I'm thinking of moving into the PC gaming side of things. I have about £1000 to drop on a PC but have no faith in my abilities to build a rig myself.
Can anyone recommend decent pre-built rigs in this price range?
Cheers
Gaming PC help
(25 posts)-
Posted 2 months ago #
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I can't speak for the UK, but usually you won't have to waste money on the biggest brands.
In Denmark I found a small(er) company selling pre-assembled (but customizable) PCs for well under the price of the major vendors, and in the US I used ibuypower.com to save some money.
I'm guessing the UK must have something similar to that.
Posted 2 months ago # -
I recently had my PC built at Palicomp, so I can vouch for them, might be worth a look? Otherwise theres plenty of companies around not sure which are reliable though, just don't go to Dell :).
Only problem with pre-built is you pay quite a bit more on top for the labour at some places, but not all of us have the time, skill or patience to build a PC.
Are you looking for a monitor, keyboard and mouse etc included in that £1000?
Posted 2 months ago # -
You'll pay over the odds using a mainstream PC builder. Either do some research on what you want I7 3770K, geforce 680.....etc and find a prebuilt new pc on ebay. Or go to someone like overclockers.co.uk / tekheads.co.uk and get a bundle, then throw in a case, peripherals and monitor (or use your TV). £1000 will go a long way. Dont forget a solid state drive for the operating system.
Edit: And just to back up what was said above. Stay away from shiny shite from the likes of Alienware (Dell). You may as well pull your pants down.
Posted 2 months ago # -
Thanks a lot everyone for the help so far. Yeah i was under the impression that going for an alienware or similar wouldn't be doing myself too many favours.
Posted 2 months ago # -
I wouldn't suggest going for an i7, won't affect your gaming performance much and may as well spend the extra on a better GPU. I use an i5 3570k Overclocked to 4.4ghz and does the job :)
Posted 2 months ago # -
that ibuypower.com quoted me a system that was over $500 more than what I am paying for my new rig piece by piece. I didn't get so far as to see shipping rates, but pieces are usually free shipping as well. Basically, that place is good if you are willing to pay someone $500 to put your system together for you. At least you get to choose your parts.
Putting systems together is super easy and you can watch tons of Youtube video explaining each and every part.
Posted 2 months ago # -
It's not even close to 500 dollars for assembly. Shop around and look at what you would be paying everywhere else.
Posted 2 months ago # -
Where in the UK are you btw?
Posted 2 months ago # -
i'm in London
Posted 2 months ago # -
a tip: get two AMD GFX Cards and combine them to gain the Crossfire-Tech.
Cheaper than a geforce and sometimes more powerful.Posted 2 months ago # -
@Uncle, well I live out of town but work in Orpington if you buy the bits and want someone to put it all together for you.
@Krazy, agreed, can often be better but getting good SLI performance is sometimes a bit hit and miss. I'd coach spending sensible money on a better single component than 2 lesser ones. Just so there's less luck involved (drivers wise especially)
Posted 2 months ago # -
@DSB
Oh, no doubt Alienware was more than $1200 difference. Not saying that for a pre-built system and being able to choose your own parts it is bad, just that it is still going to be quite a bit cheaper if you put it together yourself.For a Full Tower i7 3820, 680gtx, with 32GB or RAM will cost me about $1700 and on the ibuypower site it was around $2300. Alienware was around $3000. So for them to put it together, would cost me around $500.
Considering how easy it is put them together these days-not like when I started back in the mid 90's-it isn't worth the extra $$ for me to have someone else do it. It might be worth it for other people however. I also don't know how ibuypower handles RMA's which can be a pain when putting them together for yourself.
Posted 2 months ago # -
I can't speak for the really high end stuff, that's not what I bought.
The rig I got was an i5 with a "good enough" gfx card, I just needed it to be affordable. They run a lot of promotions, so I got a free cooling system and a bunch of free upgrades, and it was a heck of a lot cheaper than anything I could find in stores, Amazon or Newegg.
For me it's really a matter of convenience. I've always wanted to get into the nitty gritty of hardware, but in spite of having fooled around with PCs since the early 90's, I never did bother to learn.
I rule at slotting ram though *flex*
Posted 2 months ago # -
@Samoan Thanks a lot. Really appreciate the offer! :) i better get doing my research on what to buy.
