Budget gaming PC recommendations

[meckeard]

Hi all,

I'm looking to either build or buy a low budget gaming PC. Nothing fancy but I want something fairly solid that will play wow (what I play most).

My budget is $1k - $1,500 but I'd like to stay closer to the $1k if possible.

No preference really, just the most bang for my buck. Building it myself is an option since I've built many PC's but picking optimized parts for gaming is not my area of expertise.

So I'd like some input from the group on parts to build my own or a reputable builder that sells gaming PC's in my range.

Thanks,
Mark

 

[victorv]

hi,
many years ago, building PC by yourself was cheaper than
buy done; today buying separately the pieces, you pay
many times the gain of the different resellers.

Building PC by yourself is a way to enjoy for who likes it,
but if you have time to spend in other ways, buy it done.

Today the cheapest way is to find offers of well done PC,
and look for "previous year" good configurations.

ciao
vittorio

 

[wahnula]

It might stretch the budget, but Intel's X58 chipset is the latest & greatest, it holds a Core i7 CPU. MSI makes a good version and the CPU...well you can let your budget be your guide. AMD has a good CPU with the Phenom II AM3, but it simply cannot keep up with a Core i7. If you are totally budget-driven, though, this is the CPU for you.

The beauty of this platform is that it is compatible with SLI or Crossfire, so you are free to select a single card or now and add a second (or sometimes third) card later.

nVidia has the best single card last time I looked, but it's hard to beat an ATI X2 card for frame rate and low price. Rule of thumb is buy the best single card you can afford, and add to it later, that's why cards like the 4850 X2 interest me. ~$250 buys a super-fast card and leaves room for another.

Whatever you get you will need to save some of your budget for a good (around 500 Watt) PSU. Don't scrimp here, but any name-brand will do. You can get 1TB HDDs for >$100, get two minimum (one for backup), or two for RAID 0 and a WD 2TB drive for backup. 3GB RAM and you're done. Have fun!

Tony

Users helping Users...

 

[paparazi]

I would say an Intel Dual core CPU (much debate around quads for gaming) personally I believe the higher clock speed of dual cores is better for gaming. Intel E8400 would be a good bet.
Still DDR2 (very cheap for quality DDR2, OCZ PC 8500 or similiar 1066mhz) say 2 X 2gig
P45 Intel based (i7 platform out your price range)Abit/Asus/Gigabyte/DFI/MSI
I've noticed that ATI's 4870 graphics cards tumbling down in price recently...this card would be a very good option in your price range.
Good midi case
Quality power supply: Antec, Enermax, FSP, Seasonic, Tagan, CWT, Zalman, Thermaltake etc
LG,Pioneer DVDRW or maybe a Bluray player (perhaps not needed)
Martin


On wings like angels whispers sweet
my heart it feels a broken beat
Touched soul and hurt lay wounded deep
Brown eyes are lost afar and sleep

 

[Johnthephoneguy]

I still think it is cheaper to build your own PC than to buy one, at least if you are looking at a higher end/gaming PC. Low budget web surfing it probably is cheaper to buy one though.

JohnThePhoneGuy

"If I can't fix it, it's not broke!

 

[paparazi]

wahnula, way over $1000 I fear.....
Was going to add much the same as wahnula on the hard drives, 1TB's are very cheap but don't forget a backup of some description (external USB2 is my option as you can leave it turned off until needed)
Yup 600watts plus branded on the PSU
Martin

On wings like angels whispers sweet
my heart it feels a broken beat
Touched soul and hurt lay wounded deep
Brown eyes are lost afar and sleep

 

[meckeard]

Wow, lots of posts!

OK, I was leaning towards dual core with a single video card. The option to run a second one in the future is something I'll consider.

PS - yeah, I've bought some cheap cases with bad power supplies and I'll be sure to pay attention to that.

Mobo - Can I stick with one of the name brands here and still get roughly the same quality? For example, a $200 MSI vs a $200 asus? Within reason of course.

Ram - I'd get 3 or 4 gigs.

Sound card - this is one I normally skip to save $$$ but I'd like to get something decent. Sound blaster seems to be a leader here but I see speakers rated 2.1, 5.1 and 7.1 but I don't always see that same number of sound cards. Is this something I need to worry about or should I chose based on price and money available?

Outside of wow and a little music played on the PC while working from home, there won't be much use in terms of audio.

Thanks guys!

Mark

 

[wahnula]

Mark,

Sound cards are an unnecessary burden these days with most MBs having quality sound chips built in. The only argument FOR a separate sound card is isolation from the noisy circuitry of the MB but most ears can't tell the difference.

Martin...I was looking at the upper end of the budget, and I think it can squeak by...my recommendation will always be to buy the newest tech, as it will have the longest life.

$300...Core i7 920 Quad Core 2.66
$230...MSI X58 Platinum SLI LGA1366
$75....Triple Channel Corsair 3GB DDR3 XMS3 RAM (can always be upgraded)
$75....Cooler Master eXtreme Power ATX 12V V2.01 600W PSU
$200...(2) 1TB HDD
$330...4850 X2 1GB
$???...$30-50 on a case- matter of taste vs. budget

...puts us in at about $1250 and has a way better upgrade path with the X58 chipset. MSI is called "SLI" but it will accept Crossfire too.

I got these prices at

http://www.directron.com

but searching for each item at

http://www.pricewatch.com

will save a few bucks.

