Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie
Guide - the Budget Gaming PC
Options
Comments
-
-
Call Me Jimmy - Do you just need the monitor, or other bits (card reader, keyboard, mouse) as well? And I assume you have an OS license for it? If you needed all of the above as well as the components around €500 things could get a little interesting...
€500 (€390 not counting the cost of the monitor) plus P&P gets you this bundle of goodies...
If you could find a bit more money to play with you could get some dramatic (and far more future-proof!) improvement over this but if you are really strapped for cash then you'll more than survive on this.
(Note to vets: How do you use that tablegen script on hardwareversand? Or did they take it out when they updated their site and released the new beta shop? Couldn't find anything for it anywhere... I had to use Paint and Photobucket :rolleyes: )0 -
-
-
Just rough guidelines for those looking into new PCs. Not to be taken as 'Definitely buy this machine in this budget', just guidelines.
Remember if you're asking:- Budget
- Intended Uses
- Monitor size if already have one
- Priority regarding silence, temperatures
- Whether or not OS, Monitor, Keyboard/Mouse required.
1) Budget 350 euro including delivery.
2) Budget 400 euro including delivery.
3) Budget 470 euro including delivery.
4) Budget 750 euro including delivery.
5) Budget 1050 euro including delivery.
0 -
Advertisement
-
-
I've followed a lot of reviews on AXP supplies because I was surprised at how cheap they were. They get consistantly good reviews from what I can see, I admit I didn't get a review of the 500w one but I read one of the 600w reviews (or something like that, perhaps 650w) that rated it as a solid and reliable supply. Regarding the 12v, it was my understanding that a dual rail system will use 12v1 for cpu/mobo and so on, which means it delivers 75w to the pci-e lane, while the 12v2 then delivers an additional amount on the 6-pin, whatever is needed - the max draw of a 4830 is something around 100-110w so not too much more. Looking at the AXP site, the 12v2 is listed at 20A, not 14?
As for the GTX260....it's the 216 core (vs 192 stream processors as standard) version, destroys even the 1GB 4870 at 1920x1200 in any game more or less. If that's not value at 305 I dunno what is.
0 -
TerrorFirmer wrote:it was my understanding that a dual rail system will use 12v1 for cpu/mobo and so on, which means it delivers 75w to the pci-e lane, while the 12v2 then delivers an additional amount on the 6-pin, whatever is needed
If only! Original ATX2 spec has the first rail for CPU only - in other words just the little 4-pin ATX connector. Everything else - including mobo and both PCIe sides - comes from the other rail. This was fine for the servers ATX2 was designed for, but not modern PCs. Unfortunately, many cheaper PSUs still copy the ATX2 spec
Most manufacturers keep their actual rail design a closely guarded secret :mad: You sometimes get them in reviews but, otherwise, unless you have a knowledge of electronics and fancy opening up the PSU the only way you can find out if your PSU is a bad design is if it chokes on a relatively small load for no apparent reason
I have no idea whether the Axpertec uses 12V1 for CPU/mobo or CPU only.TerrorFirmer wrote:Looking at the AXP site, the 12v2 is listed at 20A, not 14?
...? It was listed somewhere as 17/14A. Best guess is that they were wrong or that Axpertec updated its design (just like CoolerMaster did a while back). Actually, its spec and efficiency now looks a lot more like the high-end AXPs than the other SimplePowers (by comparison the 630W unit still hasn't been updated and only has 22/21A 12V rails... compare them to the 500W!). Which is a very good sign - almost all the power is going to the 12V rails. As it should. That unit looks a lot better than my crappy rebadged FSP!
And I know the GTX260+ is s***-hot at the mo, but even the cheapest models retail at ~€90 more than some HD4870 1GB prices I've seen. I don't know if ppl looking for €1000 builds have high-end 22"/ cheapie 24" TFTs yet... many probably still have 19" or standard 22" TFTs that max out at 1680*1050.
And one more point: most of the benches I've seen match up a heavily OCd 260+ vs. a stock HD4870 512MB which could explain some disparities. I'd like to find a bench pitting a stock 260+ vs the 1GB version of the 4870... In which case you've got the wrong card up; that's a stock-clocked version. The OCd version only costs €10 more and that one IS great value for money 
Just check again for an identical product on Komplett that costs a smidgen more; you might notice the -EVO prefix on the model no. 
