Budget gamer, help needed

[Toro 45]

I'm putting together a budget gamer, and I'd like opinions on this set up. Concerns would be, OC the 2500k on the Asrock board(adequate board, heatsink?) looking for 4.0-4.5 on cpu. Ram good choice? I mostly just want to know if there are better choices near the price range of the items listed? Most choices were made by looking at newegg most purchased items in there perspective catagories, at the approximate price I'd like to pay. Help me fine tune this purchase.


Budget - about $500-$550
What country - US
brand preference - None
Old parts - 7200rpm sata drive (500GB), Win XP
Shopping - newegg
Games - Guild wars2
WHEN do you plan to build it? - 3weeks
Gaming Resoulution - not sure it's for my son he is not a super high res gamer, right now on an old Radeon 4850. Probably has it on 1024 0r 1280 medium to high settings(19" monitor)


Intel Core i5-2500K Sandy Bridge 3.3GHz
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819115072

ASRock Z77 Extreme4 LGA 1155 Intel Z77
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813157293

G.SKILL Sniper 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231416

EVGA 01G-P3-1556-KR GeForce GTX 550 Ti (Fermi) FPB 1GB 192-bit GDDR5 PCI
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814130625

CORSAIR Builder Series CX500 V2 500W ATX12V v2.3 80 PLUS Certified Active PFC
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817139027

COOLER MASTER Hyper 212 Plus RR-B10-212P-G1 "Heatpipe Direct Contact"
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16835103065

Total: $570. plus some rebates bringing it down another $45. or so.


All this said it would be nice to spend less on the cpu like the Intel Core i3-2120 Sandy Bridge 3.3GHz LGA, priced a $100 less then the 2500. Does the i3-2120 have any OC potential? between the i3-2120 and the GeForce GTX 550 Ti (Fermi) FPB 1GB which would be the bottleneck?

 

[DSF]

The 550 Ti would be the bottleneck by far. Like, far far far. It's not a gaming card really.

On your budget you need to be looking a little lower on the CPU so that you can spend more on the GPU. Since you need to pinch pennies as hard as possible, you'll probably also want to step down to a cheaper motherboard chipset. There are some that are still capable of overclocking, but I'm not as well versed in that as some members here, so I'll leave specifics to them.

Also, it would be good to fill out the standard questions in the sticky by Blain, although you did answer a lot of them.

 

[Ken g6]

Does the i3-2120 have any OC potential?

Nope. Well, you can OC the FSB 2-5 MHz, but that can damage other parts.

between the i3-2120 and the GeForce GTX 550 Ti (Fermi) FPB 1GB which would be the bottleneck?

I'm not sure, because you haven't answered [thread=80121]the sticky thread questions[/thread]. Edit: I misread that as a 560ti. DSF is right.

You could get the Z75 Pro3 to save money. But if you don't overclock you could get even cheaper boards.

 

[Toro 45]

I like the price on that board, can it take the 2500 to 4.0-4.5 range? I thought I read somewhere that the Z77 and the Z68 chipsets were best for OC on the 2500K.

Also What would be a better video card choice? it's for my son he is not a high res gamer, right now on an old Radeon 4850. Probably has it on 1024 0r 1280 medium to high settings. Even though the 550Ti is not great should be a big improvement over the Radeon?

 

[Ken g6]

Z75 is just Z77 without the SSD caching. (And without SLI/Crossfire, but you can't afford that.)

Even though the 550Ti is not great should be a big improvement over the Radeon?

Actually, it's not a big jump in many cases. I'd aim at this OCed EVGA 560 for $150 after $30 rebate, if you can swing it.

Also, the 3570k is $5 less than the 2500k AP right now. Its OC MHz and temps may not be as good, but its IPC is fast enough that it's competitive.

 

[AnonymouseUser]

Also What would be a better video card choice? it's for my son he is not a high res gamer, right now on an old Radeon 4850. Probably has it on 1024 0r 1280 medium to high settings. Even though the 550Ti is not great should be a big improvement over the Radeon?

For roughly the same price as the 550 Ti, an HD 7770 or GTX 560 SE would be better.

GTX 560 SE @ Newegg
HD 7770 @ Newegg

 

[Toro 45]

Z75 is just Z77 without the SSD caching. (And without SLI/Crossfire, but you can't afford that.)

Actually, it's not a big jump in many cases. I'd aim at this OCed EVGA 560 for $150 after $30 rebate, if you can swing it.

Also, the 3570k is $5 less than the 2500k AP right now. Its OC MHz and temps may not be as good, but its IPC is fast enough that it's competitive.

Wow, the 4850 is probably four or five years old, looks like the 550 is a no go, thanks for pointing that out.

 

[krnmastersgt]

I'm not sure why no one's asked but is your XP a 64 Bit license? You plan on getting 8 GB of RAM but a 32 Bit version of XP will only recognize around 3 GB of it, even less if you factor in video card VRAM (which it does count for whatever reason).

 

[lakedude]

The budget is too heavy on the CPU and too light on the GPU for a for a "budget gamer" system IMHO.

The 2500k is great (I have one) but in that price range more should be spent on the video card.

An i3-2120 is around $125 bucks and is a great CPU.

Getting the i3 will save around $100 that you can put into a better video card like the HD-7850 or something.

 

[lakedude]

Good point Krnmastersgt.

You might as well only get 4GB of RAM as well unless you get a 64-bit OS.

Finally the MB is nice but a little overkill as well. If you can afford the MB and the HD-7850 great, if not skimp a bit more on the MB. A 6870 might be nice as well...

A good video card is the most important thing for a gamer (the other stuff is important too, just not as important).

