PC and gaming noob: best cheap setup to play SC

[DirtbagPilot]

I know nothing about computers but would like to play star citizen. My current PC is on it's last legs so I'm due for an upgrade anyways, though I'd like to avoid spending an absurd amount if possible. Where do I start?

Let me reemphasize: I know NOTHING about computers. Like zero aside from basic everyday use. So dumb it down please. Like you're talking to your grandma. Thanks.

[Wyvyrias]

I suppose you won't be satisfied with self-builds then?

[Algorism]

Well, as I'm sure almost anybody else here might suggest, building your own PC is really the cheapest and best option as far as bang for your buck performance.  This may sound daunting but I promise, it really is as simple as screwing this in there and putting things in their appropriate places, and there are plenty of Youtube videos describing the process of installing various components.  The most confusing part is making sure you have chosen compatible components.  

I think PC part picker would be an excellent place to start: https://pcpartpicker.com/, complete with build guides and nearly all relevant info from purchasing compatible parts to actual assembly.

The power you can achieve will entirely depend on how much you are willing to spend.  As an example, you can achieve a decent mid-range gaming rig with a GTX960 for a modest price that will definitely run Arena Commander well on medium settings.  Keep in mind that Star Citizen has much time left in its development process that we will likely see significant performance optimizations which will allow smoother game-play experience on even modest hardware.  

If you have any specific questions feel free to ask, on the forum, or through PM!

[CyberianK]

also check out this in RSI forums https://forums.robertsspaceindustries.com/discussion/15249/new-guide-to-buying-pc-gaming-hardware/p1

the guy is constantly updating the thread

also there is some specific builds on the last pages that peoples did

Edited August 24, 2015 by CyberianK

[Rain2reign]

And to add to what @infincible said. Can you name a price(roughly) to how much you are willing to spend? That also gives us a better image as to what we can recommend to you. And are you from a country that https://pcpartpicker.com supports? 

Edited August 24, 2015 by rain2reign

[Wyvyrias]

 

Keep in mind that Star Citizen has much time left in its development process that we will likely see significant performance optimizations which will allow smoother game-play experience on even modest hardware.  

Well, I wouldn't say that.
We had discussions which ended with the opposite result.
Many details, many entities (tons of tiny ones like coins which you can interact with), the overall size of the world etc will most likely drain your performance a lot. So yeah, of course they will improve the performance. But because of all the things they add it will probably be heavy on your hardware.
Like they keep saying, SC is made (or will be made?) for future hardware.

[DirtbagPilot]

Hell, if it is just screwing stuff in I can do it. I'd be willing to learn. As far as price, I mean, is under a grand USD unrealistic? And yeah, I'm in the states so I can get parts from them.

[Algorism]

Well, I wouldn't say that.We had discussions which ended with the opposite result.
Many details, many entities (tons of tiny ones like coins which you can interact with), the overall size of the world etc will most likely drain your performance a lot. So yeah, of course they will improve the performance. But because of all the things they add it will probably be heavy on your hardware.
Like they keep saying, SC is made (or will be made?) for future hardware.

Perhaps you are right, however I would think it would not be in CIG's best interest to design a game which couldn't run well on 900 series chips.  But I guess like most other SC related topics, only CIG knows (or doesn't).

Hell, if it is just screwing stuff in I can do it. I'd be willing to learn. As far as price, I mean, is under a grand USD unrealistic? And yeah, I'm in the states so I can get parts from them.

Yeah, you just have to be careful not to apply too much pressure to components and follow all instructions to the T.  The CPU is probably the scariest part of the install process. 

[Wyvyrias]

As far as price, I mean, is under a grand USD unrealistic? And yeah, I'm in the states so I can get parts from them.

Nope, that's totally possible.
My rig is around/below that costs and I can play SC just fine (startup in less than 1 min, >60 FPS).

[CyberianK]

For 1k at newegg you probably get i5, 970 and SSD or even better depending on priority

I would go with something where you can replace the GPU in 2.5 years or so when full release of SC happens so better not blow all of the budget for GPU now.

Edited August 24, 2015 by CyberianK

[DirtbagPilot]

For 1k at newegg you probably get i5, 970 and SSD or even better depending on priority

I would go with something where you can replace the GPU in 2.5 years or so when full release of SC happens so better not blow all of the budget for GPU now.

Ok, so google says that means intel 5 and a gtx 970 video card, but what is SSD? And how do i know if a GPU is replaceable or not? Like I said, dumb it down haha

[Wyvyrias]

Ok, so google says that means intel 5 and a gtx 970 video card, but what is SSD? And how do i know if a GPU is replaceable or not? Like I said, dumb it down haha

Intel i5 = a CPU (Central Processing Unit) = Processor
GTX 970 = a GPU (Graphics Processing Unit) = Video Card
Drive = SSD = Solid State Drive (to save things) - Here an example

Better start here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_hardware

[Fizzlefuse]

@DirtbagPilot we're in the same boat, I too am looking into building a new rig.. in fact my first self-build rig. I'm waiting until we're a bit closer to launch but in the mean time I try to learn.

