The "Relatively Cheap but Decent Gaming Rig with Room for Expansion" Build

[Kevin_Walter]

Short story...

 

I've been wanting to build a gaming/work PC for about 3 years now. I've browsed multiple times, picked parts for multiple builds, but something always came up and I couldn't afford even a cheap build. Finally scrounged up the cash about a month ago and decided to jump on a new rig. Now, before this time, I was limited to a "gaming" laptop. An Asus G50-vt, to be exact. It had pretty good specs when I bought it about 6 years ago. Intel Core 2 Duo @ 2.14GHz, 512MB nVidia GeForce 9800m (a surprisingly decent card for a laptop then...), and a 1366x768 display. I loved that laptop. But when the display died, a key popped off, and it started overheating from near-constant use (even after opening it up and cleaning it multiple times), I decided it was well past it's time.

 

My budget for this rig was $750. I guess you could call this my "first" build as... to be honest... it IS my first "gaming" build. Most of my previous experience with hardware comes from disassembling and re-assembling old PCs back in the late 90s and early 00s. So I can't really call myself an expert on modern hardware, but I do read a lot, so there's that lol. After MUCH deliberation and shopping, I chose the following build...

 

Case: NZXT Source 210 (Windowed)

Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-990FXA-UD3

CPU: AMD FX-6300 3.5GHz

GPU: XFX "Double D" R9 270X

RAM: G.Skill Sniper 8GB 1866MHz

HDD: WD Blue 500GB

PSU: Corsair CX500M

 

At the end of the day, after shipping costs, the total price for this build came in at around $725. Not too shabby, in my opinion. Though I was a little annoyed when I noticed right after my order shipped that the Corsair CX600M was on sale for the same price that I paid for the 500M.

 

I chose AMD because I felt it offered the best price/performance ratio. I am a web designer, and Intel is said to be better than AMD for using professional apps (I mostly just use Photoshop and run a local server for testing though), but let's face it... compared to what I was working with before (The Core 2 Duo in my laptop), just about anything I could purchase on Newegg was going to beat that by miles.

 

My overall goal, however, was to end up with a PC with plenty of room for expansion. And I think I achieved that relatively well. If I want to, I could easily upgrade from an FX-6300 to an FX-8350, even though judging from reviews, that may not be the best idea with my chosen motherboard. I could also add a second R9 270X with Crossfire if I want an extra boost in games, Though I would have to upgrade my PSU for that. That's the part where I'm the most butthurt considering the sale price of the CX600M, but I can live with it, I guess.

 

I know I am investing in a few things in the very near future, however. I've already purchased 3 BitFenix Spectre Pros. Two 140mm, and one 120mm. Newegg would only let me purchase one of the latter, for whatever reason. Although I'm not quite sure exactly which configuration I am going to install them in...

 

I would also like to get some BitFenix Alchemy extension cables for my PCIe, EPS, and 24-pin ATX connectors, as the ones that came with my PSU are ugly, and quite difficult to work with (more on that later).

 

Other than that, doubling up my RAM to 16GBs and getting an SSD and another hard drive or two for storage is an absolute must. But, I think what I have is a pretty damn good base for $750.

 

Anyways... ON TO THE PICTURES!

 

Obligatory "LOOK AT MY BOXES OF NEW THINGS!!!" pic...

 

 

Also, I'm quite sorry for the quality of these first couple pictures... I took them with my phone. I didn't whip out my Canon until after I'd already installed the processor. But there isn't all that much to see anyway...

 

Moving on: here's my motherboard. Personally, I think it looks sexy. I wasn't TRYING to make everything in this rig match, but it ended up that way. Everything is either black or a dark charcoal color. 

 

 

And now for the real pics...

 

All of my parts unboxed and laid out for gawking. I actually didn't expect the GPU to be this large...

