GRcade

My friend's son (15) is looking to get a gaming PC. His dad tells me he has a fairly generous budget (he has well over £1k to spend), although personally I think that's being over indulgent, but whatever. Teenagers today, eh? He's asked me to try and get a decent spec for a gaming rig, which he can then take to a PC build company and get them to put together. Me and his Dad are determined to steer the boy away from getting an Alienware - he's in thrall to the look of their machines, so we have to convince him it would be a Very Bad Idea to chuck his cash away on one. Of course, because his Uncle Cal used to have an Alienware, it's set a bad example, and he remains convinced Alienware is the way to go. We need to stop this way of thinking, dead.

Let's say the maximum budget would be £1.5k, and it has to include a decent monitor, snazzy case (probably with cooling, etc), a monster GPU and a killer CPU, as well as generous RAM and HDD storage.

I told his Dad I'd ask you lot, since you effectively built me a pretty decent PC the last time I asked for a spec. Anyone care to suggest a good spec for that lot?

If you're gonna be taking it to a pc build shop you're going to get butt strawberry floated anyway, you'd probably be better off buying an alienware with that kind of budget.

£1.5K. That buys a lot of power these days.

Do you and your friends just print money or use monopoly notes or something?

JiggerJay wrote:If you're gonna be taking it to a pc build shop you're going to get butt strawberry floated anyway, you'd probably be better off buying an alienware with that kind of budget.

Not really. With Alienware you pay a premium for the name. If you're going to a PC build shop, you could specify all the specific parts and just get them to build it for you.

It's not something I'd personally do, but I can understand why people would want to do it if they've just spent a considerable amount of money on PC parts.

Buy him a tablet, and blow the rest on beer and hookers.

Can I have £400?


please

JiggerJay wrote:If you're gonna be taking it to a pc build shop you're going to get butt strawberry floated anyway, you'd probably be better off buying an alienware with that kind of budget.

You're not though. For that sort of money you could get a high-end Silverstone case that looks way better than those Alienware monstrosities.

What looks best is entirely objective.

I might like a case made out of ricepaper and covered in rainbow LED's. Doesnt mean its any better than any other case.

Falsey wrote:Do you and your friends just print money or use monopoly notes or something?

He's an only child and he's waaaay over-indulged, if you ask me. What can I do? One thing I learned early on: never criticise another man over the way he raises his kid/s. Especially if you don't have any yourself.

Think I might just suggest he gets an Alienware, then.

Cal wrote:

Falsey wrote:Do you and your friends just print money or use monopoly notes or something?

He's an only child and he's waaaay over-indulged, if you ask me. What can I do? One thing I learned early on: never criticise another man over the way he raises his kid/s. Especially if you don't have any yourself.

Think I might just suggest he gets an Alienware, then.

Why?

Scan are pretty good for built systems.

Just have a look on there, and configure to budget.

Obviously, building will be cheaper. Buy hey ho.

You were already provided with a link to the PC help thread which has a very capable build in there, but obviously you've ignored that because it isnt expensive enough.

If you want, Ill happily put a build together that will be over a grand but I seriously question the point of doing so. It'll be out of date in a year and a half and a redundant £1500 pill is a lot harder to swallow than a £700 one.

Like I say, Ill happily put the build together tonight if you want.

Falsey wrote:You were already provided with a link to the PC help thread which has a very capable build in there, but obviously you've ignored that because it isnt expensive enough.

If you want, Ill happily put a build together that will be over a grand but I seriously question the point of doing so. It'll be out of date in a year and a half and a redundant £1500 pill is a lot harder to swallow than a £700 one.

Like I say, Ill happily put the build together tonight if you want.

Seriously, take the build in the PC thread. Stick it in an expensive, shiny looking case. And maybe throw in a couple of RAIDed SSDs, and you'll have a PC that will be capable AND eat up most of your budget.

Might aswell just buy the same thing as me.

This should cover him. You may want to start off with Crysis on medium and work your way up from there.



This kind of tech could obviously use a bit of cooling.



And thanks to Stugene for this essential peripheral breakdown.



I hope that covers your needs alright!

All yours for a very fair £246,078.47

Only 8GB of RAM? Come on Falsey, this needs to be a serious gaming machine, not some kid's plaything.

I think you will find it's 16GB

Xeno wrote:I think you will find it's 16GB

Even so...