Guide - the Budget Gaming PC

Bonesy.

Is this good for 100 euro and would it be good for gaming? : Intel Pentium D 915 Dual Core 2.88GHz, 800 FSB speed, 4MB L2 cache, Asus P5ND Motherboard, Xigmatek Dark Knight Cpu Heatsink and Xigmatek Fan.

Buying Case, HDD, Graphics Card etc seperate.

Monotype

No, not good value and not good for gaming. You could have a H61 and the celeron G530 for cheaper and double the speed.

Bonesy.

Intel Core i3 2100 LGA 1155 3.10 GHz CPU Sandybridge + Stock heatsink good for 85?

Brian

Are any of the Bulldozers significantly better than my 955? My mobo is forward compatible apparently.

ShadowHearth

Baza210 wrote: »

Are any of the Bulldozers significantly better than my 955? My mobo is forward compatible apparently.

not worth it.

rcazzy

1. What is your budget?
€500 or less. (As low as possible, really)

2. What will be the main purpose of the computer?
Gaming/Photoshop/3D Modelling

3. Do you need a copy of Windows?
No

4. Can you use any parts from an old computer? [Hard drive/DVD Drive/Case/PSU/etc.]

Graphics Card - Gigabyte GV-N560OC-1GI GeForce GTX 560 Ti 1GB
Sound Card - Creative X-Fi Soundblaster
PSU - ALPINE 650 WATT PSU UNIT SUPER SILENT
Hard Drive
DVD Drive
Possibly some RAM (4GB currently, only DDR2)

5. Do you need a monitor?
No

6. Do you need any of these peripherals? [Keyboard/Mouse/Wireless Card/Card Reader/Speakers/etc.]

No (Maybe a keyboard...)

7. Are you willing to try overclocking?
Yes

8. How can you pay?
Credit Card/Paypal

9. When are you purchasing?
ASAP

10. If you need help building it, where are you based?
Athlone, but should be fine building on my own.


I'm looking to upgrade my motherboard, processor and RAM mostly.
Any cooling for OCing might help too.

Whatever works best for what I need. A new case may be in order also. I currently have an Apevia q-Pack2, which might be a bit squashed for extra parts.

IrishMetalhead

Total build cost: €433.87 + €30 shipping
ASRock P67 Pro3 (B3), Sockel 1155, ATX €84.65
8GB-Kit G.Skill RipJaws-X PC3-12800U CL9 €38.18
Intel Core i5-2500K Box, LGA1155 €195.88
be quiet!Dark Rock Advanced €44.89
NZXT LeXa S Midi-Tower - black, ohne Netzteil €70.27

I do recommend getting a new power supply as alpine have never really been reliable but up to yourself if you want to trust it or not

seanbmc

1. What is your budget?
400 at most

2. What will be the main purpose of the computer?
Gaming
3. Do you need a copy of Windows?
No

4. Can you use any parts from an old computer?

RAM, Sound card, Hard drive, CD drive


5. Do you need a monitor?
Nope

6. Do you need any of these peripherals? [Keyboard/Mouse/Wireless Card/Card Reader/Speakers/etc.]

Nope

7. Are you willing to try overclocking?
Yes



Was thinking of a motherboard along the lines of this, http://www3.hardwareversand.de/articledetail.jsp?aid=50895&agid=1603

Can someone give me a hand? I need a new power supply to as the one I currently have is only a 350w. Will need to get a new case aswell.

Thanks guys.

Peter8

I am building a Gaming pc and I am trying to cut some costs and was wondering if an SSD really effects performance?

Also if I should just boy a i5 2500k box or get the tray and a separate heat sink(+30)?

Monotype

seanbmc wrote: »

RAM, Sound card, Hard drive, CD drive

What kind of RAM (DDR, DDR2, DDR3?) and how old are the drives (old drive = IDE connector not found on many new motherboards)?

Peter8 wrote: »

I am building a Gaming pc and I am trying to cut some costs and was wondering if an SSD really effects performance?

Also if I should just boy a i5 2500k box or get the tray and a separate heat sink(+30)?

SSDs are very good for fast booting and program access. E.g., when the PC boots you can pretty much launch your browser instantly and it takes less than a second to open. I think it's well worthwhile although I think you'd notice the difference more when you're going back to using a PC that just has a hard drive.

The tray + heatsink is better if you want a quieter system with higher overclocks although the box is OK if you just want to get a system up and running with a lower overclock and spend on another component. You could upgrade the heatsink in the future.

Eboggles

seanbmc wrote: »

1. What is your budget?
400 at most

2. What will be the main purpose of the computer?
Gaming
3. Do you need a copy of Windows?
No

4. Can you use any parts from an old computer?

RAM, Sound card, Hard drive, CD drive


5. Do you need a monitor?
Nope

6. Do you need any of these peripherals? [Keyboard/Mouse/Wireless Card/Card Reader/Speakers/etc.]

Nope

7. Are you willing to try overclocking?
Yes



Was thinking of a motherboard along the lines of this, http://www3.hardwareversand.de/articledetail.jsp?aid=50895&agid=1603

Can someone give me a hand? I need a new power supply to as the one I currently have is only a 350w. Will need to get a new case aswell.

