I will be attending University in September studying a computer course and have the desire to build purchase a desktop computer. The build or desktop it self will be of a mid range specification such as: - Intel core i5 2500k -4gb ram -Sapphire hd 6850 The problem lies with the budget which currently stands at a grand total of £0 . This post is to log my journey in reaching my goal of a desktop pc attempting to gain enough funds allowing me to purchase a desktop. I will be trying to achieve my goal by attempting to gain funding, earning money via a job (currently looking for one) and any other means necessary. Enjoy the trip its going to be a bumpy ride _______________________________________________________________________________ THANKS FOR ALL THE ADVICE AND SUPPORT I have replied to some of your comments but they are waiting to be reviewed by moderator UPDATE 1:
Good luck to you. And might I suggest starting small in terms of work? There are plenty of services one can do for a small fee (aside from prostitution) and make some decent money, remember it's all about how you advertise yourself (similar to prostitution ). And good luck!
If you are low on funds it might be better to opt for a slightly lower spec machine, such as a Phenom x4 based. If you can get a copy of the latest (I think) copy of Custom PC, then there is a £410 budget build with a Phenom x4 840. Note the price includes everything from Windows to the DVD drive.
thanks for the advice i was actually considering an amd cpu such as the phenom 955/965 thanks for the support
hello bud, just read your post, a few years ago i done some medical research (human guineapig), i got paid £250 every 12 hours for being in a private clinic and puffing on inhailers whilst hooked-up to heart monitors etc. the place was in kent, i'll find the address and post it here soon. good luck, sonic.
If you do look at something like this then scrap the Athlon X4 840 (it isn't a sodding Phenom AMD!) and drop in a Phenom II X4 955BE. Solid yet cheap and poweful PC's are quite easy to spec in the current market as even mid range kit can run the latest games at mid-high settings. As an example, £500 can get you: Case - Xigmatek Asgard - £25 PSU - BeQuiet L7 530w - £44 MB - MSI 870A-GD54 or equivilant - £70 CPU - Phenom X4 955BE - £80 Memory - 4 GB DDR PC12800 - £30 GPU - HD6850/GTX460 - £115 HD - 1TB 7200rpm - £40 OS - Win 7 HP x64 - £70 Optical Drive if required - £15 Total Spend - £489 If you upped your budget to £600 a i5 2500k / P67 based system starts to look very tempting: Case - Antec 100- £40 PSU - BeQuiet L7 530w - £44 MB - MSI P67A-GD53- £110 CPU - i5 2500k - £155 Memory - 4 GB DDR PC12800 - £30 GPU - HD6850/GTX460 - £115 HD - 1TB 7200rpm - £40 OS - Win 7 HP x64 - £70 Optical Drive if required - £15 Total Spend - £619 Drop to the cheaper P67-C45 motherboard and this will come in under £600. (All of the above are using estimated prices, please assume +/- £5 either way on all components). There are also always deals to be had from the major hardware retailers. Get your post count to the point that you qualify for free postage from a number of these stores and you are laughing.
Best of luck with the build. There are ways to save lots of money, like buying from sources like pixmania.co.uk rather than Scan. What you lose though is the tech support, good RMA service and general reliability of Scan (or other reputable retailers). It is possible to save a lot of money by watching the daily deals - I think I saved close to £100 like that. I live in Kent. I am a student. I am seriously interested!
its about a week or so before I am allowed in the bit tech marketplace, but the moment i can, im putting this machine up for sale. I built it last year in halls, heres the specs. Samsung SH-S223AL Antec 200 Two Hundred Mid Tower Case - No PSU Scythe SCZP-2000 ZIPANG 2 Socket 478/775/754/939/940/AM2/AM3/1156/1366 with 140mm Fan Heatpipe Processor Cooler OCZ Stealth XStream 600W PSU - SLI Ready ATX2.2 12cm Fan Samsung 1TB FP3 7200 AMD Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition 3.1GHz 6MB L3 Cache Socket AM3 Retail Boxed Processor Asus M4A785TD-V EVO 785G Socket AM3 onboard DVI VGA HDMI 8 channel audio ATX Motherboard PowerColor HD 4850 PCS 1GB GDDR3 DVI VGA HDMI PCI-E Graphics Card Crucial 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 1600MHz Ballistix Memory Kit CL8(8-8-8-24) 1.65V Unbuffered Non-ECC What exactly do you want yours to do? Mine does everything (gaming mainly) that i ask of it, bfbc2, shogun 2, at decent settings no worries. If money is tight, dont be afraid to start with a slightly less expensive version
It's actually a Phenom for a start. Secondly it is faster clock for clock (thanks to the L3 cache) and costs bugger all more than the 840. Finally it is has a fully unlocked multipler allowing for extremely easy overclocking.
Bumpy on this thread. xxmxx: You don't need to say thanks to everyone who posts in your threads, we know you appreciate help. p.s. Sorry it's taken so long for me to get round sorting your posts out.
Don't you worry about the gaming PC, if you're only just starting the uni, you'll probably just end up boozing the first couple of months anyway... I know that's what happened over here. Anyway do you already have a laptop? Because that seems like the priority to me for any student. Also in my books 2500K is pretty far from "mid range", so if you're broke, you should probably set your sights a bit lower... Especially if you don't really DO anything so demanding on your PC?
i understand what your saying and the idea of the 2500k was just a goal and i have realised i will most likely have to set my sights lower. Im not going to use the pc for mainly gaming but i was trying to build a desktop which would last me a good few years. thanks
Yeah, jeeze, the 2500k + board is at least a £250 buy in! If your on a budget, you'd be mad to plough that much into those components. Far better off getting an i7 920 + X58 board. You can get both of these on the marketplace or ebay for about £90 and £50 a piece, 6Gb of 6 channel 1600mhz XMS3 - cost me £30 brand new on ebay. 500GB HDs can be had for £20, second hand 500w PSU, £25, cheap ass case, plough the rest of the money into a GPU.
