Budget-Builds Official never intended to get his hands on a PlayStation 5; instead, he wanted its internals, notably the graphics chip. Then, on a peaceful Friday in October, he receives a little parcel from Shenzhen and has no idea what to anticipate. Out comes a bare motherboard the size of a small book, wrapped in bubble plastic and topped with a gigantic copper heatsink the size of a dinner plate. The label reads AMD BC250, and it costs £96. The delivery letter simply reads “PS5 graphics card” – not exactly what he expected, but it did the job.
He gingerly lifts the board onto his test bench, as if it were a raw diamond. There’s no fancy case, no user manual, and no screws – just 8 gold pins that need to be attached to a power supply and one lonely M.2 slot waiting for a drive – but first things first, he needed to turn it up.
PlayStation 5 Disc Edition Console (slim)
- Model Number CFI-2000
- Includes DualSense Wireless Controller, 1TB SSD, Disc Drive, 2 Horizontal Stand Feet, HDMI Cable, AC power cord, USB cable, printed materials,...
- Vertical Stand sold separately
He connects an 8-pin CPU connection from a 1000w Corsair power supply to the board’s single power socket. He leaves the fan header empty, since there is no need for it, but he does place a spare 120mm blower on top and secures it with black electrical tape. A little CR2032 coin cell is dropped into the CMOS holder, a minor detail that is often ignored. He connects the display connection to the board’s DisplayPort, and because there are no SATA ports on the board, he also uses a 4 TB SATA SSD in a USB enclosure. The keyboard and mouse are connected to two USB3 ports on the board. He presses the little power button using a bit of plastic spudger.
Before he even takes a seat, the screen comes to life – AMI BIOS 2021 copyright – and reports 16GB of GDDR6 RAM, with 8GB designated for the system and the remaining 8GB for graphics. It specifies the six Zen 2 cores and the 3.49GHz boost clock speed, and that’s all it says about the CPU. The GPU simply states “AMD BC250”. The next step was to install Linux, which involved inserting a USB stick with Bazzite – a gaming spin on Fedora – back into the slot and letting the installer run. After 10 minutes, he has a new desktop with a resolution of 2560 × 1440, which is crisp and responsive. Steam installs in one quick terminal line. Proton is turned on in a flash.
He starts Half-Life 2 first; it runs at 240 frames per second, but he limits it to 144 because the fan is screaming and he doesn’t want it to burn out. Then he launches GTA V Enhanced and goes into Los Santos in all its 1440p glory, with all of the settings pushed up to maximum save for ray tracing, which he prudently chooses to turn off. Even so, it manages to average 62 frames per second, which isn’t awful. Turn on ray tracing, and you can see the city moving at a somewhat sluggish pace of 28 frames per second – which is actually quite playable even with ray tracing. As for Cyberpunk 2077, it plays at 1080p on medium settings with an average frame rate of 42.
Storage is simple: insert one M.2 NVMe screw and you’re done. Memory is divided into two categories: 8 gigabytes for Windows-like operations and 8 gigabytes for shaders. Some games, such as Oblivion Remastered and Batman: Arkham Knight, choke when prompted for nine. A swap file on the SSD eliminates the stutters, but Wi-Fi does not function. Despite three adapters, two distributions, and innumerable terminal fixes, drops continue to occur every 20 minutes. Ethernet using a USB dongle worked on the first try. Lesson learned: run the cable or be patient.
Peak power consumption is 180 watts, which is equivalent to a PlayStation 5 under stress. Connect it to any ATX supply using an 8-pin EPS connection and a spare molex for the fans. If you desire silence, use three 80 mm fans; if you prefer noise, use two and set the temperature to 70 °C. Custom firmware spreads across Chinese forums. Flash the correct file, and you can adjust the memory divide to 12 GB system, 4 GB graphics, or any combination in between. The modder hasn’t tried yet; he’s working on a 3D-printed tray to keep the board from dangling from another PC like a parasitic twin.
Cost breakdown for anyone with a screwdriver: Board £96; three fans £12; M.2 1 TB SSD £45; CMOS battery £1; wire ties and tape £0 (already owned). Total £154 and you get a 1440p gaming box that outperforms any £400 mini PC.
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