if you do decide you need a 3.5-inch drive later down the line.
03 MOTHERBOARD INSTALL
We typically don’t recommend you do this for most builds, as it’s far easier to install your main components (CPU, RAM, SSDs) outside of the case first. However, in this build we’re making an exception, as the system itself is fairly simple to put together and there’s no additional AIO backplate or frustrating heatsinks to deal with for the M.2 drive.
One big difference between this system and the builds we usually produce is that this has a separate I/O shield. Always remember to install this first. Then it’s a case of placing the motherboard in, making sure you don’t trap that stock fan cable, and securing it down with the included motherboard screws that you’ll find in the case accessory box.
04 FAN RELOCATION
This may seem like a trivial thing, but we’ve opted to move the fan to the front of the chassis instead of its default location in the rear. We’re big supporters of positive pressure systems, and although there’s only one included fan, having it act as an intake to draw cool air across the CPU heatsink is going to do this build a world of good.
That said, it’s our biggest caveat for this case – not enough fans. If you’ve got a spare 120mm fan kicking around, throwing it in the front as well will help a lot. Positive pressure in a case ensures that cool air is drawn in through dust filters, and then hot air is pushed out through unfiltered areas. That helps reduce dust build-up inside your system.
05 AM4 INSTALLATION
Now we can take the opportunity to install our AMD Ryzen 5 3400G processor. To do this, simply lift up the retention arm on the AM4 socket, take your processor, identify the gold triangle located on the bottom-left side of the processor, line it up with the triangle on the socket, and carefully lower it down, lining the pins up with the holes in the socket itself. Once placed in, give it a tiny wiggle with your thumb to make sure it’s secure, then lower the retention arm back down and into position to lock it in place.
06 FRONT PANEL CONNECTORS
It’s time to get the front panel headers in. The Eclipse P300 doesn’t have the best front panel I/O, but for cabling all you’ve got to worry about is an HD audio passthrough, a USB 3.0 cable, a power button cable, and an HDD LED cable.
Installing those last two can be a bit tricky. The HDD LED cable needs to be plugged in a certain way so that the positive and negative terminals are in the correct position. However, for the power it doesn’t matter, as its job is to bridge the two pins. Our Asrock B450M-HDV has the pins labelled on the board itself, but if yours doesn’t, check your motherboard’s manual. For the HD audio passthrough, that’s always located on the bottom left-hand side of the motherboard, and for the USB 3.0 port, you’ll find it has a notch in the cable, so you can install it correctly. We’re also plugging in our front 120mm fan on the bottom of the board into a chassis fan header. Again there’s a notch in the cable.
07 INSTALLING INTEL’S M.2 PCIE SSD
Installing an M.2 SSD is one of the easier things you can do with a system build. Simply use a small screwdriver to remove the screw at the end of the M.2 socket itself. Slot the M.2 drive into place (making note of the location of the notch on the drive), carefully push the drive down on top of the pin at the other end, and resecure it with the screw you removed earlier. And you’re done – no finicky SATA power cables, cable routing, or drive mounting. Nothing.
08 HEATSINK IN PLACE
With the M.2 in, it’s time to install the included cooler. AMD’s Wraith coolers are seriously impressive units and come with a fairly foolproof mounting system. Remove the plastic cover that protects the base of the cooler – this is protecting the pre-applied thermal paste already on the base of the heatsink. Then, remove the two brackets situated above and below the socket, hold onto the back plate, behind the motherboard, carefully place your heatsink on top and secure it in a diamond or diagonal pattern. Carefully secure one corner down at a time with a screwdriver, making sure you don’t go past the thread itself.
Now tidy up that PWM fan cable. Tie it into a little loop, then plug it into the CPU fan header at the top of the motherboard.
09 DDR4 ON BOARD
Our memory of choice here is this 16GB dual-channel Corsair Vengeance DDR4. The Vengeance line is a bit more budget-oriented, but this kit still packs in some impressive timings and an impeccable frequency. Ryzen’s Infinity Fabric interconnect runs at the same frequency that your memory operates at. It’s to do with the memory controller. Because the fabric interconnects with the core complexes, having it operate at a higher frequency means cores across those complexes can transfer data and process requests faster.
With 1st and 2nd-gen Ryzen, you’ll see benefits up to 3200MHz. With 3rd-gen Ryzen, that goes up to 3,733MHz, after which point the memory controller and the Infinity Fabric disconnect, and you’ll no longer see performance gains.
10 PSU ORIENTATION
When it comes to installing the power supply there’s not a whole lot to it. Simply slot it in the back of the case, line it up, and secure it down with the four screws included in your case’s accessory box. One thing worth noting is that you will have to make sure the fan is facing down toward the bottom grill/filtered area, as the PSU cover itself doesn’t have any ventilation cutouts facing towards the motherboard.
That’s great for power-supply longevity, as you’re not dumping excess hot air into your componentry there, but the downside is that when you have so few fans in a case like this, it would be good to use it as an additional exhaust.
