Futureproof console build... on a budget!

L33jaye

L33jaye

L33jaye

Associate
Joined
17 Dec 2014
Posts
3
Hi all, I'm new on here so apologies if I seem a bit green! :p

I've been moving backward and forward between getting an XBone or PS4 and have come to the conclusion that I really wanna play Old republic instead...

My current media low profile PC is a no go (would cost £150 by my reckoning to get it close to running OLD republic) so I would like to invest in and build a games console-like/ Alien Alpha/ mini Gaming pC that, will make a decent stab at Old Republic, as well as other existing/ future multiformat games (Dragon Age3, Watch dogs, Division, Fallout 4 (ahem :)) that a (granted optimised) XBone or PS4 can/ will run, but also with scope for future expansion with regard to a faster processor, GPU, SLI, RAM expansion etc...

I'm not fully bothered about 4k or Ultra settings... But ideally I would like a system incl OS for less than £500...

I apologise if this has already been spoken of... its just that any XBone/ PS4 posts I've seen on general searches have not been current...

I would like to support AMD as a system base ideally (always rooting for the underdog!)... but are they still Value for Money?... its been a while since I have looked through PC spec's in any great detail...

Although I come to this website as recommended by a friend who says they have helped him a great deal.

I appreciate any help anyone can give me!... Sincere regards
 
Hi and welcome :)

Are there any particular cases that stick out at you that you want?

I'd go for intel at £500, as the only ITX AMD board you're going to get is FM2 which is APU (which is a good idea but not massively upgradeable)

e.g. (just a random idea)

YOUR BASKET
1 x Powercolor Radeon R9 270 TurboDUO 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £113.99
1 x Microsoft Windows 8.1 64-Bit DVD - OEM (WN7-00614) £77.99
1 x Intel Pentium G3430 3.30GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £65.99
1 x Antec High Current Gamer M 520W "80+ Bronze" Modular Power Supply £62.99
1 x Kingston HyperX Fury Blue 8GB (1x8GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C9 1333MHz Single Channel Kit (HX313C9F/8) £61.99
1 x Asus H81I-Plus Intel H81 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Mini ITX Motherboard £58.99
1 x Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache WD10EZEX - OEM ** Single Platter ** HDD £43.99
1 x Cooler Master Elite 120 Advanced Mini-ITX Case - Black £39.95
Total : £539.38 (includes shipping : £11.25).



Don't take that as a final spec, not 100% sure if everything would fit (pretty sure, but not 100%) :)

Maximum Compatibility VGA card length: 343.0mm / 13.5 inch
CPU cooler height: 65.0mm / 2.5 inch
PSU length: 180.0mm / 7.1 inch with less cable management
142.0mm / 5.6 inch with full cable management
Click to expand...

From CM website for the case, I believe everything fits with that? Stock cooler would be used, the H81 board provides scope for a future i5 or i7, no SLI support as with all ITX boards, but sacrifices must be made I guess? Modular PSU so the cables aren't all messy in the small chassis, 1x8GB stick of quite slow RAM but again has scope to upgrade to 16GB in the future as there is only 2 DIMM slots
R9 270 should provide enough oomph and the pentium is okay, nothing special but should suffice

If you could stretch a bit more an i3 would be a good idea perhaps
 
Last edited:
If you can pull a ROM drive and hardisk from the old machine then I would go with this.


Sapphire AMD Radeon R9 285 Dual-X 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card
£175.99

AMD Athlon X4 860K Black Edition 3.70GHz (Socket FM2) Kaveri Quad Core Processor
£67.99

Antec ISK600M mATX Cube Case - Black Antec ISK600M mATX Cube Case - Black
£56.99

Gigabyte F2A88XM-DS2 AMD A88X (Socket FM2+) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard
£39.95

Corsair Builder Series CX 430W V2 '80 Plus Bronze' Power Supply
£34.99

GeIL Black Dragon 4GB (1x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz x2 £65.98

Microsoft Windows 8.1 64-Bit DVD - OEM
£77.99

Total £533.98
You should get free shipping so -£12.
 
Up the budget or go console. Spend £600-£700 and get a good one.Matx 500w psu and get a 970 GTX and 4790K and 8GB of ram. You should be able to do this for £600 if you used the second hand market maybe.


PSU should be around £50-£60 for a good 500w and the same for case and 8GB of memory. And you can get a 4790k and GTX 970 for £500 from here too. £100 for a motherboard too.
 
Rofflay said:
Up the budget or go console. Spend £600-£700 and get a good one.Matx 500w psu and get a 970 GTX and 4790K and 8GB of ram. You should be able to do this for £600 if you used the second hand market maybe.


PSU should be around £50-£60 for a good 500w and the same for case and 8GB of memory. And you can get a 4790k and GTX 970 for £500 from here too. £100 for a motherboard too.
Click to expand...

+ OS on top of that £77.99 + storage £42 makes something like £900 which is almost double the original price :o

Would be nice, but it's a massive amount over
 
Wow... many thanks for the advice... I have had similar trouble tho in speccing... everytime I see something I just think 'for a little bit more.....' :)....
I do wonder tho Shivy.... (thanks for the quick response!)....why perhaps an AMD build at this price point may limit future expansion?... I do remember years ago the multitude of sockets for processors.... why can.t there be a standard?!?!!?! :-).... as for the Pentium base... could an i3 or i3 be dropped in in the future?...
 
L33jaye said:
Wow... many thanks for the advice... I have had similar trouble tho in speccing... everytime I see something I just think 'for a little bit more.....' :)....
I do wonder tho Shivy.... (thanks for the quick response!)....why perhaps an AMD build at this price point may limit future expansion?... I do remember years ago the multitude of sockets for processors.... why can.t there be a standard?!?!!?! :-).... as for the Pentium base... could an i3 or i3 be dropped in in the future?...
Click to expand...

Well the am3+ AMD socket is basically dead, so AMD won't be releasing any new big leap forwards in CPUs on that socket, whereas with the h81 boards they will take an i3/i5/i7 happily in the future
 
Definitely persuaded me thanks!... I.m and AMD fan but it seems they.ve dropped the ball with what intel have done then...
could you recommend any other cases?.... is there another mboard you could suggest for SLI in future perhaps?... really appreciate the advice btw... will have to gift you a drink! :-)
 
L33jaye said:
Definitely persuaded me thanks!... I.m and AMD fan but it seems they.ve dropped the ball with what intel have done then...
could you recommend any other cases?.... is there another mboard you could suggest for SLI in future perhaps?... really appreciate the advice btw... will have to gift you a drink! :-)
Click to expand...

No mini ITX boards support SLI, unless you wanted to go for micro ATX? What's your max budget for the case? The Antec cube case jigger posted is one to look at, excellent choice there! (That is micro ATX). Anyway, the GPU you will be getting for £500 will not be massively powerful, so before you SLI it I would highly recommend just changing it out for a faster one in the future instead of SLI or crossfire, especially in a small case where the heat may build up more quickly unlike in a larger case
 
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom