Help me with a budget build

[candlegoat]

Been thinking of building a budget pc. It will be for entertainment and games like BF3, BlackOps2, Fifa 13, Assassin's Creed 3 etc. So anyways I don't have a large budget so I need to keep it all under $300 (excluding the monitor). Tell me if I can get decent framerates on high settings at 1080P
1. Intel Celeron G860 Dual core @ 2.8 Ghz
2. 1 X Adata 4G @ 1333 Mhz
3. MSI H61M-S26
4. Western Digital Caviar Blue 500G 7200 RPM SATA 3
5. Antec V450P 450 Watts
6. Galaxy GeForce GTX 560 Ti
As you can see it is quite low spec and I've had to make a lot of sacrifices with the CPU and mobo to be able to afford a decent GPU (if you can call that decent) so my question is what do you think of this build and will it play those games? This is also going to be my first pc build and big upgrade from my trusty semi-gaming acer laptop with Core 2 duo @ 2 ghz with 9600M GS 512 Mb.
Thanks guys

 

[dmoney1980]

Do you need an operating system?

 

[candlegoat]

Oops i intend to dual boot windows 7 for games and ubuntu 12.04 precise pangolin for some other stuffs.

 

[Arkaign]

That's a very ambitious goal, but one that I think is doable if you settle on running at 1440x900 or 1600x900 (depending on display aspect ratio) AND get used parts. Our FS&T section has plenty of good stuff.

This build should be doable :

AMD Phenom II X4 955BE
Modest Mobo (newegg)
8GB DDR3 (important for BF3!)
1GB 5850
~500GB or so HDD
~500W Decent PSU (decent brand/model)

BF3 is choppy even on the best dual-core. With that Celly, it's really going to suffer. The i3s at least have HT, so BF3 looks at it much like a quad, but trust me, Celeron dual-core is going to bog down BF3, not to mention combining it with 4GB of single channel memory.

A 955BE + 8GB + 5850 @ 1600x900 will let you run BF3 at mostly high details with shadows and AA turned down a bit, with consistently smooth framerates. It's the best you're likely to come across, unless you can find a used i5-750 or better (the lowest i-series that is a true quad). That would be a bump up from the 955BE, but honestly wouldn't matter that much with that 955. The bonus with going with a 955 is that you could go with a mobo that supports AMD 6300/8300 series later on for a fairly sizable boost, while the excellent core i5-750 sits on a dead 1156 socket (and 1156 i7's still command decent $ used).

 

[candlegoat]

Thanks for the reply. And yes, I also think the celeron may not be able to handle it. My first choice was Phenom II X 4 965 BE because it's a quad-core so I may be able to squeeze in a few extra bucks for that. Or I can settle for the 955 BE too like you suggest. I guess I may have to bump up the memory to 8 Ghz @ 1600 then. That leaves us with the video card. I think I may be able to find a cheap or second hand 6850 (I ve heard that OEM versions of cards are cheaper). Ill keep you guys posted..

 

[dmoney1980]

do you have a Micro Center near you?

check here- http://microcenter.com/site/stores/default.aspx

If you do, you can bundle an AMD CPU with a motherboard

 

[Clutchc]

@Candlegoat
I would stay with your original build. You can always upgrade in the future with an 1155 socket to a faster CPU if you feel you need it. But with the AM3 or 3+ socket, you have far less options for improvement. If you can get all that for $300, I'd go for it.

 

[Idontcare]

Welcome to the forums Clutchc :thumbsup:

 

[skipsneeky2]

Earlier this year,i was playing BF3 on a i3 2100 and a gtx560 and some maps like metro were perfectly playable,55+ fps from my experience and this was at 1600x1200.

I did find that once i had the gtx560 overclocked,i saw a slight bottleneck but eventually i dropped in a i5 2500 and i saw a slight improvement so honestly with a budget gpu like a used gtx460 or 6850,the i3 would be a perfect match.

Avoid the dual cores if you can help it.

 

[Clutchc]

Thank you. Hope to learn and help others...

 

[Puppies04]

I agree with what has already been said, if you want to play games like BF3 you really need at least a dual core with HT. If you can pick up an AMD quad that can be overclocked (with a mobo and PSU that will handle said overclock) then this will be easily your best option with such a low budget.

On a side note, I would stick with 4GB of RAM (2x2GB) you really aren't going to use more than that as long as you aren't planning on having BF3, 20 web pages, FRAPS and an anti virus scan all running at the same time (which would almost certainly bottleneck the CPU anyway no matter how much RAM you install) Use the few dollars you save to get a better GPU, larger HDD, better PSU or Mobo.

