Okay so yesterday i posted up saying i want to build a moderate gaming pc. The budget objective was £500. I messaged a user on youtube who had been giving people recommendations on a video and he gave me some ideas for certain parts. I have filled in the blanks and would like you to offer me any advice, alternatives and recommendations for the components. Also i am not sure if all is compatible so some confirmation on that would be nice too.

Processor (does this have fan included?)

Graphics Card - unsure of which either this or this

Motherboard

Memory

Hard Drive

Case

I still need a PSU and DVD ROM/writer drive so any recommendations you can make are great.

This came between £365.57 and £385.29 depending on which GPU i went for.

Also thought i'd add that i will be using a monitor with 1366x768 resolution.JM_MUFC

Between those two GPUs definitely go with the HD 5750.

Heres a setup for just under £500:

CPU - AMD Athlon II X4 620

GPU - Palit GeForce GTX 460 768MB

Motherboard - Asus AMD 760G AM3

Optical Drive - LG 22x DVD RW SATA

PSU - FSP 600W Modular PSU

HDD - Samsung Spinpoint F3 500GB

Case - Xigmatek Asgard Midi

RAM - Patriot Viper 2x 2GB 1333MHz RAM

£493 including VAT

It should eat through every game at that resolution and should very well for up coming titles.

Heres a setup for just under £500:

CPU - AMD Athlon II X4 620

GPU - Palit GeForce GTX 460 768MB

Motherboard - Asus AMD 760G AM3

Optical Drive - LG 22x DVD RW SATA

PSU - FSP 600W Modular PSU

HDD - Samsung Spinpoint F3 500GB

Case - Xigmatek Asgard Midi

RAM - Patriot Viper 2x 2GB 1333MHz RAM

£493 including VAT

It should eat through every game at that resolution and should very well for up coming titles.

Too_tight_shoes

[QUOTE="Too_tight_shoes"]

Heres a setup for just under £500:

CPU - AMD Athlon II X4 620

GPU - Palit GeForce GTX 460 768MB

Motherboard - Asus AMD 760G AM3

Optical Drive - LG 22x DVD RW SATA

PSU - FSP 600W Modular PSU

HDD - Samsung Spinpoint F3 500GB

Case - Xigmatek Asgard Midi

RAM - Patriot Viper 2x 2GB 1333MHz RAM

£493 including VAT

It should eat through every game at that resolution and should very well for up coming titles.

hitman6actual

A setup including a OS as well as PnP to total around £500:

CPU - AMD Athlon II X4 620

GPU - XFX HD 4850 512MB

Motherboard - Asus AMD 760G AM3

Optical Drive - LG 22x DVD RW SATA

PSU - Antec Basiq Plus 550w Modular PSU

HDD - Samsung Spinpoint F3 500GB

Case - Xigmatek Asgard Midi

RAM - Patriot Viper 2x 2GB 1333MHz RAM

OS - Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit

Your better going with a HD 4850 over a HD 5750 which is slower and costs another £20 more.

[QUOTE="hitman6actual"][QUOTE="Too_tight_shoes"]

Heres a setup for just under £500:

CPU - AMD Athlon II X4 620

GPU - Palit GeForce GTX 460 768MB

Motherboard - Asus AMD 760G AM3

Optical Drive - LG 22x DVD RW SATA

PSU - FSP 600W Modular PSU

HDD - Samsung Spinpoint F3 500GB

Case - Xigmatek Asgard Midi

RAM - Patriot Viper 2x 2GB 1333MHz RAM

£493 including VAT

It should eat through every game at that resolution and should very well for up coming titles.

JM_MUFC

A setup including a OS as well as PnP to total around £500:

CPU - AMD Athlon II X4 620

GPU - XFX HD 4850 512MB

Motherboard - Asus AMD 760G AM3

Optical Drive - LG 22x DVD RW SATA

PSU - Antec Basiq Plus 550w Modular PSU

HDD - Samsung Spinpoint F3 500GB

Case - Xigmatek Asgard Midi

RAM - Patriot Viper 2x 2GB 1333MHz RAM

OS - Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit

Your better going with a HD 4850 over a HD 5750 which is slower and costs another £20 more.

Too_tight_shoes

Ok after having a look over your components some are pretty sweet, i've done a pick and mix job and this is what i hav came up with (some parts are same as yours just cheaper on ebuyer):

CPU - AMD Athlon II X4 620

GPU - Asus HD 5670

Motherboard - Asus AMD 760G AM3

HDD - Samsung Spinpoint F3

Optical Drive - LG GH22NS50

PSU - 600w Value PSU (not overly sure about this)

OS - Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit

The memory i was unsure of, your one did not say whether or not it is DDR2 or DDR3 but the one i had previously chosen seemed overly priced in comparison. The case i'm unsure of too as im unsure of which will be more beneficial, front/side ventilation. Also i want to get one as cheap as possible as nice looking case holds no interest in me.

