low cost gaming PC: get a H110M or invest more in a B250M?

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cifroes

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I'm trying to build a lightweight, very low-cost gaming PC and I'm comparing getting 2 mobos:
- MSI H110M PRO-D - 50€
- MSI B250M PRO-VDH - 71€

Pairing it with something like a 1030 or RX 550 and CPU can be a Celeron G3900 or a Pentium G4600. As you can see, I want to save every penny I can :) And yes, I'm aware this barely classify as a 'gaming pc' :D

My question is, will I lose too much with the H110M in terms of future improvements or current gaming performance? Is it 21€ more worth it?

Just for reference, I basically can go with a 1030 and B250M or a RX 550 and H110M (price difference between 1030 and B250M is basically that).
 
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Hardware Brad

Hardware Brad

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How tight is your budget. I'm not sure how happy you would really be with the performance of a Celeron w/ a 1030. Honestly the lowest gaming system I'd recommend would be the H110, Pentium G4600, and a gtx 1050. I believe you will be much happier if you save up a little more and go with that, rather than spend money on a gtx 1030 or rx 550, which I wouldn't recommend for most games, and I wouldn't recommend the celeron at all.
 
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spdragoo

spdragoo

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At the very least I would recommend that you use the B250 motherboard:

1. Double the max RAM, & supports DDR4-2400 RAM
2. 2 extra SATA III ports
3. M.2 port
4. Extra USB 3.1 port
5. Guaranteed to support Kaby Lake-S CPUs out of the box (whereas the H110 might need a BIOS update...which will require you to have a Skylake CPU to flash the BIOS), & more likely for future upgrades to support Coffee Lake CPUs with a BIOS update

If you can swing it, go for the Pentium G4600 vs. the Celeron G3900. A faster 2C/4T CPU is going to beat a slower 2C/2T CPU any day.
 
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cifroes

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hmm, in my country I can pre-reserve AMD Ryzen 3 1200 Quad-Core 3.1GHz for 116€ + cheapest AM4 mobo 65€. I save 6€ on mobo but spend 26€ more on Ryzen 3 than on Pentium G4600. I understand Ryzen is much better but really squeezing pennies here :\
 
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cifroes

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Thanks, I analysed your points and that's the thing, for this machine those things aren't important because it never gonna have a lot of sata things connected and it's fine to deal without M.2 or extra USB

Ram speed is a good point, but probably 2133 or 2400 won't be very noticeable.

Main problem is really the kaby lake support since I don't want to pay the store to put the PC together so I don't have a way to update BIOS. Isn't there any mobo H110M with a bios guaranteed to be updated to kaby lake?

Yeah, the pentium is a good point. Too bad G4560 is out of stock (and price increased). But with G4600 I will need a B250M since it's kaby lake while the celeron is still skylake
 
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cifroes

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hmm, I understand you. The recipient of the computer was playing with a 500€ laptop 4 years old (some ATI discrete GPU) so I'm really expecting the 1030 to be an improvement. If it plays games in 720p and some games we need to go low settings I think that would be fine. I'll also try an used 750 TI but that's another thing.

Prices around here are like this:
1030 - 80€
RX 550 - 100€
RX 460 - 115€ (not sure if in stock)
1050 2GB - 130€
1050 Ti 4GB - 165€

Other components are:
case - 23€
good psu - 42€
8GB RAM - 65€
Already have SSD - 0
G3900 celeron - 40€
H110M mobo - 50€

other prices:
Pentium G4600 - 90€
MSI B250m - 71€

So I already spent 220€ of my 300€ budget. With 1030, exactly 300€. Money for this is really tight and not worth to go extra 100€ because it's for a teenager that can only play on weekends and vacations :) also can't wait for G4560 to be in stock otherwise the summer vacations end. G4400 also not an option because its 2C/2T so not a big improvement for the celeron.

So... if I want to spend a bit more, I can go with celeron + 1050 which totals 350€.
G4600 + B250M + 1030 it already goes to 371 :\
G4600 + B250M + 1050 = 421€ which is impossible for me.

I'm 99% sure that for games, celeron + 1050 will be better than G4600 + B250M + 1030. That's where my whole doubt about the mobo chipset came from. Am I right?
 
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Hardware Brad

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I do agree that the celeron with a 1050 will most likely game better than the pentium with a 1030.
 
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spdragoo

spdragoo

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And that's the thing: if you don't need the features, then you don't necessarily need to pay for them.

As for the BIOS update, it's going to depend. Some brick-and-mortar stores like Micro Center may take the time to ensure that the Skylake 100-series chipset boards they have in stock have been BIOS-flashed to work with Kaby Lake, but I can't guarantee that 100%. eRetailers are probably less likely to have it flashed, & you'll either need to contact them about it or make sure it's listed on their site. I wouldn't be surprised if some of them might even charge a nominal fee for that; I have no problem with a fee-based upgrade like that, but I personally wouldn't pay more than $25-50USD for that (maybe 20-40€ tops).
 
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