Thanks to everyone who posted in

my other thread

I now have a temporary build planned. My main aim is to maximise value for money, so although I named some pretty undemanding games as targets for this build, they are just the games that caught my attention while not paying attention to what's being released on the pc, and I do also want to be able to explore the current game library and have some breathing room moving forwards.

My plan is to look for deals on black friday/after Christmas and get the parts as cheap as possible. If I understand correctly I can just add more ram and/or a SSD whenever I want so there's no need to buy those now.

Asus M5A99X Evo R2.0 Motherboard

Seasonic S12II-520 520W ATX12V Standard Power Supply

Seagate ST1000DM003 3.5 inch 1TB Barracuda Hard Drive

Crucial BLT2CP4G3D1608DT1TX0CEU 8GB (2x 4GB) Ballistix Tactical Memory

Sapphire 11200-16-20G HD7850 GDDR5 Graphics Card (1GB)

AMD FX6300 Black Edition 6 Core

lol okay thanks.

Thanks guys, I think I've chosen a CPU now (AMD 6300) but I'm wondering is there any point buying a graphics card that has DDR5 memory or will that be bottlenecked by the DDR3 in the CPU?

Thanks for all the replies I feel much more confident about this now.

Good point, I don't think it will be practical but I really should have given this some more careful consideration. My computer's a Dell (which means less interchangeable parts?) and is almost a decade old, but here's what the diagnostic program said (not the program you recommended since I'm using lubuntu):

Processor - 2xPentium D 2.80GHz

Memory - 1023 MB

There's no mention of a graphics card so I guess it's built in to something else, but I'm surprised to see the processor seems to meet the minimum requirements. Is a 2.8 ghz processor from 8 years ago as good as a 2.8ghz processor made today?

I definitely want an i5, but does that really belong in a budget build? I was actually wondering if buying a more expensive cpu and a cheaper graphics card would be sensible if my goal is just to make sure games run well with the graphics on low? Otherwise the one PredatorRules linked to seems to make more sense since it's still comfortably above the requirements of the games I'm looking at.

Sorry for the stupid question but I'm trying to build my first computer and I feel pretty lost. I've looked at the requirements for the games I want to play and they all say " (specific model) or better, so I'm wondering how do I search for better parts short of reading through the specs of every available part ever made, and if I do need to read through the specs, where can I find out wtf it all means?

P.s. Part suggestions would also be very welcome. I haven't got a budget yet because that really depends on how much I manage/decide to save, but I want to start planning it now so I can decide on a budget, be ready when I have the money and possibly buy some parts early when special offers are available. This is partly a necessary upgrade and I really want to keep it as cheap as possible, so I think gameing wise I just want to make sure I have access to the types of games I can't play on a console without worrying too much about what graphical settings I need to resort to. (I do want them to run smoothly though). The games I know for sure I want are DOTA2, Path of Exile and Starcraft 2.

Thanks for any help.

Thanks for all the replies. The HP screen doesn't seem to be available in the uk so I've gone for the ASUS. I'll let you know what I think when I get it. :)

Cool thanks. I guess I'll go with the VN247H then.

P.s. I won't be buying it until the bank finishes clearing the money I paid in, so further comments are still appreciated.

Thanks for the reply

Hmm, that does look good but I wonder if a 27" is a good idea. I'm going to be sitting very close so I don't really want to sacrifice other aspects to increase the size. How do you feel the i2757fh compares with smaller screens in that price range?

Hi guys, could any of you recommend a good monitor? I've looked at some in shops but they didn't have the ones I'd seen recommended and even the promo movies they were running all looked pretty grainy to me. It's obvious that the stats aren't the whole story and a monitor needs to be tried to be judged so it would be great if you could share your experience. Elsewhere I've seen the Asus VN247H recommended, but that was iirc at the beginning of the year and it is now older and more expensive so I'm wondering if there might not be a better option.

My price range is about £150-200 and I'll be using it for pretty much everything. (i.e. watching video, Ps3, surfing the web etc), but gaming is probably the priority. I'm also considering spending more since I'll use it so much, so feel free to mention slightly pricier monitors if you think they're worth stretching for.

Thanks for any help.

P.s. Does anyone know the difference between the Asus VN247H and the Asus VN247H-P?

God of War 3.

It was awesome.