Without the case and ram this totals up to £368.36, assuming the ram and case costs me £100 then it'll be £468.36 for the pc w/ OS.

So now its a case of:

1. Are all the above parts compatible?
2. Is this the best i can get for £470?
3. What Memory unit do i go for?
4. What makes a good case?

And then in terms of construction (these may sound a little retarded)

1. Does each individual part come with like a set of instructions, telling you where to connect each wire and stuff?
2. Is this going to be a difficult/complicated build?

Well, I'm not sure what Vista prices look like these days, but whatever you get, get the 64 bit version. Anything over a 3GB. of RAM on a 32-bit OS is pretty much a waste, because a 32-bit OS can only utilize about 3.2GB. I would look into the price difference between Vista and 7. Vista is still quite a mess when it comes to OS, but if it's cheaper, it will get the job done. If you can work it into your budget somehow, I would still go with 7 however, because it will run much more stable. hitman6actual

Vista is only around £20 cheaper and im going to have to go on 7 some day so i figure it best to try get it now rather than have to upgrade later. I do have an XP pro disk at home which i may be able to use until i can get windows 7 but i guess thats just more work. I've re-arranged some parts and got a few more questions if you wouldnt mind taking the time to look over them.

[QUOTE="Too_tight_shoes"]

A setup including a OS as well as PnP to total around £500:

CPU - AMD Athlon II X4 620

GPU - XFX HD 4850 512MB

Motherboard - Asus AMD 760G AM3

Optical Drive - LG 22x DVD RW SATA

PSU - Antec Basiq Plus 550w Modular PSU

HDD - Samsung Spinpoint F3 500GB

Case - Xigmatek Asgard Midi

RAM - Patriot Viper 2x 2GB 1333MHz RAM

OS - Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit

Your better going with a HD 4850 over a HD 5750 which is slower and costs another £20 more.

JM_MUFC

Ok after having a look over your components some are pretty sweet, i've done a pick and mix job and this is what i hav came up with (some parts are same as yours just cheaper on ebuyer):

CPU - AMD Athlon II X4 620

GPU - Asus HD 5670

Motherboard - Asus AMD 760G AM3

HDD - Samsung Spinpoint F3

Optical Drive - LG GH22NS50

PSU - 600w Value PSU (not overly sure about this)

OS - Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit

The memory i was unsure of, your one did not say whether or not it is DDR2 or DDR3 but the one i had previously chosen seemed overly priced in comparison. The case i'm unsure of too as im unsure of which will be more beneficial, front/side ventilation. Also i want to get one as cheap as possible as nice looking case holds no interest in me.

Without the case and ram this totals up to £368.36, assuming the ram and case costs me £100 then it'll be £468.36 for the pc w/ OS.

So now its a case of:

1. Are all the above parts compatible?
2. Is this the best i can get for £470?
3. What Memory unit do i go for?
4. What makes a good case?

And then in terms of construction (these may sound a little retarded)

1. Does each individual part come with like a set of instructions, telling you where to connect each wire and stuff?
2. Is this going to be a difficult/complicated build?

[QUOTE="Too_tight_shoes"]

A setup including a OS as well as PnP to total around £500:

CPU - AMD Athlon II X4 620

GPU - XFX HD 4850 512MB

Motherboard - Asus AMD 760G AM3

Optical Drive - LG 22x DVD RW SATA

PSU - Antec Basiq Plus 550w Modular PSU

HDD - Samsung Spinpoint F3 500GB

Case - Xigmatek Asgard Midi

RAM - Patriot Viper 2x 2GB 1333MHz RAM

OS - Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit

Your better going with a HD 4850 over a HD 5750 which is slower and costs another £20 more.

JM_MUFC

Ok after having a look over your components some are pretty sweet, i've done a pick and mix job and this is what i hav came up with (some parts are same as yours just cheaper on ebuyer):

CPU - AMD Athlon II X4 620

GPU - Asus HD 5670

Motherboard - Asus AMD 760G AM3

HDD - Samsung Spinpoint F3

Optical Drive - LG GH22NS50

PSU - 600w Value PSU (not overly sure about this)

OS - Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit

The memory i was unsure of, your one did not say whether or not it is DDR2 or DDR3 but the one i had previously chosen seemed overly priced in comparison. The case i'm unsure of too as im unsure of which will be more beneficial, front/side ventilation. Also i want to get one as cheap as possible as nice looking case holds no interest in me.

