Original Post
Written by
Edited February 4, 2022
at 12:56 PM
by
My local microcenter is showing 20 in stock. This is the version with integrated graphics. The i5 12400 seems to be the new sweet spot for budget builds and budget gaming. It is faster than AMD 5600g (the closest direct competitor) and 5600x. From reports, the bundled cooler is a big improvement from previous stock coolers so it is not necessary to spend money on that either. With a ASUS Prime B660 it would be about $300 out the door for a CPU/MB combo with graphics and a cooler or even cheaper if you can get one of the $25 off coupons that was posted on here for uploading a build.
CPU Core - Alder Lake
Processor - Core i5 12400
Operating Frequency - 2.50GHz
Turbo Speed - 4.4GHz
Cores - Six-Core
Number of Threads - 12 Processing Threads
Socket Type - LGA 1700
Level 2 Cache - 7.5MB
Level 3 Cache - 18MB
https://www.microcenter.com/produ...r-included
67 Comments
Your comment cannot be blank.
Featured Comments
If you're looking for the cheapest build option you can find a near-$100 B660 chipset board paired it with the cheapest DDR4 you can find (or some you already have if you're upgrading a more modern system) would get you up and running. That could keep your total bill of materials (incl. RAM) around $300-350 and provide a functioning system with solid performance. You'd have plenty of CPU upgrade path, but unless you're willing to upgrade the stock cooler you're probably leaving a lot of performance locked away inside the CPU.
Do try to avoid motherboards built around the H610 chipset as the pricing seems to overlap with the B660 in the retail channel. The H610 chipset is positioned at the bottom end, and will probably be built into plenty of OEM systems, but there's no obvious value pricing on it available to regular consumers that I've seen (vs. more full-featured chipsets like B660 motherboards).
The next best investment to mention might be a solid air-cooler for $40-60. However, if you want to build the best platform to get every bit of performance out of the CPU you'd have to track down the cheapest Z690 chipset motherboard you can find, which probably adds another $60 or more to the bill for the H610 configuration. There are a lot of CPU tweaking and support features available in that chipset which could help with the current CPU choice or any future CPU upgrades. This is a key feature of the newest CPUs from Intel that could justify the upgrade, though obviously cheaper boards don't always implement this functionality as easily as more properly high-end motherboard manufacturers.
Good luck!
Jon
Sign up for a Slickdeals account to remove this ad.
https://www.techspot.co
Sign up for a Slickdeals account to remove this ad.
Our community has rated this post as helpful. If you agree, why not thank The_Love_Spud
If you're looking for the cheapest build option you can find a near-$100 B660 chipset board paired it with the cheapest DDR4 you can find (or some you already have if you're upgrading a more modern system) would get you up and running. That could keep your total bill of materials (incl. RAM) around $300-350 and provide a functioning system with solid performance. You'd have plenty of CPU upgrade path, but unless you're willing to upgrade the stock cooler you're probably leaving a lot of performance locked away inside the CPU.
Do try to avoid motherboards built around the H610 chipset as the pricing seems to overlap with the B660 in the retail channel. The H610 chipset is positioned at the bottom end, and will probably be built into plenty of OEM systems, but there's no obvious value pricing on it available to regular consumers that I've seen (vs. more full-featured chipsets like B660 motherboards).
The next best investment to mention might be a solid air-cooler for $40-60. However, if you want to build the best platform to get every bit of performance out of the CPU you'd have to track down the cheapest Z690 chipset motherboard you can find, which probably adds another $60 or more to the bill for the H610 configuration. There are a lot of CPU tweaking and support features available in that chipset which could help with the current CPU choice or any future CPU upgrades. This is a key feature of the newest CPUs from Intel that could justify the upgrade, though obviously cheaper boards don't always implement this functionality as easily as more properly high-end motherboard manufacturers.
Good luck!
Jon
If you're looking for the cheapest build option you can find a near-$100 B660 chipset board paired it with the cheapest DDR4 you can find (or some you already have if you're upgrading a more modern system) would get you up and running. That could keep your total bill of materials (incl. RAM) around $300-350 and provide a functioning system with solid performance. You'd have plenty of CPU upgrade path, but unless you're willing to upgrade the stock cooler you're probably leaving a lot of performance locked away inside the CPU.
Do try to avoid motherboards built around the H610 chipset as the pricing seems to overlap with the B660 in the retail channel. The H610 chipset is positioned at the bottom end, and will probably be built into plenty of OEM systems, but there's no obvious value pricing on it available to regular consumers that I've seen (vs. more full-featured chipsets like B660 motherboards).
The next best investment to mention might be a solid air-cooler for $40-60. However, if you want to build the best platform to get every bit of performance out of the CPU you'd have to track down the cheapest Z690 chipset motherboard you can find, which probably adds another $60 or more to the bill for the H610 configuration. There are a lot of CPU tweaking and support features available in that chipset which could help with the current CPU choice or any future CPU upgrades. This is a key feature of the newest CPUs from Intel that could justify the upgrade, though obviously cheaper boards don't always implement this functionality as easily as more properly high-end motherboard manufacturers.
Good luck!
Jon