What I tend to do is browse different "pre built" stores and see which items they put in those rigs.. and then look around on the internet to see why those are picked, if there is something better, what other people think.. etc.
Just research.

The people here on the Base also have a great understanding of gaming rigs which helps a lot and I definitely recommend LinusTechTips on youtube if you're looking to understanding more about PCs. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCXuqSBlHAE6Xw-yeJA0Tunw

 

[Osclin]

Ha, lord do we all love us some build threads.  Go away for an hour and come back to fun times!  Do you have a current computer with say a monitor/keyboard/mouse available, or are you starting from scratch?  I'll get on partspicker and see what I can come up with, budget builds are in some ways more fun than fantasy builds.

[Algorism]

Ok, so google says that means intel 5 and a gtx 970 video card, but what is SSD? And how do i know if a GPU is replaceable or not? Like I said, dumb it down haha

So down to some of the basics you're asking about:

Current Intel processors are basically available in three tiers, Core i3, i5, and i7 -thats in the order of least powerful/expensive to most.

Nvidia GPU/Graphics cards are similarly available in three tiers: 960, 970, and 980 -also in the order of least to most powerful/expensive.

Within each tier of GPU you will also find variants which offer more or less performance/features at different prices, as well as from a variety of different manufacturers.  I don't think you need to worry about the graphics card/motherboard interface changing over the next 2 years (so don't worry too much about the upgradable aspect).

 

Solid State Drives (SSD's) Vs. Hard Disk Drives (HDD's):

HDD's are your traditional storage technology which have been around for decades.  They offer large storage capacity and are relatively inexpensive.  1 TB HDD's are available for $50-$60 easy.  HDD's rely on mechanical spinning disks usually layered over each other, and thus to access a section of memory, a disk must spin up to find that sector of memory  in order to read it (these are generally known as seeks). This is a very costly and slow process (relatively).

SSD's are a more recent development.  They offer much faster performance as they are essentially large flash drives, and do not contain moving mechanical parts ("solid state").  Their read and write speeds are faster than spinning disk drives and as such they are highly desirable for applications which require the transfer of large files from permanent storage to available memory (RAM), like games, but more importantly, the operating system. Amazon has a 1 TB Samsung SSD (Samsung makes some of the best SSD's) for $325.

Thats $50 or $60 vs $325.  But that's only to illustrate the point.  I would suggest a smaller 120GB or 250GB SSD for the operating system and MAYBE Star Citizen (although as it stands SC is huge) and a cheaper HDD for everything else.

 

 

Keep asking and I'll keep answering.

Edited August 24, 2015 by infincible

[DirtbagPilot]

Ha, lord do we all love us some build threads.  Go away for an hour and come back to fun times!  Do you have a current computer with say a monitor/keyboard/mouse available, or are you starting from scratch?  I'll get on partspicker and see what I can come up with, budget builds are in some ways more fun than fantasy builds.

Scratch! Thanks man, It will be cool to see what you come up with!

infincible: thanks, that clears it up.

[Rain2reign]

Are you planning on running SLI, or just single card?

Are you planning on buying a OS, or do you have one lying around?

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This is what i would have gone for for that price it's a a few dollars above the 1k USD. http://pcpartpicker.com/p/8njYGX 

Note: This is going by pure case only and no additional external devices such as mouse,keyboard,monitor, OS. I'll keep looking around.

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Edited August 24, 2015 by rain2reign

[Osclin]

Because we're starting from scratch, price ends up being a bit higher, as most of us carry over at least a few components build to build.  I've got a couple builds that I'd recommend, they range from top budget tier to basic budget gaming.  I'm sure others will offer up a couple AMD builds, but I'll stick with Intel/Nvidia, because those are the companies I'm personally familiar with, I'd just be guessing with AMD.

Build #1:  This is the high-end budget build, as it uses the i5 6600k(in itself not much more expensive than older i5s, but the motherboards are still a little dear, and ddr4 memory is still higher than ddr3).  Also went with the gtx 970, but you could drop in a 960 for ~130 less and probably expect to play finished SC on low-medium.  Offers enough power for now, with the capacity to upgrade the gpu in the future or add a second card for sli, and the cpu and cooler has plenty of room for overclocking in the future to extend system viability well into the future.

Build #2:  Solid previous generation system taking advantage of cost savings with older mobos/ram

Build #3:  Aimed at your stated $1000 budget, maximized performance as best I could.  Bah, needing a monitor and OS is totally screwing up my ability to hit 1k...seems to be about the best I can do with new parts that don't leave you instantly outdated...  I'm sure the others have something for you, they're a little more inventive.  This build does not have as much flexibility as the others, the motherboard doesn't support sli(2 graphics cards at once), and the power supply unit(psu) isn't powerful enough to support sli anyway.

