Returning to pc gaming

Associate
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Hi all I used to use this site a lot about 10 year ago so I'm hoping everyone's still friendly ;)
I'm looking to get back into pc gaming since I've seen my younger brother playing arma 2 and dayz standalone and had ago myself. Some recommendations would be good ,I've got some old gear like :-
Antec 900 gaming case
Corsair 620w atx modular sli compliant psu
I'm just wondering if I could save some money using the above as a starting point ?
 
Associate
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I take it the PSU is a CMPSU-620HX, if so is a Seasonic and should still cut the mustard. The Case although dated give plenty of room for expansion and cooling so both are worth keeping.

Will need a budget and do you need a OS, Keyboard, Mouse, Monitor, Headset/Speakers.

But here is a quick stab at it without the afore mentioned kit you may or may not need.

YOUR BASKET
1 x VTX3D Radeon R9 290 V2 X-Edition 4096MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (VXR9 290 4GBD5-DHX) £319.99
1 x Intel Core i5-4670K 3.40GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £169.99
1 x MSI Z87M-G43 Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £71.99
1 x Toshiba SSD HDTS212EZSTA 9.5mm 128GB Solid State Hard Drive - Retail £65.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan ORANGE 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-19200C11 2400MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLAD38G2400HC11CDC01) £53.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200RPM 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST1000DM003) HDD £43.99
1 x Raijintek Themis Direct Contact CPU Cooler £19.99
1 x LiteOn IHAS124-14 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £14.99
Total : £770.52 (includes shipping : £8.00).

 
Associate
OP
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Thanks for the reply I should have said I'm ok for screen/keyboard/mouse etc those can be updated in time my screen samsung sm 206bw 20" another dated item but it will do for now.
I've also got :-
Noctua nhu12p CPU cooler socket am2/lga775
Samsung spinpoint 160gb Sata 2 hd
Samsung DVD rw
Window vista home 64 bit

Would the cooler be any good ? I know the hd is a little dated but keeping in mind this pc will only run games like arma etc It should be ok ? I was against using vista but I read that an up to date vista sp2 is as good as 7 is this wrong .

Please be brutally honest I can take it ;)

Thanks
 

RJC

RJC

Don
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Kent
After using Windows 7 and 8 I would upgrade to one of these - especially if a SSD is being used (in saying that I am not sure how good Vista is with a SSD).

Your CPU cooler won't fit the socket 1150 system as the mount holes will be different, it might be worth contacting Noctua as they might be able to send you the correct brackets.

Is the DVD SATA or IDE?
 
Associate
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As long as you have the DVD for Vista then no need to upgrade just yet :) saves the pennies.

The Noctua NH-U12P SE2 will work with a 1150 Socket however not sure of the model you have as the Noctua NH-U12P was AM2/LGA775 as you have already stated.

Spending £65 quid on a SSD will make the world of difference in computing experience and keeping the 160 as a games drive makes sense.

Still need a budget old fella.

Trimmed the build down to the following:

YOUR BASKET
1 x VTX3D Radeon R9 290 V2 X-Edition 4096MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card (VXR9 290 4GBD5-DHX) £319.99
1 x Intel Core i5-4670K 3.40GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £169.99
1 x MSI Z87M-G43 Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £71.99
1 x Toshiba SSD HDTS212EZSTA 9.5mm 128GB Solid State Hard Drive - Retail £65.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan ORANGE 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLAD38G1600HC9DC01) £49.99
1 x Raijintek Themis Direct Contact CPU Cooler £19.99
Total : £707.54 (includes shipping : £8.00).



This:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Sapphire Radeon R9 280X Dual-X OC 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Card £227.99
1 x Intel Core i5-4670K 3.40GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £169.99
1 x MSI Z87M-G43 Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £71.99
1 x Toshiba SSD HDTS212EZSTA 9.5mm 128GB Solid State Hard Drive - Retail £65.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan ORANGE 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLAD38G1600HC9DC01) £49.99
1 x Raijintek Themis Direct Contact CPU Cooler £19.99
Total : £615.54 (includes shipping : £8.00).



