Nice guide. I can't seem to find anything about suggested monitors in there. I will look again as I have just woken up 🙂

The guide is just the overall PC build, no mouse, keyboards and monitors.

Ok. Cheers Don. Thought I read monitors too! *drinks more coffee fast* :bang:

LOL quote from first paragraph in article: "Monitor, keyboard, mouse and speakers are not included. We do this for brevity's sake, as the monitor alone would require its own guide, especially if I were to cover LCD monitors."

DOHH! Can we have a monitor guide then? lol Soooo want an expert opinion and round-up of latest and greatest monitors for gaming. Will mooch around The HTPC, HDTV & High Definition section instead!

DOHH! Can we have a monitor guide then? lol Soooo want an expert opinion and round-up of latest and greatest monitors for gaming. Will mooch around The HTPC, HDTV & High Definition section instead!

This. Would love in depth reviews regarding monitors/tv's ranging from 24-32'' .

7850HD low-range??? Then what category am i into? Lol, with 6850, i am may be in no-range category. And, in low range i think fx6300 would be better option than i3-3220.:) Nice guide though.

7850HD low-range??? Then what category am i into? Lol, with 6850, i am may be in no-range category. And, in low range i think fx6300 would be better option than i3-3220.:) Nice review though.

My "lan rig" (which usually sits under my desk opposite my main rig but I digress) has a ECS mobo ($50.00 ), Intel G540 (2.5Ghz no HT, also $50.00), 2x2Gb of the cheapest DDR3 ram kit (18.99 at time of purchase) on newegg and a 6870 and it still does better in games than most people here would even be willing to admit to :banana: Even in RTS games it has managed to impress me quite a bit. Since most games still support DX9 our "old" cards are more than overkill if you aren't worried about running with the latest 32xSLIQXSGAA and post processing "injectors", etc, etc.

I see the OCZ Vertex 4 is not recommended. Is it because of the memory controller, and is the Samsung 840 pro 128gb really better than the Vertex 4?(I'm planing to buy a SSD and was going to go for Vertex 4)

I see the OCZ Vertex 4 is not recommended. Is it because of the memory controller, and is the Samsung 840 pro 128gb really better than the Vertex 4?(I'm planing to buy a SSD and was going to go for Vertex 4)

I (and I think most people here) would tell you to go Samsung over OCZ any day of the week. Even if OCZ made a faster drive I think the reputation Samsung has built vs OCZ speaks for itself.

My "lan rig" (which usually sits under my desk opposite my main rig but I digress) has a ECS mobo ($50.00 ), Intel G540 (2.5Ghz no HT, also $50.00), 2x2Gb of the cheapest DDR3 ram kit (18.99 at time of purchase) on newegg and a 6870 and it still does better in games than most people here would even be willing to admit to :banana: Even in RTS games it has managed to impress me quite a bit. Since most games still support DX9 our "old" cards are more than overkill if you aren't worried about running with the latest 32xSLIQXSGAA and post processing "injectors", etc, etc.

yeah.I agree. But the funny thing is, in game, your lan-rig is powerful than my/our main-and-only pc. Strange.:P

I really think the guide should mention the something like the A10-5800k for budget gaming (like really budget). You can do with the integrated graphics on that one and it overclocks really nicely. Not to say that the i3 3220 is a bad choice, but still I think the AMD deserves to be mentioned 🤓 Performance wise they are pretty much in the same league and it's cheaper (plus you don't need a dedicated GPU). Good guide, a monitor guide would be interesting I agree.

You'll note that I did not recommend any of the new SSD's, for Samsung I recommended the 830's. Reliability of SSD's has been... disappointing. So many firmware problems and drive failures, so it's really best to let the new drives have some time on the market to see if they're going to be worth buying and any bugs get resolved with firmware updates. Even then well... Crucial's latest firmware update failed to work on my 256 GB Crucial M4. If I had to choose I'd definitely take the Samsung 840 Pro over the Vertex 4, both for performance and past reliability. Monitors are tricky to make a guide to because different people want different things from their monitors and what one person can see another cannot, which can make such a guide rather subjective. The 7850 is a fantastic deal and I'm glad I could put it in my budget gaming PC guide, you can find these for as low as 160 USD. I really wish Intel would make a K series for the i3 series, something for the overclockers on a budget. Overall though the price of the low end gaming PC even with a 3570K and 7850 would run you only about 800 USD, that's not a lot. There was a time when I set my guides by budget and the budget gaming PC was 1000 USD :P

I really think the guide should mention the something like the A10-5800k for budget gaming (like really budget). You can do with the integrated graphics on that one and it overclocks really nicely. Not to say that the i3 3220 is a bad choice, but still I think the AMD deserves to be mentioned 🤓 Performance wise they are pretty much in the same league and it's cheaper (plus you don't need a dedicated GPU).

If you're using integrated graphics, you're not building a gaming machine. Integrated graphics are fine for some light, casual gaming; nothing more. At least not right yet. I expect this will change with future generations. I really wish I could could have recommended an AMD processor, the new Piledriver is a definite improvement over their Bulldozer fiasco. Head to head they do very well with Intel's processors (especially for multithreaded tasks) for the money... except for gaming. That poor single core performance means in any game not GPU limited they get stomped by Intel processors. And a gaming PC guide was what I was putting together.

