System Builder Marathon: $625 Gaming PC

Benchmark Results: Gaming, Continued

The $625 system struggles to average 30 FPS in World in Conflict, which probably isn’t going to satisfy the typical gamer. This benchmark is greatly affected by processing performance, and at its default speed, the E5200 comes up a bit short.

Overclocking changes this and provides a significant increase of 11 or more FPS at each resolution. Just to add a little extra test data, running the E5200 at 4.3 GHz provided another 3 FPS at 1280x1024, showing just how important the CPU is in this game.

With anti-aliasing (AA) and anisotropic filtering (AF) cranked up, again we see our overclocked machine yielding solid gains, although the single HD 4850 can not handle the high resolutions. Once overclocked, we once again see the same performance at 1680x1050 4x/16x as we did at 1280x1024 without AA or AF and without overclocking.

Even overclocked, the $625 system barely manages to break 20 FPS at these crushing Forged Alliance settings. As in Crysis, we aren’t being realistic to expect such high settings from a value machine.

With 4xAA enabled, the $625 PC does far better than last month’s $500 PC, but still doesn’t give us much worth looking at besides increased performance once overclocked.

  • slomo4sho
    Very nice write up. I like the new price point :)
    Reply
  • slomo4sho
    I forgot to mention that I still would like to see power consumption charts and possibly a AMD based build at this price point.
    Reply
  • nerrawg
    Impressive results! Who says a system price has to adhere to budget figures of 500, 1500 and 4500 dollars, you guys really showed how much added value can be had when the right OC parts are purchased and assembled into a nice package. Well done!
    Reply
  • cloudbase
    Hiya. Can you guys give a bit more detail about the 'further upgrades' you were inferring in the text of this article? So: Which P45 crossfire motherboard would have been nice; which RAM was out of stock; what would have been the benefiot of the more expensive CPU?

    Im looking to spend a similar amount, but as I already have the case, PSU etc it makes sense to explore those options.

    Presumably a 4870 would be better again?
    Reply
  • radguy
    Thats a pretty awesome build thanks for the article. Although I am sorry but I have to ask. Do we have our real 4ghz dual core for $84 now?
    Reply
  • jaragon13
    Sorry? What's with the comment box? I can't see what I'm typing.
    Anyways,my GTX 260 suffers on Crysis,so it's nothing new.
    Reply
  • Pei-chen
    Great choice, let the AMD fan boys whiny; I would have picked the same setup if I am to build a cheap gaming PC.
    Reply
  • matt2k
    Nice build for the money, though i personally would have sprung for a crossfire ready motherboard, the MSI P45 Neo2-FR for example.
    The only problem i have with this though is the operating system. surely that should be quite a major factor when creating a whole new system? and it would be nice to have the different vista's compared for gamers. i.e. is ultimate worth the bump in price for the extra's or is xp professional still the best option.
    just my thoughts.
    Reply
  • zodiacfml
    Nicest article, not only you did not stick to any budget but also the parts chosen could not have been any better. This is a build i'm planning except i could have chosen a less performing 9800GT since its only in Crysis where a 4850 has a usable advantage over it.
    I am an AMD user for years but this pentium dual core overclocks so far over an athlon x2.
    Reply
  • wh3resmycar
    someone from the forums was asking me months back where i can find a 4ghz e5200.. i guess this is it.
    Reply