This guide is intended for anyone world wide who's trying to build on a budget for 2025/2026. It's intended to land you with hardware on a budget to hold you over for the next 2-3 years until the market hopefully normalizes after the bubble popped.
If you're, already on AM4 or 12th gen Intel with 16-32GB of DDR4 (of reasonable speed - 3200MT/s), this guide isn't for you. If GPUs don't matter to you, because you only play lightweight e-sports titles and you need top tier CPU performance, this guide isn't for you. If a friend is willing to sell you a system like the above or you can find one for a reasonable price, you should absolutely not go down this route either.
However, if you're in a region where DDR4 pricing swiftly followed DDR5 pricing, SSDs have ballooned in pricing and you're trying to save some money to afford a better GPU, this guide IS for you.
The entire guide rides on the value of DDR4 2133 Registered ECC (RDRIMM) and DDR3 Registered ECC (RDIMM) on your used market, as well as (ideally) old Haswell and Broadwell server chips. These platforms still provide modern enough instruction sets (unlike older X79) for all games and come with enough cache/cores to perform pretty well in modern titles. If you're just looking for the performance you can expect, take a look at the benchmarks for some E5 v4 CPUs as well as how the E5 2697 v3 performs against a Ryzen 5 5600 - even in 40 games.
If those aren't available to you anywhere and you're at the mercy of RAM pricing on Amazon or AliExpress, you're probably out of luck.
However, in my experience, at least older DDR3 server memory in most regions is still dirt cheap and despite the slower performance of the overall setup, can make for an extreme budget setup without cutting corners severely.
If you're looking to build a Steam Machine type Linux PC, this section doesn't concern you - you can save some money here.
To the best of my knowledge, most DDR3 motherboards are not being made with TPM 2.0 headers. You may be able to find a board at a reasonable price, but if you are going down the DDR3 route, consider sticking to Windows 10 IoT Enterprise LTSC or a Linux installation like Bazzite or CachyOS (if using AMD GPU).
For DDR4, I highly recommend just getting one of the two motherboards I recommended. The Machinist boards are compatible with $5-10 MSI TPM 2.0 modules which you can buy on AliExpress, eBay or your local marketplace. They don't have to be made by MSI, having the correct pinout is enough. I have personally had success with this one.
Look at the price of 8GB DDR4 2133 ECC Reg DIMMs on your local marketplaces and eBay. You will need 4x8GB modules for quad channel memory, so you'll have to do the math. I would personally not be willing to pay much more than $15 per 8GB module.
Depending on the price on your local market, you most likely should buy the E5 2697 v3. However, that CPU will require modding your BIOS using S3 Turbo Tool. This is very simple, but if you don't trust yourself to do that at all, please take a look at the v4 CPUS. They perform like seen in benchmarks out of the box but may less powerful and more expensive overall. As always, it's up to you to analyze the marketplaces available to you.
For the motherboard, there are basically only 2 options worth putting your money into - make sure to get the new models with TPM 2.0 headers:
- Machinist MR9A Pro (ATX)
- Machnist X99-XD4 (mATX)
- QIYIDA X99 H9S (mATX - use as fallback if others not available)
Lower end non-TPM motherboards are an option if Windows 11 doesn't matter to you or you're buying a lower powered v4 CPU anyway. In that case, please consult the Miyconst YouTube channel for reviews on cheaper boards with weaker VRMs.
This route will require a BIOS mod using S3 Turbo Tool for v3 CPUs (v4 do not support DDR3). If you aren't comfortable with that, go back to the DDR4 section.
Look at the price of 8GB DDR3 1600 ECC Reg DIMMs on your local marketplaces and eBay - faster is better, if you can find it cheap. You will need 4x8GB modules for quad channel memory, so you'll have to do the math. I would personally not be willing to pay much more than $2-5 per 8GB module. This, as well as an mATX board without TPM is where most of your savings could come from.
Not every CPU works, you can find a full list of compatible chips in this old Reddit post.
For the CPU, you're limited to the following chips (worth buying) from worst to best performance:
- E5 2673 V3
- E5 2666 v3
- E5-2678 v3
- E5-2686 v3
- E5 2696 v3
Look at your market and buy the best chip under $30. It's not worth investing more than that, unless you need the additional cores for work.
