Price vs Performance (Gaming

[Hooey]

AMD FX-8350 4.0GHz 8-Core Processor
£152.99

Scythe Samurai ZZ Rev.B Quiet Top-down CPU Cooler
£29.00

MSI 760GM-P21 (FX) Micro ATX AM3+ Motherboard
36.42

Kingston 8GB DDR3 1333Mhz HyperX Blu Memory Kit
£33.33

Seagate 1TB Barracuda Internal Hard Drive
£41.66

MSI GeForce GTX 660 2GB Video Card TF
176.98

Lite-On iHAS124-04 DVD/CD Writer
£14.95

Acer G226HQLBBD 21.5 inch Full HD LED Monitor - Black
£86.95

CiT 1011 Midi Case 1011B £21.40


Total:

£594.25


Is there any way I can make this cheaper without loosing any performance?
Thanks!

 

[bambinobomber]

Get a 7850 instead? Unless you want physx, the 2 cards perform the same in most games. I've only seen like 2 exceptions that favored Nvidia, but drivers/patches should have fixed them by now.

Or you could ditch the FX and get a non-k ivy bridge quad cpu. Their stock cooler is more than enough.

 

[FinneousPJ]

8320 over 8350 is virtually no difference

 

[Hooey]

I was hoping to keep the 8-cores to future proof it, and the 7850 I don't know about, is it actually 100% equivalent to the 660?

 

[djangoringo]

Where's the power supply ? i can't see one, if this is for mainly gaming downgrade the cpu and get a better gpu, also that motherboard isn't good it doesn't support in fact 125W cpus.

 

[swifty_morgan]

dump the after market cooling solution.

everything I saw the 660 was faster so don't know where that data came from?

how much is a quad 980?

 

[Hooey]

Ah, good spot about the motherboard Django I was a little wary because of how cheap it was. If I were to downgrade the CPU a little to a hex-core maybe and then spend the extra cash on a better motherboard would that increase the gaming potential?
Also I need the after market cooling for the CPU I've chosen, because of how beasty it is!

Oh and the PSU comes with the case, it's more than enough voltage for this rig!

 

[lpedraja2002]

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/549?vs=660

The GTX660 is faster than the 7850, various manufacturers support different clock rates so performance may differ a little to that shown in the benchmark but from what I've seen the GTX660 is clocked higher most of the time so that will still give it better performance. I haven't used an Ati card in years but people say their drivers are much more optimized now but I keep reading about people still having problems with some games, like Dark Souls when it arrived for PC for instance. I've been using Nvidia cards from years and the drivers are kept more up to date imo and you get physx options which barely any game use but Borderlands 2 use of it was pretty cool.

As for the CPU its hard to say if it will be future proof. AMD's design didn't live up to expectations and their performance doesn't match that of intel's current offerings. But the PS4 specs were announced and it will be using and 8 core AMD CPU so I like to imagine the the future of gaming will be more optimized for AMD cpu's than Intel but that is just me hoping, I wouldn't like to see AMD go out of business anytime soon, even though I haven't bough anything from them in years.

I don't see a PSU on your list! Also, if you're planning on heavily overclocking make sure that micro atx board is capable of doing so and that your PSU isn't one of those generic things that come with the case. You don't need a vast amount of wattage like 600w for your setup but at least make sure its good quality.

As for the aftermarket cooling, I would suggest you only buy it if you're planning to heavily overclock your CPU. If not then it would only be a waste of money as the stock cooling is more than adequate even for some light overclock.

 

[djangoringo]

Do you have already the psu ? i still don't see one.

