Budget gaming PC built around 960 for 1080p..

D

dodonpachi

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Aug 7, 2012
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1) Gaming, school work

2) approx £600 ($900 ish), possibly more (slightly unclear)

3) UK - England - buying from Amazon, ebuyer, overclockers, scan

4) Case and everything inside

5) None

6) No - unless there is a point

7) 1080p 24" or so

8) Now

9) Nothing unusual

10) Yes - will purchase Win 10 x64 - price of that excluded from this build

A neighbor has asked for help building a first gaming & general PC. He is not sure of his budget (parents are getting it for Christmas I think) but seems to have done a little research himself and opted for a 960 - so something built around that is a reasonable expectation. I am open to Nvidia or AMD GPU at the price point. I have suggested to him an AMD CPU is a bad idea.

Please advise, should he go i3 or i5, what chipset etc. I dont think the size of the computer is an issue, I explained the various options to him.

Thank you
 
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Wait, if they're not getting the PC until Christmas, then why plan so early?
 
I'm not familiar with the pound or those retailers. So put together a system with an i5 skylake processor (avoid the "K" versions as you're not overclocking) and at least a 500W PSU (make sure you post the exact PSU you choose as not all are created equal). We'll go from there.
 
I think a Core i5 plus 960 build is feasable. I just did a quick run through of this site (just testing the waters), and it came out at 580 pounds for a Haswell i5 960 system with a 250gb ssd, so I'm sure it's possible.

http://www.computerplanet.co.uk/

But don't use that site, stick to building it yourself! The Haswell prices aren't too painful, but the Skylake kit is a total ripoff.
 
What games will your neighbor be playing? For example, I play Battlefield 4, which is highly CPU intensive and will most likely be too much for an i3 processor.

If you don't know the applications / games your neighbor will be using, I would recommend an i5 CPU and not look back.

As for chipset, if you're not looking to overclock, I would go with H170 (Skylake CPU) or H97 (Haswell CPU).
 
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Bump...

The last couple of builds I did for were this:

i5-4570 - Gigabyte H97M-D3H Intel LGA1150 H97 - Crucial Ballistix 8GB DDR3 1600 RAM - Samsung 840 Evo Series 250GB SSD - Antec High Current Gamer Series 520W PSU - 350D

I'm basically after the up to date version of that, based around a 960. What motherboard, CPU and RAM to get for the price point would be helpful.
 
dodonpachi said:
Bump...

The last couple of builds I did for were this:

i5-4570 - Gigabyte H97M-D3H Intel LGA1150 H97 - Crucial Ballistix 8GB DDR3 1600 RAM - Samsung 840 Evo Series 250GB SSD - Antec High Current Gamer Series 520W PSU - 350D

I'm basically after the up to date version of that, based around a 960. What motherboard, CPU and RAM to get for the price point would be helpful.
Click to expand...


You can make this exact build with a couple changes:

1. 850 Evo, might be able to afford 512GB.

2. Get a Z97 mohterboard since right now Haswell is on clearance. And get faster ram because it's not much more expensive. Faster ram has been shown to make more of a difference than ever before in modern games.

Sklyake is massively overpriced until the holidays are over, so just settle for Haswell.
 
Thank you. Could people give me a specific memory, motherboard and CPU combo recommendation? What is best value and most reliable at this price point?
 
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