Budget gaming build (~£500)

[FullNuclearBreakfast]

Hey guys,

 

I'm going to be building a PC for my friend after we finish our exams (few weeks left now ). I've been working on a spec list for him (he's a software guy; he thought a power supply was "just a cable" ), so if y'all could give feedback on it that would be great. I'll stick to the recommended format for this post, and I'll add the PCPartPicker list as well.

 

Budget & location

He has a budget of around £500-530 and he can't really go over-budget by much, if at all. As you have probably figured out, we're in England, so all of the prices I state will be in £GBP, not $USD (sorry Americans).

 

Aim & peripherals

He will mostly be playing grand strategy games such as Europa Universalis IV and Crusader Kings II, and I think he'll be playing some Morrowind and Skyrim as well. He will also likely do some sort of coding (I think he mainly uses C++ and Flash), although I wouldn't think this would be very performance hungry. He'll be using a single 1080p monitor (he already has one), and I highly doubt he'll get another one any time soon. We're not including peripherals in the budget, and he doesn't play games where you really need fancy peripherals anyway, so if he needs any he'll probably just grap some cheap ones. He will need an operating system - we were planning to go with Windows 8, since it's slightly cheaper than 8.1 and it's a free upgrade anyway.

 

PCPartPicker

PCPartPicker part list: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/3Q7js

 

CPU: AMD Athlon X4 760K 3.8GHz Quad-Core Processor  (£57.31 @ Scan.co.uk) 

Motherboard: MSI A88XM-E35 Micro ATX FM2+ Motherboard  (£37.18 @ Amazon UK) 

Memory: Corsair Vengeance LP 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory  (£62.16 @ Scan.co.uk) 

Storage: Crucial M500 120GB 2.5" Solid State Disk  (£50.15 @ Amazon UK) 

Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  (£39.50 @ Amazon UK) 

Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 750 Ti 2GB Video Card  (£107.99 @ Ebuyer) 

Case: Fractal Design Define Mini MicroATX Mini Tower Case  (£62.66 @ Amazon UK) 

Power Supply: Corsair CX 430W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply  (£35.65 @ Amazon UK) 

Operating System: Microsoft Windows 8 (OEM) (64-bit)  (£72.88 @ Ebuyer) 

Case Fan: Fractal Design FD-FAN-SSR2-120 40.6 CFM 120mm  Fan  (£6.08 @ Amazon UK) 

Total: £527.37

(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)

(Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-05-24 19:33 BST+0100)

 

I mainly tried to go with Amazon (they mostly had the cheapest bits anyway) or Ebuyer, so we wouldn't have to pay for P&P. Same reason goes for the case - we were going to use an Arc Mini R2, but the Define Mini has free delivery and isn't much more.

 

 

Anyway, sorry for the long OP and thanks in advance!

[Shd0w2]

Good joob. Only thing I would chang, EVGA FTW 750ti.

 

 

(didn't mean to quote OP)

[HeathCliff]

Everything looks good! However, unless you want to pay a butt-tonne of money for shipping from Overclockers UK, I'd suggest looking at other e-tailers or finding another way of obtaining a copy of Windows....

[DavidTheWin]

Pretty nice setup

[FullNuclearBreakfast]

Everything looks good! However, unless you want to pay a butt-tonne of money for shipping from Overclockers UK, I'd suggest looking at other e-tailers or finding another way of obtaining a copy....

Thanks I changed the retailer for the OS to Ebuyer (free delivery), but I must have accidentally undone the override. I'll just edit the OP

[wng_kingsley7]

Good joob. Only thing I would chang, EVGA FTW 750ti.

 

 

(didn't mean to quote OP)

His build is pretty good, also don't forget to mention @FullNuclearBreakfast it is

Very surprised you could fit a 120GB ssd in that build

[Coombzy]

Very good only thing I would possibly change is dropping the SSD and then buy a better GPU and get the SSD later on.

[FullNuclearBreakfast]

His build is pretty good, also don't forget to mention @FullNuclearBreakfast it is

Very surprised you could fit a 120GB ssd in that build

It's pretty much an SSD at the expense of an aftermarket cooler or a better graphics card.

[FullNuclearBreakfast]

Good joob. Only thing I would chang, EVGA FTW 750ti.

 I'll look into it, but will there be much of a performance boost over the cheaper one?

[Izaya Orihara]

Here you go . PCPartPicker part list: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/3Q84y

Price breakdown by merchant: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/3Q84y/by_merchant/

Benchmarks: http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/3Q84y/benchmarks/

 

CPU: AMD Athlon X4 760K 3.8GHz Quad-Core Processor  (£57.31 @ Scan.co.uk) 

Motherboard: MSI A78M-E45 Micro ATX FM2+ Motherboard  (£40.14 @ Aria PC) 

Memory: Mushkin Essentials 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1333 Memory  (£48.95 @ Amazon UK) 

Storage: Samsung 840 EVO 120GB 2.5" Solid State Disk  (£54.99 @ Amazon UK) 

Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive  (£35.94 @ Aria PC) 

Video Card: XFX Radeon R9 280 3GB Double Dissipation Video Card  (£167.99 @ Scan.co.uk) 

Case: Cooler Master N200 MicroATX Mid Tower Case  (£31.44 @ Scan.co.uk) 

Power Supply: Corsair CX 430W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX Power Supply  (£35.65 @ Amazon UK) 

Operating System: Microsoft Windows 8 (OEM) (64-bit)  (£68.69 @ Overclockers.co.uk) 

Total: £541.10

(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)

(Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-05-24 20:00 BST+0100)

[FullNuclearBreakfast]

 

Here you go .

No way are those prices real... That's actually crazy. Does it involve stealing at all?

[wng_kingsley7]

It's pretty much an SSD at the expense of an aftermarket cooler or a better graphics card.

wait....erm..I would give you a link to an ebay seller with a GTX 770 for 220 quid. I know it well on by passing your budget (although the 750 ti is a pretty good buy for 1080p medium settings) would you consider it? Your choice ofc.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/171282302216?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649

[FullNuclearBreakfast]

wait....erm..I would give you a link to an ebay seller with a GTX 770 for 220 quid. I know it well on by passing your budget (although the 750 ti is a pretty good buy for 1080p medium settings) would you consider it? Your choice ofc.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/171282302216?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649

This listing ended a while ago. Shame, seemed like a pretty good deal

[wng_kingsley7]

This listing ended a while ago. Shame, seemed like a pretty good deal

I think if you check with the buyer he/she might have a newly enlisted one.

[FullNuclearBreakfast]

I think if you check with the buyer he/she might have a newly enlisted one.

It doesn't look like they do, all of their current listings are laptops. Ah well, neither me nor my friend could afford it anyway

[Izaya Orihara]

No way are those prices real... That's actually crazy. Does it involve stealing at all?

A little but nothing crazy.

[FullNuclearBreakfast]

A little but nothing crazy.

Looking at it, it does kind of make sense. I just never thought you'd be able to fit a 280 into a £550 build