£250 budget: 7850 and save rest vs 7950

[Jhaemes]

Will be looking to purchase about December time, anything coming out soon?

I'll have £250 to spend, current spec is

i3 2100
Gigabyte Z68 (cheapest one OcUK stock)
Kingston 128GB SSD (old ish 300gb mechanical drive for main storage)
GTX 550Ti


I'm thinking a 2GB 7850, then using the remaining £100 for a new case and a 1TB hard drive (BitFenix shinobi most likely).

Haven't considered Nvidia yet. Uses will be newish games at 1080p if that's any help.

 

[Gregster]

The 7950 is a great card but I fear your I3 could possibly be a bottleneck if it is at stock. If it is, a 7850 would see you well and a tidy OC on that GPU would help

 

[Jhaemes]

Yep, definitely overclocking.

I did a bit of looking into if my i3 2100 would bottleneck and it seemed to be all over the place. Some people said it would on BF3 (which I don't play), where-as others have said it'll be fine.

I could always get the 7850 first, see how it performs then get an i5 3570k if it's bottlenecking, sell the i3 2100 on to offset the 3570k cost.

Option One:
YOUR BASKET
1 x Gigabyte ATI Radeon HD 7850 OC Windforce 2X 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card w/ FARCRY3, Nexuiz, Sleeping Dogs & Dirt Showdown PC Games £149.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 1TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (ST1000DL002) £59.99
1 x BitFenix Shinobi USB3.0 Gaming Case - White/Blue £43.99
Total : £268.07 (includes shipping : £11.75).




Option Two: Custom cooled 7950, like the HIS at £240

Looking at benchmarks the 7950 doesn't seem miles ahead at 1080p and I'm not overly sure I'd ever use 3GB of VRAM, planning to stick to single monitor 1080p.

I wouldn't mind an Nvidia option, but unless they do something they're out of this race.

 

[Cleeecooo]

If this is your mobo, then I'd suggest the following:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-3570K 3.40GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £184.99
1 x MSI HD 7850 OC 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Cards w/ FARCRY3, Nexuiz & Sleeping Dogs PC Games £119.99
Total : £316.38 (includes shipping : £9.50).



Bit over budget though

 

[Cleeecooo]

Option Two: Custom cooled 7950, like the HIS at £240

Looking at benchmarks the 7950 doesn't seem miles ahead at 1080p and I'm not overly sure I'd ever use 3GB of VRAM, planning to stick to single monitor 1080p.

I'd go for this one if you choose a custom 7950:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-148-MS&groupid=701&catid=56&subcat=1673

 

[pgi947]

Or even take a look at the 7870's? They took a massive performance jump with 12.11.

 

[psychodil]

Can you over clock that I3 much? I thought they were multiplier locked.

If not you could always look to a second hand 2500k

 

[Jhaemes]

Ah right, didn't see the MSI.

Mobo is this: http://www.gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=3899#ov

Don't particularly want the 1GB VRAM card, since the lack of VRAM will fast become the bottleneck there.

I suppose I could up the budget to include the 3570k and a 2GB 7850, that'd be the best option then?

Edit: Yep, i3 2100's cannot be overclocked at all. Second hand 2500k is another option, but they're a bit pricey at £150~ (would be waiting for the 3570k to hit £165ish again before buying that).

 

[Cleeecooo]

Ah right, didn't see the MSI.

Mobo is this: http://www.gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=3899#ov

Don't particularly want the 1GB VRAM card, since the lack of VRAM will fast become the bottleneck there.

I suppose I could up the budget to include the 3570k and a 2GB 7850, that'd be the best option then?

Edit: Yep, i3 2100's cannot be overclocked at all. Second hand 2500k is another option, but they're a bit pricey at £150~

They go for around £115 second hand

 

[Jhaemes]

Ah right, I must've looked at buy it now's rather than auctions.

Think that's the best option then, if I can snag one for that.

 

[Cleeecooo]

Ah right, I must've looked at buy it now's rather than auctions.

Think that's the best option then, if I can snag one for that.

Do you not have MM acess?

 

[Jhaemes]

Nope, only started posting semi-regularly after they upped it to 1000 xD

 

[Cleeecooo]

ouch

 

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I would probably get the HD7950 now,and when the CPU actually becomes an issue,get a Core i5.