Update: Build A Budget Gaming Rig
By Craig Lloyd on Jan 2nd, 2009 at 9:45AM
A couple of months ago I told you guys what a budget gaming PC really is. I gave you the inside scoop on what parts to get and why. Hopefully some of you took my advice. This time, I’ve updated the list with new prices and newer parts if any.
Antec Three Hundred Mid-Tower Case – $70
- This case is still one of the best budget cases around.
Antec Basiq 500W Power Supply – $40
- This is a downgrade from the Neo Power, but it’s still capable of delivering.
Gigabyte EP45-UD3R Motherboard – $120
- This is a couple of steps up from the P35 chipset of the last budget rig. Might as well boost our overclocking abilities.
Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 – $180
- The Q6600 is still the best budget quad core by far.
EVGA GeForce 9800GTX – $160
- This one of the perfect video cards for the budget gamer. Video card prices are drastically dropping which is great news for the gamer on a budget.
Crucial 4GB DDR2 800 Memory – $42
- Ok, prices of RAM are getting ridiculously low, and I love it.
Creative Sound Blaster Audigy SE Sound Card – $28
- Don’t let the price fool you. The sound quality is great for a budget sound card like this.
Hitachi Deskstar 500GB Hard Drive – $60
- A 16MB cache and half of a TB is just enough to store everything you need.
LG 20X SATA DVD Burner – $22
- So when will Blu-Ray burners be this cheap?
Windows Vista Home Premium 64-bit – $110
- I would recommend Windows XP Professional, but since this is a budget rig, $270 for XP Pro is quite expensive.
TOTAL: $832
That’s not budget. My current computer is $1000 and I don’t consider it budget. I think you could probably build a decent budget pc for $500. $70 for a case? I got away with a $30 case on my first pc. It wasn’t pretty but it did the job (with the help of some new fans). I challenge you to make a real budget pc. One that probably won’t play crysis on high settings, but at least you don’t have to worry about looking at system requirements stickers for a while. I know a lot of people who would be happy with a computer that just runs Left 4 Dead with no problems. Have fun :)
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Well, I configured this rig with the words “gaming”, “kick ass”, and “budget” in mind. I know that’s a little hard to do, but I think I pulled it off quite well. You’re thinking of just a “budget” PC, leaving out “gaming” and a lot of “kick ass”. If you would still like me to configure a sub $500 PC, than challenge accepted :)
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Yeah I know it’s a great budget gaming pc, but I think if you build a pc with games like left 4 dead and call of duty 4 and 5 in mind you could make it a lot cheaper. I appreciate the time you put into it I know how hard it is to build a pc at any budget.
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I completely understand where you’re coming from, but our problem was we wanted to make a single budget rig and a single dream rig. Obviously everyone has different opinions as to what “budget” implies, so we aimed at being able to play current and past games on high settings for a good price. There are some spots you could have saved more money, but this was the ideal configuration in our minds.
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Ah ok that makes sense. I don’t really think a budget system should run games on high settings. Everyone has a different opinion I guess.
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And we’re not ones to back down. So, as proposed, the $500 rig has been posted :)
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