£500-550 gaming build

LiE

LiE

LiE

Caporegime
Joined
2 Aug 2005
Posts
26,697
Location
Milton Keynes
My brothers 16th birthday is coming up and my parents want to get him a new gaming PC to replace the one that died. He starts a gaming college course in September so it will be used for that as well, but he games a lot.

I'm happy to build the PC but I haven't built one in many years and I'm out of touch with what's what. I'm partly leaning towards getting a custom build from OcUK for peace of mind, but the other part of me wants to see if I can squeeze more from the budget (£500-500) by self building.

Here's what I have roughly put together for a custom build:

RKJuvDbl.png.jpg

This is the base system I upgrade a few bits on: https://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=FS-094-OG&groupid=43&catid=2479

Really appreciate some help on this.

Thanks!
 
Hi LiE,


YOUR BASKET
1 x MSI Radeon R9 380 Gaming 4096MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £179.99
1 x Crucial BX100 250GB SSD SATA 6Gbps 7mm Solid State Drive (CT250BX100SSD1) £79.99
1 x MSI Z97-G43 Intel Z97 (Socket 1150) ATX Motherboard £74.99
1 x Avexir Core Blue Series 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-19200C11 2400MHz Dual Channel Memory Kit (AVD3U24001104G-2CI) - Blue Light £59.99
1 x Intel Pentium K Anniversary G3258 Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £55.99
1 x EVGA 500W 80 Plus Bronze Power Supply (100-B1-0500-KR) £37.99
1 x Seagate 1TB 7200RPM SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache HDD - OEM (ST1000DM003) (1 Year Warranty) £34.99
1 x BitFenix Neos ATX Tower Black/Blue Window £28.99
1 x Silverstone LED Light Strips - Blue £10.25
Total : £563.17 (includes shipping : Ex.VAT).





So you could get a 250GB SSD in if you build yourself, for example.

Gone with a Pentium-K because I don't feel the FX-4350 would be a good purchase for gaming, at this stage. Despite being a dual-core, the Pentium's cores are faster so will outperform the FX-4350 in apps that utilize one or two cores, and it's cheaper. Regardless, he'd likely ultimately want to upgrade CPU at some point no matter which of the two he'd go for, and the Intel Z97 platform offers far more in terms of upgrading.

You did select 16GB of RAM while I selected 8GB, so that needs taking into account, to be fair. I'd let your bro add more RAM later on if he really needs it, and use the money elsewhere, e.g. SSD.

Even if you decide to let OcUK build it, you don't have to restrict your component selection to what the configurator allows. You can open a thread in Customer Services, list the components you like, and ask for a quote.
 
Last edited:
Thanks, some things to think about there. Having an SSD would be nice. He will be doing some 3D modelling so maybe 16GB is needed, and do you not think more CPU cores would benefit him here?
 
How about this as an alternative?

Gigabyte GeForce GTX 960 OC 4096MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (GV-N960OC-4GD) £154.99
(£129.16) £154.99
(£129.16)
AMD Piledriver FX-6 Six Core 6300 Black Edition 3.50GHz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail AMD Piledriver FX-6 Six Core 6300 Black Edition 3.50GHz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail £82.99
(£69.16) £82.99
(£69.16)
Crucial BX100 250GB SSD SATA 6Gbps 7mm Solid State Drive (CT250BX100SSD1) Crucial BX100 250GB SSD SATA 6Gbps 7mm Solid State Drive (CT250BX100SSD1) £79.99
(£66.66) £79.99
(£66.66)
Kingston HyperX Savage Red 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 PC3-14400C9 1866MHz Dual Channel Kit (HX318C9SRK2/16) Kingston HyperX Savage Red 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 PC3-14400C9 1866MHz Dual Channel Kit (HX318C9SRK2/16) £79.99
(£66.66) £79.99
(£66.66)
MSI 970 Gaming AMD 970 (Socket AM3+) DDR3 ATX Motherboard MSI 970 Gaming AMD 970 (Socket AM3+) DDR3 ATX Motherboard £69.95
(£58.29) £69.95
(£58.29)
EVGA 500W 80 Plus Bronze Power Supply (100-B1-0500-KR) EVGA 500W 80 Plus Bronze Power Supply (100-B1-0500-KR) £37.99
(£31.66) £37.99
(£31.66)
BitFenix Neos ATX Tower Black/Black Window BitFenix Neos ATX Tower Black/Black Window £28.99
(£24.16) £28.99
(£24.16)
Silverstone LED Light Strips - Red Silverstone LED Light Strips - Red £10.25
(£8.54) £10.25
(£8.54)
Submit Sub Total : £454.29
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
Deliver to your desk @ Multiplay insomnia LAN Ex.VAT
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : Ex.VAT
VAT is being charged at 20.00% VAT : £90.86
Total : £545.15

He can add a HDD later or use the one from the old PC which is about 500gb (I think).
 
