£250 to spend on mobo, cpu, mem and gfx for a gamer

Plec

Plec

Plec

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£300 to spend on mobo, cpu, mem and gfx for a gamer

I've been asked to upgrade a friends machine and he's got £250 to spend on an existing unit and so only needs a cpu, motherboard, memory and a gfx card. He uses it mostly for gaming and so i was considering a spec along the lines of:

£62 Intel Pentium Dual-Core E5200 "LGA775 Core 2" 2.50GHz (800FSB) - Retail
£75 Gigabyte GA-EP43-S3L Intel P43
£35 Kingston HyperX 4GB (2 X 2GB) DDR2 8500C5 1066MHz Dual Channel Kit
£77 XFX ATI Radeon HD 4830 512MB GDDR3

Approx total of £249

I know very little about the current gfx market and the best bang for buck for under £100 - so any advice on that front would be appreciated.

I will stress I tried researching the sticky thread but there seems to be a problem with it.

Thanks

Plec
 
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That's about the best you can do for his budget. E5200 should clock to between 3.2 and 3.6Ghz at least. The ram is massively overkill for a E5200 though. Even when clocked you will not get near 1066mhz. I suppose it's good value at £35 for 4Gb though. 4830 is a half decent card too.
 
If you down the AMD route you can do the following for a little bit over budget but you get a 4850 instead of a 4830

The 7750+ can overclock quite well as well.

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Thanks for the replies guys.

pastymuncher, yes that RAM price surprised me too - i figured he could use it in a future board at that price.

Fonz-Valo, oddly enough i've just read an article on the AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 940 Black Edition and it mentions that it will fit into a AM2+ motherboard so there would be the benifit of future proofing a very cheap system. I'll mention it to him but he is quite INTEL orientated but he may persuaded if the combo you suggested is faster and future proof - to a degree.

I hadn't noticed that 4850 card at £99.98 i may have to persuade him to get that anyway at that price.

Thanks again for the replies, appreciated.

Plec
 
It would be worth noting that the motherboard i chose also has AM3 processor support so it is future proof even further than the AM2+ X4 940 you've mentioned
 
Decisions, decisions.

I think both builds are great fun for the money - you really get a lot of power for, relatively, little outlay. For the price he will have a system that boxes well above its weight. He just has to decide on the cpu format and if he can afford the extra £30 then the 4850 card seems very good value. I'm guessing he'll plumb for the INTEL build as the board will still be pretty future proof but the AMD 7750 Black has had good reviews so i'll show him them and let him decide.
 
Well i've showed him the reviews and this thread and he's opted for:

£62 Intel Pentium Dual-Core E5200 "LGA775 Core 2" 2.50GHz (800FSB) - Retail
£75 Gigabyte GA-EP43-S3L Intel P43 with the intention of clocking
£34 Corsair XMS2 4GB DDR2 PC2-6400C5 TwinX (2x2GB) (i've used the brand in the past and the reviews look good)
£100 XFX ATI Radeon HD 4850 'XXX edition' 512MB GDDR3

So his new total is £272 plus his delivery. I think the extra for the card is deff worth the money and he will have a great rig for a great price. TBH, i'm rather jelous it's one of the best value builds i've come across.

Thanks for the input guys.

Plec
 
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Thanks for heads up, kieves1.

Ok, he's upped his budget to £300 absolute max (including P&P) as he loves the idea of the ATI 4850 gfx card and he, now, is keen on overclocking and so is adding the Akasa AK-965 CPU Cooler to his order.

As he's considering clocking, relatively, aggressively is the Gigabyte GA-EP43-S3L Intel P43 board the most suitable option or does the next board up, the Gigabyte GA-EP43-DS3L Intel P43, offer more clocking features or stabilty - or does it just offer RAID? (it's hard to tell just looking at board features/spec - usually users or forum members have the insider knowledge.)

If it is just RAID then i would probably advise against the board as i like to keep the mobos as simple as possible - less to go wrong with friends who don't know what their doing = less phone calls for help to me.

Plec
 
Ok he's committed to the XFX 4850, 5200 CPU, Corsair XMS2 4GB DDR2 PC2-6400C5 TwinX Memory and the Akasa AK-965 CPU Cooler - i just need to know if there is any benefit, apart from the RAID, between the Gigabyte GA-EP43-S3L Intel P43 and the Gigabyte GA-EP43-DS3L Intel P43.

On the Gigabyte webiste for the S3L it states that 'Note: This motherboard is designed with VRD11.1 power phase, and cannot be compatible with VRD10 designed CPU. Please refer to "CPU Support List" for details.' but there is no mention of this for the DS3L yet the chip combatabilty looks the same - so confusing. (And tbh, i have no idea what their talking about.)

Essentially, if the S3L has the same clocking stability and the same CPU compatability as the DS3L then, as stated before, i would rather get the cheaper board as it rules out future hassles for me - plus he can spend the £10 he saved and buy me an extra crate of bud as a thank you.

Thanks for the help so far guys appreciated - it's easier building for myself as i don't feel so obligated to get the perfect buy for the money.


Edit: i've just ordered myself the XFX 4850 card as the spec is amazing and a great price - but d'oh, I forgot to use the free p&p for forum members.

Plec
 
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