The Streaming Setup Build - From Your Motherboard to Your Microphone

MicroCenterOfficial

Written by @Rayy_Goss

Streaming is becoming more and more popular and shows no signs of slowing down. There are tons of streamers out there, and maybe you’ve been saving up for the opportunity to build your own streaming setup and begin your journey on popular platforms like Twitch and YouTube. Well in this article, we’ll be running you through EVERYTHING you’ll need to get started on your streaming career. From PC parts, to lighting, we’ll be covering the entire spectrum of streaming gear.

The Most Important Piece (Your Gaming PC)

Your PC is the most important piece of gear to budget for. In your stream career, having a PC that is too weak will keep you from playing the games you want to play at a smooth frame rate for you or your viewers to enjoy. Luckily, lots of the latest generations of PC parts are strong enough to the point you can enjoy the games you love, and your viewers can properly enjoy them as well. 

CPU

For the processor we’re going to be opting for the AMD Ryzen 7 5800X, The processor isn’t the highest in the AMD lineup (and if you have room in your budget, springing for the best is always a good idea), however, it offers amazing performance through its 8 cores allowing you to stream and game on one PC while consistently hitting over 144+ fps average on the most popular games on Twitch and YouTube. It’s a killer CPU for someone setting up their first streaming PC and pairs well with any graphics card you can throw at it.

GPU

For the graphics card, we have an AMD 6900 XT. Since we’re using a Ryzen 7 5800x, we can use the x264 encoding option on OBS, without fear of performance loss, and we get the performance of a top-of-the-line GPU. 

Motherboard

For the motherboard, we’re going with the MSI X570S Tomahawk. The Tomahawk is a great board providing power delivery comparable to enthusiast-tier boards while also offering some of the latest audio and Wi-Fi hardware capabilities.

SSD

For the SSD, we’ll go with the Samsung 980 Pro 1TB SSD. The 980 Pro can utilize the Gen 4 slot on your motherboard, allowing for amazing transfer speeds for all your streaming/content creation needs. It’ll boot up your PC in seconds, and get your games and programs running without making your audience wait. 

Power Supply

For the power supply, we’re going to use the RM 850 from Corsair. It has more than enough power to handle the 5800x and 6900 XT and is known for having a long life span so you won’t have to replace it next year. 

Cooler

For the cooler, we’ll add the Corsair H150i, to keep temps down on the processor and visuals up on the entire build. Personally, I prefer the white model as it gives the whole system a clean look. Plus, it has controllable RBG through the Corsair iCue software.

Case

The case is completely up to you. If you’d like to use the cooler I mentioned, ensure the case you use supports a radiator of at least 360mm. I personally like Lian Li cases, particularly the O11/O11 XL lineups.

 And that’s the build done. Keep in mind we recommend an installation key for Windows 10/11, which puts the whole build just a smidge over $2,000. And if you’re uncomfortable building it, we offer Custom PC Building Services with a quick turnaround time so you can get home and get streaming with no hassle.

Peripherals and Accessories 

Now that the PC itself is done, you still need to get your monitor, mouse, keyboard, and everything stream related. So, let’s start with the monitor.

Monitor

For the monitor, you’d want something that will perform well with the beefy, long-lasting PC you just made, so we’re looking for a 1080 or 1440p monitor, with an IPS panel that runs at a minimum of 144hz. This will provide a comfortable and noticeably smoother viewing experience thanks to the high refresh rate. For this, I recommend the AOC 27G2E. It’s a 27” monitor that hits all the key points we’re looking for, while also having a low response time - 1ms for our competitive gamers out there.

Mouse

This is very personal. You’d want to purchase a mouse you feel comfortable with based on your hand size and interests. I personally have large hands and want a mouse that provides a precise sensor, while also being comfortable and wireless. For this, I personally use the PRO X Superlight from Logitech. It’s a very high-quality mouse for gamers, which is apparent by just how many people use it. It’s wireless which means cable management is drastically simplified, and it pairs nicely with the Logitech G Hub software, the software you’ll be needing for the webcam we will mention in a moment.

Keyboard

This is another preference-based peripheral. In general, though, you’d want to take note of the different kinds of switches, and which ones you would like for your keyboard, as well as the overall look and size of the keyboard and whether or not it satisfies your needs. For me, I use the Tenkeyless GMMK keyboard from Glorious, with the Glorious Panda switches and G.Skill’s Crystal Crown keycaps, And it’s pretty enough to do numbers on a stream setup tour.

Webcam 

An important thing to note before we show the recommended webcam is that you do NOT need to go overkill and spend 500-1000+ dollars on a mirrorless camera to get good picture quality. The key to having good quality in your webcam for your streams and videos is the lighting you provide to what you are trying to display. With that being said, the Logitech C920s webcam is a perfect webcam for starting out your streaming career. At 1080p, 30fps, and with the right lighting, this webcam can do wonders for you. If you still feel the need to upgrade - maybe to a camera with a wider lens or a higher framerate for smoother viewing - the Logitech Brio can also provide amazing quality for your webcam while still saving you money compared to the cheapest mirrorless camera.

