How much do I need to pay for a gaming computer?

MickKnipfler

My son want's a gaming computer for his 12th birthday. How much do I need to pay and what spec do I need? I probably don't need anything top notch but neither do I want to find that in a years time it isn't good enough.

Where are the best deals?

niceguyrichy

if you're prepared to put it together yourself, it can be done fairly reasonably.
the most important components for gaming are : Graphics card (looking for nvidia 88XX series preferably) , Memory (want DDR2 , not less than a gig, best 2 or more), and CPU (C2D's kick atm)
an easy way to go about it if you don't want to self build would be to buy something like a Dell (they do a Dimension 9200 complete with Vista, C2D, 2G mem and a 19" widescreen for around 680£ ) and then buy a decent graphics card seperately and fit it yourself. Most pre-builds on the 'high street' , as it were, ship with dreadfull graphics.

Mobeer

Even better, for £705 you could get the Dell with a 22" monitor and a GeForce 8600GTS.
web link
To get the £705 price, you need to change the waranty to 1 year collect and return.

damski_2

£180 for a Wii

brilliant value

even for me at a young almost childish 43yrs old

Dacarlo

First of all a little research will yield some good prices. I recommend the following sites to compare on costs. Overall I think the first one is probably the cheapest. Remember that all the parts tend to come with their own individual warranties so keep your receipts and register the parts with the manufacturer.

http://www.cclcomputers.co.uk - consistantlly good prices. I've used them many times.

http://www.ebuyer.co.uk - Has some good deals especially if they're running a promo on google checkout.

http://www.scan.co.uk - Not bad prices and often some very nice deals on their 'Today only' section. ymmv so compare shipping and item prices. The the Daewoo 19" TFT they're flogging at the moment. I've bought one already a couple of months ago at £120 and its now down to about £117. Very nice. On TODAY ONLY its £97 and I think will last the rest of the weekend.
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/productinfo.asp?WebProductID=652902

http://www.overclockers.co.uk - This site though not the cheapest will be a good basis for comparison. They're still cheaper than a highstreet computer retailer.

http://www.dabs.com - Not a bad retailer, the most expensive of the bunch above. They do finance which may be a reasonable option for those not strict with their credit mantras. (ie never a lender of borrower be)

Now onto the hardware. This assumes you're going to build it or get someone you know savvy enough to do it for you. If you dont go for this then all of the above do prebuild systems and its well worth checking out bundle deals.

If you go down the bundle route remember to check the other sites for price comparisons. Here's the ccl one, which is a good place to start. Remember if you buy all the kit from one place you only have to worry about the shipping from one store. Some of the retailers let you pick stuff up so if you're close you could save there. http://www.cclonline.com/product-categories.asp?category_id=546

Without knowing your budget I'll just get down to what I'd do given a reasonable budget.


Motherboard/Processor: Asus P5N-E SLI Motherboard.
Asus is a name I know and trust. They're consistantly at the top of their game, offer good support and perform well in tests. Check out sites such as www.tomshardware.com for in depth analysis if that floats your boat I often extoll the virtues of AMD motherboards and clock for clock they tend to be cheaper. The above board is an Intel board. Whats important is its got an Nforce (nvidia chipset) which neatly fits in with the Nvidia graphics card you would get. Nvidia currently rule the roost in terms of support and performance. This motherboard is also forwards compatible with Intel Core 2 and Quad core processors allowing you a little space to upgrade in the future if the need arose. If you want to save a little go for an AMD Mobo and chip which will perform just fine too. An Intel Core 2 Duo E6320 2x 1.86GHz 1066MHz FSB 4MB Cache is a nice mid range chip to throw in there. It will run any game on the market and any other apps you care to think of, no problem.

Mobo and Processor: 77+111 =£188


Memory: I specifically chose DDR3 board and would put DDR3 memory in it coz I'm a nutter like that but I realise that the price of such memory is a little prohibative at the moment. So to you I'd advise getting 512MB Corsair Value Select DDR400 and getting at least 2 sticks of that to give a minimum of 1Gig of system memory. Its good branded RAM which is important when considering memory. Its a mere £15 per stick so you could easily max out to 2Gig for £60.

