£500 for WOW rig inc Win 7 & Monitor

w1llyg

w1llyg

w1llyg

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549
Hey my dear OC friends.

My student friend wants a new rig to play wow on.
He is currently using a Pentium 4 single core processor @2.8Ghz. He has a 19" monitor 4:3 ratio. (EDIT res is 1280x1024)
He also has a Nvidia 2800GT? Eco version (brought this 1.5 years ago).
He has a hard drive samsung f3 HDD with XP on from Dell so i guess he needs a complete new WIN 7.

This is what I specced him (very unsure if the GFX card is an improvement or not)

Budget £500... Heres my attempt

YOUR BASKET
1 x AMD Bulldozer FX-4 Quad Core 4100 Black Edition 3.60Ghz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail **£10 CASHBACK** £89.99
1 x OcUK E2250SWDA 22" Widescreen LED Monitor - Black £85.99
1 x Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 64-Bit - OEM (GFC-02050) £79.98
1 x Asus M5A97 AMD 970 (Socket AM3+) DDR3 Motherboard £74.99
1 x Corsair Builder Series CX 600W V2 '80 Plus' Power Supply (CMPSU-600CXUKV2) £59.99
1 x Cooler Master Elite 430 Windowed Case - Black £34.98
1 x OcUK GeForce GT 520 1024MB GDDR3 Low Profile PCI-Express Graphics Card £33.59
1 x Gelid Tranquillo CPU Cooler (Socket 754/939/940/AM2/AM2+/AM3/LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366) £25.99
1 x OcUK 22x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £17.99
1 x Kingston HyperX Blu 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX1600C9AD3B1K2/4G) £17.99
Total : £536.47 (includes shipping : £12.50).



EDIT I get free delivery & cashback off the bull dozer makes me £13 over budget
 
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^^ may be i3 and use the stock cooler with that CPU which would be top draw and put the dosh towards another component
 
Surely the Bulldozer is better than the 2 core i3. May see a slight improvement in games, but surely the bulldozer @3.6 run just better in general.
 
w1llyg said:
Surely the Bulldozer is better than the 2 core i3. May see a slight improvement in games, but surely the bulldozer @3.6 run just better in general.
Click to expand...

Bulldozer is naff - Slower and hotter and more power consumption.


This is a build you should buy,

Untitled-137.png


You get £20 back with this offer - http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18347004 - I believe the offer is still valid.

• Z68 motherboard so you have SATA3.0/USB3.0 and all the other Z68 features, it will also allow overclocking of "K" CPU's and future CPU's
• Much better GFX card.
 
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Both cards are overkill in WOW, the 6850 will also be faster in other titles.

So I would get the £100 6850.
 
Hmm, great build stulid. Still £40 over budget. Is there any other corners that can be cut.

Oliver, thank you for that, but isnt the 460 old technology.

Is there anything better on the second hand market. Or is it always better to buy new.
 
Its sometimes often better to get a higher range old card, (such as 6850) than to jump to the lower range cards of the current gen.

Personally dont like the 460's as i've had a few friends with bad heat issues on them, and on top of that, some with fans that just dont seem to do their job!
 
w1llyg said:
Oliver, thank you for that, but isnt the 460 old technology.
Click to expand...

Not that old, but the hd6850 is very close and much more efficient (power usage, heat).

Is there anything better on the second hand market. Or is it always better to buy new.
Click to expand...

I wouldn't bother second hand. Either he forks out the £40, get win 7 via his university (Microsoft does all kinds of deals for student software), stick with WInXP for a while (although it is OEM?), or use a HDMI TV for monitor.
 
w1llyg said:
Hmm, great build stulid. Still £40 over budget. Is there any other corners that can be cut.

Oliver, thank you for that, but isnt the 460 old technology.

Is there anything better on the second hand market. Or is it always better to buy new.
Click to expand...

the only way you could save the £40 is by going with a H67 or H61 motherboard. however, this would be shooting yourself in the foot because you wouldnt be able to overclock your obvious upgrade choice, the i5 2500k with one of those

the GTX 460 might be old tech, but its about the same as the 6850 overall. however, because they are the same price i will recommend the 6850 because it has a better cooler and uses less power than the 460
 
I think his going to buy Stulid's build.

Any alterations needed or can we click the buy button?

Cheers

EDIT: Anyone know if we need to buy a DVI cable or is one supplied with the monitor?
 
Stulids build is bang on fella.

Nothing wrong with using the 6850 the only real alternative is the EVGA 460 Superoverclocked edition. It is better than the 6850 and can be overclocked further it also has physx and cuda support. You'll notice Beej has one in his sig which he is running at 850 mhz!

It is however £20 more than the 6850, seeing as your trying to reduce costs, I can't see you opting for that card. You could drop the mobo to the H series to save money but as the other guys have said that isn't really a wise choice.

Good luck with the build any problems you know where we are
 
So i'm not a WOW player - but this seemed to fit pretty closely with my own requirements - so will likely pick up the same build.

My Budget including OS and Monitor is 600 ish quid, with a bit of flex - I guess the thing I would need to add is a HDD - what would people recommend for a HDD to complete this build for a reasonably active gamer.. Skyrim, Deux Ex: HR etc..
 
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