Im on AMD so can’t help with that

Just made the switch to Nobara Linux on my desktop and ill probably go with Mint on my ancient laptop tomorrow. My only hang up was games but it seems like compatibility is a lot better nowadays so hopefully I can fully switch over. Same for windows only programs and Wine.

I believe it’s US-only for now

Aliexpress is basically amazon with longer shipping time in my experience. Each seller has their own store rating similar to ebay so as long as you exercise judgement ie. Dont buy from brand new stores with 0 feedback or things that are too good to be true and avoid certain things like batteries and storage media unless you know exactly what you’re buying you should be fine. I’ve bought a lot of stuff from there (mostly electronics) and haven’t had bad experiences

Yeah, that is true. I forget about the extra features sometimes because I tend to prefer native res most of the time though I haven’t tried the latest gen’s implementations of frame generation/dynamic res.

I have no idea why some people found the 7800 XT to be anything but a cashgrab at its current price point tbh. Benchmarks are within spitting distance of each other depending on game and resolution so it’s closer to like 3% at 1440p from what I saw. Yeah 500USD is closer to the going price for the 6800 XT these days.

It’s a Corsair TX550M so just a regular gold. If you’re just upgrading your GPU to a 6700 XT then you should be alright with a PSU from a reputable brand. I haven’t played a lot of very demanding things yet because I only upgraded recently but I can get 100ish FPS on Borderlands 3 with settings around medium-high and about 100 on Counter Strike 2 (but it’s in beta and not utilizing resources fully on my machine at the moment).

Since you seem to prefer gaming at higher settings, you’re most likely gonna be GPU bound in most titles unless you’re into stuff like CSGO or big sim games.

But it comes down to whether a 6700 XT is enough or if 6800 XT + PSU upgrade (and possibly a CPU upgrade down the line) is the better choice for you. The performance gap between the two is sizeable at around 40% at 1440p ultra (https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/gpu-hierarchy,4388.html).

Either is a fine choice in my opinion but it just depends on how much you want to budget for the upgrade. A 750W + 6800 XT should leave room for a future 5800X3D upgrade if they drop further in price.

For what it’s worth I have a 2600 and a 6700 XT on a 550W PSU on 1440p 144Hz coincidentally and it does alright but I don’t play super new games or max out settings. Not ideal but good enough for me.

Your current PSU is important for figuring out if you need to upgrade. Maybe consider a Ryzen 5800X3D (if your motherboard supports it with a BIOS update) and a 6800 XT because I don’t think the 2600 is gonna be pushing 100+ frames at 1440p in most newer titles (of course it depends on the title and settings). I don’t think the 7800 XT makes much sense over the 6800 XT at that price.

Telegram channels are your best bet. Something like STL Forest or STLworld should have what you need