Do note that prices shown on pcpartpicker reflect frequent updates on sales/offers, and lists frequently feature many different retailers all compiled together.  Actual builds generally end up being a bit more expensive as some offers are brick and mortar only, and some sales/offers end before you get up the gumption to act.  If  you decide to build I'd honestly recommend going with Amazon, as their prices are generally on the good side, and if you sign up for the amazon prime trial(and cancel it once your order ships)  you won't have to pay any shipping :).  Otherwise I almost always deal with newegg.

Edited August 24, 2015 by Osclin

[Minted]

If its in preparation for Star Citizen....

This game is going to be gfx heavy. You can build a pc now or later and I really don't think it will make any difference. The main thing is, is it worth waiting for the better gfx cards that may come next year?

The difference between a 4790k, 6700k, 7700k? will probably be 1fps if that.The difference between a 970 and whatever equivalent card comes next could be the difference of 20+fps.

We might get a better idea what gfx cards we need once AC2.0 comes out but probably not fully until we get our big space battles (if we ever get them). Say 50 ships of varying sizes all shooting laser and missiles...Heavy stuff.

[Rain2reign]

So.. I took another look at possible builds. It seems that i missed the last post you made, so my apologies for my previous post. 

Unfortunately i couldn't think a build, which would fit under $1000,00 USD. I did try my best to keep it as close as possible to $1000,00 USD and ended up with a price tag of $1238.29 USD, at time of posting and this is the price without any promotions and discounts. http://pcpartpicker.com/p/sZtmcf 

This build will give you future upgrade options, and SLI possibility should that be something you want. Know though, at you'd be replacing the GPU at some point to play star citizen in a year or two(maybe 3) from now to play star citizen. As it will be very taxing on the GPU and you might be seeing th eend of teh road as to what the GPU can give you regarding star citizen.

If you wish to overclock, you can overclock it to a certain extend, but you'd be better off getting the Intel Core i5-4690K for an additional $46,- USD. That will give you a much better overclock experience and it's unlocked by default. 

And again my apologies, i just can't think of a build for under a 1000 USD(from scratch), meant to play star citizen(as SC is at the moment and might be in the future). 

 

Edited August 24, 2015 by rain2reign

[Algorism]

Unfortunately i couldn't think a build, which would fit under $1000,00 USD. I did try my best to keep it as close as possible to $1000,00 USD and ended up with a price tag of $1238.29 USD, at time of posting and this is the price without any promotions and discounts. http://pcpartpicker.com/p/sZtmcf 

Good setup there except unless you're overclocking you don't need to upgrade the CPU fan.  The CD drive probably isn't necessary but for 16.88 it's whatever. 

[Rain2reign]

Good setup there except unless you're overclocking you don't need to upgrade the CPU fan.  The CD drive probably isn't necessary but for 16.88 it's whatever. 

Thanks!

I know, but the cryorig is cheap, a lot more silent and better at cooling than the stock cooler. While also being a much more solid and robust build. The stock cooler of Intel tends to be quite loud under load, even when not overclocked.

i thought i'd just mention it, that if he want to overclock the i5-4690K will be a better choice (at a price of 46 USD extra). And the CD drive, i'd just take one and you can keep using it for the next decade or so. Always handy to have it, even though you might not use it like once every 6 months, if not longer. (according to my experience that is)

Edited August 24, 2015 by rain2reign
Typo's

[Algorism]

Thanks!

I actually might pickup that motherboard and case.  For some reason, 3 months ago when I built my machine, I thought I wanted a micro ATX build in a tiny case with a full sized GPU.  Stupid, I know.

[Rain2reign]

I love Corsair Cases. I am just a fan of full sold metal cases... (quite cheesy isn't it? ) I also find that Motherboard to be one of the better onces in that price range, if you compare the feature/quality/price ratio to other motherboards(within that price range).

Edited August 24, 2015 by rain2reign

[DirtbagPilot]

 

Osclin: Awesome thanks man. I would be willing to spend a grand on just the pc itself so no worries. I'm selling my motorcycle and when I get home from this deployment I'll be getting a big check, so I won't be strapped for cash at all. Im just trying tonkeep it reasonable. I also have a headset already that I use for language training. 

Rain2reign: cool. If it gives me options I like it. I'm not going to be home for another few months so by then, who knows? It seems like a lot of the performance hinges on the GPU. That said I have some questions.

What is overclocking? 

I read briefly about SLI, do you think thats worth doing or better to just wait til a newer GPU comes out?

if the difference between current generation GPUs and the new ones is as high as Minted suggests, i am thinking i may be better off biding my time a bit longer and waiting til the game is closer to being done, say when SQ 42 comes out or something.