Budget gaming PC

Dibbley247

Dibbley247

Dibbley247

Associate
Joined
20 Feb 2013
Posts
34
I was looking at building a basic gaming PC with intel z77 boards as I will need everything from scratch except DVD drive, hard drive, and card reader. But this price soon got quite hefty.
So I thought I'd look the AMD route. This is my first time building and actually learning what's what!!
So I've come up with this:

Gigabyte F2A85X-UP4 Motherboard (SKT-FM2)
AMD A series A10-5800K 3.8ghz
PNY GeForce GTX 570 Graphics card - 1.25 GB - GDDR5 SDRAM

I'll also be buying a SSD for the OS which I'll be getting Windows 7
A PSU
And a case which I have seen for £50

Does this seem ok? I would like to play things like sim city need for speed and possibly skyrim?

Thanks
 
lol you found out that building a Z77 based machine is not cheap the hard way :p

a budget would help a little.

You can go with a Trinity APU CPU, this just means the GPU is build in and onboard:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-331-AM&groupid=701&catid=1967&subcat=1946

This really helps on a budget, not sure on a motherboard choice.

For RAM you really can't go wrong, DDR3 ram, even cheap stuff is still good quaility:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-114-GL&groupid=701&catid=8&subcat=2423
Or
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-134-KS&groupid=701&catid=8&subcat=2426

Not sure if that CPU can handle that memory clock, someone can build on that lol (EDIT: It does)

A decent 450watt PSU would be sufficient:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-006-XF
 
I would say between £400-£500.
I know I can buy "high spec" gaming PC for around £400 but common sense tells me that won't last long or I may have many problems, plus I would like to learn about how everything works. So yeah I realised the Z77 route is a no no lol.
What is meant by the CPU not handling the memory clock?
This is how I looked at it: CPU looks good for the money, look at socket type. Find a board which holds the CPU and check things like has it got pci 2 etc and BAM.
This is what I've learnt so far! Lol

I really have been struggling looking at what to pair up as I don't fully understand how these parts work together! Also I see some figures out there which look awesome, then see how cheap they are.. Like a 4gb graphics card for under £100, I need somewhere that'll show me exactly what everything is/means!
 
YOUR BASKET
1 x MSI HD 7850 OC 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Cards with Tomb Raider & Bioshock PC Games £149.99
1 x Intel Core i3-3220 3.30GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £91.99
1 x Gigabyte Z77-D3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £89.99
1 x XFX Pro 550W Core Edition '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £54.98
1 x Corsair Carbide 200R Compact ATX Case - Black £49.99
1 x Samsung Green (MV-3V4G3D/US) 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz 30nm Dual Channel Kit £35.99
Total : £485.53 (includes shipping : £10.50).


Unfortunately there's no SSD, but this build will perform better than a build you suggested originally. An SSD can always be added later.

More memory on a graphics card doesn't mean better. For example, a 2GB GT640 is worse than a 1GB 7850. 4GB is probably overkill for your needs. 2GB is generally the standard nowadays.
Also, pairing a A10 with a GTX 570 is not the right idea imo, as the A10 has a good onboard GPU. For the same performance and less price you could possibly get a Phenom (however they are becoming rare, especially with AMD's new range - Piledriver.)
 
+1 to the above. Though you can get cheaper RAM and either a cheaper motherboard or a B-grade one to accomodate the SSD.
 
So The basket quoted would let me run games okish?
And to be clear, if I wanted to upgrade CPU later, then I can't use the 3rd Gen type?
If I wanted to Have a board capable of this, but keep the CPU you recommend, What board should I go for ready to gear up in the future?

But this looks good!!

How can I look into how to pair up things CORRECTLY and how to read and understand Graphic cards etc. Like the above which I thought might run well, which turns out, isn't so great?

But thanks for your feedback!! Its much appreciated.
 
