£300 to spend on CPU/ GPU

[AbuRyu]

Hi guys

Ill be starting my 1st build in years, so a bit out of touch with new tech.

What would the best candidates be for £300? . Purpose will be gaming mainly.

Also should I split the budget 50/50 or would putting more to either cpu/gpu give greater yield in performance?

Thanks in advance

[scaryjim]

What's the total budget? You say £300 for CPU & GPU, but actually if we know your full budget we can potentially suggest lower cost motherboards and other peripherals that would free up more money. Or do you have the other bits already? And if so what are they?

[AbuRyu]

To be honest I don't have a fixed budget. I'd imagine it'd set me back between £600- 700 even though I was hoping to spend £500 ish.

I havent bought any parts yet. Just from a quick look at the offerings from both intel /amd, I feel £150 should get me a decent processor for gaming and likewise for GPU. Of course I'm still lookking into this and suggestions would be most welcome.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

What games are you going to run?? Do you need an OS and peripherals,and do you have any existing computer parts you can reuse??

Edit!!

What is your current PC??

[AbuRyu]

What games are you going to run?? Do you need an OS and peripherals,and do you have any existing computer parts you can reuse??

Edit!!

What is your current PC??

At the mo I don't have one. Moved out of parents and left my PC there. So will be building from scratch

I used to play Counter strike/ Bad Company 2/ stalker type games. Yes I've been away from gaming for a while [not even fired up BF3 properly- I do plan on doing so once set up] Aside from those I've not really kept tabs on whats new or worth playing these days, but Ill learn that as time goes by.

[Mehta23]

I was told an upgrade to the gpu makes a bigger difference than a few hundred MHz on the CPU.

I'd say a i5 3570K and a 7850. You could save by getting a cheaper i5 or even a AMD cpu, but I think the i5 is better for gaming.

[AbuRyu]

I was told an upgrade to the gpu makes a bigger difference than a few hundred MHz on the CPU.

I'd say a i5 3570K and a 7850. You could save by getting a cheaper i5 or even a AMD cpu, but I think the i5 is better for gaming.

Which of the AMD cpus would you suggest? fx 8350?

I also intend to overclock them at some point

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Is your total budget including monitor,Windows,keyboard,mouse and speakers?? Those alone will take up £150 to £200 of your budget.

[watercooled]

No way you want to be spending £180 of a £300 budget on a CPU for a gaming build TBH.

I'm jumping the gun a bit here as knowing other details would be helpful, but assuming you still have £300 to spend on CPU+GPU, you'd get excellent performance from something like 6300 (£105) and a HD 7870 (about £170-180).

[Mehta23]

Yeah, tbh I don't know much about the AMD CPU's, but I do know the jump from a 7850 to a 7870 will be a good one.

[AbuRyu]

I've got a keyboard/mouse and Speakers, and maybe an Audigy 2 zs lying aroung, [no idea if that would even be any use as I've heard that onboard tech is better nowadays]

The figures I mentioned as a budget aren't set in stone - essentially I'm looking for the best bang for buck even if that means spending a lil' more.

I'm leaning towards a 7850 [2gb] and 7870, but still undecided on which processor to go for

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Are you going to overclock the CPU?? Also,spending more on a CPU is not necessarily better value for money,you are simply paying more to get more performance!!

[Mehta23]

True say! But just as a FYI, I read the article (might have en an old one tbh) which showed a decent over clock on the CPU gave a solid 10% boost to performance.


I'd say to definitely get the 7870 unless you can justify spending more for a nvidia card, but that's probably not worth it. The 7870 is apparently comparable to the 680 at 1080p.

[AbuRyu]

Are you going to overclock the CPU?? Also,spending more on a CPU is not necessarily better value for money,you are simply paying more to get more performance!!

Yes, I will be overclocking at some point. Agreed, I'd fork out more if there was a significant return on investment.

I've seen that scan have t he fx 8350 for 149.99, but I've been told that I could probs get similar performance if i went for a 6300 as most games generally are single threaded or only use 2 cores.

[AbuRyu]

Are you going to overclock the CPU?? Also,spending more on a CPU is not necessarily better value for money,you are simply paying more to get more performance!!

Yes will be OCing at some point.

The fx 8350 is about 150 quid at scan, but I've been told I'm better off with a 6300 as games wont benefit from the additional cores.

[AbuRyu]

Seen this 7870xt for 173 quid on amazon. Never heard of club3d though so I'm a bit hesitant.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Club-3D-7870...im_computers_2