New gaming build £500 Max

[Merlin4458]

Im on a pretty tight budget, and so for that reason I will be using a few old parts:

Coolermaster Wavemaster

Samsung Spintpoint 250gb

Im assuming that not much has changed recently that will mean id have to upgrade my HD? I've only ever used one drive as i dont raid or download a huge amount.

- If I can fix the green vertical line on my Dell 2405 FPW I will be using that for gaming.

How does this look (baring in mind i've not looked at comps for years:


CPU - INTEL CORE I5 660 1156 RETAIL
MOBO - ASUS 1156 P7H55D-M PRO S/L M-ATX
PSU - T/TAKE W0104RB 650W TOUGHPOWER BLACK
MEMORY - GEIL 4GB DDR3 1600 CL9 D/C BLACK DRAGON
GFX - ASUS 1GB GEF GTX 465 PCI-E 2.0

Comes to above £540


AMD build


PSU - T/TAKE W0104RB 650W TOUGHPOWER BLACK
MEMORY - GEIL 4GB DDR3 1600 CL9 D/C BLACK DRAGON
CPU - AMD PHENOM II X4 955 AM3 BLACK RETAIL
MOBO - ASUS AM3 M4A88T-M S/V/L M-ATX 5200MT/S
GFX - ASUS 1GB RADEON HD 5850 PCI-E 2.0 HDMI

[Behemoth]

Whats the price of the AMD build coming in at ? If cheaper than the Intel Core I5 I'd be tempted to go for the AMD kit as that looks like it leaves you with more money for a better GFX card.

[Merlin4458]

520 i think behemoth. You think id be fine with keeping the wave and my hd?

[Merlin4458]

In terms of parts. And bang for buck. Would you change anything? Ideally not wanting it to go over 500 tbh.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

The motherboard in the AMD build uses the earlier SB710 southbridge.

I would suggest the following build if you want to go with AMD:

AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 965 Black Edition 125W 3.40GHz C3 (Socket AM3) Processor ~ £117

https://www.aria.co.uk/SuperSpecials...roductId=38891

VTX ATI Radeon HD 5850 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card ~ £200

https://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Comp...roductId=40733

Corsair XMS3 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit ~ £75

https://www.aria.co.uk/SuperSpecials...roductId=37570

Asus M4A88TD-V EVO/USB3 ~ £86

https://www.aria.co.uk/SuperSpecials...roductId=40258

Has the SB850 southbridge which can support upto six SATA 3.0 ports and also has USB3.0 too.

OCZ StealthXStream 2 600W Power Supply ~ £53

https://www.aria.co.uk/SuperSpecials...roductId=40944

The total comes to around £540 including postage.

Here is an alternate Intel based build:

Intel Core i5 760 2.8GHz (Lynnfield) (Socket LGA1156) Processor ~ £135

https://www.aria.co.uk/SuperSpecials...roductId=40924

Asus P7P55D-E LX ~ £98

https://www.aria.co.uk/SuperSpecials...roductId=40042

OR

Gigabyte GA-P55-USB3 ~£101

https://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Comp...roductId=39696

Has a pair of USB3.0 ports.

VTX ATI Radeon HD 5850 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card ~ £200

https://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Comp...roductId=40733

Corsair XMS3 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit ~ £75

https://www.aria.co.uk/SuperSpecials...t+?productId=3

OCZ StealthXStream 2 600W Power Supply ~ £53

https://www.aria.co.uk/SuperSpecials...roductId=40944


The total comes to around £571 to £573 including postage.

I have tried not to skimp on the motherboards in either case although you could go with a cheaper motherboard especially if you don't intend to overclock the CPU.

[Merlin4458]

Thanks CAT. But as I said im looking for under 500 idealy and 573 is a little too much at the moment unfortunately.

[Merlin4458]

Might be a silly question. But do I need to upgrade my current PSU (Enermax Noisetaker 485w)?

[kurosagi01]

Might be a silly question. But do I need to upgrade my current PSU (Enermax Noisetaker 485w)?

That really depends how old it is and low long you have been using it,also the 12v Amps it gives,since 12v is for the main GPU.

[Behemoth]

520 i think behemoth. You think id be fine with keeping the wave and my hd?

If you feel that your current hard drive is big enough then sure, keep it. Hard drives aren't exactly expensive at the moment anyway with a 500 gig coming in at an average price of £35 inc VAT with most online retailers you could always get a bigger drive later on if you find your running out of space.

As for the Wavemaster, it's quite an old case, still using 80mm fans so you might find it a tight squeeze in there if you do get a 5850 its quite a long card.

Again you can always see how you go, but I'd be worried about temps being quite high in that case in all honesty.

[Domestic_Ginger]

i3 530 for the intel build? I wouldn't go for the 660. How do the OC bundles look price wise?

[Merlin4458]

I havent looked Domestic, as I said im back to rookie stage atm.

The PSU is about 4/5 years old I think. Never had any probs with it, but I dont know if it will be fine for newer parts?

Cooling wise, as long as I equip the wavemaster with enough fans then it should be ok?


On a side note. What are people thoughts on shuttles? Would it get expensive if I went that route?

[Behemoth]

Makesure the fans you get are as quiet as possible Nothing worse than a noisey PC.

[Merlin4458]

Makesure the fans you get are as quiet as possible Nothing worse than a noisey PC.

Your right behe . Ill get some quiet ones.

Whats ur views on using my enermax noisetaker 485w for the rig to save some cash?

And also veiws on going shuttle as an alternative

And also views on going the i3 overclocking route to save some dosh aswell?


I like your views it seems lol

[scaryjim]

Whichever way you go don't get a GTX465. The 1GB GTX460 gives basically the same performance with a much lower power draw & producing much less heat.

Looks like the noisetaker provides 2 PCIe 6 pin connectors and 32A across two 12v rails (22A max per rail). That should be OK for either the GTX460 1GB or 5850, although it's on the lower end of OK, if you know what I mean!

[Merlin4458]

Whichever way you go don't get a GTX465. The 1GB GTX460 gives basically the same performance with a much lower power draw & producing much less heat.

Looks like the noisetaker provides 2 PCIe 6 pin connectors and 32A across two 12v rails (22A max per rail). That should be OK for either the GTX460 1GB or 5850, although it's on the lower end of OK, if you know what I mean!

Thanks for the advice jim, very much appreciated. Thats good news for my power supply. Trusty enermax going for a second build in its life. What a trooper. When u say ok. I wont lose performance from it will i?

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Thanks CAT. But as I said im looking for under 500 idealy and 573 is a little too much at the moment unfortunately.

The AMD build I suggested is around £540. The AMD build with a GTX460 768MB would be around £500:

http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Compo...roductId=40860

Alternatively if you go with the 95W Phenom II X4 945 you could use your existing PSU:

http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Compo...roductId=38137