Here's what i came up with :

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant / Benchmarks

CPU: AMD FX-6300 3.5GHz 6-Core Processor (£95.99 @ Aria PC)
Motherboard: ASRock 970 Extreme3 ATX AM3+ Motherboard (£64.99 @ Amazon UK)
Memory: Corsair XMS3 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory (£36.65 @ Amazon UK)
Storage: Seagate Barracuda 500GB 3.5" 7200RPM Internal Hard Drive (£38.39 @ Aria PC)
Video Card: Club 3D Radeon HD 7870 XT 2GB Video Card (£171.62 @ Amazon UK)
Case: BitFenix Merc Alpha (Black) ATX Mid Tower Case (£29.99 @ Aria PC)
Power Supply: XFX 550W 80 PLUS Bronze Certified ATX12V / EPS12V Power Supply (£48.17 @ Aria PC)
Optical Drive: Lite-On iHAS124-04 DVD/CD Writer (£12.85 @ Aria PC)
Monitor: Hannspree HL229DPB 21.5" Monitor (£88.00 @ Ebuyer)
Total: £586.65
(Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available.)
^you can change the parts for whatever you like, it's just a suggestion.

Review of the 7870 tahiti le : http://www.overclock3d.net/reviews/gpu_displays/club_3d_7870_joker_xt_edition_review/16
Performance summary of the 7870 joker card(tahiti le) : http://tpucdn.com/reviews/Club_3D/HD_7870_jokerCard_Tahiti_LE/images/perfrel_1920.gif

 

[synthaside]

While an 8 core chip is great if you do a lot of multi threaded tasks I have yet to see that many games really take advantage of >6 core architecture , examples of games off the top of my head ... Civ 5 perhaps ... and some games have downright poor multi-thread support so still favouring big quads games such as WoW or LoL

You can pick up a 7850 for £125.68 so its quite a big saving , and even in PURE synthetic testing the 660 only beats it by around 3-400 passmark's which wouldn't really translate into any real game performance once the 7850's over-clocked that margin will be very thing indeed and they are known for being very decent over clockers

there are lots and lots of threads on the 7850 vs 660 all over the net but , but the 7850 reminds of the old ATI 5770 its a real mid range contender.

 

[Hooey]

Whoah, thanks for the effort!

Presumably the Club 3D Radeon HD 7870 XT 2GB Video Card is better then the GTX 660?
Does anyone know the benchmark?
The only thing I would change is the monitor back to my one
Oh it's there, I would still like the 8 because I plan on having this for a good 3 years?

 

[djangoringo]

I listed a review in there and an overall summary performance.
There's also this motherboard for the amd cpu : http://www.amazon.co.uk/Asus-M5A97-R2-0-Motherboard-PCI-Express/dp/B008RPYB0U/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1362254301&sr=8-4

 

[Hooey]

Ohh, that looks really very good thanks, do you know what Mhz for the ram it can support because I had to limit myself to 1333 due to the motherboard.

 

[djangoringo]

I would go with the asus mobo, since it's at the same price and it supports 1600 mhz and beyond that.
I couldn't find it in pcpartpicker, but it's there in amazon co uk, i'd get the asus Asus M5A97 R2.0.

 

[Hooey]

Okay I will!
So, in summary, you're saying I should come down on the CPU a little bit, and spent the saved money on the motherboard, so that it would increase my performance.

 

[djangoringo]

The motherboard won't increase the performance, but it's wise to go with a decent one like the asus one, i wouldn't recommend downgrading more the cpu(in relation to the FX-6300), the FX-6300 is the sweet spot.

 

[Hooey]

Okay! Thanks for all the help everyone!
Do anyone have anything more to add?
Before I hand out the best answer?

Also, are you recommending the 6300?

 

[Hooey]

Best answer selected by Hooey.

 

[swifty_morgan]

cpu/faster it is the faster the machine will be.

ram/the faster it is the faster some programs will be/not so much for gaming-just a little.

motherboards are just platforms. you can get just as much out of a $75 mobo as you can a $200........ 200 just adds a little more over clocking capability and added features if you need them.

most hardware is very good these days.... most. there are still some things I will never touch.

pick the other guy..........

 

[Hooey]

I did, but thanks as well
I thought I knew a little about computers, but after listening to you guys, I'm nothing more than a n00bzorous haha