Want to build gaming computer less than $600

[suse920]

Originally posted by: venk
get an xbox/xbox360 and a bunch of games. seriously, for 600 it will be outdated real fast any ways.

thats actually a really good idea. Sadly your build will not stand up to future games .

 

[latresillustre]

It would also help to know what kind of games you'll be playing.

MMOs? You need more ram.
FPSs? You need the nicer video card.

It's going to be tough to do either with $600. Especially since you need a monitor, optical drive, etc.

 

[t3h l337 n3wb]

If you go S754 and a Sempron now, you're just going to end up blowing ~$300 on upgrades, then getting rid of it. It'll probably last like a year. Then it'll be time for a whole new system again. Just save your money.

 

[Malladine]

Originally posted by: t3h l337 n3wb
If you go S754 and a Sempron now, you're just going to end up blowing ~$300 on upgrades, then getting rid of it. It'll probably last like a year. Then it'll be time for a whole new system again. Just save your money.

Not necessarily. How long has it been since you played pc games? There could be years worth of older games to go through...

 

[tw1164]

what about a dell box? you can get a good PC for under $600

 

[0roo0roo]

600..not much room to work with. that looks about right.

 

[ixelion]

Well I was building this comp for a friend, his las PC was a Pentium 2, so you see any comp is a pretty big improvement for him.

I will mention the xbox 360 to him, I think its a good idea, but I dont think he'll go for it.

 

[imported_Collector]

Originally posted by ixelion
CPU
AMD Sempron 2500+ 64Bit 1.4Ghz Socket 754 256KB L2 Cache $66.00
Motherboard
Asus K8V-X Socket 754 VIA K8T800 w/ DDR400, Gb LAN $82.00
RAM
Samsung PC-3200 DDR400 256MB 184-pin DIMM $33.99
Video
Asus N6600/TD/128 GeForce 6600 128MB DDR AGP 8X $156.00
Hard drive
Western Digital Caviar EIDE 80GB ATA-100 7200RPM $69.99
Optical Drives
LG (CDR-8162B) 16X DVD-ROM Drive (OEM) $26.99
Case
Antec SLK1650 Mini Tower w/ SmartPower 350W Power Supply $79.99
Monitor
17" CRT Flat Monitor Black $83.00

You forgot to budget for an operating system.

Unfortunately, if you want to go with a cheap system it's hard to compete with the biggies like Dell.

 

[rhk0327]

kind of limited on my information about buying in canada.

I believe those semprons can overclock really nicely. The via k8t800 chipset does NOT have a pci/agp lock which means you can't overclock. I would recommend buying used parts off the for sale/trade section and paying for shipping to canada. It can be pretty reliable if you buy from people with high heatware (like feedback for ebay www.heatware.com). That way you might be able to build a PC taht actually plays current games decently. Plus no tax (dont' know if you get hit with that)

I don't know about shipping to canada, but the dell deals under hot deals section are pretty unbeatable for budget computers. Perhaps you can get a dell deal and then upgrade the g.card?

I dont' think you could really build a 'gaming' pc for that amount of money. And if you're not going to be doing gaming on the pc, you might as well stick with the pentium 2 and get a console for gaming.

 

[ones3k]

IMO, don't build that system, just wait for the xbox 360 to come out and buy that. It will be $400 for the premium version and will have better graphics hardware than the current top of the line gaming PCs. Yes, thats right, it will run games faster than athlon 939 paired with radeon x850s or nvidia 7800's, we're talking systems int the $1500+ price range (without monitor). On the other hand, if you're really dead set on the PC as a gaming platform, wait till after both the xbox360 and the ps3 (released march 06) come out. Optimally, you want to buy once computers surpass the upcoming generation of consoles in terms of gaming power. This will eventually happen, but it may be a good 6 months after the release of the ps3.

Remember when the sega saturn and playstation were released in 1995? Those systems ran games better than all the high end pentiums and apple powerPCs of 1995. The PC didn't clearly pull ahead until 1996 with the release of the 3dfx voodoo PCI graphics accelerator. If you wait a year, you'll have a bigger budget and you should be able to snag a good gaming PC that will beat the consoles.

Historically the months prior to a console release have shown to be the worst possible times to build a gaming PC. I would seriously either buy xbox360 or wait it out.

 

[sniperruff]

a dell with an aftermarket 6600GT comes into mind.

 

[lkm]

hmm, u can build w/o a case and get it to run. just go buy one of those plastic drawer thingies from the dollar store and cut up a few holes and add some fans. That said, at Lan parties, u will be famous.