
First timer. Where to go from here?

in New Members
Well, my 11yo & 10yo and I just put together our first budget gaming pc. We started watching YouTube to even find out where to start, Jay and Kyle, thank you. I would say thanks to Linus, but I didn't have a $10,000 budget. So, I asked friends and family looking to see if a diamond in the rough PC was in a closet somewhere that I could harvest some parts from, it didn't really work out, but I now have 4+ disassembled old PCs in the garage. We learned about the parts a got some familiarity with them. So, this is a really long post that will eventually ask where I should upgrade first. This is the warning I feel should come with PC building. It is an exciting and addicting hobby. I sold an old Xbox 360, my MTG cards (it wasn't that many) and all the books for an paper and pencil RPG ( The One Ring, it is awesome but very different from D&D). With all that my budget was set.
MB: MSI A-320M PRO (new $67)
CPU: AMD Ryzen 3 3200 (new $90)
RAM: Gskill RipJaw 16g.....2x8g 2400hz (used for $40) Blue
GPU: MSI GeForce GTX 1050 ti (used $120, added after about two months of using the onboard vega graphics)
SSD: Silicon power 128g boot drive (new $25)
HDD: Seagate 7200 1 TB (harvested)
PSU: 720W cheap off brand, no certification (harvested) with blue LED
Case: Rosewill Nautilus (used but NIB for $30)
Optical drive: Sony who knows... (harvested)
and added a couple more blue LED fans and done.
Games we play: Ghost of a Tale, Styx: Master of Shadows, 7 Days to Die, Baldur's Gate EE, Exanima, Kerbal Space Program and some other indie games. We will be getting Minecraft, Fortnite, and I am looking forward to Baldur's Gate 3. They also want to start learning to program their own games.. Ideas?
Please let us know where we should upgrade first? I have my thoughts but would like some insight from you all. Thanks so much.
MB: MSI A-320M PRO (new $67)
CPU: AMD Ryzen 3 3200 (new $90)
RAM: Gskill RipJaw 16g.....2x8g 2400hz (used for $40) Blue
GPU: MSI GeForce GTX 1050 ti (used $120, added after about two months of using the onboard vega graphics)
SSD: Silicon power 128g boot drive (new $25)
HDD: Seagate 7200 1 TB (harvested)
PSU: 720W cheap off brand, no certification (harvested) with blue LED
Case: Rosewill Nautilus (used but NIB for $30)
Optical drive: Sony who knows... (harvested)
and added a couple more blue LED fans and done.
Games we play: Ghost of a Tale, Styx: Master of Shadows, 7 Days to Die, Baldur's Gate EE, Exanima, Kerbal Space Program and some other indie games. We will be getting Minecraft, Fortnite, and I am looking forward to Baldur's Gate 3. They also want to start learning to program their own games.. Ideas?
Please let us know where we should upgrade first? I have my thoughts but would like some insight from you all. Thanks so much.

Comments
I'm not very familiar with most of the games you listed, but I'm pretty sure the 1050ti is probably fine to run most of those at 1080p, so I'd probably look at some other areas first. A larger SSD to store games on for better loading times for example, that'd probably be one of the first things I look at. Or, you could look at upgrading the CPU to something like a Ryzen 3 3300X and pairing it with a better board/faster memory.
>PSU: 720W cheap off brand, no certification (harvested) with blue LED
is 100% the most egregious error in this list. I've had very few parts feel dangerous; I had a PSU catch fire and melt the cable. The memory you're getting is a decent deal except that you want faster memory for ryzen (afaik).
You may be able to get 20 series GPUs soon here for under $300... watch out for those. I know I'll be selling my 2070s for pretty cheap if I can get my hands on a 3080 right away. it won't pair with that cpu very well though even if you did find a good one.
We had a less than a GOOD experience Saturday evening 1.16.21 with one of the staff members in the Wayne/Radnor, PA store.
Who, what, when, where, and how do we report the details. It would be preferred to speak with someone about this negative situation rather than type it all here.
Thanks