If anyone has specs of their PC that runs MSFS 2020 reasonably well then I’d appreciate them. I’m looking to be build a new PC but prices of hardware are ridiculously high compared to the last time I built a new tower PC for myself back in 2017.
I have a monitor and flights sim flightstick and throttle already. I just need to buy the bits to build the PC itself.
Problem you’ll have is that cpu / memory / motherboard if changed usually need to be changed at the same time. Like everything, budget dictates what you can and can’t do. And In the current climate, availability.
What have you got at the moment?
That’s akin to asking “How blue is the sky?”
When it comes to computers, I’ve always said this - figure out your budget, and then get the best hardware you can for that price.
All sorts of computers can run MSFS, but to ask what runs it “reasonably well” is very subjective.
My hardware was purchased at least 4 years ago. My CPU is from 2009. I maxed out my motherboard’s capabilities at 24 GB of RAM. I currently run the sim off of a HDD. I bought a GeForce RTX 2070 Super graphics card last year. I run the sim at 3840x1080, most things on medium / high, and clouds on ultra. My frame rates are in the mid 20s at most airports on the ground, and in the 30s at cruise. Approaching a large airport to land though, they will dip down to 10-12, as low as 1 fps. I still fly every day and enjoy it.
I currently have an i5-7600K, GeForce GTX 1070 OC, 16GB DDR4 RAM, 500GB M.2 1TB SATA SSD. That’s the PC I built 4 years ago. It’s not being used at the moment, so is just gathering dust. It was built to run X-Plane 11 and ran that very well with almost everything turned up pretty high. I installed X-Plane 11 on my 2017 iMac, so the PC became redundant.
I do have an Xbox Series S running MSFS 2020 at the moment. I’m looking to see if I can economically build/upgrade the PC to run MSFS 2020 adequately. I’m not particularly after 4K Ultra settings, but something visually passable at decent frame rates is the requirement.
So if you were to look at the CPU, you’re then into the motherboard and RAM straight away, which may prove a lot of expense. The lack of availability (and their 50% over price) means changing a graphics card at the moment is another expensive business.
Have you tried installing MSFS on what you’ve got to see how it would run?
i5 9600k
RTX 3070
32GB Ram
NVM SSD
game runs nice on high/ultra 1440p.
good luck getting any ampere card at these times. fkn crypto mongos bought all cards off.
I have not tried installing MSFS on the PC yet. I am wondering if I am licensed to install it? I bought a digital license for MSFS 2020 from the Microsoft Store and it is running on my Xbox Series S. I think I’m entitled to install it on a PC too.
Yes, I think so, and it’s certainly worth a go. It’s not a great time to be upgrade shopping on a budget, so this would at least give you an idea of where you’re starting from 
Latka is right. I remember 10-15 years ago when people would ask me what type of computer they should buy. I’d ask “What do you want to do?” Now it’s “Buy the most you can afford.”
PC built in the UK cost £1300 14 months ago.
The PC runs the game really well, very happy with the 3060Ti and Fuma 2 cooler. Noise is not a problem at all.
GA aircraft I can get 30 - 45 FPS or more with 5 settings on Ultra
Airliners I can get 30 - 40 FPS if I drop 2 settings down to High
All Viewed on 34" MSI Wide Screen 3440 x1440
I got the memory cheap, and the GPU for £479 …the same card is now £750 to £825
Running temps are below 75° C all day long.
No overclocking
I might update the CPU to the 7 5800X next year
Window 10 pro 64
Gigabyte B550 AORUS ELITE
Ryzen 7 3700X
Fuma 2 Cooler
Corsair Vengeance LPX 32GB (DDR4-3200)
Gigabyte RTX™ 3060 Ti GAMING OC PRO 8G
Gigabyte 1TB M.2 PCIe NVMe “C” Drive
Corsair Carbide 175R PC Case
The simplest thing you could do is find the best CPU your motherboard can handle with fully updated BIOS (your motherboard manufacturer website should have this info) and see if there’s a reasonable used one. Swap it out and keep everything else the same. Sell your i5 on eBay for $100 to subsidize the purchase.
12900k
32gb DDR5 @ 5200mhz
3090 FTW3 Ultra
and I still get issues with jerky frames on takeoff… 
Wow! You have some serious hardware there!
The sim runs surprisingly well on my Xbox Series S, albeit I cannot get 4K, but that’s fine.
I’ll see if there are any deals on PC components on Black Friday.
My PC is 10 years old with an i7-2600k, 16gb RAM, 1660 vid card, 2 x 1080p monitors, 2tb SSD and I get 60fps in the Turbo Bonanza running at a mixture of medium and high settings. I havn’t had MSFS crash on me in the last 12 months. All flights live on Vatsim with live weather.
As with all versions of FS it can bring a supercomputer to it’s knees if you set it up to do that or will be quite happy on a much lesser PC with a bit of care and maybe a compromise or two.
It’s not all about horsepower, it’s about what is good enough for you and how you achieve it.
@WilliamC27C Thanks! I might dust off my PC and and see if I can upgrade the CPU. It has 16GB of DDR4 RAM already and I can get another 16GB for it quite easily. The most powerful CPU it can take is an Intel Core i7-7700K (motherboard limitation).
CPU and RAM upgrade would be the cheapest upgrade for me.