Brand new to PC's - don't shoot!

Frodouk

Hey all,

Please don't shoot me for asking this but I'm brand new to the world of PC's and gaming. I have a limited budget and would like to know what's good and bad in regards to building my own machine.

I'd want to play games on it at decent framerates and with decent graphics - not fussed, at the moment, about 4k - more interested in getting a PC running with better graphics than my trusty PS4/Xbox One and better framerates!

Would one of you kind souls help a newly converted chap out?

Just wanting to get an idea of what I'd need, and how much it would cost.

Cheers!

me_irl

Here's a useful thread of resources.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2054994238

Best of luck!

Frodouk

Thanks - I had a look through that and I'll be honest - it confused me more!

TerrorFirmer

Hi, what sort of budget do you have in mind? That's a good starting point before we can recommend anything

Looking to self build, or buy pre-built? The former is better value for money of course, but if you shop smart, the latter isn't a bad option either.

To best the XB1 and PS4 at the moment, you'd be looking at a budget of around €500+. Skylake i3, 8GB DDR4, AMD RX460.

Digital Solitude

Have you a monitor or do you want to budget that in?

If so, what resolution is it? If you want to play off a TV we'd take that at 1080p yeah?

You want to spend €500 minimum, reaching €600 is a nice jump, 750 to 800 is a great budget for a first PC imo, gives you a solid grounding for all parts and lots of upgrade room if needed, without needing to totally cheap down on components.

We can't really help more without a budget to go off, we can give you a list of parts to buy once we have that.

Frodouk

Hi - I was thinking about €500, so that's good! I'm happy to build it myself, or if a better deal comes along buy pre-built. I'm easy really.

Just need something that I can obviously upgrade in months/years to come to keep up to date with stuff but at the same time something that will play the latest and greatest that's on offer now at a decent resolution with a steady framerate

I don't need a monitor as I'll hook it up directly to a TV over HDMI.

Frodouk

Hi - I was thinking about €500, so that's good! I'm happy to build it myself, or if a better deal comes along buy pre-built. I'm easy really.

Just need something that I can obviously upgrade in months/years to come to keep up to date with stuff but at the same time something that will play the latest and greatest that's on offer now at a decent resolution with a steady framerate

I don't need a monitor as I'll hook it up directly to a TV over HDMI. The TV is a 4K UHD one, so over time I can look at a 4K GPU.

Digital Solitude

As per Terrors suggestion.

i3 6100 €120
H150m board €60
8gb DDR4 €50
1tb HDD €50
500w PSU €60
Case €60
RX 460 €120
Total €520

It'd be about 550 delivered from Mindfactory, will play almost all of the latest games and is plenty powerful over a new console. You have the option to upgrade to an i5 in time, which would cost about 200 and sort you for several years, and space for pretty much and GPU you want.

Frodouk

Cheers - I'll take a proper look tonight when I get home. Mindfactory are German based aren't they? Any issues with getting stuff from them?

Found a link on Adverts for some chap who builds machines for you - says he has little mark up. Worth a shot?

Suppose it wouldn't hurt to drop him a message?

Grumpypants

Don't forget to check out the second hand market, those who build their own PC's tend to upgrade parts regularly so you can often pick up really good parts as they sell on the old ones. The "last gen" components are still pretty great and if you stay one gen behind you can save a nice bit.

If you wait and get lucky you can often get a full rig for that kind of money. It won't be top of the range but it will be a good starting point and you can continue to upgrade as you get some extra cash down the line.

Frodouk

Yeah, I've been looking on Adverts for cheaper older systems but I'll be honest, I wouldn't know a good CPU or GPU from a bad one - so the numbers they post next to the GPU/CPU name are straight over my head.

Digital Solitude

Any i5 3xxx, 4xxx or 6xxx is what you're after going second hand, they require different motherboards from each other though so if you find one make sure to get a compatible motherboard, we can help out there.

Some CPUs have suffixes, get a CPU with no suffix, or a K

TerrorFirmer

Digital Solitude wrote: »

As per Terrors suggestion.

i3 6100 €120
H150m board €60
8gb DDR4 €50
1tb HDD €50
500w PSU €60
Case €60
RX 460 €120
Total €520

It'd be about 550 delivered from Mindfactory, will play almost all of the latest games and is plenty powerful over a new console. You have the option to upgrade to an i5 in time, which would cost about 200 and sort you for several years, and space for pretty much and GPU you want.

