Jump to content

Recommended Posts

  • Replies 43
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Top Posters In This Topic

Posted

ccl are good, also overclockersuk for certain things, ebuyer and scan..

 

depends what components you want, some are cheaper than others - it can even be cheaper to pay for two (or even three) separate postages to get bits from different places if you know exactly what you want.

Posted

Depends on your meaning of "good" and how much you want to push it and how much you want to spend.

 

For something reasonable, but not top of the line

 

Mobo - £70

Memory - £70

CPU - £70-100

Graphics card - £80-100

Sound card - £20-40

Hard Disk - £40-50

DVD-RW, keyboard, mouse etc - £25-50

Dual 17" TFT's - £200-250

Half decent speakers - £25

Case & PSU - £20-50

 

Plus any software you may need.

 

So probably a minimum of £600 for something half decent, but could do up to £1,000+ if you wanted top end processors, graphics, memory, screens, game specific case and cooling etc etc

Posted

Building your own is a top idea, gives you a lot of confidence. I have only ever bought one PC, and that lasted about 1 week standard before the sides came off (to fit a cd writer that cost £200, to give you an idea when this was!) Try http://www.aria.co.uk when pricing up, some of their "super specials" are awesome.

Buy and read magazines, such as PCFormat and MicroMart, they regularly review kit and have great guides to home builds.

Above all, enjoy it, you will take great satisfaction once you are playing on it.

 

PS, Top Tip - take photos as you go, you'll enjoy them later.

Posted

I spent 800 quid on my self build all in (no monitors though). Its on SLi graphics loads of ram, dual core processor etc. This runs all the latest games with absolute ease, often have game on one monitor and itunes or other applications on the other, and NO lag. So you really dont need to spend this much and definately not over tbh. You can go all out and buy a top spec machine, but hardware advances alot faster than software so itll be years before it gets maxed out!

Posted

For what games, though, Crob?

 

My bf just spent nigh on £4000 on his gaming PC and it still lags slighly playing ArmA and Supreme Commander. IMO, £800 would not buy you a puter capable of playing all today's games in high detail at a good res.

Posted

I want to play games like

 

Counter Strike Source

WoW

COD3

 

etc.

 

 

We have a family computer built for £400. It plays counter strike source with no lag...

 

Thanks.

Posted
It's almost not worth bothering building your own these days. So many companies can knock them out so cheap it's hardly worth the effort.

 

My thoughts as well these days, so I've pretty much stopped building em now. But I do get upgrades and extras from the likes of Eclipse.

Posted
For what games, though, Crob?

 

My bf just spent nigh on £4000 on his gaming PC and it still lags slighly playing ArmA and Supreme Commander. IMO, £800 would not buy you a puter capable of playing all today's games in high detail at a good res.

 

?!?! My 800 quid system runs these on maximum detail/graphics etc with no lag at all. Think he wasted some money or something else is wrong if he is getting lag.

 

I mostly play BF2142 on 64 man servers, massive firefights, max res detail etc with no lag at all. There is no need for 4000 quid computers right now, the tech that costs that much will be available at 1000 quid in a years time anyhowz!

Posted
It's almost not worth bothering building your own these days. So many companies can knock them out so cheap it's hardly worth the effort.

 

My thoughts as well these days, so I've pretty much stopped building em now. But I do get upgrades and extras from the likes of Eclipse.

 

Dont agree with this at all, when I was looking at getting a new computer I shopped around everywhere, and I mean EVERYWHERE, for what I wanted it worked out 200 quid minimum cheaper to build it myself.

Posted
I shopped around everywhere, and I mean EVERYWHERE, for what I wanted it worked out 200 quid minimum cheaper to build it myself.

 

Then you have to add the build time and setting up of everything. Purchasing & installation of operating system/software, updating it etc. And the possibliity of doing it all again as you wont have a system restore disk that will put everything back. Whilst it is interesting and rewarding to build your own PC, the headaches when things dont go right is a pain too.

Posted
It's almost not worth bothering building your own these days. So many companies can knock them out so cheap it's hardly worth the effort.

 

It depends what you want. If you are just after a system for bog standard applications, then by all means just get a pre built system from Dell. But, if you are after something that, for instance will play high end games or handle high quality video editing, I would much rather build myself and have full control of what is in it and know what upgrade capabilities etc it will have.

 

Horses for courses and all.

Posted
I shopped around everywhere, and I mean EVERYWHERE, for what I wanted it worked out 200 quid minimum cheaper to build it myself.

 

Then you have to add the build time and setting up of everything. Purchasing & installation of operating system/software, updating it etc. And the possibliity of doing it all again as you wont have a system restore disk that will put everything back. Whilst it is interesting and rewarding to build your own PC, the headaches when things dont go right is a pain too.

 

Windows OEM is cheap to be honest. All the drivers come with the hardware. Putting it together is like lego. Its intimidating to look at but its soo easy really. Built about 10 now and had no problems whatsoever.

Posted

What i want from it:

 

to play good games (no need to have excellent specs just enuf to play the game with no lag)

 

i want to get into media - so good for editing movies etc...

 

Is £300 too low of a budget?

Posted

yeah, IMO. I ended up having to spend nigh on £80 on a decent PSU before even thinking about a good gfx card or mobo. Another £60+ for ram, which you'll want a lot of if you are getting into media.

 

@Crob, I've got to disagree with you. I'm at a LAN at the moment, lots and lots of pretty high class gaming PC's and none of them can run ArmA at full detail. And look at the minimum spec for the new Rainbow 6 game - the Vegas one. That wouldn't run on high detail on my PC.

Posted

300 definitely wouldnt be enough for anything but a basic PC really Ben.

 

@Clanger -

Supported OS:Windows XP (only)

 

Processor:P4 3Ghz or AMD equivalent got

 

RAM:1024 Mb got 2 Gb

 

Video Card:128MB, Shader Model 3 and DirectX 9.0c compatible (see supported list*) Got two 512mb in SLi mode

 

Sound Card:DirectX 9.0c compatible Asus Premium Mobo

 

DirectX Version:DirectX 9.0c No probs

 

Thats the Vegas requirements.

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...

×
×
  • Create New...