Build Report - #63 (~$228 profit)

Note: I'm catching up with posting - this build was sold in May 2025

Build Notes

This was my first time experimenting with purchasing the CPU and motherboard from AliExpress. With a coupon code, the total came out to $110 including tax, which is in the ballpark of what I’d pay for a Ryzen 5 3600 + B450 motherboard on the used market.

For the most part, everything performed well. The motherboard was able to POST with the Ryzen 5 3600 with no issues and XMP could be enabled to run the RAM at its advertised speed of 3000MHz. The only gotcha I encountered was that the motherboard didn’t appear to support sleep mode (S3), so only hibernate was available in Windows. The other more general problem is that there doesn’t appear to be any BIOS files for download, and so you’re stuck with what you get. I did find this YouTube video going over the Machinist B450 BIOS options to be useful for confirming the lack of sleep mode.

As far as other parts, the RAM was a pickup from Facebook Marketplace and the GPU was from OfferUp. For storage, I bought a new SATA SSD off Amazon as well as used 1TB hard drives off eBay.

I was able to use the iBuyPower mATX case + PSU from this haul. As noted in that post, I was able to repurpose the proprietary ARGB fans + controller from the Skytech pre-built and hook it into the iBuyPower case’s 2 prong LED switch to get customizable ARGB lighting working.

Lastly, the iBuyPower case was missing its hard drive cage, and so I picked up this set of Sedna hard drive stands and used VELCRO tape to mount them to the open space in the bottom of the case.

Overall, would I purchase another AliExpress CPU / motherboard? Probably not. With regards to the CPU, at the time of this writing, the cheapest Ryzen 5 3600 was $69.09 before tax. Even with the best possible coupon code of $10 off $69+, it’s still more expensive than purchasing used on the local marketplace, where I’ve seen several pop up with an average price of ~$50. As far as the motherboard, even though everything worked, the lack of sleep mode, no BIOS updates, and overall barebones nature makes it something I’d only consider if I had no other options.

Performance-wise, the PC had no issues. I was able to get a smooth 144+ FPS in my Overwatch 2 test and a very decent average 80+ FPS in Marvel Rivals.

Sale Notes

I listed this build for $550 on 4/24 and a serious buyer offered $500 on 5/1 via OfferUp. He was restricted in where he could meet and so I made the decision to go to him, since I had other errands in that general area. The buyer turned out to be around 20 minutes late and was inconsistent with messaging during that period, so I was getting worried about him flaking, but he finally did show up. The rest of the demonstration and sale went smoothly.

Unfortunately, about 3 months later, I got a Sunday evening message on OfferUp from the buyer saying the PC booted to the BIOS and said the SSD wasn’t detected. After moving to text so I could get pictures of the BIOS and diagnosing throughout the night, it did seem correct that the SATA SSD had failed. I offered to replace it for free if he could drop it off with me but I never heard back.