0 -
Yeah but it's a 216 core edition. The standard GTX260 - still sometimes faster then a 1gb 4870 - is only 192 stream processors; so yes its stock clocked but faster then a standard GTX260. And it's definitely faster then the 1GB 4870, I know because I researched and found it to be conclusively faster at 1920x1200 (what I game at; all other resolutions below were closer matched) in all of the latest FPS titles. I still got the 4870 because it's cheaper though. Comparing Komplett prices, the price between a 1gb 4870 and a marginally faster GTX260 is negligible; the price difference between the Core 216 and 1gb 4870 is a little larger but also definitely worth it in my opinion if you game on a 24" monitor. I somewhat wish I'd gone for that option myself but no biggie.
As for the PSU I'm almost positive the 12v1 powers the cpu and board (and so delivering a chunk of the pci-e requirement), otherwise half the dual rail psu's on the market would barely power an 8800gt class card. I had a dual rail psu powering dual 8800GTS 512mb cards and a Q6600 and the 12v2 was definitely hovering around 20-25a, which would never work on its lonesome with that hardware.
someone else might clarify that though, I'm not positive. The intricacy of hardware isn't my selling point. And on that note I think you're seriously underestimating PSU's across the forum - I saw one post in which you said you were surprised a 500w OCZ was powering a quad and 4850. a 500w ocz would power way more then that effortlessly! I had a quad and 2 8800GTSs 512mb powered off a 35 euro 400w Silver Power PSU for several days, no hassle at all.
Hvae a read of this.
They conclude that a high quality 400w (such as corsair) can run "Phenom X4 9850 BE, 4GB Memory, AMD 790X Chipset, ATI Radeon HD 3870X2, an optical drive, and two hard drives."0 -
-
Advertisement
-
-
Looks good I have to say Tom. There's actually a HTPC/Media Center forum here for more info, I have to say my knowledge of such cards - that is to say specifically the tv and digital ones - is essentially non-existent. From a hardware point of view, the base machine itself and the GPU are good solid choices. You might have saved money on the board by going cheaper, Komplett used to have a good range of cheap matx boards with onboard video capable of HD around the 50-60 price range, which would have saved you the guts of 100 euro but they're all gone now, not to mention you already have a card regardless so it's not a big deal. Personally I have a Gigabyte 750i S2h, cost 57 euro and has onboard 7150, with is fine for HD content - I actually use it in my main build, it's a good board, even for overclocking. Not only would you be saving money but also saving on power consumption. All in all though it's hard to fault your build.
Pabsoo....use the sub 500 euro machine above as a base point. It has a 4830 not a 4850 but at such a low resolution, it'll perform the same give or take a frame - and still more then enough to max out COD4 and COD5 easily, it's a great card. But if you really insist, you could replace that 4830 with a 4850 and still come out at about 500 euro. 0 -
-
-
-
-
Edit: Apologies, didn't see the OS there, driving the price up another €90+. Everything else there is fine other than the fact the HIS HD4830 is a good €15 cheaper for a slightly better card than you have. I'm not a huge fan of mATX mobos either, that's a full ATX case you're getting there so you might as well use it And the Antec Earthwatts 650W is less than a tenner more than the Corsair if you want a bit more futureproofing. Both are excellent PSUs. 0
-
-
-
-
Advertisement
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
komplett would suit me better as I will be getting the vat back.
Gaming rig.€500 max(ex vat)
I'd like specs of an mATX system aswel as a standard sized system.
I have an idea of what I want but I want to make sure of compatiblity and am afraid to buy a bad GFX card.
500gb hdd
2-4gb ram
non pentium dual core.core 2 duo only.
wifi
dvdrw.basic
will be using a 22" monitor(currently a 17")
would this be a good mATX rig.its ex vat
Intel Core™ 2 Duo E7200 2,53GHz -€98.35
Intel(r) DG45ID, G45, Socket-775, mATX -€85.12
Thermaltake LanBox Lite Black -€62.81
Sony Nec Optiarc DVD±rw Burner -€19.75
Sapphire Radeon HD 4830 512MB GDDR3 -€86.83
Samsung F1 500GB SATA2 -€45.46
TP-LINK Wireless PCI adapter -€13.22
NorthQ Powersupply 4800, 400W -€32.10
Akasa cold cathode case light, Blue -€11.16
Akasa Cable Management Kit -€9.09
Crucial DDR2 PC8500 2048MB CL7 -€19.75
SUBTOTAL -€483.64
PLUS P+P -€20.66
TOTAL -€504.30
oh and i have xp32/64 vista32 and w7 ultinate beta. 0 -
Advertisement
-
:rolleyes: 
Advertisement