Not everybody can afford a new high dollar pc for gaming, working, or whatever you need. Ill show you a simple but hopefully helpful tips on what to look for when building a pc without breaking your wallet.
Before we get into the builds, here are some tips on what to look for and what not to do when building a budget PC.
1. Do Not Go to Cheap: While these are cheap builds, what you do not want to do is get one extremely cheap component to compensate for getting a slightly more expensive component. For example, say you want a i3 4130 in your build, but to compensate you get a $20 ultra cheap PSU and $15 computer case. This is a bad idea, while you might get better performance with a i3 over a Pentium, your risking the life and longevity of all your components with such a cheap PSU and case. Cheap PSU might burn out and kill your entire pc, and a bad case might not give enough airflow and cause your power hungry graphics card to overheat often.
2. Know what you need: Before you even start looking at parts for a pc, know exactly what your needs are:
A. CPU: There are a variety of CPUs from AMD and Intel, all have their strengths and weaknesses. AMD's has a slight advantage in pure multithreaded apps, while intel has a huge advantage in single threaded apps.
B. Mobo: Motherboards are the hardest to decide on, there are literally dozens of motherboards for every CPU on the market. What's best for choosing is what your doing with your system, if you want a small system and only plan on gaming and web browsing, then a H81 or B85 chipset motherboard might be good. Or if you plan on plugging in multiple pci cards and lots of usb devices, then a H87 or H97 board would be good for the added expansion.
C: Graphics cards: This is a lot simpler, there are only a select few cards in each budget range, but then again it can be hard to choose. If you want the best gaming experience and don't care for features, then AMD has better offerings. But if you want a good feature set then Nvidia might be better for you.
D: Hard Drives: HDDs are very simple, SSD's are nearly out of the question at this price range so HDDs are the only way to go. I recommend 500GB and 1TB drives from Seagate and WD, the ones with the most reviews are the best.
Cases: These can be confusing, I've found that Cooler Master and Corsair have some of the best budget cases out there. Good looks and tons of airflow and flexibility.
E: PSUs: This is the most important in choosing for your PC. Power supplies power your entire system, and getting a bad one can result in totaling your entire PC. It is vital to get a PSU that is cheap but good. A popular chose is the corsair CX, good features and good price. Do not buy these for gaming builds!! They have very cheap parts that can kill your system over time, even if it's years. I have found that evga makes good PSUs for budget builds, while they aren't as "pretty", they will do the job well.
3. Deals: Deals can be lifesavers for a budget build, always be on the look out for them! BTW...I've found that Christmas time has the best deals, I was able to get up to $100 off of my computer build just because of Christmas sales.
Now for the exciting part, builds!! Here's a $300 gaming build:
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant
CPU: AMD A8-7600 3.3GHz Quad-Core Processor ($92.99 @ NCIX US)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-F2A68HM-HD2 Micro ATX FM2+ Motherboard ($47.93 @ Mwave)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 4GB (2 x 2GB) DDR3-1866 Memory ($39.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($44.99 @ Amazon)
Case: Silverstone PS08B (Black) MicroATX Mid Tower Case ($39.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: EVGA 500W 80+ Certified ATX Power Supply ($34.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $300.88
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-03-13 01:02 EDT-0400
You pretty much have to get an APU for a $300 gaming build to work, so I chose the latest from AMD's line, the kaveri A8. Don't expect good performance in the latest titles, but it will play older games on Steam at good settings and frame rates. 4GB will hinder you, but I can't add 8GB without breaking the bank. I used to game on a laptop with 4GB of ram, and it could run War Thunder and all my older games just fine.
Then for our theme build, the $400 mainstream budget PC:
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant
CPU: AMD Athlon X4 860K 3.7GHz Quad-Core Processor ($69.99 @ NCIX US)
Motherboard: ASRock FM2A88X+ BTC ATX FM2+ Motherboard ($70.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 4GB (2 x 2GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($39.89 @ OutletPC)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($44.99 @ Amazon)
Video Card: MSI Radeon R7 250X 1GB Video Card ($89.99 @ Amazon)
Case: Corsair SPEC-01 RED ATX Mid Tower Case ($47.99 @ Micro Center)
Power Supply: EVGA 500W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($47.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $411.82
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-03-13 01:02 EDT-0400
While you could go with a G3258 and a H81 motherboard, h81 is not meant for everybody, and AMD's A88X and 860K offer a lot more functionality for the price.
R7 250X is a step up from the A10 7850K's IGPU, with 100 more cores you should get at least a 10-20% performance increase over a A10-7850K only build which is what most people would buy for a $400 gaming build.
If you want more graphics horsepower like a GTX 750 or R7 260X, you can get an A78 chipset motherboard if you do not want to overclock.
Now for the "cream of the crop" of extreme budget builds (lol):
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant
CPU: Intel Pentium G3258 3.2GHz Dual-Core Processor ($49.99 @ Micro Center)
Motherboard: ASRock H97 Anniversary ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($74.78 @ Newegg)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($69.98 @ OutletPC)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($44.99 @ Amazon)
Video Card: Gigabyte Radeon R9 270X 2GB WINDFORCE Video Card ($172.98 @ Newegg)
Case: Corsair SPEC-01 RED ATX Mid Tower Case ($47.99 @ Micro Center)
Power Supply: EVGA 500W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($47.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $508.70
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-03-13 01:10 EDT-0400
This build is designed for all around upgradability. The G3258 is a powerhouse for the price, will play any light game with ease and when overclocked will fly! As for the mobo, H97 is a must if you want to upgrade to the next generation of broadwell core i3 i5 or i7 CPUs, and it also has a lot of PCI slots for adding in tons of cards, good amount of USB ports, and 4 Dimms slots. An astonishing amount of stuff for only $70. However, because it is only $70 you do sacrifice a few things like crossfire support, M.2 support and a few extra ports. I recommend getting the Asrock PRO4 if you can get a slightly better mobo in your computer build.
R9 270X is the gtx 980 of budget builds, capable of getting high frame rates and high detail settings on almost any game at 1080P.
Before we get into the builds, here are some tips on what to look for and what not to do when building a budget PC.
1. Do Not Go to Cheap: While these are cheap builds, what you do not want to do is get one extremely cheap component to compensate for getting a slightly more expensive component. For example, say you want a i3 4130 in your build, but to compensate you get a $20 ultra cheap PSU and $15 computer case. This is a bad idea, while you might get better performance with a i3 over a Pentium, your risking the life and longevity of all your components with such a cheap PSU and case. Cheap PSU might burn out and kill your entire pc, and a bad case might not give enough airflow and cause your power hungry graphics card to overheat often.
2. Know what you need: Before you even start looking at parts for a pc, know exactly what your needs are:
A. CPU: There are a variety of CPUs from AMD and Intel, all have their strengths and weaknesses. AMD's has a slight advantage in pure multithreaded apps, while intel has a huge advantage in single threaded apps.
B. Mobo: Motherboards are the hardest to decide on, there are literally dozens of motherboards for every CPU on the market. What's best for choosing is what your doing with your system, if you want a small system and only plan on gaming and web browsing, then a H81 or B85 chipset motherboard might be good. Or if you plan on plugging in multiple pci cards and lots of usb devices, then a H87 or H97 board would be good for the added expansion.
C: Graphics cards: This is a lot simpler, there are only a select few cards in each budget range, but then again it can be hard to choose. If you want the best gaming experience and don't care for features, then AMD has better offerings. But if you want a good feature set then Nvidia might be better for you.
D: Hard Drives: HDDs are very simple, SSD's are nearly out of the question at this price range so HDDs are the only way to go. I recommend 500GB and 1TB drives from Seagate and WD, the ones with the most reviews are the best.
Cases: These can be confusing, I've found that Cooler Master and Corsair have some of the best budget cases out there. Good looks and tons of airflow and flexibility.
E: PSUs: This is the most important in choosing for your PC. Power supplies power your entire system, and getting a bad one can result in totaling your entire PC. It is vital to get a PSU that is cheap but good. A popular chose is the corsair CX, good features and good price. Do not buy these for gaming builds!! They have very cheap parts that can kill your system over time, even if it's years. I have found that evga makes good PSUs for budget builds, while they aren't as "pretty", they will do the job well.
3. Deals: Deals can be lifesavers for a budget build, always be on the look out for them! BTW...I've found that Christmas time has the best deals, I was able to get up to $100 off of my computer build just because of Christmas sales.
Now for the exciting part, builds!! Here's a $300 gaming build:
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant
CPU: AMD A8-7600 3.3GHz Quad-Core Processor ($92.99 @ NCIX US)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-F2A68HM-HD2 Micro ATX FM2+ Motherboard ($47.93 @ Mwave)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 4GB (2 x 2GB) DDR3-1866 Memory ($39.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($44.99 @ Amazon)
Case: Silverstone PS08B (Black) MicroATX Mid Tower Case ($39.99 @ Amazon)
Power Supply: EVGA 500W 80+ Certified ATX Power Supply ($34.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $300.88
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-03-13 01:02 EDT-0400
You pretty much have to get an APU for a $300 gaming build to work, so I chose the latest from AMD's line, the kaveri A8. Don't expect good performance in the latest titles, but it will play older games on Steam at good settings and frame rates. 4GB will hinder you, but I can't add 8GB without breaking the bank. I used to game on a laptop with 4GB of ram, and it could run War Thunder and all my older games just fine.
Then for our theme build, the $400 mainstream budget PC:
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant
CPU: AMD Athlon X4 860K 3.7GHz Quad-Core Processor ($69.99 @ NCIX US)
Motherboard: ASRock FM2A88X+ BTC ATX FM2+ Motherboard ($70.98 @ Newegg)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 4GB (2 x 2GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($39.89 @ OutletPC)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($44.99 @ Amazon)
Video Card: MSI Radeon R7 250X 1GB Video Card ($89.99 @ Amazon)
Case: Corsair SPEC-01 RED ATX Mid Tower Case ($47.99 @ Micro Center)
Power Supply: EVGA 500W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($47.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $411.82
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-03-13 01:02 EDT-0400
While you could go with a G3258 and a H81 motherboard, h81 is not meant for everybody, and AMD's A88X and 860K offer a lot more functionality for the price.
R7 250X is a step up from the A10 7850K's IGPU, with 100 more cores you should get at least a 10-20% performance increase over a A10-7850K only build which is what most people would buy for a $400 gaming build.
If you want more graphics horsepower like a GTX 750 or R7 260X, you can get an A78 chipset motherboard if you do not want to overclock.
Now for the "cream of the crop" of extreme budget builds (lol):
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant
CPU: Intel Pentium G3258 3.2GHz Dual-Core Processor ($49.99 @ Micro Center)
Motherboard: ASRock H97 Anniversary ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($74.78 @ Newegg)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($69.98 @ OutletPC)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($44.99 @ Amazon)
Video Card: Gigabyte Radeon R9 270X 2GB WINDFORCE Video Card ($172.98 @ Newegg)
Case: Corsair SPEC-01 RED ATX Mid Tower Case ($47.99 @ Micro Center)
Power Supply: EVGA 500W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($47.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $508.70
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-03-13 01:10 EDT-0400
This build is designed for all around upgradability. The G3258 is a powerhouse for the price, will play any light game with ease and when overclocked will fly! As for the mobo, H97 is a must if you want to upgrade to the next generation of broadwell core i3 i5 or i7 CPUs, and it also has a lot of PCI slots for adding in tons of cards, good amount of USB ports, and 4 Dimms slots. An astonishing amount of stuff for only $70. However, because it is only $70 you do sacrifice a few things like crossfire support, M.2 support and a few extra ports. I recommend getting the Asrock PRO4 if you can get a slightly better mobo in your computer build.
R9 270X is the gtx 980 of budget builds, capable of getting high frame rates and high detail settings on almost any game at 1080P.
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