Without the case and ram this totals up to £368.36, assuming the ram and case costs me £100 then it'll be £468.36 for the pc w/ OS.

So now its a case of:

1. Are all the above parts compatible?
2. Is this the best i can get for £470?
3. What Memory unit do i go for?
4. What makes a good case?

And then in terms of construction (these may sound a little retarded)

1. Does each individual part come with like a set of instructions, telling you where to connect each wire and stuff?
2. Is this going to be a difficult/complicated build?

I would still go with a 4XXX series card, because you can get much better performance for less. Your PSU is way overpowered. A 400W one will do fine. I think pretty much everything else looks fine, and if your unsure how to put things together, I would look at this forum post.Everything you need to know is right there in that post. If you use that guide, just follow it very precisely, and everything should work out fine. hitman6actual

This is now what i am looking at:

CPU - AMD Athlon II X4 620 £70.49

GPU – ATI Radeon HD 4850 £70.49

Motherboard - Asus AMD 760G AM3 £47.83

HDD - Samsung Spinpoint F3 £31.99

Optical Drive - LG GH22NS50 £16.80

PSU – Casecom 500w ATX £16.98

OS - Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit £84.99

Which will bring me to a grand total of £339.57, all that is needed now is ram. I am completely lost when looking at that so advice is yet again needed.

This is now what i am looking at:

CPU - AMD Athlon II X4 620 £70.49

GPU – ATI Radeon HD 4850 £70.49

Motherboard - Asus AMD 760G AM3 £47.83

HDD - Samsung Spinpoint F3 £31.99

Optical Drive - LG GH22NS50 £16.80

PSU – Casecom 500w ATX £16.98

OS - Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit £84.99

Which will bring me to a grand total of £339.57, all that is needed now is ram. I am completely lost when looking at that so advice is yet again needed.

JM_MUFC

Your nit picking and lost on RAM but you easily opted for a £16 PSU?!.... seriously.

All ram as long as its compatible with your motherboard will work fine as in DDR2 or 3 and Dual Channel or Tri Channel. You need DDR3 Dual Channel ram and anything from:

- OCZ

- Kingston

- Crucial

- Patriot

- Corsair

... It really doesn't matter what you company you chose, just go for the cheapest DDR3 1333MHz Ram you can find which is around £70-80 roughly.

Again please re-consider getting a better PSU. Im not being stubborn, Im just going by experience cheap PSU's are often very noisy and are more likely to break down as well as having short 24pin cables and in general are poorly made with cheap plastics and with tin like metals.

Well i am pretty much broke right now so nit picking to save cash is a habit i have fallen into, There is a 450w psu here:

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/151287

It says it has short circuit protection and over voltage protection which is probably a good thing to have so that the other components arent fried, although i really have no idea what im looking for in terms of connectors and the pins i need.

I saw a Corsair 4gb DDR3 1333mhz for £75.03 which seems to fit your guidelines perfectly.

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/178943

It says something about it being 'unbuffered' whatever the hell that means, maybe you can explain.

One reveiw for it says this though:

'...but one thing that could be misleading is that I thought these come with a heat sink but on arrival I was horrified to see that what appears to be a heat sink in the pictures is actually a LONG WHITE STICKER stuck on the memory modules,' Is this a problem or not?

I'll total the results now and hoping i can get some extra hours for the next few weeks i should be able to afford it. Also a huge thanks to both you and hitman as your advice and wisdom has been invaluable!

I would go with the 450w psu you posted seeing as its 80% efficient and will run everything listed just fine, its also used and rebranded by a number of hardware sites as their own and is used for budget gaming setups it will do fine and is far more efficient and reliable than what you posted earlier... which I would only use for work PC's with excessive amounts of hard drives and optical drives. Also don't worry about the unbuffered ram part I don't even know why its put up seeing as buffered ram is used for servers.Too_tight_shoes

Great Thanks again! Just a few weeks and then i can enjoy building it, ive selected a case for £20... i know it seems i hav gone cheapo again but i liked the nice added feature that it has 2 x 80mm side fans. 1 runs constantly but after the temperature reaches a certain height the other fan will kick it to cool it back down again. This seemed a nice power saver, meaning im not going to be running a fan that i dont need but when i do need it it'll start up.

