Budget Gaming PC

[SumRandomHobo]

Hey, was wondering if anyone could help me, in building a Gaming PC that will be powerful to run new games but at a budget of under 500 pounds.
Need advice on all components except the rig does not have to include monitor, mouse, keyboard or OS i.e. windows 7

Cheers

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

What is the resolution of the monitor you are using BTW??

I have come up with two different builds from Ebuyer.





The Intel build uses a mATX motherboard and no overclocking is possible. Some overclocking is possible on the AMD build although it uses a non-modular PSU and a smaller hard disk. The motherboards in both builds support SATA 3.0 although the one in the AMD build supports USB3.0 too.

The HD5850 1GB is quite close to the HD6870 1GB in performance although the latter has much better tessellation performance:

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/H...D_6870/29.html

However,the HD5870 1GB can be had for around £158:

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/248887

With 20 posts you can get free postage from Scan:

http://forums.hexus.net/scan-care-he...-delivery.html

Scan also does special offers every week too:

http://www.scan.co.uk/todayonly/index.aspx

http://www.scan.co.uk/shopoffers/index.aspx

[Millenwagon]

if i were you id opt for CAT-THE-FIFTH's second choice, only spend a little bit extra and get a slightly better GPU. GTX 470, 480, 560, 570 all very good nvidia GPU's. Though if you'd prefer ati then 6870 is a good choice

[maverick77_uk]

Hi,

Well, if you REALLY want to go budget, this would run most stuff, with a few settings lowered on newer games:

Tekheads:

TekValue Mini Tower Micro ATX Case Black - NO PSU TekValue Mini Tower Micro ATX Case Black - NO PSU £14.99

LiteOn Black 24X DVD-RW + RAM SATA OEM £13.99

Samsung SpinPoint F3 HD502HJ 500GB 7200RPM SATA II 3GB/s 16MB Cache - OEM Samsung SpinPoint F3 HD502HJ 500GB 7200RPM SATA II 3GB/s 16MB Cache - OEM £29.99

4GB PC3-10600 1333MHz DDR3 OEM Memory Module Lifetime Warranty 4GB PC3-10600 1333MHz DDR3 OEM Memory Module Lifetime Warranty £27.50

ASRock N68-S3 UCC (Socket AM3) DDR3 mATX Motherboard ASRock N68-S3 UCC (Socket AM3) DDR3 mATX Motherboard £32.50

Scan:

AMD Athlon II X3 450, Rana, Triple Core, S AM3, 3.2GHz, 1.5MB Cache, HT 4000MHz, 95W, Retail £58.14

512MB Sapphire HD 5670 PCI-E 2.1 (x16), 4000MHz, GDDR5, GPU 775MHz, 400 Cores, D-Sub/ DL DVI-I/ HDMI £57.07

430W Corsair CMPSU-430CX Builder Series, 80% Eff', 120mm Fan, Single 12V Rail, ATX, PS/2 £35.32

Total: £269.50

Probably a bit cheaper with Today Only offers. There are some sacrifices though - the MoBo is only HT1 for instance. Just thinking!

Cheers!

[mkins99]

I'd go for Cat-The-Fifths second option. Look around for similar parts on other sites but the graphics card is very good value... I just spent £95 on a hd5770

[SumRandomHobo]

Thanks everyone for your suggestions, I will keep them all in mind until I buy... which may not be for a while.

The screens resolution is 1920 x 1080

If I were to increase the budget to 600 pounds, how much better would the rig improve and what GPU would be the best out of the GTX's??

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Thanks everyone for your suggestions, I will keep them all in mind until I buy... which may not be for a while.

The screens resolution is 1920 x 1080

If I were to increase the budget to 600 pounds, how much better would the rig improve and what GPU would be the best out of the GTX's??

You could get a GTX560TI 1GB or an HD6950 2GB.

[SumRandomHobo]

Thanks again for the advice, been looking at different 560 ti GPU's. Three I've been looking at are

MSI GeForce GTX 560 Ti TWIN FROZR II 1GB NVIDIA Graphics Card

1GB EVGA GTX560Ti Maximum Graphics Edition Crysis 2

Palit GeForce GTX 560 Ti 2GB NVIDIA Graphics Card

Could you tell me which one I should look into the most or another one that would be better?

At the moment I've decided to wait until scan have a good cheap combo of either the i5 or i7 processor and hopefully can get an 8GB ram. Is this sounding like a good plan or would you suggest looking elsewhere?

