Help! Looking for a desktop.

[gingerninja252]

I'm looking for a gaming desktop for under roughly £375. The reason my budget is so low is because I'm going to have to pay for it myself. I've been looking around for a while now and I can't find a good quality desktop for that amount of money, or I can, but the websites look dodgy. Is there anyone out there with a little time on their hands to help me find something suitable? I'm getting increasingly frustrated with my laptop because the graphic card is shoddy (Intel HD 4000) so I preferably want something with as good a graphics card as possible for my budget, or one where i can replace the graphics card, I don't mind.

I also wouldn't mind building my own, if that's a possibility and/or cheaper. Thanks

 

[rockie_]

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: AMD FX-6300 3.5GHz 6-Core Processor (£74.34 @ Aria PC)
Motherboard: MSI 970A-G46 ATX AM3+ Motherboard (£52.79 @ Aria PC)
Memory: Corsair Vengeance 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (£64.00 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£37.50 @ Aria PC)
Video Card: MSI Radeon R7 260X 2GB Video Card (£80.39 @ Aria PC)
Case: NZXT Source 210 (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case (£31.45 @ Scan.co.uk)
Power Supply: EVGA 500W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply (£35.38 @ Amazon UK)
Optical Drive: Samsung SH-224DB/BEBE DVD/CD Writer (£10.09 @ CCL Computers)
Total: £385.94
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-10-12 15:05 BST+0100

with FX 4300 would cost 374.52

 

[DonkeyOatie]

Hi there.

Building your own will allow you to buy good 'just right' parts and in an order that makes sense. It will allow you to make present choices on the path to a glorious future.

It might be worthwhile to look at using a modern CPU with an on-board GPU to start with. HD 4600 is much better than HD 4000 and desktop components are just more stout and have more power available.

At the beginning you need three important parts for the future.

Power supply. Don't skimp here!
Motherboard. To provide a home for parts and communications between them
CPU. The beating heart.

For the moment, a HDD can be anything lying around, even an old laptop drive, same with monitor, keyboard and other peripherals. You could get by with just one stick of RAM (4Gb), planning to upgrade later. You will need a case, but this could be recycled or second hand now, planning to replace later. You will need an Operating System.

Here is the sandbox you can play in to design your system.

http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/

 

[rockie_]

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Pentium G3258 3.2GHz Dual-Core Processor (£49.57 @ Aria PC)
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-H81M-H Micro ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£33.35 @ Aria PC)
Memory: Corsair 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1333 Memory (£59.98 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£37.50 @ Aria PC)
Video Card: MSI Radeon R9 270 2GB TWIN FROZR Video Card (£114.99 @ Ebuyer)
Case: NZXT Source 210 (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case (£31.45 @ Scan.co.uk)
Power Supply: EVGA 500W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply (£35.38 @ Amazon UK)
Optical Drive: Samsung SH-224DB/BEBE DVD/CD Writer (£10.09 @ CCL Computers)
Total: £372.31
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-10-12 15:28 BST+0100

 

[DonkeyOatie]

Given your budget, I would be very tempted to go with rockie_'s second build and leave out the GPU completely, putting the money into a better CPU (nothing wrong with the one there, but a good i5 would be a good foundation with decent HD4600 iGPU, decent of iGPU that is), a H87 or H97 motherboard, and an Operating System, unless you can re-use your laptop's OS.

I'd be planning to put in a GTX970 later.

 

[gingerninja252]

Thanks man, you're the greatest

 

[gingerninja252]

Given your budget, I would be very tempted to go with rockie_'s second build and leave out the GPU completely, putting the money into a better CPU (nothing wrong with the one there, but a good i5 would be a good foundation with decent HD4600 iGPU, decent of iGPU that is), a H87 or H97 motherboard, and an Operating System, unless you can re-use your laptop's OS.

I'd be planning to put in a GTX970 later.

Hang on, What about the operating system?? Windows 7 or 8? I mean I'd rather windows 7 but I'm a bit of a noob when it comes to these things...

 

[DonkeyOatie]

Get Windows 8.1. It can be configured very much like a desktop and it is more modern and efficient than Windows 7.

However, if you have an old Windows 7 license that you could move onto this new machine, I do that to save money now.

 

[voyboyfan]

CPU:
AMD Athlon X4 860K 3.7GHz Quad-Core Processor
£64.80 £64.80 Scan.co.uk

MOBO:
MSI A88XM-E45 Micro ATX FM2+ Motherboard
£44.00 FREE £44.00 Amazon UK

RAM:
G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory
£62.39 £62.39 Aria PC

HDD:
Samsung Spinpoint F1 DT 750GB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive
£24.98 £4.99 £29.97 Overclockers.co.uk

GPU:
MSI Radeon R9 270 2GB TWIN FROZR Video Card
£114.99 £114.99 Ebuyer

PSU:
Corsair CX 430W 80+ Bronze Certified Semi-Modular ATX

Base Total: £348.42
Shipping: £4.99
Total: £353.41
WITHOUT CASE BECAUSE THAT YOU SHOULD CHOOSE YOURSELF

 

[LinFan15]

Building one yourself is cheaper most of the time. I believe the best you can do with your budget is something like this. http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/b68bVn
You can always install a discrete graphics card later, when your budget allows it.

 

[voyboyfan]

Building one yourself is cheaper most of the time. I believe the best you can do with your budget is something like this. http://uk.pcpartpicker.com/p/b68bVn
You can always install a discrete graphics card later, when your budget allows it.

Why would he buy an APU and a discrete GPU?

 

[rockie_]

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-4590 3.3GHz Quad-Core Processor (£148.00 @ Aria PC)
Motherboard: ASRock H97 PRO4 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£66.59 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (£62.39 @ Aria PC)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£37.50 @ Aria PC)
Case: Corsair SPEC-01 RED ATX Mid Tower Case (£36.35 @ Aria PC)
Power Supply: EVGA 500W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply (£35.38 @ Amazon UK)
Optical Drive: Samsung SH-224DB/BEBE DVD/CD Writer (£10.09 @ CCL Computers)
Total: £396.30
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-10-12 16:55 BST+0100

 

[voyboyfan]

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

CPU: Intel Core i5-4460 3.2GHz Quad-Core Processor (£131.94 @ Aria PC)
Motherboard: ASRock H97 PRO4 ATX LGA1150 Motherboard (£66.59 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: G.Skill Ripjaws X Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (£62.39 @ Aria PC)
Storage: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£37.50 @ Aria PC)
Case: Corsair SPEC-01 RED ATX Mid Tower Case (£36.35 @ Aria PC)
Power Supply: Corsair Builder 500W 80+ Bronze Certified ATX Power Supply (£39.99 @ Amazon UK)
Total: £374.76
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2014-10-12 16:44 BST+0100