 

[krnmastersgt]

Not sure how the launch will be but apparently AMD cards didn't scale as well as nVidia ones did this past beta weekend. Opting for a 560 Ti might be the best call.

And I wasn't bringing up the OS just for the sake of the amount of RAM being purchased, as I noted before it typically takes VRAM into account as well meaning that with a 1 or 2GB VRAM card, you'd only be left with about 1 GB left in actual system RAM. I'd suggest dropping down to an i3 2120, grabbing the cheapest B75 motherboard, grabbing a 560 Ti along with the same PSU and RAM, and you're set. The system should do decently well at GW2, only issue might present itself in the WvWvW with too many players about

 

[Toro 45]

For roughly the same price as the 550 Ti, an HD 7770 or GTX 560 SE would be better.

GTX 560 SE @ Newegg
HD 7770 @ Newegg

Those cards look much better for the price!

 

[Toro 45]

I'm not sure why no one's asked but is your XP a 64 Bit license? You plan on getting 8 GB of RAM but a 32 Bit version of XP will only recognize around 3 GB of it, even less if you factor in video card VRAM (which it does count for whatever reason).

Nice catch, I forgot about the ram limitation on XP. Looks like a copy of win7 is needed.

 

[AnonymouseUser]

Those cards look much better for the price!

I know you said you may keep the HD 4850, but don't forget it's only DX 10.1 capable. DX 11 games will perform much better on the newer cards.

 

[Toro 45]

The budget is too heavy on the CPU and too light on the GPU for a for a "budget gamer" system IMHO.

The 2500k is great (I have one) but in that price range more should be spent on the video card.

An i3-2120 is around $125 bucks and is a great CPU.

Getting the i3 will save around $100 that you can put into a better video card like the HD-7850 or something.

I was thinking the same thing, thats why I asked about i3-2120 in my first post. He's coming from an E7300 core 2 duo with a mild OC. I did'nt know if the 2120 was going to be a big enough jump without overclocking it but sounds like it could be.

Lot's of good info here guys, I appreciate it!!

 

[krnmastersgt]

The i3 2120 is a great jump from an E7xxx, not to mention it has HT so it can act like a lower end quad for most applications and games. I strongly suggest you do so and instead put the money into a nice video card.

Also Anonymous does have a point, however GW2 is purely DX9 so if that's the primary game this system is built around, holding on the 4850 can work out just fine if you turn down a few of the settings. Here's a thought, get a really nice base system and maybe an SSD and hold onto the 4850 since it's still decently strong. Then later on down the road when a bit more money is available/your son can't stand the 4850's performance you upgrade it to a newer card. Might be able to sell the old components for a decent amount too.

 

[Sonikku]

I know you said you may keep the HD 4850, but don't forget it's only DX 10.1 capable. DX 11 games will perform much better on the newer cards.

Can 32 bit XP even make use of a DX11 card's DX11 capabilities or wouldn't it just be limited to DX9 regardless?

 

[AnonymouseUser]

Can 32 bit XP even make use of a DX11 card's DX11 capabilities or wouldn't it just be limited to DX9 regardless?

Yeah, I guess you're right. Get with the times Toro 45, and ditch XP for good. You seriously won't regret it!

 

[Ken g6]

Yeah, I guess you're right. Get with the times Toro 45, and ditch XP for good. You seriously won't regret it!

Actually, I recommend waiting until October, and then buying a Windows 8 upgrade. If you have a valid XP license, and don't mind overwriting everything on the main drive (you'll need backups), the Win8 upgrade will be only $40!

 

[DSF]

Actually, I recommend waiting until October, and then buying a Windows 8 upgrade. If you have a valid XP license, and don't mind overwriting everything on the main drive (you'll need backups), the Win8 upgrade will be only $40!

Will the upgrade be able to take you from 32-bit XP to 64-bit Win8?

 

[AnonymouseUser]

Will the upgrade be able to take you from 32-bit XP to 64-bit Win8?

You can always do a clean install.

Windows 7 users can upgrade from any consumer edition and bring along their settings, personal files, and applications.
Windows Vista users can bring along their settings and personal files, but not their applications.
Windows XP users may only keep their personal files.
All users have the option to perform a clean install.

 

[Sonikku]

Actually, I recommend waiting until October, and then buying a Windows 8 upgrade. If you have a valid XP license, and don't mind overwriting everything on the main drive (you'll need backups), the Win8 upgrade will be only $40!

You can get Windows 8 for only $40 as an XP upgrade? I've never heard of this deal. Linky?

Edit; see it now, nevermind

 

[krnmastersgt]

Well I'd suggest the same in upgrading to 8 however the Metro UI plus other things they're doing with it really kill it for me. Also that's over 2 months away, not sure the OP's son will like waiting that long as school starts up for him and such.

 

[mfenn]

Actually, I recommend waiting until October, and then buying a Windows 8 upgrade. If you have a valid XP license, and don't mind overwriting everything on the main drive (you'll need backups), the Win8 upgrade will be only $40!

Yeah, but then you'd have to deal with the nonsense that is Windows 8. IMHO, dropping $100 on a Windows 7 license is the way to go.

Anyway, OP I agree with the other posters here. You definitely do NOT need an overclocked i5 to completely trounce an old Core 2 Duo. There is more to processor performance than cores and clock speeds. Sandy Bridge (and Ivy Bridge) are overall much more efficient processors meaning that that they can do a lot more work in any given clock cycle than a Core 2 can.

I think that you should step down to an i3 2100 or 2120 (don't pay more than $10 extra for the 2120) and step the GPU up to something of at least 6870 caliber.

 

[lakedude]

Micro Center has the 2500k for $159.99, if you live by a Micro Center...

http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0354589