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Thanks again for the advice, been looking at different 560 ti GPU's. Three I've been looking at are

MSI GeForce GTX 560 Ti TWIN FROZR II 1GB NVIDIA Graphics Card

1GB EVGA GTX560Ti Maximum Graphics Edition Crysis 2

Palit GeForce GTX 560 Ti 2GB NVIDIA Graphics Card

Could you tell me which one I should look into the most or another one that would be better?

At the moment I've decided to wait until scan have a good cheap combo of either the i5 or i7 processor and hopefully can get an 8GB ram. Is this sounding like a good plan or would you suggest looking elsewhere?

I would still go for an HD6950 2GB reference model though for around £190 to £200. You have a good chance of unlocking the shaders and getting near HD6970 2GB performance.

[SumRandomHobo]

Cheers I'll look into it.

Would you recommend that GPU and the scan deal of the day today? I wont buy today but it will give me an idea of what to look for

Thanks

[SumRandomHobo]

Could you give me advice on this. Is it worth it?

2GB XFX HD 6950, PCI-E 2.1 (x16), 5000MHz GDDR5, GPU 800MHz, 1408Cores, DL DVI-I/ DVI/ HDMI/ 2x mDP

LN35239 2TB Samsung HD204UI/Z4 Spinpoint F4EG, SATA 3Gb/s, 5400rpm, 32MB Cache, 8.9ms, NCQ
LN34957 600W Coolermaster Silent Pro Gold, Modular, 80 PLUS Gold, 90% Eff', SLI/CrossFire, EPS12V, 135mm Fan
LN36550 8GB (2x4GB) Corsair Vengeance DDR3 PC3-12800 (1600), Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 9-9-9-24, XMP, 1.50V
LN38948 Gigabyte GA-Z68X-UD4-B3, Intel Z68 Express, S 1155, DDR3 2133, SATA 6Gb/s, RAID, ATX, USB 3
LN36726 Intel Core i5 2500K Unlocked, 1155, Sdy Bridge, QuadCore, 3.3GHz, GPU 850Mhz, 95W, Retail +Free Game
LN36787 Pioneer DVR-S19LBK 24x DVD±R, 12x DVD±DL, DVD+RW x8/-RW x6, RAM x12, SATA, Black, Retail Labelflash
LN21137 Silverstone KL03B Kublai, Black, Mid Tower, eATX, w/o PSU

All this comes to 804 pounds

Cheers

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Could you give me advice on this. Is it worth it?

2GB XFX HD 6950, PCI-E 2.1 (x16), 5000MHz GDDR5, GPU 800MHz, 1408Cores, DL DVI-I/ DVI/ HDMI/ 2x mDP

LN35239 2TB Samsung HD204UI/Z4 Spinpoint F4EG, SATA 3Gb/s, 5400rpm, 32MB Cache, 8.9ms, NCQ
LN34957 600W Coolermaster Silent Pro Gold, Modular, 80 PLUS Gold, 90% Eff', SLI/CrossFire, EPS12V, 135mm Fan
LN36550 8GB (2x4GB) Corsair Vengeance DDR3 PC3-12800 (1600), Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 9-9-9-24, XMP, 1.50V
LN38948 Gigabyte GA-Z68X-UD4-B3, Intel Z68 Express, S 1155, DDR3 2133, SATA 6Gb/s, RAID, ATX, USB 3
LN36726 Intel Core i5 2500K Unlocked, 1155, Sdy Bridge, QuadCore, 3.3GHz, GPU 850Mhz, 95W, Retail +Free Game
LN36787 Pioneer DVR-S19LBK 24x DVD±R, 12x DVD±DL, DVD+RW x8/-RW x6, RAM x12, SATA, Black, Retail Labelflash
LN21137 Silverstone KL03B Kublai, Black, Mid Tower, eATX, w/o PSU

All this comes to 804 pounds

Cheers

It looks fine but that is much more than £500!!

Remember,Bulldozer is being released next month and this will lead to price drops.

[SumRandomHobo]

Yeah I know

And thanks I shall wait it out if new processers are coming out in a month... sounds best

[kalniel]

Could you give me advice on this. Is it worth it?

Well, it's not budget, and you've got a slow hard drive which will annoy you with loading times. If you need a lot of storage that drive is great, but for an OS drive and/or game loading you'd be better with a smaller capacity faster drive, or make room in the budget for an SSD.