Tom's Hardware > Forum > Homebuilt Systems > New System Build > WHAT IF you made a new gaming rig for $850, what would you use?

WHAT IF you made a new gaming rig for $850, what would you use?

Forum Homebuilt Systems : New System Build - WHAT IF you made a new gaming rig for $850, what would you use?

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As alot of you know Im about to buy every thing and make a new comp.
Its my frist build and before I buy I just wanted to see what you guys came up whit my budget.
I got $850 to spend just on the comp parts.
I dont need a OS, monitor keyboard or speakers just the case and every thing that goes in it.
And I am definately willing to wait for the 4850 and get a p45 to crossfire

Also I want to OC as much and still have a rig that runs for 4yrs.

THX!

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8800GT(S) 512mb
E7200/E8400/Q6600
GA-(E)P35-DS3L/GA-P45-DS3L
WD6400AAKS
Antec/Corsair/PCP&C PSU

Reply to pcgamer12

I'd get a GTX 280 and use some old fashioned hobo construction building the rest of it out of cardboard.

Message quoted 1 times
Message edited by Oh Snap on 06-19-2008 at 09:26:37 PM

------------------------------ Intel Core 2 Quad q6600 @ 3.0ghz // 8GB PC8500 RAM @ 1066
2x WD Velociraptors 10k rpm RAID 0
3x (Tri-SLI) BFG NVidia GeForce 8800 GTX OC 768MB
3x 30" Dell 3007WFP Monitors
Reply to Oh Snap

As much as I love nVidia cards, the benchmarks for the GTX280 might not be worth all that you pay considering what you could get relatively to it for cheaper. But I will say this, depending on the size monitor you are using, a single 8800gt(s) would be far sufficient for you. If you have a large display that yields great quality, then go SLI

Reply to nhanandmel

Oh Snap wrote :

I'd get a GTX 280 and use some old fashioned hobo construction building the rest of it out of cardboard.

What a waste of a post. Have something insightful to add or just don't bother.

Now then to the OP:

Middle Budget Build: Goal $800- Acutal Price- $761.65 shipped before rebates of $40

CPU: Intel Core2Duo E7200 $129.99 add $60 for E8400
Motherboard: MSI P45 Neo-F $99 (or Asus P5Q Pro- add $50) for Crossfire support
RAM: OCZ Platinum Revision 2x 2GB DDR2-800 ($20 MIR) $23 for 2GB of RAM
Video: Radeon 4850 Video card $199
Case: Antec Sonta III $129
Hard Drive: Seagate 250GB 16MB cache $59.99
Optical Drive: SAMSUNG Black 20X DVD Burner SATA $22.99
Thermal Compound: Arctic Cooling MX 2 $6.99
Cooling:XIGMATEK HDT-S1283 $36.99
Bracket:XIGMATEK ACK-I7751 Retention Bracket $6.99

Message quoted 1 times
Message edited by shadowduck on 06-20-2008 at 05:08:54 AM

------------------------------ Success comes from knowing that you did your best to become the best that you are capable of becoming."-John Wooden
Reply to shadowduck

Forget doing XFire with the 4850 and the P45.

The P45 only runs 8X PCIE for XFire.
I suspect you will be severly bottlenecked.

Get Cheaper GPUs or get a better Mobo.

------------------------------ If its good in theory but not in practice,
its not good theory.
Reply to zenmaster

the p45 has 2.0 pcie so its like haveing a 1.1 x16 and ive read that htey did tests with 1.1 x8 crossfire and there wasnt any bottlenecking

Reply to licid24

Someone posted earlier, the 4850 is actually on newegg at 199.99. If you want it, it's there.

Reply to ohiou_grad_06

http://cgi.ebay.com/Core-2-Duo-Gam [...] dZViewItem

Parts and shipping cost $799.51 I got to make a little profit and pay fees.

Reply to roadrunner197069

licid24 wrote :

And I would like three wishes from the wizard.... You have champaigne taste on a beer budget. Lucky for you this cpu overclocks to speeds of up to 3.6 to 4.0. But for now I would just move up the FSB on this to 3.16GHz...it's the natural overclock for this cpu (9.5x333). Anyways there's your build.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6811119152 $69.99
COOLER MASTER Centurion 590 RC-590-KKN1-GP Black SECC / ABS ATX Mid Tower Computer Case - Retail

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6817139005 $109.99 ($99.99 after $10.00 Mail-In Rebate)
CORSAIR CMPSU-650TX 650W ATX12V / EPS12V Power Supply 100 - 240 V UL, CE, CB, TUV, FCC, CCC - Retail

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6819115052 $131.99
Intel Core 2 Duo E7200 Wolfdale 2.53GHz 3MB L2 Cache LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor - Retail

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835233001 $24.99 ($14.99 after $10.00 Mail-In Rebate)
XIGMATEK HDT-S963 92mm Rifle CPU Cooler - Retail

