£500-£550 gaming pc

Silverdust3011

Silverdust3011

Silverdust3011

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Joined
26 Jun 2011
Posts
33
Hi guys, I would apreciate some advice if possible

I am looking to do my first pc build and would like some help specing the machine if possible. My price limit is £500-£550 and I don't need windows 7 or Optical

Thanks again for looking
 
My humble offering:
Product Name Qty Price Line Total
Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor £161.99
(£134.99) £161.99
(£134.99)
OcUK GeForce GTX 460 OC 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £109.99
(£91.66) £109.99
(£91.66)
MSI P67A-G45 Intel P67 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard (Sandybridge) ** B3 REVISION ** £99.98
(£83.32) £99.98
(£83.32)
BeQuiet Pure Power L7 530W '80 Plus' Power Supply £44.99
(£37.49) £44.99
(£37.49)
Samsung SpinPoint F1 1TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (HD103UJ) £34.99
(£29.16) £34.99
(£29.16)
Corsair XMS3 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CMX4GX3M2A1600C9) £30.98
(£25.82) £30.98
(£25.82)
Cooler Master Elite 335 Case - Black £29.99
(£24.99) £29.99
(£24.99)
Arctic Cooling Freezer 13 High Performance CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775/1155/1156/1366/939/AM2/AM2+) £22.99
(£19.16) £22.99
(£19.16)
Sub Total : £446.59
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £11.75
VAT is being charged at 20.00% VAT : £91.67
Total : £550.01
 
My humble AMD offering:

MSI GeForce GTX 560 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £159.98
(£133.32) £159.98
(£133.32)
AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 965 Black Edition "125W Edition" 3.40GHz (Socket AM3) - Retail £99.98
(£83.32) £99.98
(£83.32)
Gigabyte 990XA-UD3 AMD 990X (Socket AM3+) DDR3 PCI-Express ATX Motherboard £89.99
(£74.99) £89.99
(£74.99)
OCZ StealthXStream 2 600W Power Supply £50.99
(£42.49) £50.99
(£42.49)
Samsung SpinPoint F1 1TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (HD103UJ) £34.99
(£29.16) £34.99
(£29.16)
Corsair XMS3 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CMX4GX3M2A1600C9) £30.98
(£25.82) £30.98
(£25.82)
Akasa AK-CC4005SP01 Venom Nano CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366/AM2/AM3) £29.99
(£24.99) £29.99
(£24.99)
Cooler Master Elite 335 Case - Black £29.99
(£24.99) £29.99
(£24.99)
Sub Total : £439.08
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £12.50
VAT is being charged at 20.00% VAT : £90.32
Total : £541.90

The graphics card is a bit better and the PSU has a little more wiggle room.

The CPU is not as hot as the Sandybridge but the board supports the upcoming Bulldozer chip so you could upgrade in future.
 
I think you have done very well to be fair. That is assuming you are set on SandyBridge I think that is the best you are going to get for the price anyway. The case doesn't come with a front fan, you might wanna stick one of those in but other than that, a decent spec.
The problem is that you have used a GTX460. I fully understand how hard it is to fit a 2500k into a budget like yours and I think you have done well as I said before but if you went with an AMD system with an AM3+ mobo you could probably be looking at 560Ti. How likely are you to be able to make a big upgrade (at least £150) in about 6 months - 1 year?
This was regarding the Intel build.

About AMD...
I think you could get a 560 Ti in there, it is quite a bit better than a normal 560, definitely worth the extra £10-£15 especially as you haven't maxed out on the budget. I have this one and it is pretty good. Stays quiet even when playing games on maxed.

All depends on when/if you plan to upgrade in the near future..


3rd edit on this post: Basically I was at this price point a few weeks ago and if I had it again I probably would still go with AMD. It isn't struggling and now there are affordable AM3+ mobos out to tempt you even more which I didn't have. I haven't really tested it as I am waiting for the summer sale on steam to buy some games although I have MW2 and it runs everything completely maxed and recording with fraps at 1080p fine. I basically have the spec you suggested with a lot worse motherboard and a 560Ti.
 
Last edited:
 
A second run at the AMD build (including 560ti):

KFA2 GeForce GTX 560Ti EX OC Edition 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £179.99
(£149.99) £179.99
(£149.99)
Gigabyte 990XA-UD3 AMD 990X (Socket AM3+) DDR3 PCI-Express ATX Motherboard £89.99
(£74.99) £89.99
(£74.99)
AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 955 Black Edition "125W Edition" 3.20GHz (Socket AM3) - Retail £89.99
(£74.99) £89.99
(£74.99)
BeQuiet Pure Power L7 530W '80 Plus' Power Supply £44.99
(£37.49) £44.99
(£37.49)
Samsung SpinPoint F1 1TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (HD103UJ) £34.99
(£29.16) £34.99
(£29.16)
Cooler Master Elite 430 Windowed Case - Black £33.98
(£28.32) £33.98
(£28.32)
Corsair XMS3 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CMX4GX3M2A1600C9) £30.98
(£25.82) £30.98
(£25.82)
Akasa AK-CC4005SP01 Venom Nano CPU Cooler (Socket LGA775/LGA1155/LGA1156/LGA1366/AM2/AM3) £29.99
(£24.99) £29.99
(£24.99)
Sub Total : £445.75
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £10.50
VAT is being charged at 20.00% VAT : £91.25
Total : £547.50
 
Last edited:
Ooh I thought that Pickman was the OP when typing above post which is why it might look a bit weird, anyway you definitely want to go for the 955 Phenom. Why the change between spec? It would fit in the budget. Also noticed you did the 965 over the 955 earlier. 955 is basically the same just clocked a bit lower, easily changed with a nice overclock, make those slight changes and I will probably suggest what you go for.