For the motherboard, there are 2 ways to go (in order from best quality to worst):
With TPM 2.0 header:
- JGINYUE X99 Titanium D3 (ATX)
- X99 XD3 (mATX) - usually cheapest, also check Alibaba
- HUANANZHI X99 4MT (mATX)
- JGINYUE X99 Gaming D3 (mATX)
Without TPM header:
- HUANANZHI X99 CD3 (ATX)
- HUANANZHI X99 QD3 (mATX)
- HUANANZHI X99 PD3 (ATX, mobile chipset, only dual channel)
- Machinist K9-D3 (mATX)
- HUANANZHI X99 P4T (mATX)
- Machinist PR8 (mATX)
- Machinist PR8-H (mATX, mobile chipset - not recommended, E5 2666 v3 maximum)
- SOYO X99 D3 (mATX - not recommended, E5 2666 v3 maximum)
For the cooler, you may look locally for LGA 2011 compatible coolers. In my experience, you will not find something cheaper than what AliExpress offers. If you're getting a board with weaker VRMs (reviews are your friend), getting a 4 heat pipe down-draft cooler is probably your best bet.
For everything else, just get a 4-6 heat pipe tower cooler.
If you need TPM 2.0 for Windows 11, please don't blindly trust my recommendation and ask the seller of your motherboard which TPM module to buy. They may even be selling some themselves.
Saving money by buying a used PSU produced in the last 5 years is fine, imo. However, if you are going down that route, it should be at least an A tier unit.
Whenever buying a PSU, consider that these CPUs can easily pull 150W, so do the math for your system and make sure not to buy a low quality unit. The PSU tier list is your friend, always.
Regardless of whether you're on DDR3, a v3 or v4 CPU, you want to install the LTSC IoT Enterprise Edition of Windows. Whether you're choosing 10 or 11 doesn't matter. Don't install the fully bloated AI loaded versions of Windows.
If you're going to modify your BIOS at all, start with Windows 10 and install your target OS cleanly after.
In Windows 11, disable Core Isolation. You're giving up performance by not doing so.
Download InSpectre, run it as administrator and disable both protections, then restart. You aren't the target of these exploits and easily lose 10-15% performance by keeping them enabled.
Note to seasoned overclockers: You can likely find a custom BIOS for your board with unlocked RAM timings (no voltage control) so if you think squeezing another 5-10% by tuning RAM timings is worth it to you, look into it.
All pricing includes tax and shipping to any EU country. If you're outside the EU, please consult your own local market. These are every day "Buy Now" prices. They don't assume you have access to any coupons or good local deals and I compiled them from AliExpress, eBay France/Italy/Germany and Amazon EU.
- X99 MR9A Pro (AliExpress) - 60€
- E5 2697 v3 (eBay - piosparts accepts cheap offers on their website within the EU but also eBay price offers) - 15€
- TPM 2.0 Module (MSI, AliExpress) - 7€
- 4x8GB DDR4 2133 ECC Reg - 50€
- LGA 2011 CPU cooler - 15-20€
- RX 5700 XT - 110€
- A Tier 650W+ PSU (used) or B/C Tier 650W+ PSU (new) - 50€
- 512GB SSD (until prices stabilize) - 50-60€
- PC case (your choice, no USB-C front panel on motherboard!) - 30-100€
- Total: 412€
This build assumes you're going to use your computer mostly with a TV so that having only one display output on your GPU is enough. It also assumes you're staying on Linux. The Instinct Mi50 is both a 16GB card (high quality textures for 4K) as well as capable of running FSR4's Int8. The RX 5700 XT does NOT run FSR4 Int 8, you'd have to AT LEAST buy something like an RX 6600.
You can find these cards on AliExpress or directly on Alibaba for way less than 100€/piece. Piosparts also accepts offers in the EU via their website. You will need to find a cooling solution. You can buy a 3€ blower GPU fan off AliExpress and get a PWM to VGA fan adapter for another 2€ or so. Dremel a hole into the shroud, place the fan inside and plug it into your motherboard. Or cut open the heatsink similar to what people are doing to the BC-250 and put 2 Arctic 92mm fans on top.
- X99 K9-D3 or X99 QD3, whichever you can find cheaper - 35-40€ (I recommend getting some discount codes going)
- E5 2673 v3 - 10€ (seen cheaper - check against E5 2666/2678 v3 in your region - both are better)
- 4x DDR3 1600-1866 ECC - 15€ (I have seen even cheaper listings for 1600 - you could save money by going 4x4)
- LGA 2011 CPU cooler - 15-20€
- AMD Instinct Mi50 - 50-80€ (incl. cooling solution)
- A Tier 650W+ PSU (used) or B/C Tier 650W+ PSU (new) - 50€
- 512GB SSD (until prices stabilize) - 50-60€
- mATX PC case (your choice) - 30-50€
- Total: 280€
Nice guide! This'll help anyone surviving Rammageddon.