[deleted blog]

75% is still a C right? Here's April's $500 Dollar PC Rig.

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Mobo: Foxconn H67S LGA 1155 Intel H67 $59.99

Cpu: Intel Core i3-2120 $115

Ram: Patriot Signature 4 GB PC3-10600 $22

Hdd: Western Digital 1 TB Caviar Blue SATA III 7200 RPM 32 MB Cache $100

Gpu: Sapphire AMD Radeon HD 6850 $135 (with rebate)

Psu: Cooler Master Elite 460W $21 (with rebate)

Tower: Cooler Master RC-343-KKN1 Elite 343 $36

Odd: Lite-On LightScribe 24X SATA DVD+/-RW $23

Total Cost: $512

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Looking back : I feel pumped duders and you should be too! The main theme of the build this month is "price drop". The Tower, Pus, Cpu, and Mobo have all decreased in price. Plus, did you see that sexy 1TB harddrive?!?! This is the first $500 dollar rig to feature this beast. My hope is that it likes what it sees and stays a while. The release of the next gen of graphics cards means that discounted cards of the previous generation are ripe for the taking. The 6850 gives our $500 dollar beast a big ass bite to back up its little bark (metaphors!). To give you an idea of the capability of this GPU I'll link a review by Tom's Hardware . If you don't like reading, then my synopses is that it runs Crysis Very High at 30fps in 1080p. As always, this is a budget PC for people that can't necessarily drop big money on their PC. If you feel you can save more money for your PC, then please do so. In closing, you should always check your local computer hardware store for better prices. Show them this list and see if they can beat it. This build gets a "seal" of approval. Until next month duders.

P.S: Don't know how to build a PC? These duders will show you how. Reminds you of the old days...

You chose a GPU that requires a 500W power supply but listed a 460W PSU. I don't know about you but I'd rather have more power than less in instances such as this. Got another recommendation for a PSU?

The PSU is more than adequate for the build.

A 6850 will run fine off a decent 300W PSU. I built an SFF gaming PC with an SFX 300W Silverstone PSU and it runs great.

@dekkadekkadekka: I'd use this 500 watt psu. I used http://www.thermaltake.outervision.com/ to calculate the wattage necessary for this build. With the wattage consumed by this build, i felt the 40 watt loss was not a big hit.

Edited: I felt my original response was too pointed.

@dekkadekkadekka: I'll echo what @stenchlord said. A 6850 doesn't require a 500W, despite what the official requirements might list. That's more to cover their asses than anything, and the general assumption is that people are using crap PSU brands so you'd need a higher capacity PSU in that case just to be able to supply the required power (as in, those PSUs are usually rated at a higher capacity than they can actually handle).

My 6850 is running fine on a 450W Corsair 450VX. The card itself consumes ~110W at load, and might peak at ~130W under abnormal conditions (i.e. artificial stress tests).

Anyway, pretty good for $500. Well done.

The HDD on amazon is actually 500GB, not 1TB