 

 

Sexy motherboard with CPU and stock heatsink/fan installed as well as RAM. I'm not all that interested in overclocking (I generally like things to last as long as possible, and I like my computers stable, so OC'ing them has never my bag...). I would like to get an aftermarket cooler someday. A custom watercooling loop would be nice someday, but it's expensive, and since I don't do the whole overclocking thing, it would probably just be a waste of money. Although, I have no AC, and even though I'm in Ohio, it does hit 100 degrees from time to time in the summer, so at least a liquid solution would keep temps down a bit more than air could on those hot days. Though I would need a different case before really considering that. There isn't much room for even a small radiator, reservoir, and pump in this one.

 

 

Here's the 24-pin connector that I'm sure comes with all of the PSUs in the CXM series. I don't like how it was sleeved at all. It looks decent enough, but they used that extra-thick bit of heatshrink that is literally impossible to bend, which left me with 2 options. I could either leave it there and have a bunch of extra cabling sticking out into my case and blocking my 5.5 inch bays (which I'm not using anyway, but that's beside the point)... or I could snip off the heatshrink, probably void my warranty in the process, but end up with something a little prettier. Which I did.

 

Though that was probably a stupid thing to do considering my plans to buy extension cables anyway...

 

 

Unfortunately, I didn't take any "after" pics, so you'll just have to take my word for it and see the end result in the next pics.

 

And here we are with the motherboard and the PSU installed. I had some issues routing the EPS connector for my CPU. I wanted to run it up the back and through the cable-management holes above the motherboard, but the connector was too large to fit through there, so I was once again left with two options. I could either route it around the board, making the inside of my case that much uglier, or I could squeeze it in between the motherboard and the motherboard tray. I had my reservations about doing this, but there was enough room to squeeze it in through the cutout on the tray and around the edge of the board with minimal contact. This will complicate things once I get those extensions though, as I'll have to pull the motherboard out to re-route the extensions.

 

 

And here is the finished product.

 

 

And an extra shot showing my cable-management.

 

 

As I said, nothing too fancy yet... but it runs really well. I've been playing Battlefield 4 on it for a couple of weeks now everything on High with the exception of textures and texture filtering, which are on ultra. I also have AA off, but I get around 70-80fps on average. Which is more than good enough for me. I'll add more pictures to this thread as I add more things. Hopefully I'll end up with a nice $1400 rig by the end of the year.

[Alphabloom]

that is sexy, and what a price!

[shouldervalley]

that's a super clean build. was it your first one too ?

[paulsterio]

That motherboard looks great, really similar to my X79-UP4 with the grey design, but mine doesn't have the blue accents. 

[JAKEBAB]

nice sexy but shoulda just got a 270 non x.

[iSuzak]

Looks awesome

[Marco Martinho]

That GPU shroud is damn sexy  :wub:

 

Simple, clean and functional.

[Homicidium]

Nice budget build, dude! I love the new design of these XFX cards! 

[Kevin_Walter]

that's a super clean build. was it your first one too ?

 

Technically? Yes? It's my first PC that I've purchased all of the parts separately and built myself. Though I have swapped parts with older PCs before... creating the odd "Frankenputer" from old parts. 

 

 

nice sexy but shoulda just got a 270 non x.

 

Maybe. But the 270 has to be overclocked to match the speed of the 270x... and then the difference between the two is around 1fps in games.

 

At least, that's what I got out of Linus' video about the 270.

[Pointyman77]

Really clean cable management nice

[JAKEBAB]

Maybe. But the 270 has to be overclocked to match the speed of the 270x... and then the difference between the two is around 1fps in games.

 

At least, that's what I got out of Linus' video about the 270.

the price difference isnt worth it.

[Kevin_Walter]

the price difference isnt worth it.

 

They're all around $200 on Newegg. And by the time I bought from somewhere else and paid $10 for shipping, it would have come out the same anyway.

[UnderADyingSun]

Nice job with cable management. I kind of just cram mine together and call it a day. 

[kvnhaas24]

Love the budget builds.  Excellent build and great cable management!