11 24-PIN CABLING
We’re getting to the final stages of the build now, and things are starting to finally wrap up. All we have left to do is install the power supply cables. That’s the 24-pin motherboard ATX power, and (in this scenario) a single four-pin EPS power for the CPU. Our B450 motherboard doesn’t require too much juice to run. Fortunately the Phanteks Eclipse P300 comes with ample cable management, so it’s not too difficult to run them up and around.
12 REAR CABLE MANAGEMENT
And here’s a shot of the rear. You can see we’ve tucked the majority of our excess cables out of sight down below where the hard drive caddy is, and then just routed the main power cables in a direct line to where they need to be. There’s nothing fancy going on here, and we’ve still got space to add some 2.5-inch or 3.5-inch drives if we want to, after the fact.
13 BUILD COMPLETE
And there you have it, one complete system ready to go. For just under $900 you get access to a 1TB PCIe 3.0 SSD, 16GB of DDR4 3200 MHz dual-channel memory, and a hefty four-core, eight-thread processor. There’s a fleck of RGB thrown in too (controlled via a button on the top of the I/O).
This is a really nice build for those not looking at that gaming angle. For office work and day-to-day use, it’s going to be quick and to the point. The only major difference is the lack of a dedicated GPU. The Eclipse P300 is a fantastic case, and the fact that you can pick one of these up for just shy of $100 at the time of writing is nothing short of incredible. It’s clean, has plenty of modern build features included, and it’s just a pleasure to build in.
14 BOOTABLE WINDOWS
Now it’s time to get Windows installed. To do this, head to Google and search for “Windows Media Tool” on a separate system or laptop. Click the top result: “Download Windows 10 Disc Image (ISOFile) – Microsoft”, which will take you to the official Microsoft website. You’ll see a sub-heading called “Create Windows 10 installation media.” Click “Download tool now.”
Once that’s downloaded, run the program, and it’ll identify which version of Windows you’re using. Plug in an 8GB USB stick (preferably USB 3.0), accept the terms and conditions, then select “Create installation media (USB flash drive…)” and hit “Next.” In the next screen select your options. Making sure that your architecture is 64-bit, hit “Next” again, then choose USB flash drive, then hit next again, select the drive you’ve plugged in, and Windows will begin creating your bootable Windows install USB drive.
15 DRIVERS & BIOS
Next, pick up some key files for your system. On your other device, head to your motherboard’s product page. Click “Support,” and find your drivers. It’s always better to get the brand-new ones from the website, and not rely on those found on the discs enclosed with the motherboard. Also, although some motherboards’ Ethernet ports work without a driver download, some don’t, so it’s handy to have these.
Create a new folder on your USB stick and label it “BIOS,” and another one called “Drivers.” Make sure you download the AMD all-in-one driver/AM4 Chipset, your network driver, your audio driver, and then place them in “Drivers.” As an aside, if your build has a dedicated GPU, you can also pick up your GPU drivers. After that, get the latest version of your BIOS – there should be a “BIOS” tab on the support page. Grab the file, then move it to your “BIOS” folder on the USB stick, and extract it on the drive before you go to your build.
16 UPDATING BIOS
This part can be scary. If you do mess it up, it’s very hard to come back from without warrantying the board, and not all manufacturers accept liability for that (something Asrock states on its website). But as long as you don’t suffer a major power outage or turn off the system, it’s completely safe.
Plug the USB stick with the BIOS and Windows Installer into the back of your new system, and power it up. Mash the Delete key on startup to get into the BIOS. This part will vary depending on motherboard manufacturer, but you’re looking for the same area and the same feature. In Asrock’s case, select “Instant Flash” under the “Tool” section at the top of the BIOS page. Scan for your devices, find your USB stick, then the “BIOS” folder, and select the BIOS file you downloaded earlier. Hit “Update” and let the motherboard do its thing. It’ll restart once or twice. Eventually you’ll end up back in the BIOS screen with a freshly updated BIOS.
17 INSTALLING WINDOWS
Next, head to the “Boot” section of your BIOS, and reorder or boot from your USB stick – it should be labelled as “Windows 10 UEFI USB,” or something similar. Move it to first in the queue, and hit F10 to save and exit. Your system will restart and then begin to run you through the installation process. Here select what language and keyboard layout you want to use, then after install it’ll run you through which features you want to enable (we usually disable all ad tracking, Cortana, and full diagnostic options on every install).
If you’ve got an Ethernet cable plugged in and your port is working, it will also ask you to login to your Microsoft account or create one before letting you proceed. If you don’t want to do that, just remove the Ethernet cable prior to the installation of Windows 10, and it’ll let you create a local account and password. You can activate it or login later on the desktop if you want to.
18 THE POWER OF NINITE!
Using Ninite has become almost a ritual of ours whenever configuring and setting up a new system. Once you’re on the desktop and your drivers are installed, use an internet browser to reach https://ninite.com. From there you can download the latest versions of a bevy of programs, including web browsers, security essentials, messaging applications, media centers, imaging tools – you name it.
Select what programs you want to download and install, and then hit the “Get Your Ninite” button at the bottom of the page. Run the installer, and Ninite will download and install all of the programs you requested, but without having to search the internet for them or being attacked by unwanted adware in the process.