I'd just go with this. Rock solid for games now at beyond console quality, and completely upgradable down the line to a better CPU and card as the need arises. Pretty bullet proof to be fair.

It can be had for €500 on the button really, by getting a decent €30 case and €30-35 power supply.

Frodouk

I've been quoted €550 for this (€580 with 16Gb RAM) :

OS -Windows 10 (Professional)
CPU - i5 6400
GPU - RX 460
RAM -8gb DDR3 Hyper X BEAST ADD 30 euros for 16gb
HDD - 320gb HDD
MOBO - MSI1151 H100m
PSU - 500w Aerocool
CASE - AVP Storm P27 (trasparent side panel)

He seems open to negotiations so I'm gonna say €550 with a bigger HDD.

TerrorFirmer

Fair price for a pre-built, no major complaints other than that a 320GB hard drive is going to be quite old and potentially, or even likely, to be pretty slow and fairly well used. It would be worth paying an extra few euro to ask the builder to make it a new 500GB hard drive at least.

Frodouk

I have a 1Tb HDD at home - it might be a bit slow and certainly slower than an SSD but I'd rather use that in the short term than pay for a 320Gb one.

I've gone back to him and said do me that spec with no OS or HDD (I have Windows 10 already) for less than €500 and we have a deal. See what comes back.

tadcan

It maybe a bit late now, but why is it DD3 Ram and an i5 6xxx cpu, This says its the motherboard supports DDR4, maybe its an older model?

Frodouk

I've not bought anything yet - I guess he offered the DDR3 to keep costs down a bit as I said I was working to about €500?

tadcan

8GB DDR4 (of a similar type) would be around €35. I would prefer to start there and upgrade later. If you have a 1TB HD then why get a small SSD like this for around €42.

Frodouk

He priced me up an SSD (240GB) and I'd put the 1TB in for storage for €585. I may go back and say how much for DDR4 rather than 3.

tadcan

What price and what model of SSD. For example a Samsung 850 pro 500GB costs £130 or €160 with postage via parcel motel, which is one of the best models on the market at the moment. Or for a Kingston 120GB for £40 or €52 with postage. SSD's are much better value then they used to be, I'm wondering if the builder is upping the price because they are faster.

Frodouk

That I don't know but I can ask what he is putting in. I'd say, for the price he is charging, it won't be a top notch disk though, which is a shame.

See, I reckon I should look at sourcing my own parts and building it from scratch. I have a business contacts in the north and I'm originally from the UK so have plenty of ways to get stuff from the areas that deal in Sterling for little to no delivery charge.

tadcan

In part picker the power load for those specs is around 215w, so the psu can be dropped down to 400w.
Here is how much it would cost to buy the main parts yourself.
i5 = €171.46
GA-H110M = €53.06
8 GB Hyper X Fury = €38.90
120GB Kingston SSD = €41.31
Gigabyte Radeon RX460 = €127.46
430W PSU = €43.76

€475.95 + €30 postage = €505.95

Then add the case on top, which is cheaper to buy from the UK.

I would also ask which exact model of RX460 it is since that a number of manufacturers make their own version of the card.

Frodouk

So realistically he isn't ripping me off - I mean he has to make something (he reckons he makes around €20/40 each build), so with the case on top it's around €500 plus the HDD he quoted me for is 240Gb SSD which is probably double that price ish.

Shlippery

Yea, I'd say build it yourself if you can, it'd save you the markup he's adding for building it himself (not that there's anything wrong with that for providing a service!)

It's as easy as assembling a jigsaw and it makes it even more rewarding! You'd learn a lot and it'd make upgrading it yourself in the future a lot easier. It's quite the addictive habit!

Frodouk

I've read some nasty review about MindFactory though - is that really the cheapest/best way to get parts over here?

Joshua J

Frodouk wrote: »

That I don't know but I can ask what he is putting in. I'd say, for the price he is charging, it won't be a top notch disk though, which is a shame.

See, I reckon I should look at sourcing my own parts and building it from scratch. I have a business contacts in the north and I'm originally from the UK so have plenty of ways to get stuff from the areas that deal in Sterling for little to no delivery charge.

The delievry wont really matter if you're buying it all from the one supplier. Now if you had a VAT number, that'd make a nice saving.

Shlippery

A lot of people here use Mindfactory, Overclockers.co.uk, Scan or Amazon UK!

You can flick through past threads and I don't think there's been problems, the boardsies here wouldn't lead you astray!

tadcan

They are used by people here. Buying from Amazon UK will cost a bit more but has better customer service.