Attn: C5th and AMD gurus

[Phage]

Reading DanOln's thread I have a similar question.
I wanted to build a reasonably-priced gaming rig for the kids in Australia. Low price, and longevity are the order of the day. I'm thinking AMD, but have litle idea of what is the best setup for gaming under the AMD banner. No Overclocking, no SSD but USB3 would be nice, but not essential.

What CPU, MoBo and memory would you recommend ?

Ta !

[Attila the Bun]

I wanted to build a reasonably-priced gaming rig

What is reasonably priced?...I spent £850 in total and consider that money well spent...you may have a different total in mind.

[Phage]

It's not the total per se, it's just trying to keep costs down overall, on the principle that AMD systems should run 1-200 cheaper for similar games performance.
I was thinking a quad-core, 4gb RAM, 6870 or similar. It's the details I'm fuzzy on.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

The X3 450 for around £58 on Scan it quite good value. After that it would be the Intel Core i3 540 for around £80 and after that it would be a Phenom II X4 955BE for around £108 on Ebuyer. After that it would be the Core i5 760 for around £140 to £150.

Regarding the motherboard the MSI 870A-G54 was around £69 on Ebuyer and had USB3.0 and SATA 3.0 but it seems to be not available on Ebuyer any more. Other websites sell the motherboard for between £70 to £75.

If you don't mind going for the older 770 chipset these motherboards have USB3.0 too:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/asus-...-sata-raid-atx

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/msi-8...-sata-raid-atx

At around £70 to £80 the 870 motherboards tend to have both USB 3.0 and SATA 3.0 ports.

This 790X based motherboard is only £70:

http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Compo...roductId=37386

It does not have USB 3.0 or SATA 3.0 but does symmetrical Crossfire and has the SB750 southbridge. There is also a USB3.0 version of the motherboard:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/asus-...-sata-raid-atx

[Phage]

You're the Man !
So - a 955BE, a MSI 870A-G54, but what memory would be suitable ?

[Attila the Bun]

It's not the total per se, it's just trying to keep costs down overall, on the principle that AMD systems should run 1-200 cheaper for similar games performance.
I was thinking a quad-core, 4gb RAM, 6870 or similar. It's the details I'm fuzzy on.

Well I'm sure that Cat will be along soon but here's my 2 pence worth.

The Phenom II 955 BE is good value at the moment and is often touted around here as a good CPU. It is easy to OC to 965BE speeds apparently.

I choose my mobo because it offered USB 3 and 6gb SATA. I thought it offered 2 PCIe x16 slots but it has 1 PCIe x 16 and 1 PCIe x 4 so XFire is out...in hindsight I would go for the 890 chipset which does offer 2 x PCIe x 16 rather than the 880 chipset.

RAM, I bought the Corsair Dominator 1600 8-8-8-24 BEMP...good memory but a bit pointless as unless all the factors are correct it doesn't do the extra stuff that you pay for...I would go for 1600 9-9-9-24 and save myself £20+...more if you buy a cheaper brand.

Going on how good the 5850 is on my rig I would go for the 6870 now as well.

Hard drive is up to you...I went on Hitachi because it seems to do well on reliability.

...now has CAT beaten me to it...probably

edit...YEP

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

The MSI motherboard is around £70 to £80 now.

Both these motherboards are also quite decent:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/asus-...-sata-raid-atx

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/gigab...-sata-raid-atx

Any decent 1333MHZ or 1600MHZ dual channel RAM kit should be fine IMHO.

Run the RAM at 1333MHZ at lower latencies seems to be the best settings for a Phenom II X4 at stock speeds IIRC.

I know a friend who used the Asus M4A87TD EVO in a build and it is a nice motherboard.

[Phage]

Well I'm sure that Cat will be along soon but here's my 2 pence worth.

The Phenom II 955 BE is good value at the moment and is often touted around here as a good CPU. It is easy to OC to 965BE speeds apparently.

I choose my mobo because it offered USB 3 and 6gb SATA. I thought it offered 2 PCIe x16 slots but it has 1 PCIe x 16 and 1 PCIe x 4 so XFire is out...in hindsight I would go for the 890 chipset which does offer 2 x PCIe x 16 rather than the 880 chipset.

RAM, I bought the Corsair Dominator 1600 8-8-8-24 BEMP...good memory but a bit pointless as unless all the factors are correct it doesn't do the extra stuff that you pay for...I would go for 1600 9-9-9-24 and save myself £20+...more if you buy a cheaper brand.

Going on how good the 5850 is on my rig I would go for the 6870 now as well.

Hard drive is up to you...I went on Hitachi because it seems to do well on reliability.

...now has CAT beaten me to it...probably

edit...YEP

However - you both agree. So I'm onto a winner !

[Attila the Bun]

One other thing...I would go for a quality PSU around the 500-550w mark if I was building this time, especially if I was going the 6870 route, as I have found that only when gaming do I go over 50% of the PSU's 650w rating the rest of the time it is around 30-35% on normal usage.

If I was going to add another GPU and lots of extra drives then the 650 would be justified but for a standard setup like you've in mind 550w would be a better and probably cheaper option

[Phage]

Agreed. I'm OK with cases and PSU brands, but the AMD mainboard setup is what I was unsure of.

[Domestic_Ginger]

PII 940 for £75 but you've got to use DDR2 and there are no USB3/SATA3 native motherboards .for AM2+ AFAIK. IMO it provides the best bang/buck.

What size is your screen? If its 1920x1080 or 1200 I would just get a athlon tricore if usb3 is important and stick with an AM3 setup. The GPU will be doing all the work anyway.

Most of the motherboards are much of a muchness for one card and no investments in OCing. Price is probably the biggest determining factor.

[Phage]

New system for the kids. So 1920.1080. But I've heard that many of the newer games are hittting the CPU quite hard nowadays.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

This Antec PSU is made by Seasonic and looks decent for the price:

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/245671

[Phage]

This Antec PSU is made by Seasonic and looks decent for the price:

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/245671

Indeed, I have the 750w in my system.

[Pob255]

I just want to point out

for the kids in Australia.

Which means you don't want to buy the bits here, otherwise you're going to get hit with custom charges.

So if you buy the bits over there, then we want to look more at generals not specifics, esp as brands and models are not always available in different countries.

Motherboard, amd 870 or (slightly older but cheaper 770) chipset
AMD the AthlonII x3 is still a great performer for the cost or PhenomII x4
GPU I'd say a gtx460 1gb or 6850 ether of which can cope with the vast majority of stuff you can throw at them on a single monitor
DVDr/w, sata, whatever you can get.
Hard drive, a good Sata drive, 500gb
PSU look for something decent in the 500w range
CPU cooler, look for a 120mm fan based tower cooler
Case, somethingg big enough to fit everything in and maybe a couple of extra low rpm fans (depending on case)

[c.ruel]

Pob ... surely he can put most of the stuff excluding case, monitor and psu in hand luggage. I have taken a whole computer in hand luggage on the plane before ... same with laptop. Who is suppose to stop you?

Generally interested because I do that a far bit. Taken loads of components in retail packaging or not back and forth on the plane. So I would like to know whether I am breaking the law. Mind you it probably won't stop me haha.