Super Tight Budget Gaming

[Saurfang]

Hi!

 

So my brothers friend is trying to ball on a SUPER tight budget. He wants to be able to do some 1080p gaming at decent settings. Things like Counter Strike, Overwatch, League, WoW, etc... His budget is $300 dollars. He already has RAM and an SSD (don't know if he wants a hard drive or not, but let's exclude that from the cost). So what that leaves is a case, power supply, CPU, GPU, a motherboard, and cooling.

 

I'm able to get an FX-8350 for $60 USD. I feel confident I could get this get the 8350 to 4.5-4.6GHz no problem on air, using something like a 212 Evo (which I can get for around $26 USD).  Is going for the 8350 a smart decision? I feel like, for $60, overclocked to 4.6GHz, it's going to be the best performance for the value, however I could be wrong. I was planning on pairing the FX-8350 with a GTX 660 Ti that I can get for $50 USD.

 

Does this seem reasonable or am I mistaken?

[Electronics Wizardy]

Id get a old dell optiplex for about 200. You can get a sandy bridge i5 for that much, and it will be faster than that 8350 in games. Then get a gpu like a 460 or 470 with the leftover.

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Dell-Optiplex-3010-MT-i5-3450-Quad-Core-3-1GHz-4GB-500GB-HDMI-Windows-7-Nice-/322416560903?hash=item4b11864b07:g:1nkAAOSw4DJYmiI1

[Not_Sean]

1 minute ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Id get a old dell optiplex for about 200. You can get a sandy bridge i5 for that much, and it will be faster than that 8350 in games. Then get a gpu like a 460 or 470 with the leftover.

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Dell-Optiplex-3010-MT-i5-3450-Quad-Core-3-1GHz-4GB-500GB-HDMI-Windows-7-Nice-/322416560903?hash=item4b11864b07:g:1nkAAOSw4DJYmiI1

Completely agree, Try grab a old box, that's PSU, Case and prob also a 500Gb hdd included with the MB+i5  
Can even go a bit bigger on budget and run the On board card until he can save up again for a card. Since the games he mentioned should easily play off a on board maybe not to our high standards but no problem for the price he's paying.  

[Saurfang]

11 minutes ago, Electronics Wizardy said:

Id get a old dell optiplex for about 200. You can get a sandy bridge i5 for that much, and it will be faster than that 8350 in games. Then get a gpu like a 460 or 470 with the leftover.

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Dell-Optiplex-3010-MT-i5-3450-Quad-Core-3-1GHz-4GB-500GB-HDMI-Windows-7-Nice-/322416560903?hash=item4b11864b07:g:1nkAAOSw4DJYmiI1

 

Maybe. Judging by benchmarks I can find the performance difference between the 8350 OC'd to 4.6GHz and the 3450 at stock w/ boot is pretty marginal. I think he'd rather go the custom built route so he has things like a case and decent power supply to use in the future.

 

I'm going to check eBay and see if I can find an i5+mobo that will outperform the 8350 @ 4.6 for a cheaper price.

[Guest]

6 minutes ago, Saurfang said:

 

Maybe. Judging by benchmarks I can find the performance difference between the 8350 OC'd to 4.6GHz and the 3450 at stock w/ boot is pretty marginal. I think he'd rather go the custom built route so he has things like a case and decent power supply to use in the future.

And lose out performance? Why? If you don't like PSU from old prebuilt you can slap a different one

[Saurfang]

1 minute ago, deXxterlab97 said:

And lose out performance? Why? If you don't like PSU from old prebuilt you can slap a different one

Well like I said the performance difference is reeeeeeeeallly small. But he'd hate the case so theres that.

 

I think I can actually get a i5-3450 + Mobo + decent case cheaper than that Optiplex, so I might go that route.

[scottyseng]

6 minutes ago, Saurfang said:

-snip-

I have a 2500K sitting on my desk that I don't mind selling for cheap...though the hard part for you is getting a motherboard for it...(They're hard to find at a reasonable price now...)

[Saurfang]

Just now, scottyseng said:

I have a 2500K sitting on my desk that I don't mind selling for cheap...though the hard part for you is getting a motherboard for it...(They're hard to find at a reasonable price now...)

Yeah the 2500k was actually my first thought but the motherboard was my biggest barrier there.

[Guest]

Just now, Saurfang said:

I think I can actually get a i5-3450 + Mobo + decent case cheaper than that Optiplex, so I might go that route.

That would better. 

Just now, Saurfang said:

Well like I said the performance difference is reeeeeeeeallly small. But he'd hate the case so theres that.

If you think an i5 has small difference between FX then I don't know what to say. 

[Saurfang]

Just now, deXxterlab97 said:

That would better. 

If you think an i5 has small difference between FX then I don't know what to say. 

From benchmarks I can find of the 8350 OC'd at 4.6-4.7 the difference is really small. But that's kind of an insane overclock and I'd rather go with an i5 so I don't have to do that.

[scottyseng]

1 minute ago, Saurfang said:

Yeah the 2500k was actually my first thought but the motherboard was my biggest barrier there.

Yeah, I still had my original Z77 board so I upgraded to the 2700K (Got it for $100) and I'm loving it at 4.9GHz. No reason to jump to kaby lake yet (Maybe next gen)

[Krillingt75961]

9 hours ago, Saurfang said:

From benchmarks I can find of the 8350 OC'd at 4.6-4.7 the difference is really small. But that's kind of an insane overclock and I'd rather go with an i5 so I don't have to do that.

On paper and looking at benchmarks are one thing. Real world performance, especially in gaming is another. The FX series is not a good deal, especially now.