Best bang for the buck processor

[Magusigne]

Hey all,

Friend of mine is doing a budget build, attempting to stick around the 500-600 dollar range with monitor/video card included.

I just snagged that Solo III w/ 500w ea psu for 44.99.

I'm looking for a good processor for cheap that will allow him to play SC2 when it comes out well (Thats the minimum Requirement for this build and it will be paired with probably a 4850 or 8800 GT).

I was thinking an E7300 but I didn't know if I could go cheaper for something almost as good. We probably won't be overclocking it much (we will be using stock HSF).

Unless a CPU is going on a BF sale i don't know of please make a recommendation!

Thanks!

 

[exar333]

7200/7300 CPU, P35/P45-class MB, and a 4850 ATI/9800 NV would be a great system to play SC2 really well. Don't skimp on RAM either, 4GB would be minimum requirements; it's cheap anyhow.

 

[Magusigne]

Originally posted by: ExarKun333
7200/7300 CPU, P35/P45-class MB, and a 4850 ATI/9800 NV would be a great system to play SC2 really well. Don't skimp on RAM either, 4GB would be minimum requirements; it's cheap anyhow.

Yeah thats what I was thinking.

Need to go on the cheap end of all this.

He's using a 32 bit XP..its OEM so I don't think i could exchange for 64 bit.

I'll still be picking up 4gb of ram since its so damn cheap.

The 4850 is still ~150 with rebats so I think I'm going for a ~100 9800GT

However whats everyone's opinions with the E5200 series. 76 Shipped for a 2.5ghz..a little low on the cache but that shouldn't matter.

 

[Flipped Gazelle]

If you want to go even cheaper, the Pentium E5200 is a good fit. Performance is generally only down maybe 10% on most applications/games compared with E7200. Should be able to overclock to at least 3 Ghz with the stock cooler.

 

[VirtualLarry]

With a little luck and patience, I think that the E5200 should overclock to 3.75Ghz or thereabouts. Two of them that I know of (both of my friends) have them running at that speed. 1.4v actual.

 

[Cheex]

Originally posted by: VirtualLarry
With a little luck and patience, I think that the E5200 should overclock to 3.75Ghz or thereabouts. Two of them that I know of (both of my friends) have them running at that speed. 1.4v actual.

On what boards Larry?

 

[Flipped Gazelle]

Originally posted by: VirtualLarry
With a little luck and patience, I think that the E5200 should overclock to 3.75Ghz or thereabouts. Two of them that I know of (both of my friends) have them running at that speed. 1.4v actual.

OP said he intended to use the stock HSF.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: Cheex

Originally posted by: VirtualLarry
With a little luck and patience, I think that the E5200 should overclock to 3.75Ghz or thereabouts. Two of them that I know of (both of my friends) have them running at that speed. 1.4v actual.

On what boards Larry?

One is a Gigabyte G31-based micro-ATX, and one is an Abit IP35-E. The chip only needs 300FSB for 3.75Ghz, with a 12.5 multi.

 

[Denithor]

e5200 @ 3GHz on stock volts should be almost braindead OC and you won't need any more than stock hsf for that low OC.

I'd say 9800GT for now or try to pick up a GTX 260 on eBay with MS cashback for $150 or so.

 

[Dadofamunky]

Yeah, the 9800GT is a bargain. Excellent card for the money. 9600GTs are even cheaper and not far short of them in performance.

 

[faxon]

if you are going to pick up an e5200 i highly advise against even considering an Nvidia chipset motherboard if you plan to OC. the 680i board im running my e5200 on (spare from a friend) is running it at 3.2ghz stable but at 1.36vcore (cpu-z). i had to give it 1.4vcore cpu-z to get it to 3.3, and anything higher would crash prime, quake wars, or windows instantly, upon loading the core that was unstable