Gaming PC for £350?

shocco

shocco

shocco

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26 Dec 2012
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Looking to build a gaming PC capable of playing games at 1080p High settings for most games for around 350.

Here's what I got:

Case: Bitfenix Merc Beta - £30 (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-011-BX&groupid=2362&catid=2277)
Mobo: Gigabyte GA-78LMT - £40 (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-415-GI&groupid=701&catid=1903&subcat=1481)
CPU: AMD FX 6300 - £80 (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-338-AM)
Ram: HyperX 4GB Black - £29 (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-166-KS)
HDD: WD Scorpio 250GB - £35 (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-347-WD)
GPU: GTX 750TI OC - £103 (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-248-MS)
PSU: Corsair CX 430W - £38 (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-115-CS&groupid=701&catid=123&subcat=2462)

= £355

It's either a gaming PC or an Xbox One and I'd rather stick to PC gaming. Would this suffice or can you make a better build?
 
Last edited:
4GB of Memory is not a lot today esp for a 64bit OS, IMO look to 8GB at least.

The GPU is kind of weak IMO also but I am not too hot with lower end parts TBH.

I am pretty sure some peeps can do you a better spec for near same price.
 
shocco said:
Looking to build a gaming PC capable of playing games at 1080p High settings for most games for around 350.

Here's what I got:

Case: Bitfenix Merc Beta - £30 (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-011-BX&groupid=2362&catid=2277)
Mobo: Gigabyte GA-78LMT - £40 (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-415-GI&groupid=701&catid=1903&subcat=1481)
CPU: AMD FX 6300 - £80 (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-338-AM)
Ram: HyperX 4GB Black - £29 (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-166-KS)
HDD: WD Scorpio 250GB - £35 (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-347-WD)
GPU: GTX 750TI OC - £103 (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=GX-248-MS)
PSU: Corsair CX 430W - £38 (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-115-CS&groupid=701&catid=123&subcat=2462)

= £355

It's either a gaming PC or an Xbox One and I'd rather stick to PC gaming. Would this suffice or can you make a better build?
Click to expand...


Some things to watch out for:

The Gigabyte GA-78LMT motherboard does not support Piledriver CPUs (according to Gigabyte's official CPU support list). So they may or may not work. And in any case, with only SATA II, USB 2.0 and 1333MHz memory support, you're better off spending a little extra on a better/newer tech motherboard, imo.

And as jh30uk advised, 8GB RAM would be good.

So I'd stretch budget if I were you. Alternative basket, with changes, including a slightly cheaper case to compensate a little, with two fans:

YOUR BASKET
1 x MSI GeForce GTX 750Ti OC 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (N750Ti-2GD5/OC) £103.99
1 x AMD Piledriver FX-6 Six Core 6300 Black Edition 3.50GHz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail £79.99
1 x MSI 970A-G46 AMD 970A (Socket AM3+) DDR3 Motherboard £57.95
1 x Kingston HyperX Beast 8GB (2x4GB) PC3-19200C11 2400MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX24C11T3K2/8X) £45.95
1 x NZXT Hale Power 90+ 550W '80 Plus Gold' Power Supply £39.95
1 x Toshiba (7K1000.D) 500GB SATA 6GB/s 32MB Cache - OEM (DT01ACA050) HDD £35.99
1 x Aerocool V3X Advance Evil Blue Edition Midi-Tower - Black/Blue £25.99
Total : £389.81 (includes shipping : ).




Or start off with a cheaper GPU:

YOUR BASKET
1 x AMD Piledriver FX-6 Six Core 6300 Black Edition 3.50GHz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail £79.99
1 x MSI HD 7770 GHz Edition 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £65.99
1 x MSI 970A-G46 AMD 970A (Socket AM3+) DDR3 Motherboard £57.95
1 x Kingston HyperX Beast 8GB (2x4GB) PC3-19200C11 2400MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX24C11T3K2/8X) £45.95
1 x NZXT Hale Power 90+ 550W '80 Plus Gold' Power Supply £39.95
1 x Toshiba (7K1000.D) 500GB SATA 6GB/s 32MB Cache - OEM (DT01ACA050) HDD £35.99
1 x Aerocool V3X Advance Evil Blue Edition Midi-Tower - Black/Blue £25.99
Total : £351.80 (includes shipping : ).




The NZXT 550 Gold PSU with SuperFlower internals (as far as we know) is a steal right now and worth buying for a couple of quid extra, as it would give you more scope when/if you upgrade GPU in future, and comes with a 5-year warranty.
 
Thanks for your insight, I didn't know about the motherboard. As for 4GB my current build did fine. I loaded into games quite fast. I'd assume an SSD would aid load times faster than another 4gb?
 
You could buy a second hand PC i7/i5 for the price of a new one that will play games better then these AMD systems.

It's a shame you don't have access to the members market here, there are good systems always being sold.

shocco, the SSD will load the game fast and when new assets are being called, they will also load really fast but having more RAM is always good because that's where the game is being "run" as to say. 4GB is pretty low these days, to be honest I find 8GB is not enough for me.
 
YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i3-4130 3.40GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £82.99
1 x MSI HD 7770 GHz Edition 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £65.99
1 x Seagate SSHD 7200RPM 3.5" 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST1000DX001) SSHD Hybrid Drive £59.99
1 x Kingston HyperX Beast 8GB (2x4GB) PC3-19200C11 2400MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX24C11T3K2/8X) £45.95
1 x Asus H81M-E Intel H81 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £37.99
1 x SuperFlower Amazon 300W "80 Plus Bronze" Power Supply £29.99
1 x Zalman T1U3 Mini-Tower USB 3.0 - Black £20.99
1 x LG GH24NSB0 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £14.99
Total : £358.87 (includes shipping : ).



assuming you wont be upgrading this rig in the near future:
core i3 build. with a r9 250 equivalent.
specced a sshd instead of a normal hdd as you'll have a large improvement compared to solo hdd performance.
8gb ram

ps: i dont think a 350 quid rig will run more recent (2013/2014) games at high, a more realistic target is med-high
 
yea tbh if i had a budget of 350 quid i'd be going the 2nd hand route. the premium on "new" just doesnt make sense in a low budget
 
IronWarrior said:
You could buy a second hand PC i7/i5 for the price of a new one that will play games better then these AMD systems.
Click to expand...

tamzzy said:
yea tbh if i had a budget of 350 quid i'd be going the 2nd hand route. the premium on "new" just doesnt make sense in a low budget
Click to expand...

I've looked for second hand and refurbished parts wherever I can. I can't find much and they tend to be overpriced. I'd rather pay a little extra for the peace of mind of a new product. However I've managed to find an R9 270 for £100. That's a steal as it offers better performance than the GTX 750ti and is slightly cheaper!

With ram though I can always go for 4GB now and upgrade later. The HyperX at £45 is very tempting though even though going for that goes over my budget.

How much of a difference is an X4 760 compared to an FX 6300? Benchmarks on cpu world suggest very little yet on passmark there's a 3000 point difference. Going for an FM2+ saves around £50 but am I going to be able to play mid/high on 1080p?
 
how fast can you get to 1000 posts? ;p
the member's market on this forum has many decent priced 2nd hand items.

tbh, at your price range, you should be looking at a core i5 750 + its associated mobo.
the 8gb ram is very good value for money, you wont find that for much cheaper 2nd hand.
 
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