Memory minimum: £30

Graphics: The current best price for a directX 10, DDR3 (fast memory) GeForce 8600GT is CCL's own brand graphics card. It is based on the Nvidia reference and will happily chug along at the same speeds as any other of its class. Brand alone do not an uber card make.
http://www.cclonline.com/product-info.asp?product_id=13173&category_id=497&manufacturer_id=0&tid=n/a

GFX card: £63

Hard disc: SATA drives have really gone down in price over the last couple of years and its very possible to pick up some excellent deals. TO put it inter perspective for you, you can pick up a 500Gig drive for £65. Check out the 500GB Western Digital Caviar drive. Obviously you can get a smaller drive for less so if money is tight consider that 160Gig is plenty too for lots of installed games and an operating system. For the same make (which I'd recommend for speed and reliability) is £33.

HDD: £33

DVD drive: DVD writers are pretty much fitted as standard these days and I'd recommend a RICOH, NEX or Liteon drive. They're quite inexpensive and provide a good means of backing up data or making legitimate backups of your games. A reasonable one starts at about £17.

Case/Power: A generic case will do. Get one with a 400Watt power supply built in. £30 for a reasonable one will do the trick. Antec make good cases if you're looking for a branded one.PSUs can be noisy so take a look around at the costs of getting a quiet one. 30dB iirc is a reasonable level. You will probably want to invest in a couple of 80mm fans to install which will keep your new system cool. One at the front of the machine sucking in air and an extra at the back helping to suck warm air out. The idea is to create air flow over the system.

Monitor: If you already have a 19" CRT or a 17"+ TFT then you might save here. For a TFT I'd advise checking if its response time is 8ms or less since ghosting effects on slower response times (higher values) means ghosting effects during games. Not good. As mentioned above the Daewoo is on Scans today only section for £97 so ignore the direct link price and double check the today only.

Hope that gives you some help and if you read it all well done Quite a phat system for Around £450

Dac

MickKnipfler

Thanks, I'll check all that out.

By the way, He already has a 32" screen in his room....

Dacarlo

If its got a vga or (name escapes me at the moment) tft connector then thats cool. A friend of mine used to play Quake and doom on his 42" plasma lol.

Little_John

DVI?

The advice i would give is to buy a console, Games PC's eat cash like no tomorrow infact tomorrow they will want more. newer games required better graphics cards, more memory faster processors more hard drive space. to power the high end cpu's and graphics cards you need a decent power supply, none of the budget "400W" supplies will cut it I'm afraid, you are likely to get fluctuations in the power that can damage the componenets or cause the pc to lock up/crash.

I spent thousands over a few years keeping my machine up to scratch selling my old kit to buy the new stuff a month or so later. It isnt too bad if you have a stream of people wanting to buy your old kit but when they dry up you end up loosing a lot of money. It is just money down the pan.

Buying a console means the thing should stay the same for many years, they only replace them every 3-4 years and at half the cost of a decent gameing PC you can buy all the games he wants and stll save a fortune. The xbox 360 has been out for a year or so now and the developers are now starting to produce some good stuff to use the power available, the PS3 is more expensive and too new realy to see its real potental The Wii is no where near as powerfull as the 360 or PS3 but game play is brillaint and I cant wait to see what they come up with to make use of the inovative control method. I have a360 and a Wii the Ps3 will come some day when the prce is reasonable or when GTA4 turns up and gran turismo HD. I also have a PSP and a DS and aloft full of older consoles and games.

Lakeuk

buy him a console, an expensive upto date PC for playing the latest games will only be good for 18months

Little_John

and scrimping buying low end kit will last even less.

banger9365

sorry to put a spanner in the works purt a GeForce 8600GT not really a gaming card you can get 7600 and 7900 that will be better for games ,
and you will need high end ddr2 ram or the motherboard is wasted and cost the same http://www.cclonline.com/product-info.asp?product_id=15686&category_id=262&manufacturer_id=0&tid=ocz2soe8001gb
x2 =£60.
do not forget a good psu to run a gaming pc is a must.

ps almost for got mouse and keyboard get a nice fast keyboard and mouse if nothing else and not wireless some thing like http://www.cclonline.com/product-info.asp?product_id=7085&category_id=305&manufacturer_id=0&tid=x-750bf
or http://www.cclonline.com/product-info.asp?product_id=6408&category_id=305&manufacturer_id=0&tid=rz01-00110100-r2m1
and keyboard like http://www.cclonline.com/product-info.asp?product_id=4074&category_id=441&manufacturer_id=0&tid=pz30av

yes i us ccl alot (just down the road to me)