Poor Man's Build Help

[DeadSurvivor]

Hello everyone! Thanks to everyone in advance for helping me.

(Doing this off windspeed36's format)

Budget and Location:

My budget is $350 USD or lower. (I will want an upgradable path though because $350 bucks is not getting you anywhere in the near future)

Aim:

I specifically want to play APB: Reloaded and in the near future GTA V, that's if they release it on the pc.

Monitors:

I am going to use one monitor and right now I have an old Sony CRT monitor I am using. it's resolution is 1024x768 and am planning to buy a 21.5" monitor soon to replace this one.

Peripherals:

None but I want this build to be able to use Ubuntu because I don't want windows XP 32 running on here.

I mostly just want to run the game in high settings running higher or close to 60 fps. I dont care if you take the intel or AMD route I just want the system to work well in Ubuntu and Windows 8 (when I buy it of course)

Once again thanks to everyone helping me.

[snes]

That is a tight budget.

I'm not of much help here, since I too am doing this "build your own PC" thing for the first time, at the moment. However, there are a few things I noticed:

- You forgot your location.

- You seem to have a PC already. Can you re-use the case, HDD and possibly the power supply (long shot, I know) to save a few bucks?

- I personally think that a 21.5" screen is really small. If you aren't dead set on getting a 4:3 screen, then you should think about getting at least a 24" one. They are dirt cheap these days and imo they're better on the eyes, too.

I have a feeling that most will tell you to look into getting an AMD cpu of some sort and an ATI graphics card.

[DeadSurvivor]

Woops sorry about that, I am in Californa,USA. I can reuse my HDD, and DVD burner but not the PSU, and I will most likely get the 24" because I just need one around the 20" size.

[iTonyy]

Honestly I would really recommend to wait until you double your budget to make it worthwhile (if you build a new pc with that budget expect ~30fps on GTA V if you are lucky)

What I mean is that the upgrade path for such a low budget pc is very small

For example if you buy a budget 775 cpu, you need a 775 board but if you were to upgrade you will need a complete new set (expect to spend $200~$300 for a decent upgraded set)

Same applies for the ram, 775 boards are mainly ddr2 so the ddr3 compatible ones aren't going to be cheap

And also expect significant bottlenecking if you go through with this build and add something current gen to it like a 7970

If you really can't wait. I suggest buying a used comp from craigslist. That way you can afford better specs that will make gameplay actually bearable.

By comparison, $350 of new parts will get you a pc from 5 years ago and $350 of used parts can get you a pc from 3 years ago.

[DeadSurvivor]

Since AMD is the $/Performance ruler for budget i was thinking of a 5800k APU ($130), motherboards are $45-$50 lowest,4gb ddr3 ram at 1866 mhz is expensive, the case should be around $20, and psu is around idk lets say $40. All of these are USD so the total is around $320 with tax and shipping (all of these are guestimates) but the problem is since I don't know if the apu will work with ubuntu (I heard that intel works better with ubuntu).That is the main problem for me, knowing if AMD parts will work the same in Ubuntu just as intel.

[iTonyy]

Since AMD is the $/Performance ruler for budget i was thinking of a 5800k APU ($130), motherboards are $45-$50 lowest,4gb ddr3 ram at 1866 mhz is expensive, the case should be around $20, and psu is around idk lets say $40. All of these are USD so the total is around $320 with tax and shipping (all of these are guestimates) but the problem is since I don't know if the apu will work with ubuntu (I heard that intel works better with ubuntu).That is the main problem for me, knowing if AMD parts will work the same in Ubuntu just as intel.

You will be extremely limiting yourself by going with an apu and as I said before, expect only 30fps- on GTA V

[christoi]

Given your current situation, I'd recommend this:

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/Sz7n

I've purposefully opted for a system with solely performance in mind, because I doubt you will be upgrading the rig for at least a year or two given your current upgrade plans. As a result though, the system should perform pretty well with the games you listed, you may even be able to turn the settings up to high at 1024x1280 (though I would recommend replacing that as soon as possible). Upgradability is a bit limited, but I've included a decent power supply and case which should last a couple of years, you'll probably want to replace the other parts when you upgrade anyways.

[Willson94]

Get a PS4

[DeadSurvivor]

Get a PS4

no offense but i made that mistake with my xbox 360.