I would love monitors guide as well.

I'm gonna have to second this.

Nice guide boss.

This guide always seems so misguided... The mid end and high end PC's are pretty well thought out hardware wise, but the low end PC's are never smart buys at all. It's perfectly possible to put a low end gaming PC together, even for a target of 1080p, that won't run you more than 300-400$. Why would you recommend a core i3 for a low end build? The Phenom II, while admittedly outdated, is 94.99$ on Newegg right now with free shipping. It's an ACTUAL 4 core CPU which can easily be overclocked into the 4ghz range, and for a budget PC I can't understand why you would ever recommend anything else. It will absolutely stay even with the Ivy bridge dual cores in modern games, unless you're doing artificial benchmarking at 640x480, which nobody is doing. And the 7850 for a low end GPU? really? How about a 6850 for less than 140$, or even a 6770 for less than 100$ Granted those are LOWER END but thats the point of a budget gaming PC isn't it? Even if you buy a 955BE and a 6770, you're already at about 200$. That's a good chunk of money for a low end budget PC build. And an SSD? There is no way that an SSD should be included in a budget PC build, for gaming or otherwise. While they're amazing performance wise, they are extremely expensive and offer practically no storage space. HDD's are the only viable option on a low budget. A 128GB SSD gives you enough room for an OS, a couple programs, and maybe 3 or 4 games before you've maxed it out. Why not spend half the money on a 500GB HDD and have enough room for plenty of games and all the programs you'll ever need? The h60 recommendation seemed a little weird too... what about all the fantastically performing budget air coolers that are cheaper? The hyper 212+ is half the price(or less, I got mine for 15$ when it was on sale on newegg) and still gives a ton of performance. My 1055t is at 3.9ghz on a 212+ and barely goes over 50c. I chaffed a little at the gtx 680 recommendation too... has there ever been a card that was worse in the price/performance category? You can get a 670 for over 100$ less, some of them are even going for 350$ on newegg, and it's only a couple percentage points of performance difference. Now granted that's for a high end build, but if you're trying to get really high end why not buy 2 670's and SLI them for 700$, rather than a single 680 for 500$? And bare in mind that almost ALL of my accumulated knowledge(or more accurately memorized statistics) comes from reading hardware reviews on Guru3d. But every time one of these buyer guides comes out I feel like they do a bad job on the low end segment. I feel like a lot of it could be more well thought out, especially if you actually consider the prices of various components across the board(which would seem to be the point of the article).

This guide always seems so misguided... The mid end and high end PC's are pretty well thought out hardware wise, but the low end PC's are never smart buys at all. It's perfectly possible to put a low end gaming PC together, even for a target of 1080p, that won't run you more than 300-400$.

You're absolutely wrong. You can put together a budget PC that is capable of playing some games at that price, but it won't be a gaming PC. Let's refer to our Far Cry 3 benchmarks: http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/far_cry_3_graphics_performance_review_benchmark,6.html. You certainly won't be able to crank up the graphics settings at 1080p with a Phenom II and a Radeon 6850.

You're absolutely wrong. You can put together a budget PC that is capable of playing some games at that price, but it won't be a gaming PC. Let's refer to our Far Cry 3 benchmarks: http://www.guru3d.com/articles_pages/far_cry_3_graphics_performance_review_benchmark,6.html. You certainly won't be able to crank up the graphics settings at 1080p with a Phenom II and a Radeon 6850.

Dumb statement, I've already made it clear that I avidly read every article on this website. Your opinion presupposes that any PC incapable of playing the newest game on the most modern graphics engine at maximum settings with 60 FPS doesn't qualify as a gaming PC. My PC plays far cry 3 fairly well, but I can't play at max settings and still maintain smooth gameplay that is necessary for an FPS. Does that mean my system isn't a gaming machine? A Phenom II with a 6850 will absolutely be able to play far cry 3 if you sacrifice some of the IQ settings. And that's the point of a budget gaming PC. If you're ONLY advising parts based on what will allow you to play the most modern games with the highest settings possible then you are NOT explaining how to build a budget gaming PC, and you should just come out and say that. By the by, notice that the 7850 only pulls 17 FPS on that chart? 17 FPS is choppy and completely unplayable, so by your standards the 7850 build wouldn't qualify as a gaming PC either.

And an SSD? There is no way that an SSD should be included in a budget PC build, for gaming or otherwise. While they're amazing performance wise, they are extremely expensive and offer practically no storage space. HDD's are the only viable option on a low budget. A 128GB SSD gives you enough room for an OS, a couple programs, and maybe 3 or 4 games before you've maxed it out. Why not spend half the money on a 500GB HDD and have enough room for plenty of games and all the programs you'll ever need?

Clearly you haven't used an SSD. Really the speed difference (and reduced load times) and improved responsiveness of a computer running an SSD compared to a HDD is well worth the tradeoff. I understand some people like to have 100 games installed at one time, that's fine, go ahead and get the HDD if that's what really matters. But to everyone else I would go with the SSD.