Nvidia's RTX 4070 GPU makes our list of best graphics cards thanks to its strong balance of price to performance. The card is great for 1440p gaming, provides strong ray tracing performance, and supports other DLSS and DLSS 3 for higher frame rates.
Normally, if you want to buy a PC with an RTX 4070 inside, you must spend $1,400 or more and expect an SSD that's 1TB unless you pay quite a bit extra. However, with all the great Prime Day tech deals we're seeing today on Amazon and competitors such as Newegg, I was able to put together a list of parts you can buy for $1,000, which will get you a system with an RTX 4070 GPU, 2TB PCIe Gen 4 SSD, AMD Ryzen 5 CPU and 32GB of RAM.
Here's the parts list for a $1,000 RTX 4070 build.
| Component Type | Model | Price (at Pub Time in USD) |
|---|---|---|
| CPU | AMD Ryzen 5 5600X | $114 |
| Motherboard | Gigabyte B550M DS3H AC | $89 |
| GPU | Gigabyte RTX 4070 | $499 |
| RAM | Crucial Pro RAM 32GB (2 x 16GB) DDR4-3200 | $49 |
| Storage | SK hynix Platinum P41 SSD (2TB) | $127 |
| Case | Phanteks XT Pro | $49 |
| PSU | MSI MAG A750GL, 80 Plus Gold PSU | $79 |
| Cooler | included in box | |
| Total | $1,006 |
Let's talk about what I chose, why and how you can take it a step further if you're willing to spend over $1,000. Our CPU is an AMD Ryzen 5 5600X, which is currently on sale for $114. That gets you a 65W processor with 6 cores, 12 threads and a max boost clock of 4.6 GHz. Very importantly, it comes with a CPU cooler in the box, saving us the cost of buying one.
Now, admittedly, any Ryzen 5000 series processor is a last-gen CPU, with the Ryzen 7000 series having been out for nearly two years and the Ryzen 9000 series on the way. However, these chips are still decent and quite popular and, because they use DDR4 RAM and less-expensive motherboards than the newer models, they are also budget-friendly.
It's worth pointing to our excellent CPU vs GPU upgrade guide, where we looked at four different CPUs and four different GPUs to show how component choices could impact overall performance. The Ryzen 5 5600X should be somewhat faster than the old Core i7-8700K we used in those tests, but not as fast as the Core i9-11900K. The RTX 4070 meanwhile basically matches the previous generation RTX 3080 in performance, meaning if you look at the performance scaling of the 8700K with the 3080, you can see where the older CPU may reduce framerates in games. TLDR: An older CPU may hurt quite a bit for 1080p gaming, but at 1440p it's less of a factor.
For our motherboard, we're going with Gigabyte's B550M DS3H AC, which is on sale at Newegg for $89. Not only is this a great price, but you get a couple of standout features for it. First, there's built-in Wi-Fi 6, which is more than adequate for most people. There's also Q-Flash, a feature that allows you to update the BIOS without having a CPU installed. Some motherboards don't support 5000 series CPUs out of the box and, if this one doesn't, you can always install an update using a flash drive.
Our graphics card is, of course, the venerable RTX 4070. We're going with this Gigabyte model, because it's just $499 at Newegg, the lowest price we've seen. When we reviewed the RTX 4090 in 2023, we noted that not only could it dominate in 1440p gaming, but it could also run at around 55 fps with ray tracing off at 4K resolution.
Our SSD is the 2TB capacity of the SK hynix Platinum P41, which is currently going for $127 at Amazon. The Platinum P41 is one of the fastest PCIe Gen 4 drives on the market, with rated read / write speeds of 7,000 and 6,500 MBps, respectively, along with 1.4 and 1.3 million IOPS. It outpaced other speedy drives, such as the WD Black SN850, on many of our tests. It's not quite as fast as the Samsung 990 Pro, but it is right up there in the conversation.
In 2024, unless you are trying to hit a sub-$500 price point, you should not build a PC with less than 32GB of RAM. So we're choosing this kit of 2 x 16GB DDR4-3200 Crucial RAM, which is on sale for $49 at Amazon.
We were trying to hit a budget, so we are using a Phanteks XT Pro as our case. It's a fine chassis and is on sale for $49 at Newegg, but one trade-off is that it only comes standard with one fan. If you can splurge another $20, buy the Phanteks XT Pro Ultra for $69 because it has four ARGB fans.
Finally, our PSU is the MSI MAG A750GL. It's a 750W, 80 Plus Gold certified PSU with a 12VHPWR connector, which is required for the RTX 4070 built in. Right now, Newegg has it on sale for $79.
Upgrading Our RTX 4070 Prime Day PC Build
In putting together this build, we tried to hit a $1,000 price point, but what if you could spend just a little bit more? Here's a slightly upgraded build that gives you a better CPU and case.
| Component Type | Model | Price (at Pub Time in USD) |
|---|---|---|
| CPU | AMD Ryzen 7 5700X3D | $183 |
| Motherboard | Gigabyte B550M DS3H AC | $89 |
| GPU | Gigabyte RTX 4070 | $499 |
| RAM | Crucial Pro RAM 32GB (2 x 16GB) DDR4-3200 | $49 |
| Storage | SK hynix Platinum P41 SSD (2TB) | $127 |
| Case | Phanteks XT Pro Ultra | $69 |
| PSU | MSI MAG A750GL, 80 Plus Gold PSU | $79 |
| Cooler | ID-Cooling Frost Flow X 280 | $47 |
| Total | $1,141 |
Here, we've upgraded to an AMD Ryzen 7 5700X3D, which is currently on sale for $183 at Amazon. When we reviewed the 5700X3D, we called it a "value gaming masterpiece." The CPU comes with 100MB of L2 / L3 cache, which allows it to dominate CPU-limited games at 1080p and 1440p. The other chips with this amount of cache cost a lot more.
However, the Ryzen 7 5700X3D does not come with a cooler in the box, so we're going with ID-Cooling's Frost Flow X 280. It's an affordable and useful 280mm AIO that's on sale for $47 now at Amazon.
Finally, we're upgrading the case to a Phanteks XT Pro Ultra, which is just $69. It's like the Phanteks XT Pro, but comes with 4 ARGB fans.
