Holiday Budget System Buyers' Guide
by Zach Throckmorton on November 8, 2011 12:00 AM ESTRecommended Budget Systems
Note the below prices include neither taxes nor shipping as those vary based on the buyer's specific location. The RAM, hard drive, optical drive, power supply, and case recommendations are all, of course, interchangeable between the AMD and Intel-based systems, so mixing and matching those components is unproblematic.
Budget AMD Athlon II X2 system
As noted on previous pages, the AMD motherboards are largely interchangeable and the inclusion of the ASRock board in this list is largely subjective. In this case, it is my opinion that the ASRock board's richer feature set outweighs its shorter warranty.
| Component | Product | Price |
| CPU | AMD Athlon II X2 250 (dual-core 3.0GHz) | $60 |
| Motherboard | ASRock 880GM-LE (HD 4250 IGP) | $55 |
| RAM | GSkill 4GB DDR3-1333 kit | $26 |
| Hard drive | Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB | $70 |
| Optical drive | Lite-on iHAS124-04 | $18 |
| Power supply | Antec Earthwatts 380W | $40 |
| Case | BitFenix Merc Alpha | $39 |
| Operating system | Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit | $100 |
| Total: | $408 |
Budget AMD A4-3300 system
It's important to remember that the A4-3300 uses socket FM1 motherboards, so you cannot swap only the processor between these two AMD builds. You must change both the chip and the board. Given the benchmark results on the second page, the Athlon II X2 250 system above is a better general, basic usage computer—if you are not interested in gaming. However, if you are interested in playing less system-demanding titles at lower resolutions, as well as general computing, the following A4-3300 system will let you game on a budget. For anything more demanding, we'd recommend either upgrading to a quad-core Llano APU (with its faster GPU), or add a budget GPU to one of the other two builds. The Llano system also uses less power than the Athlon build, though the Celeron still wins as the low-power champ of this trio.
| Component | Product | Price |
| APU | AMD A4-3300 (dual-core 2.5GHz, HD 6410) | $70 |
| Motherboard | ASRock A55M-HVS | $59 |
| RAM | Mushkin 4GB DDR3-1333 kit | $26 |
| Hard drive | Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB | $70 |
| Optical drive | Lite-on iHAS124-04 | $18 |
| Power supply | Antec Earthwatts 380W | $40 |
| Case | Fractal Design Core 1000 | $40 |
| Operating system | Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit | $100 |
| Total: | $420 |
Budget Intel Celeron system
Similar to the AMD system, the budget Intel boards are also interchangeable, and in this case I include the Biostar motherboard largely because it offers a DVI port and legacy PCI slots (whereas the ASRock and MSI boards do not).
| Component | Product | Price | Rebate |
| CPU | Intel Celeron G530 (dual-core 2.4GHz, Intel HD Graphics) | $57 | |
| Motherboard | Biostar H61ML | $60 | |
| RAM | Mushkin 4GB DDR3-1333 kit | $26 | |
| Hard drive | Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB | $70 | |
| Optical drive | Lite-on iHAS124-04 | $18 | |
| Power supply | Corsair CX430 V2 | $45 | -$10 |
| Case | Fractal Design Core 1000 | $40 | |
| Operating system | Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit | $100 | |
| Total: | $416 | -$10 |
Suggested upgrades
Neither the Celeron nor Athlon II X2 systems as configured will work as a gaming computer. Adding a Radeon HD 5670 will bump both systems near $500, or a more capable Radeon HD 6770 will push them over $500. Including an SSD will not significantly change the overall cost of the system given current HDD pricing; it's worth considering ditching the mechanical hard drive altogether if you don't need much storage space given the relatively high cost of platter-based drives right now. (Note that you'll still want a larger capacity drive if you plan on storing any video or lots of pictures, and if you want to install more than a couple modern games.) As discussed earlier, the Llano platform with an A4 chip isn't going to impress in terms of benchmarks; upgrading to a faster A6 or A8 chip would help, but that will also increase the price quite a bit. If you're interested in going that route, we'd also suggest looking at motherboards with the A75 chipset, which adds native USB 3.0 and SATA 6Gbps support.
Closing Thoughts
If it weren't for the anomalously high prices of hard drives at the moment, budget systems built around AMD and Intel CPUs would be well under $400—OS included. That's about 10% less than the budget systems we outlined back in February of this year. While the AMD AM3 system hasn't changed all that much, on the Intel side, you're getting a substantially more powerful computer today than earlier this year, and one with much better upgradeability to boot. AMD's Llano platform is a bit of an odd man out at this price, as the dual-core Llano fails to really impress given the cut-down GPU, but about $20 more will net you a modest gaming system if you're willing to go that route.
Once more, it's important to note that the upcoming holiday season will present lots of great deals for budget-conscious builders. The Hot Deals section of AnandTech's forums is a great place to find and share the latest low prices on components. Further, the General Hardware section of the forums is a great place to ask for and share advice with fellow computer enthusiasts.