LukieBoy007 said:
YOUR BASKET
1 x MSI HD 7850 OC 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Cards with Tomb Raider & Bioshock PC Games £149.99
1 x Intel Core i3-3220 3.30GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £91.99
1 x Gigabyte Z77-D3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £89.99
1 x XFX Pro 550W Core Edition '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £54.98
1 x Corsair Carbide 200R Compact ATX Case - Black £49.99
1 x Samsung Green (MV-3V4G3D/US) 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz 30nm Dual Channel Kit £35.99
Total : £485.53 (includes shipping : £10.50).


Unfortunately there's no SSD, but this build will perform better than a build you suggested originally. An SSD can always be added later.

More memory on a graphics card doesn't mean better. For example, a 2GB GT640 is worse than a 1GB 7850. 4GB is probably overkill for your needs. 2GB is generally the standard nowadays.
Also, pairing a A10 with a GTX 570 is not the right idea imo, as the A10 has a good onboard GPU. For the same performance and less price you could possibly get a Phenom (however they are becoming rare, especially with AMD's new range - Piledriver.)
Click to expand...

No hhd required, just re-read the post.
 
Last edited:
 
I understood it, Just wanted to check about the Motherboard, I'd rather save a little more for me to be able to put a better CPU in at a later date, and not be stuck with 2nd gen.

Thanks :)
 
Z77 is 3rd gen. 4th gen will be Haswell, but has a 1150 socket. If you wanted to, wait a few months as Haswell should be arriving within a few months, and you may have more money to put into it too :)

Idleman said:
No hhd required, just re-read the post.
Click to expand...
"I'll also be buying a SSD for the OS which I'll be getting Windows 7" ;)
 
YOUR BASKET
1 x HIS HD 7850 IceQ X 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (H785QN2G2M) with Tomb Raider & Bioshock PC Games £155.99
1 x Plextor M5 Pro 128GB Extreme Series Solid State Drive - (PX-128M5P) £99.95
1 x Intel Core i3-3220 3.30GHz (Ivybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor (77W) - Retail £91.99
1 x **B Grade** Gigabyte Z77-D3H Intel Z77 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £60
1 x XFX Pro 450W Core Edition '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply £39.95
1 x Samsung Green (MV-3V4G3D/US) 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz 30nm Dual Channel Kit £35.99
1 x Xigmatek Asgard Pro Gaming Case - Black £32.99
Total : £530.95 (includes shipping : £11.75).



£30 over budget but you get 2 free games which you could sell and get around £50 or so. The Z77 board will allow you to upgrade to an i5-3570k if you wanted to.
 
Oh I thought I was being told to re-read the post haha.
To be honest, it'll be a few more months before I buy it, so hopefully the price might fall (fingers crossed) but if not, just means that tad more overtime to save up and stash away from the Mrs!!! haha
 
On another note.

The SSD, I was only looking at getting the lowest size to cater for windows, or is that the wrong idea? As I have seen most builds for 100g+
 
Cache that on as well????? For years I've literally just use a PC for downloading music and videos and a couple of older games like patrician 2 and some tycoon games.

I've got a 320g hard drive in m current PC which I can format and use to install games for the time being.

The plan was:
About a 60GB SSD for windows
Use my 320GB Hard drive for the time being to install some games
Then get a network hard drive as the main one so I can download onto that and then The other PC can be used also and both can access the network drive.
 
Dibbley247 said:
Cache that on as well????? For years I've literally just use a PC for downloading music and videos and a couple of older games like patrician 2 and some tycoon games.

I've got a 320g hard drive in m current PC which I can format and use to install games for the time being.

The plan was:
About a 60GB SSD for windows
Use my 320GB Hard drive for the time being to install some games
Then get a network hard drive as the main one so I can download onto that and then The other PC can be used also and both can access the network drive.
Click to expand...

You would be better installing the games and any programs you use regularly on the SSD due to the much faster loading times. The hard drive can be used just as a storage device.
 
lee32uk said:
You would be better installing the games and any programs you use regularly on the SSD due to the much faster loading times. The hard drive can be used just as a storage device.
Click to expand...

That may be true for multi-player games, loading maps etc, but in single player games I have not noticed any difference. All my games, including steam, origin and u-play are now all installed on my hard drive.
A 60GB ssd would be all right, as you can move a lot of folders on to a small partition on your hdd as well as any other software.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom