Hello all!I am trying to decide on building a budget gaming pcs(400-500$ each) or slowly part them together with nicer parts

[Nerdlove639]

Hello all!
I am trying to decide on building a budget gaming pcs(400-500$ each). One for the wife and me.
The other option is to slowly part them together with nicer parts like a nice mother board and power supply and ram. Then get decent(with in budget CPU w/ integrated video.)
The problem I'm having is it worth it being that I will probably be unable to buy any more parts for at least 1-2 years. Saving to move...


All I want is a pc that can play weld of warcraft on high and runs other games nicely.

 

[maxtex]

Ok good luck

 

[zeyuanfu]

I generally don't recommend building a PC with parts bought separately over a period of time as you might necver know if a part you bought is DOA or not until you have all the parts. This owuld be what I'd do with 500$ right now:
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Pentium G3258 3.2GHz Dual-Core Processor ($69.99 @ Newegg)
Motherboard: Asus H81M-K Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($52.99 @ Newegg)
Memory: G.Skill Sniper Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1866 Memory ($81.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($57.22 @ Amazon)
Video Card: PowerColor Radeon R9 270X 2GB DEVIL Video Card ($169.99 @ Newegg)
Case: NZXT Source 210 (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case ($40.26 @ Mwave)
Power Supply: Antec 450W ATX Power Supply ($37.08 @ NCIX US)
Total: $505.50
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-10-12 18:36 EDT-0400
I'd wait for GPU prices to drop, though.

 

[Nerdlove639]

Any reason for Radeon over nvidia

 

[zeyuanfu]

Any reason for Radeon over nvidia

It's the best GPU you can get for 170$. The 750 Ti are worse than the 270X and the GTX 760 costs 30$ more, unless you want to stretch your budget:
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Video Card: EVGA GeForce GTX 760 2GB Superclocked ACX Video Card ($222.58 @ Amazon)
Total: $222.58
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-10-12 19:03 EDT-0400

 

[Cons29]

if budget is limited, i would suggest building just 1 instead of 2. you will have a better build (just share) instead of 2 slow ones

 

[sparestuff]

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Pentium G3258 3.2GHz Dual-Core Processor ($69.99 @ Amazon)
Motherboard: ASRock H97 Anniversary ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($64.78 @ Newegg)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($70.99 @ Newegg)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive ($49.98 @ OutletPC)
Video Card: Asus Radeon R9 270X 2GB DirectCU II Video Card ($155.75 @ Newegg)
Case: NZXT Source 210 (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case ($29.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: XFX 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($59.98 @ OutletPC)
Total: $501.46
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available

This is an alright build, should be able to run pretty much anything except for hardcore games, a lot of games will be able to be easily run but the more extreme games like BF4 will have a bit of trouble with this build, might have to drop settings to run those kind of games. No need to build everything slowly, and this build should be good for a few years for WoW at high settings, it should work pretty well. You can do a slight overclock with the G3258 as the stock coolers can handle a small overclock without getting too hot.

Black Friday is coming up so there are going to be a lot of deals and price drops, don't buy anything now, wait for then.

 

[Nerdlove639]

One computer isn't an option and is kinda of a dumb suggestion
This is to play world of warcraft with my wife as it's main purpose other then for her surfing the web and my other games.(skyrim/elderscrolls, fallouts, and some other games.)
So it has to be two

As far as processors would you pick the g3258 over an i3?
For now I can canabalis my old laptop and tower for hard drives and optical drives. My father said he might grab me so ram for the wife and I for Xmas
So that two parts off the list would you use that extra money on the CPU or gpu?

 

[Nerdlove639]

And yes I will be waiting till Black Friday or Xmas time cause I'm studying for my pharmacy tech certification right now and don't have time to play till after

 

[sparestuff]

One computer isn't an option and is kinda of a dumb suggestion
This is to play world of warcraft with my wife as it's main purpose other then for her surfing the web and my other games.(skyrim/elderscrolls, fallouts, and some other games.)
So it has to be two

As far as processors would you pick the g3258 over an i3?
For now I can canabalis my old laptop and tower for hard drives and optical drives. My father said he might grab me so ram for the wife and I for Xmas
So that two parts off the list would you use that extra money on the CPU or gpu?

Alright, I'll strip off the hard drives and other things you listed from my build, and I will show you what I would do with the extra money

If you need ram
PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i3-4150 3.5GHz Dual-Core Processor ($109.99 @ Amazon)
Motherboard: ASRock H97 Anniversary ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($64.78 @ Newegg)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory ($70.99 @ Newegg)
Video Card: Sapphire Radeon R9 280 3GB DUAL-X Video Card ($189.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Cougar Solution (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case ($29.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: XFX 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($54.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $507.73
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available

If you do NOT need RAM

PCPartPicker part list: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/nrCnNG
Price breakdown by merchant: http://pcpartpicker.com/p/nrCnNG/by_merchant/

CPU: Intel Core i5-4440 3.1GHz Quad-Core Processor ($174.99 @ SuperBiiz)
Motherboard: ASRock H97 Anniversary ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($64.78 @ Newegg)
Video Card: XFX Radeon R9 280 3GB Black Edition Double Dissipation Video Card ($184.99 @ Newegg)
Case: Cougar Solution (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case ($29.99 @ Newegg)
Power Supply: XFX 550W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply ($54.99 @ NCIX US)
Total: $509.74
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available

 

[Nerdlove639]

You would pick the r9 280 over the gtx760?

 

[zeyuanfu]

It depends what you're doing. If you're just casually gaming, the 760 would be the choice. If you play VRAM-hungry games like Watch_Dogs, the 280's 3 GB of VRAM will come in handy.

 

[Nerdlove639]

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/LJMNBm
As far as gaming mostly wow, starbound, skyrim, fallout, bioshock, halflife,portal and the expansions.
What do you guys think?
Other then the video card it's almost with in budget. I think I can scrap 40$(20 each)
But that is pushing it quite a bit on my budget

 

[sparestuff]

http://pcpartpicker.com/p/LJMNBm
As far as gaming mostly wow, starbound, skyrim, fallout, bioshock, halflife,portal and the expansions.
What do you guys think?
Other then the video card it's almost with in budget. I think I can scrap 40$(20 each)
But that is pushing it quite a bit on my budget

For those games, especially skyrim I would go with the extra v-ram and get a r9 280/280x w/e is in your budget.

 

[Nerdlove639]

Every where I look about the r9 280 says it needs A 750w psu
Is that true?

 

[pnpcrazyfool]

I ran it with a 450 watt that had converted molex to power the GPU. I upgraded very quickly because it scared me. Possible yes recommended no

Now I use a 1200 watt so I need a 2nd GPU

 

[zeyuanfu]

Manufacturers say that you need an x amount of wattage assuming you have a crap PSU. Any good XFX 550 watt PSU should be fine for a single-card setup.