Thanks, so anything else to consider or is the build solid? Need some fans? Does it come with a heatsink the AMD piledriver?
 
LiE said:
Thanks, so anything else to consider or is the build solid? Need some fans? Does it come with a heatsink the AMD piledriver?
Click to expand...

Has all it needs to get going. Yes, it does come with one albeit a bit noisy.

2 x 120mm fans can be added to front of case. Better aftermarket CPU heatsink can be added later on. Or spend a bit extra now.

Could ask him if he'll need a DVD drive at all, maybe.
 
As an alternative in a smaller form factor which I think may suit my brother better, how does this look? I haven't built a smaller form PC before, so any guidance would be appreciated.


MSI Radeon R9 380 Gaming 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card 1 £158.99 (£132.49) £158.99 (£132.49)

Corsair Vengeance Low Profile "SKYLAKE" 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3L PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Memory Kit - Red (CML16GX3M2C1600C9R) 1 £79.99 (£66.66) £79.99 (£66.66)

Crucial BX100 250GB SSD SATA 6Gbps 7mm Solid State Drive (CT250BX100SSD1) 1 £79.99 (£66.66) £79.99 (£66.66)

ASRock B85M-ITX Intel B85 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ITX Motherboard 1 £65.99 (£54.99) £65.99 (£54.99)

Intel Pentium K Anniversary G3258 Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail 1 £55.99 (£46.66) £55.99 (£46.66)

BitFenix Prodigy Mini-ITX Cube Case - Red 1 £54.95 (£45.79) £54.95 (£45.79)

EVGA 500W 80 Plus Bronze Power Supply (100-B1-0500-KR) 1 £37.99 (£31.66) £37.99 (£31.66)

Silverstone LED Light Strips - Red 1 £10.25 (£8.54) £10.25 (£8.54)

BitFenix Spectre PWM 120mm Fan Red LED - Black 1 £7.99 (£6.66) £7.99 (£6.66)
*
Sub Total :
£460.11
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with: Deliver to your desk @ Multiplay insomnia LAN Ex.VAT
(This can be changed during checkout)
Shipping :
Ex.VAT
VAT is being charged at 20.00% VAT :
£92.02
* Total :
£552.13
 
After doing some reading on the components, the final build I'll be buying today is:


MSI Radeon R9 380 Gaming 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £158.99
Kingston HyperX Fury Red 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 PC3-14900C10 1866MHz Dual Channel Kit (HX318C10FRK2/16) £85.99
AMD Piledriver FX-6 Six Core 6300 Black Edition 3.50GHz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail £82.99
Crucial BX100 250GB SSD SATA 6Gbps 7mm Solid State Drive (CT250BX100SSD1) £79.99
MSI 970 Gaming AMD 970 (Socket AM3+) DDR3 ATX Motherboard £69.95
EVGA 500W 80 Plus Bronze Power Supply (100-B1-0500-KR) £37.99
BitFenix Neos ATX Tower Black/Black Window £28.99
Silverstone LED Light Strips - Red £10.25
BitFenix Spectre PWM 120mm Fan Red LED - Black £7.99

Total : £563.14
 
Thanks, had to change the Silverstone LED strips because they are out of stock. Almost all red LED strips were out of stock, had to get the 20cm BitFenix Alchemy premium in the end for £6 more. Also went for the 600W EVGA at the same price as the 500W.
 
LiE said:
Thanks, had to change the Silverstone LED strips because they are out of stock. Almost all red LED strips were out of stock, had to get the 20cm BitFenix Alchemy premium in the end for £6 more. Also went for the 600W EVGA at the same price as the 500W.
Click to expand...

:)

As far as I know, the 80+ EVGA's are very similar inwardly to the 80+Bronze EVGA's, just a bit less efficiency. I think they are a good choice if budget doesn't allow for better.

I've played with a pair of 600B's, and they felt "solid" and were reasonably quiet with a 4770+GTX 770. No problems with either so far after 1 1/2 years.
 
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