Can anyone recommend a Gaming PC for less than £250?
- Thread starter Tom
- 17 comments
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Robin
Premium
- 16,799
- United Kingdom
Do you have any common bits you could bring over from an old PC... like DVD drives, Power Supply, Hard Drives, Case etc? If you do and you are able to build one yourself you might be able to get a good Mobo / CPU bundle and some ram for £250.
Might be worth having a look at these bundles on Aria but at £250 your likely to only get a mid level gaming system.
http://www.aria.co.uk/Systems/Bundles/
Might be worth having a look at these bundles on Aria but at £250 your likely to only get a mid level gaming system.
http://www.aria.co.uk/Systems/Bundles/
- 971
- Sunny Devon
About this time last year I built a PC for just £320, but I didn't have to buy much as I carried a lot over from previous computers and had an unopened windows7 disk kicking around.
https://www.gtplanet.net/forum/showthread.php?p=4669768#post4669768
If you have to buy windows, or even a hard drive at current prices you'll have no chance for £250. If you want more than onboard graphics, again no chance - a good graphics card will easily cost half your budget.
https://www.gtplanet.net/forum/showthread.php?p=4669768#post4669768
If you have to buy windows, or even a hard drive at current prices you'll have no chance for £250. If you want more than onboard graphics, again no chance - a good graphics card will easily cost half your budget.
- 6,390
- Kent
- tombrookscomms
I've seen a rather decent one kicking around on eBay. Take a look.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/gaming-pc-/250992226406?pt=UK_Computing_DesktopPCs&hash=item3a704d7066#ht_702wt_1270
Pako
Staff Emeritus
- 16,455
- NW Montana
- GTP-Pako
- GTP Pako
Depending on what games you want to play, sure! Heck, I got a system I'll sell ya for £250.
Seriously though, what do you have to contribute to the build? Do you already have a monitor, keyboard, mouse, operating system, harddrive, case, anything?
You could build a bare bones system for around that price, if all you needed was the box, but with everything else added to the build, damn near impossible to find anything that would play any current games without going back to 8-bit graphics. Ok, not really, but.... You would be hard pressed in trying to enjoy any current game on the market. A little notebook or budget laptop comes to mind.
Look into some i3's perhaps and a used graphics card might be your best bet. Good luck.
Seriously though, what do you have to contribute to the build? Do you already have a monitor, keyboard, mouse, operating system, harddrive, case, anything?
You could build a bare bones system for around that price, if all you needed was the box, but with everything else added to the build, damn near impossible to find anything that would play any current games without going back to 8-bit graphics. Ok, not really, but.... You would be hard pressed in trying to enjoy any current game on the market. A little notebook or budget laptop comes to mind.
Look into some i3's perhaps and a used graphics card might be your best bet. Good luck.
- 15,994
- United Kingdom
- haitch40
- Xbox?
Im most likely untrustworthy. In my IT course last year we were told to design the cheepest posible computer using parts off net and you could still get a bundle cheeper than my attempt 
But if you want a good one try a standard PC and upgrade the ram. The ram is the easiest way to boost the speed of a PC.
But if you want a good one try a standard PC and upgrade the ram. The ram is the easiest way to boost the speed of a PC.
Not always.
For 250 quid, he'll need to get something that he can relatively easily overclock, if he doesn't mind doing the previous generation processors.
I'm still rocking a AMD X2 240 (overclocked to 3.2Ghz, apparently max is about 3.7Ghz) with a motherboard (MSI 770-C45 AM3 socket). It has a AMD HD4850 1GB graphics card. I kinda cheated with the system as I was able to buy it in Shenzhen (near Hong Kong) and got the above, two hard drives, DVD, CPU cooler and PSU for about 250-270 quid. I had to buy the case in England...
If you don't mind going for systems that is a bit behind the performance curve but can be overclocked by a big margin, then I would point you in that direction.
Intel i3 and i5 have no actual competition due to AMD not actually being fast enough when it comes to the performance chips, which means its not really that competitive to buy.
For 250 quid, he'll need to get something that he can relatively easily overclock, if he doesn't mind doing the previous generation processors.
I'm still rocking a AMD X2 240 (overclocked to 3.2Ghz, apparently max is about 3.7Ghz) with a motherboard (MSI 770-C45 AM3 socket). It has a AMD HD4850 1GB graphics card. I kinda cheated with the system as I was able to buy it in Shenzhen (near Hong Kong) and got the above, two hard drives, DVD, CPU cooler and PSU for about 250-270 quid. I had to buy the case in England...
If you don't mind going for systems that is a bit behind the performance curve but can be overclocked by a big margin, then I would point you in that direction.
Intel i3 and i5 have no actual competition due to AMD not actually being fast enough when it comes to the performance chips, which means its not really that competitive to buy.
