Cheap Gaming PC?

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11 Aug 2007
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1,666
Hey there

Well basically I want to buy a new PC mainly for gaming but I don't have that much cash to spend atm and I only need the PC tower cos I upgraded my monitor/keyboard/mouse/speakers at Christmas. I have between £300 and £400 to spend and I know I am not going to be getting the cream of the crop gaming PC but I want something that will play games like Battlefield 2, Battlefield 2142, Stalker, Oblivion and stuff like that on pretty decent settings. Any help with this is much appreciated.
I don't mind if it means buying the computer parts all seperate and building it up myself so either a ready built PC or all of the parts is OK.

Thanks for your time.
 
Something like this should do the trick:

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The E4400 is a good overclocking chip and with the 2mb cache it will help. The ATI 2600 has relatively the same power on DX9 games as the Nvidia 7900 GS/GT Cards so you should get high settings on most games, maybe not on Oblivion but hey if you want to overclock, the world is your oyster :)
 
I like playing games that are supposed to look awesome as awesome as possible lol, I'm not one to settle for playing the game on low with jagged edges and stuff so yeah, I need something to can make the games look pretty good with anti-aliasing.
 
For your gaming needs I would suggest scrape together anuva £100 and get a 8800 GTS 320.

HP DVD 1035i 20x DVD±RW x12 Ram Dual Layer DVD-Writer (Black) - OEM £13.99
(£16.44) £13.99
(£16.44)
Western Digital Caviar SE16 320GB 3200AAKS SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM £38.99
(£45.81) £38.99
(£45.81)
Antec Sonata II Piano Black Quiet Case - 450W Smart Power PSU £59.99
(£70.49) £59.99
(£70.49)
Crucial 2GB (2x1GB) DDR2 PC2-5300C5 Dual Channel Kit (CT2KIT12864AA667) £44.99
(£52.86) £44.99
(£52.86)
Intel Core 2 Duo E2140 "LGA775 Conroe" 1.60GHz (800FSB) - Retail £39.99
(£46.99) £39.99
(£46.99)
EVGA nForce 650i Ultra (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard (122-CK-NF66-T1) £54.99
(£64.61) £54.99
(£64.61)
EVGA GeForce 8800 GTS 320MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (320-P2-E811-AR) £159.99
(£187.99) £159.99
(£187.99)
Sub Total : £412.93
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £9.95
VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £74.00
Total : £496.88

However if you cannot afford it drop the GTS above a get this instead.
Sapphire ATI Radeon X1950 Pro 512MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £84.99
(£99.86) £84.99
(£99.86)
Sub Total : £337.93
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £9.95
VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £60.88
Total : £408.76
 
As someone already said, you really should consider saving a little more and going with the 8800GTS. Especially as you like playing with high settings with AA.
 
DFI Infinity P965-S Dark (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £44.99
(£52.86)
OcUK 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C5 800MHz DDR2 Dual Channel Kit 09) £51.99
(£61.09)
Intel Core 2 Duo E2160 "LGA775 Conroe" 1.80GHz (800FSB) - Retail £49.99
(£58.74)
OcUK ATI Radeon X1950 Pro 256MB GDDR3 HDTV/DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £59.99
(£70.49)
Samsung SH-S203BEBN 20x20 DVD±RW Dual Layer Serial ATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £16.99
(£19.96)
Samsung SpinPoint T HD501LJ 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM £53.99
(£63.44)
Antec Sonata III Piano Black Quiet Case - EarthWatts 500W PSU £60.99
(£71.66)
Sub Total : £338.93
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £10.95
VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £61.23
Total : £411.11
 
Im gonna get flaimed for this one but you sound like your in the same boat as i am.

Spec.png


yes its not Core 2 but its cheaper. could knock another £30 of and get the 256mb X1950 Pro if needs be. just an idea for ya buddy


ta

alec
 
allllec said:
yes its not Core 2 but its cheaper.

The only real logical thing to do on a tight budget is buy a cheap c2d and overclock it a fair bit essentially getting a very quick ~2.7GHz - 3.6GHz processor for about £50 which is superb "bang for buck" which you should be trying to do on a tight budget.
 
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Yes, but if you cannot afford C2D in the first placee.. whats better nothing or AMD? :o

despite what the average person on here might earn i do not, as do others and some of us cant afford it. dont get me wrong i reckon it would be much more beneficial, just not possible in some cases thats all :)
 
truebluecfc said:
The only real logical thing to do on a tight budget is buy a cheap c2d and overclock it a fair bit essentially getting a very quick ~2.7GHz - 3.6GHz processor for about £50 which is superb "bang for buck" which you should be trying to do on a tight budget.

No, that's not the logical thing to do at all. On a tight budget you should look into AMD, because it's cheaper, therefore letting you spend more on graphics/RAM.
 
Intel E2140 Overclocked to 2.7GHz probably on stock vcore for £39.99, and thats a moddest estimate, could easily reach ~3, 3.2GHz on air.

So why would you buy an AMD if you can get a £40 CPU to 3GHz? especially when the same priced AMD processor couldnt overclock anywhere near it thus making a C2D a much better "bang for buck" :confused:
 
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becuase when you add the price of the cpu + motherboard together its often cheaper (assuming your an average customer buying at normal prices) to get AMD.

for example my motherboard + cpu (brand new) came to *edit* £62 *edit* or there abouts. couldnt do that with c2d. now im really not trying to be argumentative or make c2d sound rubish. but there is NOTHING wrong with AMD's cpu's. okay they are not as fast as c2d but that dosent mean they are slow. if you are on a very tigh budget (<350ish for a complete base unit) more often than not your better of going amd


*edit*


and stop playing with figures.

the Intel E2140 is £46 inc vat (which vast majorty of us pay). add ontop intel motherboards and usualy more expensive..
 
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