 

[tweakboy]

Been thinking of building a budget pc. It will be for entertainment and games like BF3, BlackOps2, Fifa 13, Assassin's Creed 3 etc. So anyways I don't have a large budget so I need to keep it all under $300 (excluding the monitor). Tell me if I can get decent framerates on high settings at 1080P
1. Intel Celeron G860 Dual core @ 2.8 Ghz
2. 1 X Adata 4G @ 1333 Mhz
3. MSI H61M-S26
4. Western Digital Caviar Blue 500G 7200 RPM SATA 3
5. Antec V450P 450 Watts
6. Galaxy GeForce GTX 560 Ti
As you can see it is quite low spec and I've had to make a lot of sacrifices with the CPU and mobo to be able to afford a decent GPU (if you can call that decent) so my question is what do you think of this build and will it play those games? This is also going to be my first pc build and big upgrade from my trusty semi-gaming acer laptop with Core 2 duo @ 2 ghz with 9600M GS 512 Mb.
Thanks guys

A-DATA is not reliable my friend. These days where RAM is soo cheap, grab some Corshair kit. My friends A-DATA PSU blew up. My dads A-DATA SSD is at 96 percent and only transfers 300mbps and is soo much slower then when we first got it. crystal disk shows you 96 percent and is used to transfer 375mbps...... very pos ssd and the RAM is the same. They use that A-DATA RAM on ready build systems a lot. But you as a consumer and sorta enthusiast please dont buy their RAM. Grab Kingston or Corshair or G.SKILL. gl

 

[Puppies04]

A-DATA is not reliable my friend. These days where RAM is soo cheap, grab some Corshair kit. My friends A-DATA PSU blew up. My dads A-DATA SSD is at 96 percent and only transfers 300mbps and is soo much slower then when we first got it. crystal disk shows you 96 percent and is used to transfer 375mbps...... very pos ssd and the RAM is the same. They use that A-DATA RAM on ready build systems a lot. But you as a consumer and sorta enthusiast please dont buy their RAM. Grab Kingston or Corshair or G.SKILL. gl

While we are trading horror stories about RAM... I have had to swap 3 sets of corsair RAM in the last 12 months because it would not run at its rated speed and voltage however I would still buy corsair over A-data unless the price difference was significant.

 

[Hubb1e]

The i3s can handle BF3 well enough because they have 4 threads so you may want to try to stretch your budget by a bit in order to afford them. The dual cores without hyperthreading won't cut it. You'll also want to try and get 8GB of memory for that game as well, though it is doable on 4GB.

I have no idea how you got to $300 with that build. The GPU alone is $180. I priced out your components and found it came to $430 and you didn't even spec out a case. I tried to put together an alternative system with an AMD 7850 1GB and a FX 6100+ but it's also over $400 for that setup.

 

[Puppies04]

The i3s can handle BF3 well enough because they have 4 threads so you may want to try to stretch your budget by a bit in order to afford them. The dual cores without hyperthreading won't cut it. You'll also want to try and get 8GB of memory for that game as well, though it is doable on 4GB.

I have no idea how you got to $300 with that build. The GPU alone is $180. I priced out your components and found it came to $430 and you didn't even spec out a case. I tried to put together an alternative system with an AMD 7850 1GB and a FX 6100+ but it's also over $400 for that setup.

BF3 uses between 1-2GB of RAM on my main RIG, as I said unless you are running several other programs in the background 4GB is going to be more than enough and if you are running several other programs you are going to hit a CPU bottleneck on the OPs budget way before you hit a RAM one. Don't be confused by windows reporting close to 2GB of RAM usage at idle either, it isn't actually using the full amount and will release a lot of it if another program needs it.

 

[candlegoat]

I'm lost guys. Should I get the phenom or the i3 2120 (is this the cheapest i3 with hyperthreading?). I'm a little inclined towards the phenom, but only because it's cheaper. From a performance viewpoint, the benchmarks suggest the i3 is better but only so slightly.
http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/102?vs=289

Which mobo do you suggest for OCing because I may have to go down that road eventually? So, ill opt for a better RAM, maybe Samsung. And do you think Antec 450 is unreliable? If so, do I have to get 500 watts?
I'll probably pair a 6850 with the phenom. let me know what you think guys.

 

[pcsavvy]

If you want to overclock then go AMD otherwise if you get an i3 intel it does not overclock. You would then have to save up your money to purchase a i5 2500k if you want to overclock and you would have to purchase a motherboard for the intel that would support overclocking. Again that increases the cost of components.