Posted 2 months ago # -
Here is a handy website for picking parts and managing your budget when building a custom PC.
And if you're a fan of reddit, or at least not against it, then there is a great PC building community there that will help you build within your budget.
Posted 2 months ago # -
Before you make any hard decisions, take a look through a PC building tutorial.
It's really not very hard. All you need is a couple of screwdrivers and an antistatic wristband and clip (costs like £3-5) and just be really careful and gentle with things.
As long as you're wearing the wristband you can't short anything, just plan ahead and don't remove anything from its packaging until you're ready for it.
There are plenty of enthusiast forums who will give you a recommended build if you give them a budget, a couple have been linked here already.
Posted 2 months ago # -
Overclockers or Novatech websites should be your first port of call. Buying separate components for a PC novice is not recommended, you need to order parts which will work with each other and not all of them do.
£1000 will get you a very good gaming PC and it will be at two-three years before you get a graphics card upgrade itch.
Some ideas for parts: Asus Sabertooth Z77, intel i5 2500K, 16GB of RAM, 256GB Samsung SSD, 1TB WD black HDD, Geforce GTX 660 or even better 670 will see you right for now. Then you just have to decide on a case and PSU.
In terms of keyboards and mouse it is all down to personal preference. IMHO, you want a 22 inch monitor at least. Maybe 24 or 27.
Overclockers have a good warranty which for the novice is a good idea.
PS Don't listen to goons who say you should 'wait' for any particular hardware. If you waited another 2 years you could indeed buy a monster gaming PC and it would cause the earth to stop spinning etc etc etc but in the meantime you wouldn't have a machine to play.
PPS Don't even contemplate SLI or XFIRE setups at this stage. One monster card will aways be preferable to two smaller ones.
Posted 2 months ago # -
Any news on the new PC front then? Hope we managed to give you some helping hints.
Posted 2 months ago # -
haven't got one just yet... but i'm thinking of trying to scoop this one when it ends in 4 days if the price doesnt go too high:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/160991601707?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649
does this look like a good setup?
Posted 2 months ago # -
That's a pretty beastly pc, but there's a reserve on it so depends how much that is, may well be over 1k with the monitor and all.
Posted 2 months ago # -
yeah i was thinking that too. but i'll dip my toe in the water and see what happens ;)
Posted 2 months ago # -
That really is a monster. As KC says it depends on the reserve but assuming it the seller hasn't set one that reads like a telephone number, you should have a crack at it. It'll save you a lot of bother and you'll run anything.
I'm looking at sticking a 3570k in mine once I've saved some spondoolies.
Posted 2 months ago # -
yeah, if the reserve or the bidding goes too high on that i will probably scale back a little bit.
Posted 2 months ago # -
Well there is no way that PC is going to sell for less than £800 probably £900, the graphics card alone cost him over £400 and none of the components are on the budget side at all. Even the headphones and sound card are on the pricier side of things.
That said, you could build a rig which would play games at comparable levels for around £800 I would say.
As I said, get yourself an Asus Z77 chipset motherboard, an I5 ivy/sandy CPU, 16GB of Corsair RAM at 1600mhz, and a GTX 670 and you'll be good to go.
From Amazon, you'll be looking at:
Asus Sabertooth Z77 £175 (can get an 8 series Asus board for £100 or less)
I5 3570K CPU £170
Antec 300 case £61 (big cheap case for now)
Corsair Vengeance RAM 16GB £86 (half this for only 8GB which would be fine for now)
Antec Kuhler H20 620 £47 (can get an air cooler for half the price)
Samsung SSD £75 (not totally necessary but strongly recommended)
WD Caviar Black 1 TB HDD £68 (again could use cheaper Caviar blue/green one)
Corsair Builder CX 600W PSU £56 (ample PSU)
Asus DVD Drive: £20Total so far: £758 if I haven't made a mistake.
Leaving you to get an operating system (W7 64 bit) and decide on a graphics card.
GTX 660ti will be about £220 or so.
GTX 670 will be around £310AMD competitors are the 7870 (£185) or the 7950 (£250).
So there is no need to go buying a massively overpowered PC particularly if Nvidia release their 7 series cards this year as you will get more graphics punch for the same money.
Posted 2 months ago #
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