Thanks guys.

Total build cost: €337.87 + €30 shipping
ASRock H61M-HVS (B3), Sockel 1155, mATX €42.25
Sapphire HD6770 1G GDDR5 PCI-E €85.83
Intel Core i3-2100 Box, LGA1155 €104.53
BitFenix Merc Beta €32.63
8GB-Kit G.Skill PC3-10667U CL9 €31.68
Super-Flower Amazon 80Plus 450W €40.95

I don't know what ram you have so I have some thrown in. What's your monitor res? The card is good for the money but is quite low-end-ish.

Total build cost: €383.43 (inc delivery Free!)
ASRock S1155 Intel H61M DDR3 mATX €49.19
Corsair 430 Watt CX430 V2 Builder Series 80 Plus Power Supply €39.84
XIGMATEK Asgard III Case €34.83
Corsair Memory 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3 1333MHz 240-pin DIMM CL9 €39.59
XFX ATI Radeon 6770 HD 850MHz 1GB PCI-Express HDMI €90.79
Intel Core i3-2120 3.30GHz LGA1155 3MB €129.19

Or from Dabs if you wanted to go Irish (goes to the Irish taxpayer anyway) , might be easier as it's not coming from Germany, although I've heard about them being a bit late before...
Depending on the RAM you have, and if it's usable you could upgrade the graphics to this (Dabs)

seanbmc

Monotype wrote: »

What kind of RAM (DDR, DDR2, DDR3?) and how old are the drives (old drive = IDE connector not found on many new motherboards)?




SSDs are very good for fast booting and program access. E.g., when the PC boots you can pretty much launch your browser instantly and it takes less than a second to open. I think it's well worthwhile although I think you'd notice the difference more when you're going back to using a PC that just has a hard drive.

The tray + heatsink is better if you want a quieter system with higher overclocks although the box is OK if you just want to get a system up and running with a lower overclock and spend on another component. You could upgrade the heatsink in the future.

Hmm yeah. The drives are releatively new so that shouldn't be a problem I don't think.

Edit. Is the i3 enough? Is is worth going up to the i5 for gaming? I've been hearing mixed reports from people regarding this.

Eboggles wrote: »

Total build cost: €337.87 + €30 shipping
ASRock H61M-HVS (B3), Sockel 1155, mATX €42.25
Sapphire HD6770 1G GDDR5 PCI-E €85.83
Intel Core i3-2100 Box, LGA1155 €104.53
BitFenix Merc Beta €32.63
8GB-Kit G.Skill PC3-10667U CL9 €31.68
Super-Flower Amazon 80Plus 450W €40.95

I don't know what ram you have so I have some thrown in. What's your monitor res? The card is good for the money but is quite low-end-ish.

Total build cost: €383.43 (inc delivery Free!)
ASRock S1155 Intel H61M DDR3 mATX €49.19
Corsair 430 Watt CX430 V2 Builder Series 80 Plus Power Supply €39.84
XIGMATEK Asgard III Case €34.83
Corsair Memory 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3 1333MHz 240-pin DIMM CL9 €39.59
XFX ATI Radeon 6770 HD 850MHz 1GB PCI-Express HDMI €90.79
Intel Core i3-2120 3.30GHz LGA1155 3MB €129.19

Or from Dabs if you wanted to go Irish (goes to the Irish taxpayer anyway) , might be easier as it's not coming from Germany, although I've heard about them being a bit late before...
Depending on the RAM you have, and if it's usable you could upgrade the graphics to this (Dabs)

I use 1680x1050 monitor and a HD TV currently.


I'm liking the looks of that second build. And the delivery is free. I have 4gbs DDDR3 ram so that graphics card is tempting.

Genghiz Cohen

Those are H series motherboards. I don't think you can overclock with those.
You'll have to spend like twice the amount on your mobo if you are still interested in overclocking.
Cheapest non H-Series.

Completionist

Don't forget your 2 free games if you are going the dabs route.

Serephucus

You can't overclock with a H series chipset, but the i3s aren't exactly at the top of the food chain, and even with a H board, you can get anything up to an i5 2400 without OCing, and that's over twice the power of the i3 already.

This is the cheapest OC-friendly board from HWVS if you're interested.

http://www3.hardwareversand.de/articledetail.jsp?aid=46920&agid=1601

seanbmc

Completionist wrote: »

Don't forget your 2 free games if you are going the dabs route.

Oh that's cool.

Not sure if I'll be interested in overclocking, it's a pc for my brother but I'm putting it together for him. I'm not sure whether to get the i3 or i5, but when I have enough money for buying my own machine I'll probably be interested in overcloking.

Peter8

I need to find a GTX 570 to go with this build, I just wan't to make sure I get the best bang for buck seeing how the prices range on the same card.

http://www3.hardwareversand.de/articledetail.jsp?aid=30069&agid=1628
http://www3.hardwareversand.de/articledetail.jsp?aid=41224&agid=1617
http://www3.hardwareversand.de/articledetail.jsp?aid=52888&agid=1601
http://www3.hardwareversand.de/articledetail.jsp?aid=44315&agid=1192
http://www3.hardwareversand.de/articledetail.jsp?aid=41084&agid=631

Eboggles

For a €400 build an i3 is perfect. To upgrade you'd want maybe a 2500k to overclock which means you'd need a p67/z68 board which is an extra €140ish. For gaming you'd be grand for now with the i3, most games only use one core.

