Under 500 to play SWTOR

[Predator]

Hey guys,

My friend is going to join me on SWTOR but only has £500 to spend, what could you recommend him that will handle the game on decent settings at 1920x1080?

I said i'd ask on here what you guys think as you guided me well with mine

Either pre-built or components (I can put it together for him) or even a laptop!

Thanks

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Do you need an OS and a monitor??

[Predator]

Indeed he does.

However he may be able to get his family to buy an OS for him as a present.

Monitor doesn't have to be anything special.

[kalniel]

Hard drive prices are the killer at the moment. Once they drop this is a simple build. In the meantime:



Which is in budget if you get free delivery or source outside of SCAN.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I came up with the following build from Ebuyer.



I would get the Samsung F4 kalniel has mentioned and use the free postage offer you have. OTH,if your mate pays for the postage, I would get the folllowing 500GB drive instead:

http://www.dabs.com/products/seagate...seagate&src=16

The total cost of the build including the OS is around £550 to £560.

Regarding the PSU the Coolermaster GX 450W is under £30 on both Scan and OcUK. It usually retails for around £40 to £45 and is a decent enough PSU for the price. However,it does use a sleeve bearing fan unlike the more expensive XFX Pro 450W but is over £10 cheaper. You could put the money saved towards an HD6870 1GB for around £130 to £140.

I chose a more basic motherboard which has no overclocking options and is only mATX. It does have USB3.0 but lacks SATA3.0 ports. However,it means you can fit in a better graphics card for the price and the motherboard does have 4 RAM slots.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Just realised no motherboard was added!! Doh!!

For my previous build remove the ZS 550W and add this PSU instead:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/450w-...t-fan-atx-v231

This is the motherboard:

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/gigab...hdmi-micro-atx

If you get the Samsung F4 320GB it will come around £135 with free postage and around £145 including postage.

The total cost should be around £576 if you use free Scan postage and Ebuyer free supersaver postage.

However,if you need to add postage for the Scan parts get the following components off Dabs instead:

http://www.dabs.com/products/gigabyt...matx-7V25.html

http://www.dabs.com/products/seagate...rive-7M3C.html

http://www.dabs.com/products/xfx-450...bles-7NSV.html

Because of the free Dabs postage you are getting a higher capacity hard drive and a better PSU for around £151.

If you cannot get a free copy of the OS,you can still get a capable build for around £500.



The motherboard has six SATA3.0 ports as it uses the SB850 southbridge unlike the earlier version of the motherboard.

The other AMD alternative is to get the following parts:

http://www.dabs.com/products/amd-ath...100w-7VMF.html

http://www.ebuyer.com/279248-gigabyt...d-ga-a55m-s2hp

Get the GS 450W from Scan and it should cost around the same as the previous build. In games the CPU should be around the same as a Phenom II X4 945.

[kalniel]

And I forgot a DVD player Still, should be able to find the few quid (~£3) needed to be in budget after free delivery - getting the ebuyer ram for example.

[Hoonigan]

And I forgot a DVD player

Who uses a DVD drive these days? I haven't used mine for such a long time that I'm considering taking it out and putting the blanking plate back in.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Sometimes it is cheaper to get a game on disc than as a download and most Windows installs will be off a disc still.

[Bagnaj97]

Sometimes it is cheaper to get a game on disc than as a download and most Windows installs will be off a disc still.

USB optical drive I've got a white case with no door to hide a drive; optical drives tend to be black, with the odd beige and, rarely, silver option. I use a dvd drive so rarely that USB is fine and it also means I can use it with my netbook if needed.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

It seems the earlier version of the BenQ monitor without the LED backlight can be had for around £83:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B...=hotukdeals-21

[Biscuit]

I would also like to add another vote for the use of USB DVD drives rather than installing one. Just owning one is really handy for troubleshooting!
I actually have a BDRW drive in mine but in hindsight i wish i had just got a blu ray USB one.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I have a USB optical drive too, but with such a tight budget it is another £8 to £10 which is better spent on other components TBH.

[Predator]

Cheers for the help guys, I'm going to forward him this thead and let him decide what he wants to do

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

HD6850 1GB for just under £100:

http://www.ebuyer.com/321991-powerco...p6850-1gbd5-dh