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Super Budget Gaming HTPC

G

gamezaddic

n00b
Joined
Oct 8, 2007
Messages
53
I am looking to build a budget htpc with the ability to play the latest games. Looking for good bang for buck parts.

350-400$ is the price range im looking for in terms of cost, and what I would prefer to pay on something like this.

The parts:

Processor: AMD Athlon II X2 245 Regor 2.9GHz 2 x 1MB L2 Cache Socket AM3
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103687&Tpk=regor 245

COOLER MASTER Elite 360 Case
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...ooler_master_elite_360-_-11-119-195-_-Product

ASUS M4A77D AM3/AM2+/AM2 AMD 770 ATX AMD Motherboard
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131618&cm_re=M4A77D-_-13-131-618-_-Product

Video Card:Radeon HD 4850 1GB 256-bit GDDR3
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...6&cm_re=radeon_hd_4850-_-14-125-236-_-Product

Ram:patriot Extreme Performance 2GB DDR2800
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...0144&cm_re=ddr2800_2gb-_-20-220-144-_-Product

Hard Drive:Western Digital Caviar Black WD1001FALS 1TB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...re=western_digital_1tb-_-22-136-284-_-Product

PSU:OCZ ModXStream Pro 500w Modular
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...6&cm_re=ocz_modxstream-_-17-341-016-_-Product

Final Price:460$AR shipped

I Will be using this build as a htpc to run xbmc and hyperspin frontends. The pc will be fully shelled through xbmc and hyperspin will be launched within the xbmc main menu. I will be using tv for the display. Would like to be able to run newer games at a decent framerate. The 1Tb is a must for me. I picked the case because it can be turned on it's side and not look completely awkward and it's cheap.

If I could shave off some money somewhere I would really like it to get down to 350-400$ in costs. Anybody have any recommendations? I don't mind taking a small hit in performance on some older gen parts as long as there available on the egg.
 
$112 - AMD Athlon II X2 245 CPU + Biostar TA785G3HD AMD 785G mATX Motherboard
$43 - Patriot 2GB DDR3 1333 RAM
$107 - Gigabyte HD 4850 1GB PCI-E Video Card
$75 - Samsung Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
$65 - Antec NEO ECO 520C 520W PSU
$40 - Cooler Master Elite 360 Case
---
Total: $442 plus tax and shipping.

Cheaper than even the after-rebate price of your planned setup but you get a more upgrade friendly setup (Socket AM3 and DDR3 RAM). In addition, you get a significantly faster hard drive and a significantly better quality PSU.

If you don't mind not having much upgrade room in the future, you can save $15 by going with this PSU:
$50 - Corsair 400CX 400W PSU

If you don't mind a 15 to 20% performance hit in gaming performance, you can save another $22:
$85 - eVGA 512-P3-N987-TR GeForce 9800 GT 512MB PCI-E Video Card

If you really don't need a 1TB drive, you can shave off another $20:
$55 - Samsung Spinpoint F3 HD502HJ 500GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive

So besides the above changes, you really can't go any lower without sacrificing quality.
 
Last edited:
Danny Bui said:
$112 - AMD Athlon II X2 245 CPU + Biostar TA785G3HD AMD 785G mATX Motherboard
$43 - Patriot 2GB DDR3 1333 RAM
$107 - Gigabyte HD 4850 1GB PCI-E Video Card
$75 - Samsung Spinpoint F3 HD103SJ 1TB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
$65 - Antec NEO ECO 520C 520W PSU
$40 - Cooler Master Elite 360 Case
---
Total: $442 plus tax and shipping.

Cheaper than even the after-rebate price of your planned setup but you get a more upgrade friendly setup (Socket AM3 and DDR3 RAM). In addition, you get a significantly faster hard drive and a significantly better quality PSU.
Click to expand...

I completely agree on those last two points, though be careful of this HTPC having a tempting Bulldozer upgrade in the future (well... I hope it's tempting, lol).
 
Thanks Danny, I didn't know there was still that much legroom for parts. That ram choice would be a no brainer for me. Hard drive and psu are good options as well. I may rethink the biostar mobo, I dunno if saving 10$ would be worth the chance, the reviews are kind of shotty. I Will look for another board.

Good heads up on the rebate 99vw. ;)

Don't worry Jeremy the only upgrading I'll be doing is investing in some old school gaming peripherals like an arcade stick and a 3-button usb genesis controller :cool:
 
I'd suggest going with a 5750 instead. Pretty much the same as a 4850 but with lower power draw and it can do bitstreamed HD audio so it's an awesome HTPC card too. I've got one, it plays games pretty well too at decent levels.
 
Right on Evil. I got the 5750 before the price drop. It rocks every game I throw at it. I think now the 5770 is the better buy. I also think the GTX460 might be worth fudging the budget a little.
 
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