Building a gaming PC - where to start

[mollycuddles]

ds is in need of a new PC - old one very poorly. He wants something that will cope with games and he wants to build it himself. I have nomidea about specs/compatibility etc. Budget is £500. Any advice?

Presumably if he wants to do this he has some idea about what he needs? ebuyer and dabs both good sites for components. For gaming needs, make sure cooling is good and that he doesn't skimp on the powersupply, those beefy graphics cards and cooling fans need enough juice to run.

He knows what he wants but I'm not sure what he actually needs! He gave me an example list of components that was way above budget and he can't understand that it isn't going to magically be under budget if I ask amazon nicely. I have no idea and he can't/won't tell me. Oh well.

How old is your DS?

It all depends on what games he's expecting to play and his expectations.

Most games, even the toughest will let you turn down the settings so it doesn't need such a beefy PC to play.

Is he expecting a monitor/keyboard/mouse for the £500 or is it just the box itself?

You can get some pretty decent gaming PC's for £500 mark but it will NOT be top of the range.

My advice is to get him something like this ZoomStorm PC

If he's unhappy with that, send it to my son, he'd murder for a rig like that.