Lighting

This is an important piece. With good lighting, you can make almost any camera look really good, and for lighting, I would like to recommend the Elgato Key Light Air. Elgato offers even more impressive lights for when you’re ready to upgrade, but from personal experience, even the Key Light Air provides more than enough light to improve your camera quality. You can pair one with the lighting in your room, or do a setup with two to help you put emphasis on shadows and you, compared to your background. What I love about this lighting is how easy it is to control from your phone or desktop while you’re playing. It only takes a couple seconds to adjust the lighting for a cool, warm, bright, or dull look. 

Microphone

The last piece to the puzzle is the microphone. When people enter your streams, your voice and your webcam will be the first things people take notice of, so you’d want them to be at their highest possible quality. Because of this, I’d like to recommend the Shure MV7 microphone. It’s an amazing microphone that provides crisp vocals, even on the USB setting alone. If you were to connect it to a mixer via XLR, (which is completely optional) you would open the flood gates to even better audio quality that will leave your friends and teammates in all your games wondering what kind of mic you have. It also allows you to adjust your mic and headset levels from the microphone itself. The MV7 provides a lot and I think it’s the perfect way to finish off this stream setup build plan. 

More from the Micro Center Community:

Looking for more information about Building a Streaming PC? We’ve got PC Build Guides as well as our 2022 Streaming PC Build Guide, a How To Start Streaming guide, and a StreamLabs OBS Beginners Guide And if you can’t find what you’re looking for, don’t hesitate to post a new discussion and the Community will be happy to help!

Faceless

Well I would love to see a 5800X that in a a modern AAA title can encode and output a stream at the equal quality of Nvenc (medium setting in X264) and still game at 100+ fps.  I think your writer shouldn’t cut and paste amd marketing trash it’s poor advice at best!!

Rye_Bread

I've come to enjoy both the Elgato Wave 3 and the HyperX Quadcast mics as alternatives to the MV7. For anyone looking to get a mic, I highly recommend taking a look at a YouTube channel called "Podcastage". He goes through and tests a ton of mics and gives detailed comparisons.

That being said, the MV7 is a good mic regardless :)

Julia_V

My friend who does V-Tubing has the same webcam (Logitech C920s), and I can confirm that it is indeed a really high quality streaming webcam.

ronwoodson

I've found that refurbished iPhone 7(s) and above connected to either a video switcher or Elgato HD60 Pro via lightning to HDMI adapters or off greater clarity and overall image quality at a super value price. This combination offers much more flexibility when it comes to overall production quality.

smaddaus

Awesome! I can't wait to start my streaming build, this pottery Twitch stream is about to hit different!

Lesaol

Love those Tomahawk motherboards! Always have a clean aesthetic but good performance and features too! This is a great setup!

ChaosDTV

all options on this guide is amazing. I currently use for my mouse steel series aerox 3, c920s webcam, lights i got from govee and elgato wave 3 mic and my keybaord is custom made as well by me. almost any good setup can help anyone in there streaming career

Vaganza

I love my MV7 microphone, not only does it look great, but the options are amazing, XLR and USB inputs and you can send the audio from the computer to the headphone jack on the mic and listen from that port. I have mine paired with Shure AONIC 50 headphones.

ronwoodson

@Vaganza I also have a Shure MV7. I'm really satisfied with it. I have two condenser mics as well. One is a Neewer NW-800 and the other is a CAD GXL1800 and both capture voice really well. The are powered through a CAD Connect II audio interface. The interface is connected to a Zoom LiveTrak L-8. I use the multrack recording feature for pre-production and the MV7 usb for my livestreaming and zoom.

Vaganza

Most of the systems I am designing are large public meeting and conference rooms, so quite often I am hanging a multi-lobe ceiling mic in the room for everyone at the table, Usually Sennheiser Team Connect II or a Shure MX901, they get run through a Q-Sys core and into a computer for Zoom or Teams systems. I also work with a lot of Shure Microflex for wireless goosenecks or body packs or handhelds.

ronwoodson

https://community.microcenter.com/discussion/comment/44197#Comment_44197

Pro level stuff for sure! Do you request blueprints to client facilities before planning?

Vaganza

I do, and in many cases if they don't have them I offer the service to draw them. As these installations require a team of people to install I have to provide drawings for them to know where and how things get installed.

frontierplus

Just dropping in to say hi and also that these gaming PC builds are great not only for gamers and streamers but also for indie game developers like myself who need the same kinds of specs that the gamers who play our games will be using in order to test out and see what kind of capabilities we can design into our games for the maximum entertainment value to our customers (the gamers aforementioned). Keep up the good work and thank you for these tutorials! 😀 (Also, I don't know if I'm using the right emoticon/emoji here.)

Shoan041

Nice build, I'm a huge fan of the Samsung 980 Pro SSDs. I have one for my main drive too!