Edit: as serephecus said, the i5 is better of course than the i3, if you have the money go for the i5 2400.

seanbmc

Grand, thanks lads. I'll probably order off DABS.

Peter8

Hey guys, about to buy my GPU and was wondering what the difference between these two GTX 570's would be?

http://komplett.ie/Komplett/product/ZKB_01COM/10_GRPCARD/11_NVIDIA/productdetails/20076976/ASUS_GeForce_ENGTX570_DCII_2DIS_1_25GB_PCI_E/90_C1CQ60_X0UAY0BZ/default.aspx

http://www3.hardwareversand.de/articledetail.jsp?aid=41032&agid=707

Serephucus

The ASUS one has a 3-slot cooler. It'll be able to handle very high overclocks, and will probably run cooler and quieter than the POV one. I'd go with the ASUS if it was me, considering that comparable after-market coolers usually cost a lot more than €25. Just make sure your case and motherboard can support a triple slot card correctly. (If not sure post specs)

Peter8

http://www3.hardwareversand.de/articledetail.jsp?aid=52888&agid=1601

That is the motherboard I am ordering.

ShadowHearth

I got that asus gtx570.

i call it a fat bastard. tempretures on it are fantastic, but OCing is hit and miss.

stock it is 734mhz at 1014v. the only stable setup i managed to get out of it was 830 at 1.1v. with that OC unigine gets only 56 degrees max and full load 2h BF3 session went max to 62 degrees,which is very very good.

great card, but make sure you can fit in as it is a pain in a hole. make sure no sata or fron panel connection in the way.

Peter8

Thanks, ASUS it is

ShadowHearth

Peter8 wrote: »

Thanks, ASUS it is

Good when you decide to upgrade I wil buyl it of you for sli . Or I will sell you my one if I decide to go 7970

Peter8

ShadowHearth wrote: »

Good when you decide to upgrade I wil buyl it of you for sli . Or I will sell you my one if I decide to go 7970

I will have this build for quite a long while so I will probably end up buying the 570 off of you! (for a reduced 'friendship' price of course :P)

snip123456789

conzymaher wrote: »

There are a lot of threads here looking for advice on building a cheap gaming PC so I thought it would be good to make a series of guide systems with the best bang for buck components available...

So, First up is the 500 euro Gaming PC!

The CPU will reach 3ghz with some very easy overclocking
2gigs of PC2-8000 memory lots of OC headroom and good performance
750i motherboard gives option of SLI
9600gt 512mb Great value and will play every modern game just fine
500gig HDD
DVD-RW drive
Decent 650watt PSU future proof and ready for SLI or upgrade to Quad etc


Shop : www.hardwareversand.de very reliable, shipping to Ireland is 30 euro

I assumed you have an existing case / OS / peripherals

Overall its a great system and seen as it has an SLI motherboard you can add a second 9600gt later for a huge boost in performance (allmost the performance of the flagship 9800GX2 in some cases)

Recommended upgrades:

8800gt Much better graphics card worth the extra 20 euro

Recommended Monitor:

22"
20"
19"

Recommended peripherals:

Razer DeathAdder Mouse

Logitech Slim Keyboard

That's it! You will be owning noobs in no time, have fun

could you get me the links for these things please

VenomIreland

snip123456789 wrote: »

conzymaher wrote: »

There are a lot of threads here looking for advice on building a cheap gaming PC so I thought it would be good to make a series of guide systems with the best bang for buck components available...

So, First up is the 500 euro Gaming PC!

The CPU will reach 3ghz with some very easy overclocking
2gigs of PC2-8000 memory lots of OC headroom and good performance
750i motherboard gives option of SLI
9600gt 512mb Great value and will play every modern game just fine
500gig HDD
DVD-RW drive
Decent 650watt PSU future proof and ready for SLI or upgrade to Quad etc


Shop : www.hardwareversand.de very reliable, shipping to Ireland is 30 euro

I assumed you have an existing case / OS / peripherals

Overall its a great system and seen as it has an SLI motherboard you can add a second 9600gt later for a huge boost in performance (allmost the performance of the flagship 9800GX2 in some cases)

Recommended upgrades:

8800gt Much better graphics card worth the extra 20 euro

Recommended Monitor:

22"
20"
19"

Recommended peripherals:

Razer DeathAdder Mouse

Logitech Slim Keyboard

That's it! You will be owning noobs in no time, have fun

could you get me the links for these things please

That post was made 4 years ago, so it's quite outdated now.

century21

hii am looking for a gaming pc asap,must be able to play all the call of duty games,including latest versions. does anybody know where i could get one,tried various websites but didnt see anything much yet for sale,my budget is approx300-400 euro.thanks

Serephucus

Have a look towards the bottom of the PC Building and Upgrading 101 thread. There's a list of sample builds.