Personally I’ve got a mix - I have most Call of Duty games on Xbox, buying on the same platform as the ones I had in childhood, but have largely dropped the console for my PC running EndeavourOS. My biggest game is a bit of a cheat - Clone Hero - 550GB aha!
Good luck with the upgrade! I have a 4TB HDD, a WD Blue from 2017, and am hoping to upgrade to an NVME SSD before the drive dies of old age. looks at the component market Before I do.
I recommend Seagate Ironwolf Pro or any CMR/HAMR storage for the best balance of capacity, price and lifespan.
Yeah I feel you. It’s hurting all of us, seeing parts at over double the price they’re worth or simply out of stock. I heard that after taking all the DDR5 RAM they went after HDDs.
These are my notes on components I was looking at, dated
This is very close to my exact PC build. I bought in December of 2024 because I was sure Trump with fuck everything up with his tariffs. While that ended up being true, AI bullshit made it far worse.
Personally I’ve got a mix - I have most Call of Duty games on Xbox, buying on the same platform as the ones I had in childhood, but have largely dropped the console for my PC running EndeavourOS. My biggest game is a bit of a cheat - Clone Hero - 550GB aha!
Good luck with the upgrade! I have a 4TB HDD, a WD Blue from 2017, and am hoping to upgrade to an NVME SSD before the drive dies of old age. looks at the component market Before I do.
I recommend Seagate Ironwolf Pro or any CMR/HAMR storage for the best balance of capacity, price and lifespan.
Ack! No one has the 4TB Ironwolf Pro drives!
This is bullshit.
F’ckin’ datacenter pricks.
Yeah I feel you. It’s hurting all of us, seeing parts at over double the price they’re worth or simply out of stock. I heard that after taking all the DDR5 RAM they went after HDDs.
These are my notes on components I was looking at, dated
Motherboard
ASRock Phantom Gaming X870E Nova WiFi (1.3x base)
CPU
AMD Ryzen Zen 6 10700X3D?
AMD Ryzen 7 9700X (1.1x base)
RAM
Corsair Vengeance / LPX - DDR5, 6800MT/s, CL32, 2x32GB (4.6x base)
Depressing compromise RAM
Corsair Vengeance DDR5, 5600MT/s, CL40, 2x16GB
Note: RAM in current build was £170 for 2x16GB in Feb 2017, equivalent to £230 in Jan 2026
Games SSD
WD Black SN850X 8TB (2.4x base)
OR Samsung 9100 Pro 8TB
OS & Program SSD
Samsung 990 Pro 4TB (1.7x base)
Fans
Noctua 140mm x 8
Case
NZXT H6 Flow (1.1x base)
PSU
Corsair HX1200i Platinum (2025) (1.2x base)
GPU (1.3x base)
Sapphire Radeon RX 7900 XT 20GB (1.3x base)
Hypothetical:
High Capacity HDD
Seagate Ironwolf Pro 20TB, 7200RPM, CMR (1.3x base)
Seagate Ironwolf Pro 24TB
Xbox Expansion SSD
Notes
base = ~Sep/Oct 2025, just before hell
RAM eBay Sellers ~ 2x base
This is very close to my exact PC build. I bought in December of 2024 because I was sure Trump with fuck everything up with his tariffs. While that ended up being true, AI bullshit made it far worse.