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6835233019 $6.99
XIGMATEK ACK-I7751 Retention Bracket - Retail

http://secure.newegg.com/Shopping/ [...] ChangeItem $319.99<---Combo Deal
ASUS P5Q Pro LGA 775 Intel P45 ATX Intel Motherboard EPU w/ 8-Phase power, heat-pipe, designed for overclocker
&
ASUS EAH4850/HTDI/512M Radeon HD 4850 512MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 HDCP Ready CrossFire Supported Video Card
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6814121253

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6820146731 $89.99 ($74.99 after $20.00 Mail-In Rebate)
mushkin 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory - Retail

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6822148262 $59.99
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3250410AS 250GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6827106263 $23.99
LITE-ON Black 20X DVD+R 8X DVD+RW 8X DVD+R DL 20X DVD-R 6X DVD-RW 12X DVD-RAM 16X DVD-ROM 48X CD-R 32X CD-RW 48X CD-ROM 2MB Cache SATA 20X DVD±R DVD Burner - OEM

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 0&Tpk=mx-2 $6.99
ARCTIC COOLING MX-2 Thermal Compound - Retail

Total
$844.90
$804.90 w/mail in rebates

Message edited by Why_Me on 06-20-2008 at 05:09:18 AM

------------------------------ "God invented Google so you would stop asking stupid questions."
Reply to Why_Me

OP:

The extra $100 on Why_Me's build over mine will give you 2GB more of RAM and a better PSU.

Go with his build if you can swing the extra $100 which it looks like you can.

------------------------------ Success comes from knowing that you did your best to become the best that you are capable of becoming."-John Wooden
Reply to shadowduck

I have been wanting to upgrade my computer and have been reading the forums about gaming rigs for the last week. I really like Why_Me's build and just purchased the exact parts from Newegg except for the case and power supply. I got a NXT Apollo Case (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811146025) and Antec 650 power supply (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817371001).

I have never overclocked and will be reading those forums while I wait for my parts to come in. I was hoping to get some more info about how to "...move up the FSB on this to 3.16GHz...it's the natural overclock for this cpu (9.5x333)." THX!

Message quoted 1 times

Reply to marinco

shadowduck wrote :

What a waste of a post. Have something insightful to add or just don't bother.

The OP didn't even bother to try and do any research. Get over it Captain Serious-about-computers.

marinco wrote :

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/690/1/ <---Read that. There's a "drop down menu" at the bottom of that page. 9.5 is the multiplier for this cpu (E7200), so 9.5 x 333 = 3.16GHz. Now you can go higher than that, but don't until you get more experience with overclocking. With that clock up above you should't have to go out of the voltage bounds for this cpu, wich means little added heat and longer cpu life. Not only that, but you don't really gain that much after you clock to a certain point. Alot of guys on here overclock to the moon and back but that's becouse they are speed freeks.

------------------------------ "God invented Google so you would stop asking stupid questions."
Reply to Why_Me

The last of the parts should be coming in today for my build. I have only tried one other build quite a few years back and it never got up and running.

I have been reading a lot lately on E7200 overclocking. Good article at Legion Hardware in regards to the benefits of going from 2.53GHz to 3.00GHz to 3.6GHz and finally to 3.80GHz. They concluded for gaming, the best performance gains are seen when going from 3.0GHz to 3.6GHz, as pushing the processor further only accounted for very minimal gains.

http://www.legionhardware.com/document.php?id=754

Any here running at 3.6 with just the bios adust and stock voltage using XIGMATEK HDT or other air cooling?

I also may want to do some timing adjust on the mushkin 4GB DDR2 800 if it will help the gaming performance for AoC.

Reply to marinco

Ok.. E7200 has a 9.5 multiplier.

So going to 333 will get you 3.16GHz.

You could underclock your RAM to 667 to get a 1:1 with the FSB and probably tighten your timings to 3-3-3-10.

------------------------------ Success comes from knowing that you did your best to become the best that you are capable of becoming."-John Wooden
Reply to shadowduck

I want to Thank Why_Me. I've been lurking around for a while, about a month or so, trying to get a feel for different equipment. I haven't built a system in over a decade, so I didn't really have a feel for what I wanted or how I wanted to start. So long story short, I came across this thread, last week sometime. The system he proposed looked interesting.

So I bit the bullet and pretty much grabbed his whole build. Got the pieces on the 30th got windows installed the same day, OC-ed it to 3.17 on Tuesday after updating, tinkering, updating drivers, etc. Yesterday, Wednesday, I got it up to 3.8, and today I found the voltage it was stable at. Stress testing, haven't done any lengthy ones, want to play some games, but it Peaked at 55 C, Idle at 32 C, AoC under 40 C. Vcore around 1.3 and haven't messed around with Ram yet.

So in short, just want to say Thanks to Why_Me, he got me stimulated to try overclocking again and helped me find a build I liked. I would of been happy with a normal homebuilt system, but after I ordered I reread the post and noticed the OC parts.

Reply to nwse

Right on way to go ! :bounce:

------------------------------ "God invented Google so you would stop asking stupid questions."
Reply to Why_Me

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