Pickman said:
I Reaper's case/psu is probably a better idea for this build.
Click to expand...
i would say if you can afford the bequiet which he can then go for it. The Case + PSU bundle is always something that gets thrown around but that PSU at 500W and not a 80+ efficient one too, bit risky with a 560Ti surely?
 
Last edited:
DJmartin said:
i would say if you can afford the bequiet which he can then go for it. The Case + PSU bundle is always something that gets thrown around but that PSU at 500W and not a 80+ efficient one too, bit risky with a 560Ti surely?
Click to expand...

Well I meant if the OP goes for the intel build, I know that the bundle PSU's are less than ideal but the Sandy build is a really tight squeeze.
 
Hi, just started looking at the post there, was away doing something :)

I'm trying to make it a gaming PC to the person who asked earlier and would like the build to last a couple of years (don't mind if I have to change a few things over that time)

For some reason I'm in two mind about going with AMD, is it as good as Intel at the moment. I can only judge on other people I know telling me to always go Intel cause they last longer and are more reliable, Thanks for all the tips though, trying to go through them and see if I can stretch my budget.
 
It isn't as good as Intel at the moment but then it is also cheaper. I've said to a few people it is around this price point where things get difficult as Intel is affordable but you have to skimp on a lot of things in order to get it whereas speccing with AMD is more of a luxury as you can put more money into every area. I'll look now at what the lowest price i think you should go for Intel with. Just my opinion though.

I've heard a few people say that for a computer to last the next few years, a 560Ti is the lowest GPU you should get. That is why i went for it myself. On these forums the 5850 tends to get a lot more praise than from people I talk to irl and other people I know through the internet/gaming. To get an Intel + 560Ti build I would struggle to get below £600~
 
Last edited:
As above, the intel is a lot better. The AMD plays everything fine at the moment but won't have nearly the same maximum life span as the intel.

If you go with the AMD then in a year or two you will probably need a CPU upgrade but the GPU and other componants will last a bit longer than the ones in the intel spec.

If you go with the Intel spec then the CPU will probably last you years. The down side is that the GPU is not as flashy and you will want to upgrade that in a year or two instead.

Personally I would go with the intel (and preferablly sell a kidney to raise an extra £70 so you can slap in a GTX 560ti, which will last a good deal longer than the GTX 460 will).
 
Well this is what I was looking at:


YOUR BASKET
1 x KFA2 GeForce GTX 560Ti EX OC Edition 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £179.99
1 x Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor £161.99
1 x MSI P67A-G45 Intel P67 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard (Sandybridge) ** B3 REVISION ** £99.98
1 x BeQuiet Pure Power L7 530W '80 Plus' Power Supply £44.99
1 x Samsung SpinPoint F1 1TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (HD103UJ) £34.99
1 x Cooler Master Elite 430 Windowed Case - Black £33.98
1 x Corsair XMS3 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CMX4GX3M2A1600C9) £30.98
1 x Samsung SH-S222AB/BEBE 22x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £16.99
Total : £616.50 (includes shipping : £10.50).

It's now over £600 cause I forgot about the Optical drive until right before posting. It's not necessarily needed though. Mine will probably go unused for ages and the Operating system can be booted from a pen drive. As you can see, there is a big jump between the 3 main components in price to everything else cause you really have to go for the lowest possible ones. Don't go for the Case + PSU bundle because as well as the problems I stated earlier, it also only has one power connector for the graphics card and the 560Ti needs 2, you could get a molex adapter but then it may be a bit unstable I have read. Also doesn't include an aftermarket cooler but overclocking is not necessary at the moment as at stock it will still beat the AMD build any day and then if you want a performance increase a couple of months down the line you can buy a cooler and overclock it.
 
DJmartin said:
Well this is what I was looking at:


YOUR BASKET
1 x KFA2 GeForce GTX 560Ti EX OC Edition 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £179.99
1 x Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor £161.99
1 x MSI P67A-G45 Intel P67 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard (Sandybridge) ** B3 REVISION ** £99.98
1 x BeQuiet Pure Power L7 530W '80 Plus' Power Supply £44.99
1 x Samsung SpinPoint F1 1TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (HD103UJ) £34.99
1 x Cooler Master Elite 430 Windowed Case - Black £33.98
1 x Corsair XMS3 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (CMX4GX3M2A1600C9) £30.98
1 x Samsung SH-S222AB/BEBE 22x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £16.99
Total : £616.50 (includes shipping : £10.50).
Click to expand...

The Optical drive is not needed, so the build is just under £600.

This is the build you should buy. Pawn something, mug someone, stop eating for the first two weeks of July and buy this.

(Please note that I do not condone mugging people or starving ones self, if it is against forum rules)
 
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