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Taft12 - Tuesday, November 8, 2011 - link
Not only do you not need a graphics card, you'll have much better thermals and acoustics from your small form factor HTPC case without an additional furnace in the case.Death666Angel - Tuesday, November 8, 2011 - link
This was precisely why I chose an A6-3500 for my HTPC. I came from a Core i3 530 (which could OC to about 4GHz) and an HD4670. I used it for a few games (beat em ups, racing games etc.) and of course movies/tv series of all sorts. But once I decided to get a new, smaller case (I had a desktop HTPC case that fit 7HDDs but they moved to a dedicated file server making the case too big for the living room), I decided against the SNB line up, because of the crappy game performance. My Llano setup saved me money assuming I went for a SNB setup with equal graphics power. And then, the system would not have allowed the case I ended up using (half height, no PCI slot in the back, 60W PSU). I is awesome to just have to worry about cooling one thing, not an extra graphics card and no IGP chip on the motherboard. :-)Overall, I think this article is interesting but a bit all over the place. As others have mentioned, you compare Llano sans graphics card to X2/Celeron with graphics card.... you don't show the power consumption of those two with graphics card.... While I agree with the overall theme of it, it is not very thorough or thought through. I think people not familiar with all the different tests will have a harder time figuring out which is the best setup for them.
I also don't like the dual-core Llanos. The graphics part is too cut down. The triple core for me was a great balance, because I needed to fit the 60W envelope of the PSU (works great with undervoling, I'm at 54W@2400MHz LinX) and I wanted a powerful graphics part. And the difference between the dual core and triple core parts for me was about 15 or 20€. If I wanted, the triple core also looks to be easily overclockable with K10Stat from within windows.
But enough ranting for now. :D
piroroadkill - Tuesday, November 8, 2011 - link
Sure, the GPU may be a bit worse than the Llano system, but you can't underestimate the usefulness of already having a socket 1155 board. You're immediately open to THE best upgrade path with nothing more than a flip, a click, and a pop of 4 pins.piroroadkill - Tuesday, November 8, 2011 - link
Along those lines, I'd spend a teeny bit more to begin with on the PSU. Then you're all set.Lunyone - Tuesday, November 8, 2011 - link
The PSU is just fine, IMHO. I have a e6700, 6850 GPU, 4 gb's DDR2, 2 DVD's, & 1 HD being powered by the Antec 380w PSU. It runs just fine and no issues whatsoever, so these systems have plenty of upgrade path with the PSU's selected. Now if you get a really power consuming GPU than you should upgrade the PSU, but most people the PSU is just fine.Dustin Sklavos - Tuesday, November 8, 2011 - link
Honestly, people grossly overestimate the amount of PSU they need these days. My desktop is running an 80 Plus Gold 1.2kw PSU, but under heavy load only pulls maybe 510 watts? That's with an overclocked i7-990X, overclocked GTX 580, four hard drives, an SSD, a separate USB 3.0 card, AND a GeForce GT 430 driving two other monitors.So long as the PSU is quality (and mine is) and the amperage is right, people could be getting by with a LOT less these days than they actually use. On the flipside, if I ever completely lose my mind, at least I know my desktop'll take a second 580. ;)
JarredWalton - Tuesday, November 8, 2011 - link
Look who's talking about overestimating power requirements. LOL. 1.2kW PSU, Dustin? I'm running my GTX 580 off a "paltry" 750W model. ;-)ckryan - Tuesday, November 8, 2011 - link
Man, my OCd 2500K P67 system idles at 50w@the wall and pulls about 200w gaming... with a 650w Seasonic X series PSU. That's about the same ballpark of ridiculous, but as soon as someone makes an equally great 350w I'll get one. 1.2KW is pretty silly though... I hope the PSU was comped at least. I got the Seasonic for $100 shipped and the fan never comes on even when gaming so that's one justification.Incidentally, I just purchased the G530 to drop in a H67 board for my SSD endurance testing rig. After playing with it for a while, I think it's well worth the premium the CPU is going for over MSRP. I could see just about every one I know using a G530 and thinking it's the greatest thing ever. The problem with SB Celerons and Pentiums is the motherboards. H61 boards are just not that good, and H67 boards are a little too expensive for a $50 processor. I already had a Biostar TH67+ laying around, and the system is now sitting in my entertainment center trying to put a SSD in the dirt at the rate of over 10.5TB a day. If Intel actually cared about what I want, they'd release a i3 K series as that's the SB I'd really like to see. I considered getting an i3, but I couldn't justify spending $130 for a processor that will spend it's entire life at idle putting SSDs to the sword.
Dustin Sklavos - Tuesday, November 8, 2011 - link
Yeah, the PSU was comped. That's why I'm using it. 1.2kW is most definitely nuts. ;)jabber - Tuesday, November 8, 2011 - link
Yeah we really need a manufacturer to bring out the ultimate baddass 450W PSU that delivers top quality and most of us can use that instead of these frankly ridiculous mega supplies we feel we need to buy.