Coming over from console gaming.

damadom0

damadom0

damadom0

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So after being out of the PC gaming space for around 10 years now, mainly playing video games on both xbox 360 and xbox one I'm finally going to get back into PC gaming after deciding it would be a better choice then getting the xbox one X.

I know this question has been asked many times before and I've been reading a lot of information on here and other places about the hike in GPU and RAM prices due to mining if I should just wait until they come down in price first or bite the bullet and get a gaming rig even though I would need everything keyboard, mouse and monitor.

with a budget of around £700 will I see more of a benefit over my xbox one?

At current I'm used to playing games at 30fps and most games don't even run at 1080P so most of the articles I've read say that with a budget of what ive said I would see a good gain in quality and fps.

I was thinking of maybe getting everything apart from the monitor as I could just use my TV but then again I've read things about response times and screen tearing due to not running games at the native resolution and with my TV being a 4K display I would be worried that it would be screen tear heaven.

So as mentioned before I'm out of my depth with where the PC scene is right now so I would be very grateful if someone could give me some advice as to the best route to go down Ryzen APU or CPU with discrete graphics?

Many thanks Matt.
 
To be quite honest, buying new with a £700 budget means corners would need to be cut somewhere in order to have a complete system with great experience.

My advice is to buy a second hand base unit, with out a graphics card, an old Dell/HP/Lenovo tower with an i7-4770 and 8/16GB RAM, cost between £200-250, and then buy a graphics card for it, you could budget around £350-400 for an Nvidia GTX 1070 or 1070Ti, since prices are starting to drop significantly. The only other thing you might need is a better PSU, since the ones installed in the base systems are only usually around 350w, so that would be about £50-70. You may also want an SSD for a better experience, but it's not 100% necessary as it won't slow down your FPS, just loading times, and the Windows experience.

In total, you'll end up with a system that can play all of the AAA titles at 1080p/1440p at beyond 60FPS, and well in to the 100+ range in other with very high settings enabled. Due to the stagnation of the CPU market between 2010, and last year, the i7's from 2014, with 4 cores and 8 threads are more than capable if running most of the latest games, with out issue.

You then also have the benefit of being able to easily upgrade in future, with peace of mind knowing that your biggest investment (graphics card) will be the one that lasts the longest, and the rest of the system would still sell for almost what you paid for it, even 12-18 months down the line.

It may also pay to wait a couple of months, to see if Nvidia launch a new range of cards, but it could be that they only release the xx80 card, rather than the xx70, and below meaning you'll end up waiting even longer, so it's a coin toss presently. :)
 
You can see why @Journey had suggested the above

My basket at Overclockers UK:
  • 1 x OcUK Gaming Vision VR Gaming PC - Intel 8th Generation 3.6GHz Quad Core = £744.98
    • Processor:*Build Promo* Intel Core i3-8100 3.6GHz (Coffee Lake) Quad Core Processor
    • Memory:*Build Stock* Team Group Vulcan T-Force 8GB (1x8GB) DDR4 PC4-24000C16 3000MHz - Grey
    • Graphics Card:*Build Stock* Palit GeForce GTX 1060 Dual 6144MB GDDR5 Graphics Card
    • Solid State Drive:Unwanted
    • CPU Cooler:Unwanted
    • Case:Phanteks Eclipse P400 Midi Tower Case - Black Window
    • WIFI:Unwanted
    • Security Software:Bullguard Anti-Virus 2017 - 1 PC 1 Year **Offer Price**
Total: £759.08 (includes shipping: £14.10)​
​

Older i7 still has more grunt then latest i3 which is now 4 cores and 4 threads Vs older i7 4 cores 8 threads.
A gtx 1070 will destroy a gtx 1060 etc
Only thing you lose out on is warrant if second hand for main system . A year ago, would have been a different story
 
thanks for the help guys, I did have a think of buying second hand but didn't cross my mind to have a look for a full system already and put a decent graphics card in. I don't have a desktop at the minute just a £300 4 year old laptop I do internet browsing on. I have seriously thought of getting the one X just that there are some games that I really enjoy playing such as Cities Skylines and Planet coaster that wouldn't/don't work on consoles.

Thanks for the advice ill have a lot of researching to do now.
 
Budget is a little tight - especially with a 4K screen...

Probably not enough storage - could potentially half the ram, or could drop to a GTX 1060 6GB - but that wont drive a 4K TV very well - tough one! Could get a cheaper case - but its not going to knock much off the bill...

AMD Ryzen would be better value - but would add about £50 to do it right, maybe slightly more.


My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £796.51 (includes shipping: £11.70)​
​
 
 
thanks for the advice bongohunter but I think ill go with the second hand route get a machine with a i7-4770k in it and buy a 1070 for it, I wouldn't be playing games at 4K as that would take a monster of a rig, I'd just be using the tv whilst I got a monitor.
 
Actually, you'll be fine at 4K with a GTX 1070. You won't get ultra detail on the newest games but you won't notice it.
 
Would it be worth looking for a I7-4770k for the overclocking ability? I’ve found a few second hand Dell towers for sale so will keep looking for a decent one.
 
damadom0 said:
Would it be worth looking for a I7-4770k for the overclocking ability? I’ve found a few second hand Dell towers for sale so will keep looking for a decent one.
Click to expand...

You'll be lucky to find anything with a K chip in it, especially from the top teir OEM's - here's a few I found just now

Lenovo ThinkCentre M93p - i7-4770 3.40GHz (3.90GHz boost), 8GB RAM, 1TB - £259 or £279 with 16GB
HP ProDesk 600 G1 Tower - i5-4570 3.20GHz (3.60GHz boost), 8GB, 1TB, DVD-RW, GeForce 8400GS, Win8Pro - £154.99
HP EliteDesk 800 G1 Tower - i7-4790 3.60GHz (4.00GHz boost), 8GB RAM, 1TB HDD, DVD-RW, Win10Pro, - £249

All of them are instant purchase, or have best offer available, so you can usually knock another £20-30 off. :)
 
Thanks Journey, they are some of the ones I’ve found on a popular selling sight.

Is there anything I should out for when buying second hand?
 
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