Build advice Another computer build thread

[gasman]

Just been told I am getting my lad a gaming PC for Christmas. This comes as a bit of a surprise and a bit short notice, wanting to run the latest games and as future proof as possible.
£5/600 spend available, can someone point me in the right direction @little_pob
Here's a screenie of the spec he has sent to me.

Any advice greatly appreciated, I was going to head to Bowlers computer fair on saturday morning and see what's available, would be nice to go armed with as much info as poss.

Regards gm

 

[alimac]

take a look @ flea bay some good deals some with free games

just been asked to source one here as well

 

[little_pob]

Gaming and "future proof"?
Intel K series LGA 1150
High-end Z87 chipset LGA 1150 motherboard
4-8GB DDR3 1600MHz
Nvidia GTX 760 or AMD R9 280X
120GB+ SSD
HDD for storage
600-850W PSU
But that'll cost you well over £700.

Gaming but within budget?
Intel i5 K series LGA 1150
Mid-range Z87 chipset LGA 1150 motherboard
4GB DDR3 1300MHz
Nvidia GTX 660 or Nvidia GTX 660Ti or AMD R9 270X or AMD HD 7870
1TB WD Caviar Black
500-650W PSU
Approx £600: Lists | Ebuyer.com (depending on source and offers)

 

[gasman]

Having a look now pob, I am going to order it all tomorrow as your judgment on these matters is always spot on. One thing I will ask is if its worth going for a solid state drive to boot from ? I do have a collection of hdd's so I can install one or two of those for storage.

 

[little_pob]

In my opinion SSDs are worth it, but for gaming you'll need at least a 120GB drive. Worth mentioning symbolic links are a nice compromise if, like most of us, the £400 price tag of a 512GB is beyond justification.

Although all brands are reliable, personally I'd go for; Samsung 840 EVO, 840 Pro, Crucial M4, and OCZ Vector. With a nod to the SanDisk Ultra Plus. (However, please note that OCZ have gone bankrupt and are looking for a buyer).

 

[gasman]

Cheers pob will see how the budget stands up.

 

[daveleebond]

this seems like a bargain

 

[little_pob]

this seems like a bargain

Would cost you at least £800 to build the same spec.

However, if you were to be looking at building a new gaming PC, an Intel i3 3220 based rig - with everything the same but the CPU and motherboard - would out perform the AMD 8120 for £50-80 less on the total build cost. I stress gaming, as the 8-core AMD would wipe the floor with the i3 on highly threaded applications such as video encoding.

It'll be interesting if the current gen of consoles (i.e. PS4 and XBone) and their AMD x86 processors hand any advantage back to AMD's desktop CPUs for cross platform titles.

 

[gasman]

I got it all coming Friday now, we can build it Christmas Day. The only thing I changed was the ram simply because it sold out lol, I upgraded it to 8gb give it a bit more space to think in, took me slightly over budget but only by a few pounds.

 

[gasman]

Update
He was very pleased, runs anything you throw at it to a high spec, drove me mad building it Christmas Day lol but it was excellent.
Many thanks @little_pob