£350-400 Budget Gamer Machine!

Finchowned

Finchowned

Finchowned

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Joined
6 Dec 2007
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37
Hi.

After Christmas I'm looking at spending £350-400(MAX!) on a half decent general use/gaming machine. I'm going to use Windows XP as the OS and I already have a HDD. Pref to keep it Intel (Dual Core) and not looking for massive uber great peformance.

Found this in another thread:

Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3R (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £64.99 (£76.36)

GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C4 800MHz Ultra Low Latency DDR2 Dual Channel Kit (GX22GB6400UDC) £31.99 (£37.59)

Intel Core 2 Duo E2180 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.00GHz (800FSB) - Retail £48.99 (£57.56)

Sub Total : £145.97
Click to expand...

Was hoping to build on that (GFX, Case and PSU).

Cheers.
 
How about:-

Akasa AK-ZEN-01-BK Zen Black Case - No PSU
(£27.01)

Corsair VX 450W ATX PSU (CMPSU-450VXUK)
(£44.64)

OcUK GeForce 8800 GT 512MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail
(£164.49)

Total : £247.83
 
This is about £10 over the budget but it is going to be very very quick. You could either wait for the Abit IP35-E or similar to come back into stock if the budget is important but the other parts might go up in price or you could drop the graphics to an ATI 3850pro if you aren't quite so bothered about the graphics. :)

Corsair VX 450W ATX PSU (CMPSU-450VXUK) £37.99
(£44.64) £37.99
(£44.64)
Intel Core 2 Duo E2180 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.00GHz (800FSB) - Retail £49.99
(£58.74) £49.99
(£58.74)
GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C4 800MHz Ultra Low Latency DDR2 Dual Channel Kit (GX22GB6400UDC) £24.99
(£29.36) £24.99
(£29.36)
OcUK GeForce 8800 GT 512MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £139.99
(£164.49) £139.99
(£164.49)
Akasa AK-ZEN-01-BK Zen Black Case - No PSU £22.99
(£27.01) £22.99
(£27.01)
Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3R (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £64.99
(£76.36) £64.99
(£76.36)
Sub Total : £340.94
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £9.95
VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £61.41
Total : £412.30

//edit, I was slightly too slow checking prices so didn't see the post above. :)
 
Thanks for the quick replies!

Sounds like a nice bundle, however, I can't really afford £164.99 on a Graphics Card.

Are there any slightly cheaper options?

Cheers.
 
You did say up to around £400 max and with a fairly low budget the temptation is always to take it as far as can be done, the 3850pro as I mentioned would be an acceptable substitute and takes you closer to £350 but for a gaming machine I wouldn't like to go that much lower. In fact I'd suggest the 512mb version of that card if you can get one at a reasonable price and can stretch that far. :)
 
Intel Core 2 Duo E2140 "LGA775 Conroe" 1.60GHz (800FSB) - Retail £37.99
(£44.64) £37.99
(£44.64)
OcUK ATI Radeon HD 3850 Pro 512MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £94.99
(£111.61) £94.99
(£111.61)
Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3R (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £64.99
(£76.36) £64.99
(£76.36)
Crucial Ballistix 2GB (2x1GB) DDR2 PC2-8500C5 1066MHz Dual Channel Kit (BL2KIT12864AA1065) £64.99
(£76.36) £64.99
(£76.36)
Akasa AK-ZEN-01-BK Zen Black Case - No PSU £22.99
(£27.01) £22.99
(£27.01)
Corsair HX 520W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU (CMPSU-520HXUK) £57.99
(£68.14) £57.99
(£68.14)
Sub Total : £343.94
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £9.95
VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £61.93

Total : £415.82

Not bad at all and still leaves you with option to add another 3850 if u come across money. Costs can be cut by getting slower (and significantly cheaper) memory. and as an after thought you could get the cheaper Corsair PSU too!
 
What about this:

buildpe8.jpg
 
Intel Core 2 Duo E2180 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.00GHz (800FSB) - Retail £49.99
(£58.74) £49.99
(£58.74)
Gigabyte GA-P35-DS3L Intel P35 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £53.99
(£63.44) £53.99
(£63.44)
GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C4 800MHz Ultra Low Latency DDR2 Dual Channel Kit (GX22GB6400UDC) £24.99
(£29.36) £24.99
(£29.36)
Antec Sonata III Piano Black Quiet Case - EarthWatts 500W PSU £61.99
(£72.84) £61.99
(£72.84)
Samsung SH-S203D 20x DVD±RW SATA Dual Layer ReWriter (Black) - OEM £14.99
(£17.61) £14.99
(£17.61)
OcUK ATI Radeon HD 3850 Pro 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £79.99
(£93.99) £79.99
(£93.99)
Sub Total : £285.94
Shipping : £10.95
17.5% VAT : £51.96
Total : £348.85
 
hmm, not sure about that ^^ ;)

The 8600 GTS is worse than it's price suggests - read the sticky in the graphics forum.
3850 Pro is supposed to be alright.
 
Can confirm the E2180 with X3850 Pro is a good pairing (together with Geil ULL 2GB RAM) - recently did this myself as a cheapo upgrade for my aging 754pin AMD rig. Best bang for buck upgrade I ever did. Overclocked, you can break 10,000 on 3DMark06, to give an idea of what such a cheap system is capable of. (I only got the 256MB version of the X3850 as well, but it's advisable to get the 512MB version if you have any intention of actually playing DX10 games.) That said, the 8800's are the better cards, so if your budget can stretch then go for them instead.
 
Last edited:
HAz said:
LOL your having a laugh right?
Click to expand...

Yeah what HAz said! 256Mb RAM?? surely a gaming machine needsat least 1Gb, and RAM that's actually compatible lol. I have the ever so slightest feeling that SDR RAM won't work in a DDR2 slot :)

And I really don't think a Celeron would last that setup very long, in fact I think it'd be better to just get an E2180 and clock it (or just leave it at stock)
 
closeratio said:
Yeah what HAz said! 256Mb RAM?? surely a gaming machine needsat least 1Gb, and RAM that's actually compatible lol. I have the ever so slightest feeling that SDR RAM won't work in a DDR2 slot :)

And I really don't think a Celeron would last that setup very long, in fact I think it'd be better to just get an E2180 and clock it (or just leave it at stock)
Click to expand...


lol, the ram would not work with mobo, the cpu wont work with mobo, the graphics also... wonder why he got banned?
 
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