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Thread: £250 build - is it possible?

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    ɯʎɔɐɹsɐʌʍ mycarsavw's Avatar
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    £250 build - is it possible?

    A buddy has given me the task of seeing if this is possible.

    He would like;

    CPU
    1 - 2 Gb RAM
    Mobo
    GPU
    HDD
    Case
    PSU

    He already has a monitor, keyboard, mouse, optical drives and one external IDE drive.

    It's a business machine at the core but there'll be some light gaming (Doom3 was mentioned in passing). It will run XP and will never, ever, ever, have to run Vista.

    My first thoughts were second hand, but I've done a few new builds adding over generous parts and I get to £200 without a case, psu or mobo which is why I'm here, asking for help again, because I think it can be done.
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    Re: £250 build - is it possible?

    Easy.

    AMD Ath AM2 4000+ £40
    Value case ~£10-20
    380-450w PSU branded £30
    ASRock AM2 Mobo - £30
    Geil Value 6400 DDR2 - £35
    80GB Sata drives are around £30
    And finally 8600GT - £70.

    Under £250.
    The situation's looking...

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    root Member DanceswithUnix's Avatar
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    Re: £250 build - is it possible?

    Cheap motherboards tend to need SATA these days, so your external IDE drive may not be that cost effective if it is PATA and a new drive would be faster anyways.

    As for DooM 3, I played that on a 128MB 6600GT which is pretty low end by modern standards. A 7600GS could see it off I believe, 7600GT by a factor of 2.

    How about:
    ASUS barebones for 74 quid
    7600GT 128MB for 34 quid
    1GB of DDR2 667MHz for 20 quid
    Single core 2.2GHz CPU 1MB Cache for 29.36 quid

    Aught to get some work done now, but it looks more than possible from that start.

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    Moderator DavidM's Avatar
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    Re: £250 build - is it possible?

    <snip>
    Last edited by DavidM; 31-07-2008 at 12:02 PM.

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    ɯʎɔɐɹsɐʌʍ mycarsavw's Avatar
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    Re: £250 build - is it possible?

    Using links as examples and Scan due to loyalty that gives me;

    CPU - AMD 4200+ - £46.40 - pre order
    Mobo - Asrock ALIVENF6G-VSTA - £34.65
    RAM - DDR2 PC4300 - £33.95 - recommended for the mobo above
    PSU - Silverstone ST35F - £29.36
    HDD - 160GB Samsung - £32.54
    GPU - XFX 8600GT - £74.01 - seems a bit overkill to me though

    Cost - £250.91 leaves (£0.91) for a case
    |Kata: "Read title as 'fisting'. Not sure why I clicked. Relieved, really."|
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    Re: £250 build - is it possible?

    Again - that mobo has onboard vga... so you could save a few pounds to begin with.

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    Re: £250 build - is it possible?

    Quote Originally Posted by DanceswithUnix View Post
    Cheap motherboards tend to need SATA these days, so your external IDE drive may not be that cost effective if it is PATA and a new drive would be faster anyways.

    As for DooM 3, I played that on a 128MB 6600GT which is pretty low end by modern standards. A 7600GS could see it off I believe, 7600GT by a factor of 2.

    How about:
    ASUS barebones for 74 quid
    7600GT 128MB for 34 quid
    1GB of DDR2 667MHz for 20 quid
    Single core 2.2GHz CPU 1MB Cache for 29.36 quid

    Aught to get some work done now, but it looks more than possible from that start.
    Quote Originally Posted by DavidM View Post
    And that barebone has onboard graphics anyway
    Barebones <slaps head> d'oh!

    David, Is the onboard GPU capable enough?

    If it is, that'll leave cash to step the CPU and RAM up to something a little quicker.
    |Kata: "Read title as 'fisting'. Not sure why I clicked. Relieved, really."|
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    Moderator DavidM's Avatar
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    Re: £250 build - is it possible?

    <snip>
    Last edited by DavidM; 31-07-2008 at 12:02 PM.

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    Re: £250 build - is it possible?

    The amd chipset is slightly newer and faster than the Nvidia one, but I felt that neither lived up to the Doom 3 requirement.

    Note that I played doom3 limited at 800x600 for the most part on something massively more powerful than any onboard, hence my cheap 7600GT recommendation.

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    Re: £250 build - is it possible?

    Just looked up the graphics, and 7600GT is around 70&#37; of the performance of the 8600GT, which isn't bad considering the 7600GT is 40 quid cheaper. Substituting video cards gives you 40 quid to spend on a case.

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    ɯʎɔɐɹsɐʌʍ mycarsavw's Avatar
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    Re: £250 build - is it possible?

    Thanks for the info, and the links. I have a 7600GT (XFX 256) myself, and while it's not wonderful, it's good for what I need and plays BF2 (and PR) on almost-full settings at 1280x1024 with no lag at all. It's not enough and I want more, but that's another thread

    Asus Barebones - £74.01

    256Mb Asus 7600GT - £88.82 - ideally I'd get something cheaper but I can't find (on Scan at least) a fan cooled 7600GT. The XFX 7600GT is passively cooled

    2Gb PC2-5400 - £33.36

    Athlon 64 4400+ - £51.69

    160GB Samsung - £32.54

    £30 over.
    |Kata: "Read title as 'fisting'. Not sure why I clicked. Relieved, really."|
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    root Member DanceswithUnix's Avatar
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    Re: £250 build - is it possible?

    My 34 quid 128MB 7600GT link on Scan seems to have disappeared. I thought it was a good deal

    How come you don't want passively cooled? My 6600GT was passively cooled, and is still going strong in the wife's PC some years on (that was an early Gigabyte one).

    Or for that sort of money, the 8600GT is generally faster as well as cheaper.

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    Re: £250 build - is it possible?

    I saw the &#163;34 card earlier on and when I went to rejig my spec, it had gone

    The box is going to be "stuffed under a desk somewhere" my worry was not enough airflow to the GPU.

    I'll keep hunting, I'll take a look at the 8x series too
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    Re: £250 build - is it possible?

    Quote Originally Posted by DavidM View Post
    On your post here - it's slightly better.
    If it's anything like the dedicated 7100 then it won't even be able to draw 2D at 1920x1200 at 25fps. I know he won't be using it at that res (well, I expect not), but it gives a bit of a hint at just how hopeless it will be. It certainly won't have a hope in hell of playing Doom3 on it.

    Gotta be a 7600GS minimum in my opinion, but dropping the gaming requirement would open up the rest of the system a lot.

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  20. #16
    ɯʎɔɐɹsɐʌʍ mycarsavw's Avatar
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    Re: £250 build - is it possible?

    Quote Originally Posted by this_is_gav View Post
    If it's anything like the dedicated 7100 then it won't even be able to draw 2D at 1920x1200 at 25fps. I know he won't be using it at that res (well, I expect not), but it gives a bit of a hint at just how hopeless it will be. It certainly won't have a hope in hell of playing Doom3 on it.

    Gotta be a 7600GS minimum in my opinion, but dropping the gaming requirement would open up the rest of the system a lot.
    I'm working on dropping the gaming angle today, I still say it can be done though, but we'll see. My thoughts are to make it work for now until there's more funds to upgrade components later.

    Thanks, nice find
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