Advice needed £450 to spend on gaming computer

[petworld123]

Hi
I am new to this forum and am based in the UK. I am looking to spend around £400-£450 on components for a low-mid range gaming computer. Price does not include monitor, I already have a 20" asus AL1916W monitor (I am not sure what the best resolution is to set it at for games) O/S or speakers. I am going round in circles trying to sort something out. My local shop reckons it is best to base your system on an AMD chip.
Any advice gladly appreciated.
Thanks Paul

 

[008Rohit]

How much is that in USD?

Processor : Intel Core i3 2100 - $124.99
Motherboard : ASRock H61-M GE - $69.99
Graphics Card : XFX HD-687A-ZDFC Radeon HD 6870 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 - $166.99
RAM : Corsair 2 x 4GB DDR3 1333Mhz Dual-Channel Memory - $45.99
Storage : Seagate Barracuda ST31000524AS 1TB 7200 RPM - $59.99
Optical Drive : LG DVD R/W - $18.99
Case : Any Decent ATX Mid Tower - $50
PSU : CORSAIR Builder Series CX500 V2 500W - $49.99

Total : $585 after rebates

Should do good in new games. $60 more for an i5 2400.

 

[petworld123]

Thankyou for replying
Would you go for the Intel core rather than an AMD phenom quad core 850 black ?
Price is around $600

How much is that in USD?

Processor : Intel Core i3 2100 - $124.99
Motherboard : ASRock H61-M GE - $69.99
Graphics Card : XFX HD-687A-ZDFC Radeon HD 6870 1GB 256-bit GDDR5 - $166.99
RAM : Corsair 2 x 4GB DDR3 1333Mhz Dual-Channel Memory - $45.99
Storage : Seagate Barracuda ST31000524AS 1TB 7200 RPM - $59.99
Optical Drive : LG DVD R/W - $18.99
Case : Any Decent ATX Mid Tower - $50
PSU : CORSAIR Builder Series CX500 V2 500W - $49.99

Total : $585 after rebates

Should do good in new games. $60 more for an i5 2400.

 

[008Rohit]

If I was you, I'd go for the i3 rather than a X4 850. The entire Phenom lineup is old and the 850 is amongst the oldest processors in the lineup.

Here's a comparison between an i3 2100 and a X4 920 as I couldn't find the 850 in that list :
www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/289?vs=81

As you can see, the i3 kills the quad core 920 in almost every tasks. The 920 however beats the i3 in heavy multitasking by only a small margin.

FYI, i3 has 2 physical cores and thanks to hyperthreading 4 logical cores in total. So it can process 4 threads at the same time like a Phenom II X4. Just the 2 extra physical cores give phenom quad cores a slight advantage in heavy multitasking over the i3.