This:

YOUR BASKET
1 x VTX3D Radeon R9 280 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £189.95
1 x Intel Core i5-4670K 3.40GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £169.99
1 x MSI Z87M-G43 Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £71.99
1 x Toshiba SSD HDTS212EZSTA 9.5mm 128GB Solid State Hard Drive - Retail £65.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan ORANGE 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLAD38G1600HC9DC01) £49.99
1 x Raijintek Themis Direct Contact CPU Cooler £19.99
Total : £577.50 (includes shipping : £8.00).



Or this:

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-4670K 3.40GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £169.99
1 x Sapphire Radeon R9 270X Boost OC 2048MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Card £149.99
1 x MSI Z87M-G43 Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 Micro ATX Motherboard £71.99
1 x Toshiba SSD HDTS212EZSTA 9.5mm 128GB Solid State Hard Drive - Retail £65.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan ORANGE 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLAD38G1600HC9DC01) £49.99
1 x Raijintek Themis Direct Contact CPU Cooler £19.99
Total : £537.54 (includes shipping : £8.00).



All down to budget really.

Just spotted RJC point about the DVD Drive. Most modern boards don't use IDE.
 
Last edited:
Associate
OP
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some great specs there thanks for that .

im still trying to work on budget i was thinking as cheap as possible to play arma 3 and dayz standalone as im not heavy into pc gaming . but now that im looking im starting to get the bug i might have to slap myself a few times. i need to have a good think t be more helpful haha . just a quick question regarding gfx cards ive noticed you have gone for ati is this the prefered option right now or is this just down to budget ive used both ndvidia and ati in the past and im ok with both
 
Last edited:
Associate
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some great specs there thanks for that .

im still trying to work on budget i was thinking as cheap as possible to play arma 3 and dayz standalone as im not heavy into pc gaming . but now that im looking im starting to get the bug i might have to slap myself a few times. i need to have a good think t be more helpful haha . just a quick question regarding gfx cards ive noticed you have gone for ati is this the prefered option right now or is this just down to budget ive used both ndvidia and ati in the past and im ok with both

Mainly cost really and larger VRAM/Memory bus on the HD 280 upwards.

Nvidia wise, if you spec your own, l would suggest a GTX 750 Ti would be a min spec to run the game.
 
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OP
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Been thinking about budget and £800 is my max .

Going to reuse :-
Antec 900 gaming case
Corsair 620w atx modular sli compliant psu
Samsung spinpoint 160gb Sata 2 hd
Window vista home 64 bit (i have the dvd) may upgrade what is the best os atm?

so i will need gfx/ram/mobo/cpu/cooler/SSD and possible os depending on price and if its really worth it .

Based on this what would you go for ?

Regards
 
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It has been in my current pc sitting in a cupboard , not long before I put it away it was replaced under warranty so it's pretty much not had much use . It's running is there anyway I can check voltages or anything just to check the numbers are right ?
 
Soldato
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Hi there,

If you think you will be playing a lot of ARMA2/3/Dayz then I would suggest prioritising the CPU (including overclocking) and SSD. Since these games use a very CPU-heavy engine which can push even a modern Intel Quad core hard when things get busy. As for the SSD, these games use so many assets that they rely on the storage drive much more than most "standard" games which can hold most of it in memory, therefore SSDs will provide a performance improvement for these games.

Therefore, with a £800 max budget I would suggest :

720_zps5632d807.png


(use your free delivery to get it for £9 less)

The motherboard is a nice one that overclocks well and supports SLI and Crossfire should you ever want to run dual graphics cards. The CPU cooler is also a very nice one that is great for cooling and runs very quiet (it can even run without a fan) and will help you to get a good overclock on your CPU.

This would also allow you to add Windows 7 for on your budget.

Windows 8 seems to be getting better that it was, but personally I'd rather stick with an OS I know works well now instead of one that will hopefully get a lot better in the future. Plus there are no special features windows 8 has over windows 7 that interest me (the only one possibly being DirectX 12 - though they haven't committed one way or another whether it will come to windows 7).
 