[codytappen]

Given your current situation, I'd recommend this: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/Sz7n I've purposefully opted for a system with solely performance in mind, because I doubt you will be upgrading the rig for at least a year or two given your current upgrade plans. As a result though, the system should perform pretty well with the games you listed, you may even be able to turn the settings up to high at 1024x1280 (though I would recommend replacing that as soon as possible). Upgradability is a bit limited, but I've included a decent power supply and case which should last a couple of years, you'll probably want to replace the other parts when you upgrade anyways.

You forgot a drive for storage! Otherwise that would be great...

 

Edit: I didn't notice that he had an HDD already. This plan looks good.

[codytappen]

I'd like to know why you need to use Ubuntu, but even if you do AMD support isn't that bad (for CPUs you shouldn't worry whatever you have will be supported) so just make sure they have drivers for the GPU that you're getting into to buy. You can do that by checking the Ubuntu website or looking for drivers on the web before buying. I wish you luck.

[DeadSurvivor]

Given your current situation' date=' I'd recommend this: [url']http://pcpartpicker.com/p/Sz7n I've purposefully opted for a system with solely performance in mind, because I doubt you will be upgrading the rig for at least a year or two given your current upgrade plans. As a result though, the system should perform pretty well with the games you listed, you may even be able to turn the settings up to high at 1024x1280 (though I would recommend replacing that as soon as possible). Upgradability is a bit limited, but I've included a decent power supply and case which should last a couple of years, you'll probably want to replace the other parts when you upgrade anyways.

You forgot a drive for storage! Otherwise that would be great...

I got a HDD already I am using from before.

[DeadSurvivor]

I'd like to know why you need to use Ubuntu, but even if you do AMD support isn't that bad (for CPUs you shouldn't worry whatever you have will be supported) so just make sure they have drivers for the GPU that you're getting into to buy. You can do that by checking the Ubuntu website or looking for drivers on the web before buying. I wish you luck.

Well I dont want to spend another $100 bucks on windows 8 and I don't want to pirate it so that is why I am using Ubuntu.

[codytappen]

Well I dont want to spend another $100 bucks on windows 8 and I don't want to pirate it so that is why I am using Ubuntu.

 

 

:Note: This forum software let's me edit your quotes as I quote them?

Fair enough. The GTX 650 should have good enough driver support; I looked it up and it seems like NVidea has the drivers for it on Linux (and by extension ubuntu). You can always double check if you wish.

[bradscoolio]

This is about as good as it gets for your price range given you can reuse your HDD: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/SW65

 

;)

[ShadowLight18]

This is about as good as it gets for your price range given you can reuse your HDD: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/SW65

 

;)

No PSU. could serve to be a bit of a problem.

[MathiasMains]

Well I dont want to spend another $100 bucks on windows 8 and I don't want to pirate it so that is why I am using Ubuntu.

Is gta even avalible for Ubuntu?

[orangecat]

You can but you can't really build a system for under 350 its just not possible. I understand that you actually can but to make it upgradable to something mid-high end is not a realistic system.

[DeadSurvivor]

Is gta even avalible for Ubuntu?

I know it won't be, but as I said i will update to windows 8 when i have the money..

[DeadSurvivor]

You can but you can't really build a system for under 350 its just not possible. I understand that you actually can but to make it upgradable to something mid-high end is not a realistic system.

That is very true, but of course I will buy another one of everything for example, you don't want a 3770k running on a H61 motherboard, it limits its uses.

[DeadSurvivor]

I want to go AMD just so I could take use of the 8 core CPU (I mean come on 8 CORES) but intel wont be as much as a pain with Ubuntu and has PCIE 3.0.

[DeadSurvivor]

Does anyone know if outletpc.com has good customer service? They have low prices on their hardware which is a great plus for me.

[DeadSurvivor]

Ok guys so this is the computer I am running currently is this: http://www.geeks.com/details.asp?invtid=GATEWAY-FX-250D915-B

 and in it I have a Pentium 4 3.0 GHz single core, a 320 gb HDD, 2gb of DDR2 ram, and a wifi card, should I just buy a Core 2 Quad,  2 more gb of ram, and a GTX 650 ti or go for a whole brand new build?

[JoshM]

This is about as good as it gets for your price range given you can reuse your HDD: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/SW65

 

;)

This is probably your best option, if you can afford to add a cheap PSU on top of tha.

[DeadSurvivor]

I've decided to save up money because I dont want to rush into buying these parts and not getting the performance I want. Thank you to everyone who helped me!