- 6,390
- Kent
- tombrookscomms
Well I'm looking to play a variety of games, rFactor, pC.A.R.S, iRacing, Battlefield 2142/2/3 and so on.
I can contribute the mouse, keyboard and monitor but no case at the moment. My uncle (the one who I previously stated works in I.T) is coming down at the weekend, so I'll have a word with him then I guess, I know that he's got an old gaming PC knocking about (He used to play Battlefield 1942 on it), so I'll try and discuss it with him.
bevo
Premium
- 2,483
- GTP_bevofrancis
- bevo francis
If your wanting to play new games there is no way you can get one that cheap. That price range is why they make consoles. Your best bet would be to look at PC, or overclocking forums and buy a used system in their marketplace. You might be able to get something for around 400 or so. You could overclock an old 250$ system until it was ready to explode and your still not going to be able to play battlefield 3, cars, or any other new game coming out.
Second hand is your only option and it's going to take more then what you have to get it. There's nothing wrong with second hand though, most companies have pretty good warranties.
The video card, and HDD alone is almost going to kill your whole budget. Your going to need at least a 6670 gpu and a 100$ HDD. Right there is 180 of your budget. Just save your money and keep playing consoles until you can save up around 400 and start looking for used systems. Stay away from ebay and like I said look on forums dedicated to gaming PCs and overclocking and something you can use will pop up. Maybe even put up a thread in the wanted sections and tell them what your budget is, and what you want to do. Someone will probably help you out.
Second hand is your only option and it's going to take more then what you have to get it. There's nothing wrong with second hand though, most companies have pretty good warranties.
The video card, and HDD alone is almost going to kill your whole budget. Your going to need at least a 6670 gpu and a 100$ HDD. Right there is 180 of your budget. Just save your money and keep playing consoles until you can save up around 400 and start looking for used systems. Stay away from ebay and like I said look on forums dedicated to gaming PCs and overclocking and something you can use will pop up. Maybe even put up a thread in the wanted sections and tell them what your budget is, and what you want to do. Someone will probably help you out.
- 8,491
- Rockay City
Well, his price is in UK pounds, and the Euro is pretty bad at the moment. 
I was able to conjur something together that should be able to play any recent game at fairly high detail and resolution quite well for around 370 euro's, which is about 310 UK pounds. Does not include Windows license, assembly or shipping though, and no peripherals.
I was able to conjur something together that should be able to play any recent game at fairly high detail and resolution quite well for around 370 euro's, which is about 310 UK pounds. Does not include Windows license, assembly or shipping though, and no peripherals.
Seismica
Premium
- 4,346
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It would be possible to build one for £350 to £400; but a new build on £250 is nearly impossible. I just priced up this on Scan:
AMD Athlon II X4 631 - ~£58
Gigabyte FM1 motherboard - ~£62
AMD Radeon HD 6670 - ~£60
2x2GB RAM - ~£18
Antec 520W neo-eco - ~£50
The processor and motherboard are your budget items which fare well in benchmarks against Intel i3 CPUs, the 6670 is half decent and the PSU is highly rated (Don't let the wattage fool you) which will enable upgrades in the future; you could go cheaper than this though. I'm not sure if the processor comes with a cooler with it but i'd assume it does as it's the retail version.
There is your budget gone. If you can get a case and an old hard drive at not extra cost you're sorted; but it would be advisable to save up a little extra and get an Intel P67 or Z68 chipset motherboard with maybe an i3 2100 CPU (Which in total will be maybe £30-50 over your budget) as this would allow you to upgrade to a better processor in the future without swapping out the motherboard. With HDD prices the way they are there is no chance of hitting your budget unless you can find one or two of the above parts for no cost.
There is also costs in getting the fans for your case cooling, DVD drive etc. that can add up.
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- 938
- Ålesund, M&R, Norway
- Finduszip
In, fact, check out this website, based in Britain: http://www.envizage.com/
They have ridicolously cheap computers. Go to "Computers", then "Office", and "AMD Based". You'll find quite some good computers there, I found one with an FX4100 for 222£, for example. But these come without graphics cards, you'll need to head to the "Gaming" department for those.
They have ridicolously cheap computers. Go to "Computers", then "Office", and "AMD Based". You'll find quite some good computers there, I found one with an FX4100 for 222£, for example. But these come without graphics cards, you'll need to head to the "Gaming" department for those.
- 3,232
- Wales
£250 is not going to get you anywhere near anything worth using for games unless you buy something used.
You could spend that or more on one part alone, or even the majority of that budget on just an operating system, £500 is hard to work with for a gaming PC, let alone £250.
You could spend that or more on one part alone, or even the majority of that budget on just an operating system, £500 is hard to work with for a gaming PC, let alone £250.
