Build Advice Budget multi display pc

Hi everyone, ive built a few pc's in the past but mostly run of the mill budget systems. I have recently been given 3 monitors and would like to run them all together with my tv aswell, im basically looking for the most cost efficient way to do this.

Budget: £250 is around how much id like to spend however im willing to go a little over

Main uses of intended build: mainly webdesign, media center, no hardcore gaming so a little football manager.

Parts required: I have the case i want, and windows 7 ultimate, and ill hold off buying memory thanks to bit tech's heads up so dont factor it into the price however a reccomendation would be greatly appreciated. Overall I am just looking for a hard drive, power supply, motherboard, cpu, graphics card, optical drive.

Storage requirements: preferably a 500gb drive

Will you be overclocking: yes slightly

Extra information about desired system: needs to support 4 displays

Thanks for looking any questions dont hesitate to ask

 

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/hardware/2010/09/22/zotac-unveils-four-monitor-fermi/1

 

thanks for that will just have to wait to see about the pricing any reccomendations on the rest of the build?

 

I think you will basically be looking along the lines of the affordable all rounder.

The problem is that although you don't need a powerful graphics card for gaming, getting 4 monitors to run usually requires quite an expensive one like goodbytes linked. You might be able to use 2 cheap graphics cards and get 2 outputs on each (not running them in sli or xfire). You will have to pay slightly more for a motherboard with 2x pci-e x16 slots but it may be cheaper overall.

 

I built my cousin a computer for stock trading and it had to run 4 monitors. I picked up 2x 5550's for a reasonable price (I believe $80 Canadian dollars on newegg) and it worked fine for 3 monitors. 2 running off 1 gpu, 1 off the other.

I'd recommend a amd dual core, any compatible motherboard that has 2x pci-express slots, and 2x low end graphics cards so you can get all your outputs. 4gb of ram is pretty much standard these days also and the rest is really up to you. Not so much part recomendations but I built my cousins (full pc, windows 7, case, etc. etc.) for just under $800 canadian but I ended up going wit a midrange motherboard and a quad core phenom x2. You should be able to fit in a dual core in your budget just fine though.

 

Thanks for your help everyone ill look at getting 2 cheaper graphics cards would a Radeon HD 4550 512MB suffice and be able to run 4 monitors if i had 2 of them? it had a hdmi dvi and vga output. (linky)
and i was thinking about the ASROCK M3A770DE 770 (linky)
and i was thinking about the AMD Athlon II X2 Dual Core 250, is there any point in spending the extra £12 on the AMD Athlon II X3 440 Tri Core? Is it possible to unlock the 4th core with this? thanks
Dave

 

Unlocking the 4th core is a risk.
Some CPU's might be a quad core locked, which in this case would work fine, or the fourth core can be broken, unstable or not up to specs. Getting a tri-core and unlocking the fourth one is playing the loto (with more chances to win).

 

I should think you will be alright to run 2 monitors off that, its a lot more powerful than cards i've run 2 monitors on though they were quite low resolutions. That motherboard should be fine its got the required slots. One of them is only a 4x but that won'y make a noticeable difference really for your uses. I would stick with the dual core there's a pretty good chance you can unlock it into a tri or maybe even a quad core.
The motherboard allows core unlocking I don't know how easy it is to do but you need to look at it as bonus speed. Don't buy a lower spec cpu than you need thinking for certain you will be able to unlock it, if you can't you may regret it.

 

Sorry dude, dual core are dual cores. Not locked down quad cores.

 

Really? My mistake I must have been getting confused after some research with the phenom x2's and just thought the athlon x2's were the same.

 

ok then i think i will go for the tri core but not unlock it to be safe and just to clarify if i were to buy those 2 graphics cards and run them i could run 4 monitors, and for resolution im only looking at about 1024x768. Thanks for the quick replies and any more advice on psu or memory would be greatly apreciated

Thanks