With AMD, you can get a quad core that can be overclocked and you really don't need a higher end m/b. It is dependent upon which features are important, single graphic card or crossfire support. Just stick with any of the 900 series AMD motherboards and you should have no problem overclocking. If in the future you want to go piledriver then it is simple drop in upgrade.

If you are planning to o/c than a good quality 500 watt p/s is very important. Antec, Corsair, Seasonic are just some of the reliable brands. You DO NOT want to go generic or to low in wattage with the power supply. A cheap or underpowered p/s will take out your m/b, cpu etc.:'(

Just my 2 cents.

 

[Torn Mind]

A-DATA is not reliable my friend. These days where RAM is soo cheap, grab some Corshair kit. My friends A-DATA PSU blew up. My dads A-DATA SSD is at 96 percent and only transfers 300mbps and is soo much slower then when we first got it. crystal disk shows you 96 percent and is used to transfer 375mbps...... very pos ssd and the RAM is the same. They use that A-DATA RAM on ready build systems a lot. But you as a consumer and sorta enthusiast please dont buy their RAM. Grab Kingston or Corshair or G.SKILL. gl

G.Skill 1333 Mhz 4 GB dual channel memory can be had for 20 bucks at Newegg.

 

[Arkaign]

BF3 uses between 1-2GB of RAM on my main RIG, as I said unless you are running several other programs in the background 4GB is going to be more than enough and if you are running several other programs you are going to hit a CPU bottleneck on the OPs budget way before you hit a RAM one. Don't be confused by windows reporting close to 2GB of RAM usage at idle either, it isn't actually using the full amount and will release a lot of it if another program needs it.

4GB will work, but I can tell you it loads maps a LOT faster with 6 or 8GB. Also less hitching. This is with W7 x64 SP1 with nothing in the background, not even AV. With a handful of programs in the background (AV, etc) it can be more pronounced.

http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?p=1038147821

It's deceptive to look only at the bf3 executable memory usage, as there's a lot more going on when the game is running.

I'm lost guys. Should I get the phenom or the i3 2120 (is this the cheapest i3 with hyperthreading?). I'm a little inclined towards the phenom, but only because it's cheaper. From a performance viewpoint, the benchmarks suggest the i3 is better but only so slightly.
http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/102?vs=289

Which mobo do you suggest for OCing because I may have to go down that road eventually? So, ill opt for a better RAM, maybe Samsung. And do you think Antec 450 is unreliable? If so, do I have to get 500 watts?
I'll probably pair a 6850 with the phenom. let me know what you think guys.

The AMD will be cheaper to overclock given your tight budget. The i3 is a great little chip, and the 1155 socket is also excellent, but the cheaper boards will be H61 or even B75, and have no real overclocking options. You will need P67/Z68/Z77 to use the K-series processors properly in the future.

It's really win/win either way, the PhII X4 will give a good BF3 experience, and so will the i3. The i3 will have a better platform future if you get a Z77-based mobo to pair it with, otherwise you'll be tossing a board in order to really use an i5-2500K or better (eg, 3.3Ghz 2500k overclocks easily to 4.5Ghz on the right board, but is impossible to do with an H61 board). If you get a 970-based board of decent quality for the PhII, then you can drop in an 8350 or something later, which is actually a pretty solid CPU (competes decently with 2500k for example).

 

[Hubb1e]

Yup, BF3 uses a lot of RAM. I know this firsthand. On my Q6600 I had 4GB of RAM and BF3 would slow down sometimes. I was using all of my RAM on that box and that machine was for gaming only so I didn't run any other Apps. Granted, that was Vista 64 and win7 is better about RAM usage, but it's not that much better. You can play BF3 on 4GB of ram and have a good experience, but it is better with more RAM. BF3 reports 2.5GB of RAM usage out of my available 16GB now.

Go i3 or Phenom II and both are good options but you really should try and get as much clockspeed on that i3 as possible and that costs extra $. BF3 is really the only outlier here as the rest of the games willl run faster on the i3. If you go with an i3 and a cheap nonoverclockable motherboard then you can still drop in a quad core i5 or even an i7 and extend the life of your computer with a very nice upgrade even if you can't overclock it to 4.5ghz, Quad core i5s are still fast chips at their stock clockspeed and will outpace all stock AMD chips in games.

That said, there is a lot to be said for a super cheap PhII and a decent AM3+ motherboard. They can still game, are a great value right now, and can be upgraded with up to 8 core chips. Just make sure you don't cheap out too much on the board or you won't be able to support the high wattage CPUs.

 

[candlegoat]

Thanks for all the input guys. Looks like i have to shell out a few extra bucks and go with a decent mobo, 8 gigs ram and at least 500 watt supply. now it's shopping time