The Official Budget-Conscious Dream Machine!

Yeah but with quality RAM you can lower the timings!

 

I still meant PC6400, I meant a proper brand. I'm near certain OcUK at least at one stage used Elixir as their value brand - and elixir memory sucks, REALLY badly.

 

but it will run at the rated speed.

and with a £400 budget you wont really be seeing a differnce with 444-12 and 555-15

its a budget build for a reason.

the res of a monitor for a £400 budget will be only 1280x1024.

 

if it's anything like the Elixir me and my friends have had, not for long it won't.

 

new £400

 

Once again, half the cost of Shaff's build is the motherboard...

 

(pssst, its less than a quarter )

HAHA

yeah, well OCing should be at all levels

 

and you can't overclock with a P35-DS3L? Plenty of other people seem to have managed...

 

I have gotten 3.2Ghz STABLE with a P35-DS3L and a E2180 on five systems so far.

Seems as though BOTH your motherboard and CPU are overly expensive.


You hear that? That's the sound of you getting owned! lol

 

No comment.

 

lol

I'm sure you have SOMETHING to say.

 

i have nothign against the DSL, i jsut wanted to fit the budget so i upped the mobo.


and nothing wrong with the E2200, as the extra multi, means 3.5 easy.

 

btw, me = pwn3ed

http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=554060

but they were using a true, but if i saved that extra £15, i could get the true, and a yateloon

 

Exact budget figure systems are rarely the best idea, because component prices vary to the extent that you're wasting money to reach them or have to make too big a sacrifice to meet them. That system's better off as a £370 odd system with the DS3L board, or as a £400 PC with said board and a bigger hard disk.

 

shaffaaf,

I think that the build presented is solid, but could use improvement.

The Abit board will OC that E2200 like a demon. I can see an E2200 hitting at least 3.2GHz without much difficulty. Not a bad mobo at all. I much prefer my Gigabyte board though

I like the inclusion of the 9600GT. It really puts out some impressive numbers. Most benchmarks have it equal to the HD3870 or better. If you really want to build a budget super system, get a decent SLI motherboard and have 9600GTs in SLI. Dual graphics scale well with the GeForce 9 series. SLI 9600GTs will easily beat an 8800GTS 512MB or maybe even a 9800GTX.

Now, those parts are all fine and dandy, but the case/PSU combo bothers me. Antec does make good cases and PSUs, but why a mini tower case? And why a 380W PSU? I would at least get a standard sized mid-tower case like a Cooler Master Centurion or an NZXT Nemesis. And a 500W PSU is a must for most systems(if only to make sure you'll always have enough power). I wouldn't trust that system to be completely stable on a 380W rated PSU(even an Antec), especially if you plan to OC.

There are many nicely priced PSUs that are of excellent quality and have overkill power for that rig. Here are a few budget models I've worked with and been impressed by:

Corsair 450/550VX - Excellent, stable, quiet, but non-modular and only a single 12V+ rail. Both of these PSUs are massively under-speced (rated lower than they can actually do). The 450VX could easily be rated at 550-600W and still blow away most competition. The 550VX (which I have) could easily be a 650-700W PSU.

OCZ StealthXstream 600W(excluding the 500W) - I have used and seen a few of these now. They are deadly silent and of similar quality and style to the Corsair models mentioned above. 4 x 12V+ rails at 18A each is a lot of power and way more than enough for something heavy-duty like SLI 8800GTS 512s(seen it done). This PSU is also a bit under-speced, but not as much as the Corsairs. Easily a 650-700W unit. I actually prefer this to the Corsairs if only for the 4 12V+ rails. I actually intend to retire my aging Liberty 620W in favor of one of these very soon.

Antec Earthwatts 500W - Self explanatory. Antec makes a solid PSU, but the 380W is just not enough IMO.

Other brands that have solid budget models include Cooler Master, Thermaltake, FSP(Fortron Source), and Silverstone. Though, Thermaltake seems to be a bit conservative on 12V+ amperage, so make sure the rails will supply the power you need.

Remember that making a budget build doesn't mean you can cut corners. IMO, first priorities are quality and balance(no bottlenecks), then price. If I were to put together a budget gamer build right now, this would probably be it:

Intel Core 2 Duo E4600 2.4GHz - $119.99(I'd go for the E4x00 series over the E2x00 series)
Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS3L - $89.99(basically my mobo with power saving features)
2 x 1GB G.Skill DDR2-800 - $44.99(name one game where you need more than 2GB of RAM)
XFX 9600GT 512MB - $139.99(Cheapest of the 9600GTs. XFX is a good company)
Lite-On DVD-RW - $24.99(not much needed here)
Seagate Barracuda 250GB SATA 16MB Cache - $59.99(Seagate being my preference)
Cooler Master Centurion 5 - $54.99(good stock cooling and the best layout I've ever seen.)
Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro - $26.99(easily one of the best budget coolers made and just enough even for large OCs.)
OCZ StealthXstream 600W - $84.99

Final price comes out to $646.91

This is a system that can handle Crysis with mostly high settings and is overkill for almost every other game made. For a budget rig under $700, this a bad ass system and I wouldn't mind trading my current one for it.

 

As it happens, 380W is enough to power a dual graphics system. It's not too far off the limit, but it would power it. For a single GPU system therefore, I don't see the problem. I had this debate before, people kept saying you needed a 750W PSU to have dual graphics, and took it very personally when I basically told them they were talking out of their backside.

To be honest, Estuansis, I'd add a couple of brands to that list, but take a few off. Thermaltake's PSUs aren't all good in the lower ranges, only their Toughpowers are solidly reliable, Coolermaster units don't seem very stable of late, and FSP/OCZ units have rather strange quirks that stop me from recommending them on a regular basis. However, Tagan, BeQuiet, Zalman and Seasonic make decent units.

 

exactly sam, and the 380W earthwatt has 27A on its rails, with 80plus certifiaction

MORE than enough, and is a very reliable psu.

ad sam, i have been hearing rave reviews of the new mid-high end FPS PSUs.

 

The reviews I saw before were never bad as such, but the fact that the units have very high ripple and the manufacturer doesn't know why is a bad sign...

 

I know that the Antec 380W is a good PSU. But being a 380W, it only has 27 amps on the 12v. I would not use that for dual cards. At least not something like 9600GTs, 8800GTs or 3870s. The 9600GT has a requirement of at least 26 amps. I wouldn't go lower than a solid 500w PSU with 30 amps or more on the 12v for security. I am also aware that dual graphics setups don't suck that much power, but I don't want to skimp on amperage.

You yourself have recommended the StealthXstream to a few people. I've used it in a few higher end builds for friends and it seems to have a zero mortality rate and is extremely silent. I have to check the fan to see if it is running. It also keeps fairly cool and moves a lot of air. I know that some of the higher wattage GameXstreams and the StealthXstream 500W have some infrequent problems.

And every time I see someone talk about FSP units, there are rave reviews. Maybe it's just recently that they are going bad? Do you have a specific article in mind? The 500W Blue Storm is supposed to be one of the best in its range.

I guess I won't argue on the lower Thermaltakes though. They're good but seem to have a high rate of DOAs.

 

The StealthXStream is the only unit I recommend - it's better than the GameXStream and certainly better than the ProXStream units. I just don't trust a power supply brand that doesn't know why their units ripple badly, and that produce a 1KW PSU that goes belly up south of 800W - it's the sort of things that cheapo brands do, and we all know what happens with cheapo PSUs.

As for the 380W Unit, I would never run two cards off it either, but it's possible. 750W units for dual cards is crazy unless they're 8800 Ultras or HD3870X2s...