[Budget Build]Need help planning

jeffmeyer5295 · May 24, 2018

Hello All,

Been awhile since I've posted(or even really been on here), and I come to you looking for advice. I have made the mistake of selling all of my PC's aside from my laptop, which is not good enough to do what I am looking for, and am now wanting another computer.

Reason:

JUST to play rust, I want a computer that can play rust and I probably wont be doing anything else on it.

Price:

As cheap as possible, used parts okay, OS not an issue. I am legit hoping we can muster something together for 200-250.

I currently have a power supply, that is pretty much it. Just looking for a tower though, I can just run it on my TV.

Any advice? Recommendations?

Thanks!

redsquirrel0249 · May 24, 2018

As far as price, it will depend on how long you're willing to wait and where you can find deals (with regards to used things). Obviously, you can look up how graphics cards perform compared to each other, so that shouldn't be an issue. If you want advice on a specific model, decide on what resolution, settings, and frame rate you'd like to play at.

A FULL build for $250 is going to be nearly impossible because of RAM prices, unless you are willing to frankenstein together something from 2004. However, a Ryzen APU (Advanced Processing Unit, what they call a CPU with integrated graphics) might be good bet to do the job with a Ryzen 3 2200G costing $99 and having gaming graphics in the chip that might be able to do what you expect (but your expectations are unclear, so that's yet to be seen). That also includes a CPU heatsink. but if you're true about a $250 budget, that would leave you $30 each for a case, power supply, a stick of RAM, a hard drive, and a motherboard. Good luck.

If you're willing to wait, wait for the next Nvidia graphics line later this year. This will reduce graphics cards prices in general, and make it that much easier to meet your budget.

Jasun · May 24, 2018

I've built a fully functioning PC for $180 (excluding peripherals).

The trick for building a budget PC is all about timing. I bought a prebuilt Lenovo Thinkcentre w/ a i5-2400 + everything that comes with one normally. The year before, I found a deal for a GTX 750 (w/o Ti) for 40 bucks (isn't the best deal but I thought it was good enough for me, considering it was that cheap and was also "Buy It Now"). Earlier this year, I actually bought some RAM from the LTT forums (thank you @iamdarkyoshi) for 20 bucks. Great deal for me because I got 8GB + 4GB (the one that was already in the system), thus totaling out to be a total of 12GB RAM. I also got an SSD and plopped that right in for ~40 bucks. With your budget, you can try to aim for a better GPU and maybe a better prebuilt.

Also, I bought basically everything off of eBay (except for RAM + SSD). But on eBay, try not to buy those scammy looking GPUs, try to buy off of an independent seller or from a seller that can be trusted. (And as always, if something is too good to be true, it probably is...)

tl;dr - buy a prebuilt desktop and upgrade from there. buy used parts from eBay or from your local area (craiglist, etc.)

jeffmeyer5295 · May 24, 2018

13 minutes ago, redsquirrel0249 said:

-snip-

I'm familiar with the APU's, just not sure if they can run Rust above 30 fps even at absolute min settings. The price range is extremely soft, just trying to around building another $1500+ USD computer that I'm going to use for a week then not touch till I sell it

5 minutes ago, Jasun said:

-snip-

I will definitely check out Ebay, haven't looked at used prices in ages, I refuse to buy a pre-built for a number of reasons I know right now it's probably cost effective it's just there is a lot more wrong with them than just the price.

I will probably get like a Ryzen APU, a mobo, 120gb ssd and like 8 gbs of ram(already have a psu) and nail it to a piece of wood. I seriously just want to play rust Very familiar with parts and such just not sure if there are any sweet spot builds that people are playing with for budget right now.

Thanks a ton for the replies though I appreciate the advise a ton. Always love seeing people actually trying to help instead of 'you can't afford it'. Seriously!