[QUOTE="Too_tight_shoes"]I would go with the 450w psu you posted seeing as its 80% efficient and will run everything listed just fine, its also used and rebranded by a number of hardware sites as their own and is used for budget gaming setups it will do fine and is far more efficient and reliable than what you posted earlier... which I would only use for work PC's with excessive amounts of hard drives and optical drives. Also don't worry about the unbuffered ram part I don't even know why its put up seeing as buffered ram is used for servers.JM_MUFC

Great Thanks again! Just a few weeks and then i can enjoy building it, ive selected a case for £20... i know it seems i hav gone cheapo again but i liked the nice added feature that it has 2 x 80mm side fans. 1 runs constantly but after the temperature reaches a certain height the other fan will kick it to cool it back down again. This seemed a nice power saver, meaning im not going to be running a fan that i dont need but when i do need it it'll start up.

Don't worry about the case its one thing I go cheap on my self ;). As long as everything fits and it has at least one fan pulling in cold air it will do fine... everything else is just a luxury, although I do want a new case one with a side window so people can look in and go ooh!Too_tight_shoes

They got a few of them cheap on ebuyer, the only thing that put me off was the fan on the front had an LED in it. Not too much of a problem for some but personally i didnt like it. Otherwise it was pretty nice and like £18.99. One final question is that i need to connect to internet wirelessly so how do i do that from a desktop pc? is there some extra hardware i'll need or some time of usb dongle?

Heres an example of one with a window:

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/115479

Its got the big red blue 120mm fan on the front that put me off but i didn't notice that there is also an 80mm fan on the rear too. There is also it in red or a tri-color one!

EDIT: Other Cases:

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/134803

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/146271

[QUOTE="Too_tight_shoes"]Don't worry about the case its one thing I go cheap on my self ;). As long as everything fits and it has at least one fan pulling in cold air it will do fine... everything else is just a luxury, although I do want a new case one with a side window so people can look in and go ooh!JM_MUFC

They got a few of them cheap on ebuyer, the only thing that put me off was the fan on the front had an LED in it. Not too much of a problem for some but personally i didnt like it. Otherwise it was pretty nice and like £18.99. One final question is that i need to connect to internet wirelessly so how do i do that from a desktop pc? is there some extra hardware i'll need or some time of usb dongle?

These questions just keep hitting me! (literally ;) ) Usually when updating your pc you'll have new drivers to install, so when doing a home build do they still need installing and if so in what order?JM_MUFC

Just a sidenote. Before building a new computer, gather all the basic driver/software installation into a file like gfx/sound/antivrius/instantmessenger/adobe stuff/favorite game like into a dvd or external. Save like an hour worth of bs :P so you can game right away.

Not sure what order you speak of, all I can say is install your OS first!

[QUOTE="JM_MUFC"]These questions just keep hitting me! (literally ;) ) Usually when updating your pc you'll have new drivers to install, so when doing a home build do they still need installing and if so in what order?Bikouchu35

Just a sidenote. Before building a new computer, gather all the basic driver/software installation into a file like gfx/sound/antivrius/instantmessenger/adobe stuff/favorite game like into a dvd or external. Save like an hour worth of bs :P so you can game right away.

Not sure what order you speak of, all I can say is install your OS first!

I know you wouldn't get it from here, but connecting to the internet is as simple as something like this.I use it myself, and even in my little remote corner of my house, I can do everything on the net just fine. Of course you'll need a router to connect to, but I am assuming you already have that. Another, slightly more expensive alternative is what you were suggesting (connecting a wireless adapter to a PCI slot) which you hook right into the motherboard. I have had rigs with both, and both work equally well, it's just using the USB generally costs a tiny bit less, and you won't have to run the risk of your GPU being too big and your wireless connector getting in the way of it. As far as driver installation is concerned, install your OS of course, and then install whatever you feel you need to. It really doesn't matter in what order I don't think. hitman6actual

Just a sidenote. Before building a new computer, gather all the basic driver/software installation into a file like gfx/sound/antivrius/instantmessenger/adobe stuff/favorite game like into a dvd or external. Save like an hour worth of bs :P so you can game right away.

Not sure what order you speak of, all I can say is install your OS first!Bikouchu35

Thanks for the advice, i hadn't thought of that. I have a 60gb external so that'll be able to hold the stuff i need with ease.

Ok a compatibility question, I went on XFX's official site to read up about the graphics card and then it said system requirements it shows that it fits fine onto the motherboard so that was ok but then when it went onto psu's it said that the card needs 2 75w 6-pin PCI-E power connectors. Upon checking the psu it says that there is only 1 6-pin PCI-E power connector. So the question is really can it run off of one or do i need to get a different PSU?

Feel free to check the sites:

Graphics Card Specs - http://xfxforce.com/en-gb/products/graphiccards/HD%204000series/4850.aspx#4

PSU specs