Cheapest possible rig for photo editing/ light gaming

Sumer

Sumer

Sumer

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26 Aug 2012
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My sisters laptop has died so now she wants a desktop with its main aim being some photo editing and light gaming (sims etc). She doesn't have a budget at the moment but would just like to see what people could suggest.

Operating system, keyboard and mouse do not have to be included in the build.

If you can squeeze in a monitor that would be perfect but if not then the tv will have to suffice for a little while.

Cheers.
 
Heres my quick attempt.

YOUR BASKET
1 x AMD A8-5600K Black Edition 3.60GHz (Socket FM2) APU Trinity Quad Core Processor (AD560KWOHJBOX) £83.99
1 x Gigabyte F2A55M-DS2 AMD A55 Chipset (Socket FM2) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £49.99
1 x Western Digital Caviar Blue 500GB SATA 6Gb/s 16MB Cache - OEM (WD5000AAKX) HDD £46.99
1 x Corsair Builder Series CX 430W V2 '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply (CP-9020046-UK) £40.99
1 x Avexir MPower Yellow Series 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Memory Kit (AVD3U16000904G-2CM) £40.00
1 x Cooler Master Elite 310 Midi Tower Case - White/Blue £32.99
1 x Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro Rev 2 CPU Cooler (Socket 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366 / AM2 / AM2+ / AM3 / FM1 / FM2) £19.99
Total : £327.54 (includes shipping : £10.50).



CPU has decent onboard graphics and is capable at some gaming. It's also a quad core which might come in handy for photo editing. You can reduce the cost here by going for a dual core CPU if you feel that she wont need 4 cores.

Motherboard is cheep and cheerful with a UK RMA centre for peace of mind. Sadly, this one does not have a HDMI so it cannot be used on most TVs (As far as I know) but for a few pounds more I believe there are Gigabyte, and other brands, which offer this display option.

HDD is decent size. You may find cheaper/large capacity for a similar price on Overclockers.

PSU is more than enough for this build. If you want something a little more reliable you could look into either Seasonic or XFX branded power supplies but sadly these can cost a bit more.

Case is nice and basic and there are a few cheaper or better looking ones for a little more.

8GB RAM for smooth operation since the AMD onboard graphics will share this memory. To get better graphical performance you can get faster RAM, but if it's light gaming it may not be worth the extra cost.

CPU cooler which is pretty silent and when I had it it performed well and was a simple whisper even under load :)

I whipped this up quite quickly so there may be parts slightly cheaper which you could get away with but this is personally what I would go for for a reliable computer. If you want it even cheaper you could get a weaker CPU, get rid of the CPU cooler or maybe even a cheaper motherboard :)

I don't know much about monitors but I have this one: http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MO-041-AS and I personally think it's fantastic:)
 
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Thanks for the builds so far, I completely forgot about the AMD A series cpu's. I can definitely conjure up a good cheap build from the parts mentioned.
 
YOUR BASKET
1 x Samsung S24A300BL 24" Widescreen LED Monitor - Glossy Black £119.99
1 x AMD A10-5800K Black Edition 3.80GHz (Socket FM2) APU Trinity Quad Core Processor (AD580KWOHJBOX) £99.95
1 x Gigabyte F2A85X-D3H AMD A85X Chipset (Socket FM2) DDR3 ATX Motherboard £64.99
1 x Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache WD10EZEX - OEM ** Single Platter ** HDD £48.95
1 x GeIL EVO Leggera 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-17000C11 2133MHz Dual Channel Kit (GEL38GB2133C11DC) £43.99
1 x Corsair Builder Series CX 430w Modular '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply (CP-9020058-UK) £39.98
1 x NZXT Source 210 Elite Midi Tower Case - Black £39.95
1 x Alpenföhn Matterhorn Pure Edition CPU Cooler (Socket 775 / 1155 / 1156 / 1366 / AM2 / AM2+ / AM3 / FM1 / FM2) £29.99
1 x OcUK 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £12.95
Total : £524.86 (includes shipping : £20.10).

 
For photo editing an IPS panel works best, and a matt screen as well in my view.

One thing - monitors usually come setup too blue. You need to go into the setup and put the colour temperature to 6500K. Some monitors have a choice of modes but give them names, you need to look in the documentation to find out which one is the one you want.
 
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