Last edited:
Soldato
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It has been in my current pc sitting in a cupboard , not long before I put it away it was replaced under warranty so it's pretty much not had much use . It's running is there anyway I can check voltages or anything just to check the numbers are right ?

If it's up and working you'll be fine.
 
Associate
OP
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4 May 2003
Posts
887
Location
Newcastle Upon Tyne
YOUR BASKET
1 x Sapphire Radeon R9 280X Dual-X OC 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Card £239.99
1 x Intel Core i5-4670K 3.40GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £167.99
1 x Samsung 250GB SSD 840 EVO SATA 6Gb/s Basic - (MZ-7TE250BW) £119.99
1 x Gigabyte Z87X-D3H Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ATX Motherboard £99.95
1 x Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 64-Bit - OEM (GFC-02733) £73.99
1 x TeamGroup Vulcan ORANGE 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-19200C11 2400MHz Dual Channel Kit (TLAD38G2400HC11CDC01) £55.99
1 x Thermalright HR-02 Macho CPU Cooler £39.98
1 x OcUK 24x DVD±RW SATA ReWriter (Black) - OEM £19.99
Total : £827.47 (includes shipping : £8.00).



Anyone heard anything bad about the mobo listed^ ive seen a mixed review on a few sites , anything worth changing or have i missed anything will that cpu cooler come with paste ? hope im not being ott just to play abit of dayz and arma3 haha

Thanks
 
Soldato
Joined
22 Mar 2014
Posts
3,956
Hi there,

If you think you will be playing a lot of ARMA2/3/Dayz then I would suggest prioritising the CPU (including overclocking) and SSD. Since these games use a very CPU-heavy engine which can push even a modern Intel Quad core hard when things get busy. As for the SSD, these games use so many assets that they rely on the storage drive much more than most "standard" games which can hold most of it in memory, therefore SSDs will provide a performance improvement for these games.

Therefore, with a £800 max budget I would suggest :

720_zps5632d807.png


(use your free delivery to get it for £9 less)

The motherboard is a nice one that overclocks well and supports SLI and Crossfire should you ever want to run dual graphics cards. The CPU cooler is also a very nice one that is great for cooling and runs very quiet (it can even run without a fan) and will help you to get a good overclock on your CPU.

This would also allow you to add Windows 7 for on your budget.

Windows 8 seems to be getting better that it was, but personally I'd rather stick with an OS I know works well now instead of one that will hopefully get a lot better in the future. Plus there are no special features windows 8 has over windows 7 that interest me (the only one possibly being DirectX 12 - though they haven't committed one way or another whether it will come to windows 7).

That build looks nice but if it were me I would take out the R9 280x and get a R9 290 :)
 
Soldato
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Location
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That build looks nice but if it were me I would take out the R9 280x and get a R9 290 :)

Aye, the R9 290 is a fantastic card - especially with one of the good custom coolers (like this one).

However, it is £100 more expensive. If the OP can afford this extra then he should absolutely get it, but if he can't then I wouldn't suggest sacrificing other components to afford the 290.

Plus the R9 280X is still a really nice card that can power through any game at 1080p and make it look amazing (speaking as a guy with a HD 7970).
 
Associate
OP
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Posts
887
Location
Newcastle Upon Tyne
Aye, the R9 290 is a fantastic card - especially with one of the good custom coolers (like this one).

However, it is £100 more expensive. If the OP can afford this extra then he should absolutely get it, but if he can't then I wouldn't suggest sacrificing other components to afford the 290.

Plus the R9 280X is still a really nice card that can power through any game at 1080p and make it look amazing (speaking as a guy with a HD 7970).


ive been tempted by that R9 280X but my original concerns were my Antec 900 case im just concerned about the space and if everything will fit , its an old case but i like it and would rather not spend more money on another one ..... if it would fit though i think i could wait until i have more funds and get the r9 280x .
 
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