I disagree with buying a pre-built PC...there's always some compromise, although shopping somewhere like

http://www.digitalstormonline.com

is a bit different.

Tony

Users helping Users...

 

[PRPhx]

You might try looking at best buy on line. Search for computers, then choose your price range. I found this:

HP - Pavilion Elite TV Desktop with AMD Phenom™ X4 9850 Quad-Core Processor Model: m9515y. It's priced at $1,079.99, Has a quad core AMD proc. with 8GB of RAM, a 750 GB hard drive, built in video, and audio.

If I was in the market for a new pc, and at your price range, I'd take a hard look at it.

 

[wahnula]

Core i7 vs. Any Other CPU...FAIL!

If I were buying a Phenom it would be the Phenom II AM3...

...and a Pavilion Elite is not considered a gaming PC by anyone's definition..."built-in video" is simply not going to cut it!

Tony

Users helping Users...

 

[PRPhx]

Core i7 might be good for a high end gaming pc, but not for a budget pc (altho $1,000-$1,500 really isn't budget).

The price of the i7 cpu, board and memory will eat up a good chunk of that.

Sorry, I will disagree. The hp can run games just fine. Esp. older games like WOW,a s the OP stated he played the most. And a good card can still be added and he'll still be under the $1,500 budget.

 

[paparazi]

It just never ceases to amaze me how cheap you have it over in the states....I completely ruled out i7 because I thought it would come in way over budget.
If these prices are accurate then there is simply no contest..go with X58 and an i7 platform.

Martin

On wings like angels whispers sweet
my heart it feels a broken beat
Touched soul and hurt lay wounded deep
Brown eyes are lost afar and sleep

 

[kmcferrin]

$1000-$1500 is hardly a budget PC. I'd put "budget" at more like $600. Of course, it depends on what you need to buy. If you already have a monitor/mouse/keyboard/etc, then you have a little more extra to spend.

For example, back in February Toms Hardware did their regular "System Builder Marathon". The machine that they came up with in their $1250 class is here:

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/core-2-overclock,2146.html

CPU Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550 $274
CPU Cooler Xigmatek HDT-S1283 (& ACK-I7751 Retention Bracket) $46
Motherboard Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3LR $103
RAM G.Skill HK 2 x 2GB $50
Graphics Sapphire Radeon 4870 X2 $449
Hard Drives Western Digital Caviar Black 640 GB 32 MB cache $80
Sound Integrated 0
Network Integrated Gigabit Networking 0
Case Rosewill Wind Ryder RZLS142A-P YE $30
Power Corsair 650TX $100
Optical Lite-On 20X DVD±R SATA Model iHAS120-04 $22

Total Price $1,154

Sorry about the messed up spacing. Anyways, in my book that's not a budget system at all, it's fairly high end. But it's well within your budget range, leaving you $346 to play with if you wanted to go with a Core i7 CPU and DDR3, or a faster Core 2 Quad. You could drop the 4870x2 video card and get a 4850x2 and save about $180, and still have screaming performance. If you wanted to really tweak you could probably get it to a top-end Phenom II, AM3 board, DDR3 memory, and a 4850x2 for under $1000. It wouldn't be as fast as the Core i7, but it would be plenty fast. Especially for an older game like WoW.

________________________________________
CompTIA A+, Network+, Server+, Security+
MCTS:Hyper-V
MCTS:System Center Virtual Machine Manager
MCSE:Security 2003
MCITP:Enterprise Administrator

 

[meckeard]

I guess budget is more of an industry term than my own. Most PC builders have a $1k system and they tend to call is budget.

Trust me, I don't think that's cheap by any means!

I'll look over what everyone posted...and thanks a ton for the input!

 

[Valandis]

You could try this setup:
1. GPU: Nvidia 9800GT 512MB ===> $100
2. CPU: Intel Core 2 Quad Q8200 @2.33GHz 4MB Cache ===> $170
3. Motherboard: Gigabyte EP45-UD3R ===> $130
4. Memory: Corsair Dominator 4GB(2x2GB)@1066MHz CL5 ===> $45
5. Hard Disks: 2xSeagate Barracuda 7200.12(500GB) for RAID ===> $130
and 1xSeagate Barracuda 7200.12(500GB) for your Data/Back-Up ===> $65
6. CD/DVD Drives: Lite On IHAS222-06 DVD Burner with Lightscribe ===> $30
and in case you need a Blu-ray ROM: Sony BDU-X10S BD-ROM ===> $100
7. If you want a better Sound card than the one of your Motherboard then go for: Creative Labs Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeGamer ===> $100
or for: Creative Labs SB X-FI Titanium Fatal1ty Pro ===> $150
8. Power Supply: Should be at least 600W. One of the best companies out there is Seasonic. Take a look at this one: SeaSonic M12 SS-600HM 600W ===> $130
9. Case: Should be Mid Tower and it should have at least 2 fans built in. Take a look at these: Apevia X-Discovery, or NZXT Apollo, or Thermaltake Soprano. They all have fans on them and they cost ===> $70
10. Monitor: if you already don't have one, choose an LCD one with max.response time 2ms and at least 19" wide ===> prices vary from $150.
11. Keyboard and Mouse: for Gaming the wired ones are better than the cordless ones. Keyboard can be a standard or ergonomical one. Mouse has to be a laser one and the more DPI it has the better it is. Prices vary here too.

So without BD-ROM, extra Sound card, Monitor altogether costs around $900. I hope I helped.

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