I have just got Bitfenix Prodigy, advice on what to fit it with?

[fendershredder]

Hello folks, not posted in a while, but figured there is no better place to ask on this one.

In short I just got my 1st Mini-ITX chassis and my girlfriend and I fell in love with it, it's it gorgeous? (got the white chassis btw)

BitFenix.com » Products » Chassis » Prodigy

I've never used a mini-ITX board before, but we have a budget of no more than £300 (but aim to be under that) and I feel I have two options.
Already have PSU, DVD-Rom and the case so:

AMD Mini-ITX board with a Quad Core 3.0Ghz AMD APU, 4GB ram 128GB SSD

Or do I go for a dual core i3 and an Nvidia GTX 460 / 560

It's going to be used for some occasional gaming, I have my main rig and my girlfriend wants to join the party in a few of the free-to-play shooters and battlefield etc, if I can get BF3 to run on something like mid settings 1280 x 720 then we're happy.

Open to suggestions

Thanks in advance.

 

[EndlessWaves]

Wow, 250 x 404 x 359mm. That thing is massive, I bet it dwarfs some of the mATX cases you've seen.

As a keen gamer the graphics card would win hands down, the 6530 isn't bad and the 6550 is impressive for what it is, but 3x the performance for the same money or an SSD is an easy choice.

 

[fendershredder]

Yeah been looking into comparisons online, stunned to see that the AMD Quads are whopped in most tasks by the i3 2100 Dual core, at least when pared with a discrete graphics card of similar spec to the integrated APU.

I want to push the budget for an i5 quad, but it's just not going to happen, going to need a monitor with this setup lol, so can have a kick ass 2500k in there, but no screen! my girlfriend would f'in love that

So far I have:

£69.56
Gigabyte SKT-1155 H61N-USB3 Mini ITX Motherboard

£89.61
Intel i3-2120 Sandybridge 3.3Ghz

£68.97
OCZ AGT3-25SAT3-120G Agility 3 120GB SATA III 2.5 inch SSD

£86.12
MSI Overclocked Radeon HD 7750 AMD Graphics Card - 1GB

I can find a suitable 4gb ram kit for around £20 that will do the job for now.

Total = £334.26

Pretty sure I can bump that down, that just a quick search, but it doesn't seem like I can get an intel Mini-ITX setup down closer to my idea target of £250 Even with a 2nd hand GPU I don't think I'd make that much difference.

Appreciate if anyone can help me configure this system better

 

[fendershredder]

Wow, 250 x 404 x 359mm. That thing is massive, I bet it dwarfs some of the mATX cases you've seen.

It is quite chunky, but the thing has those massive wings on the top and bottom that give it most of its size, but for what it can pack inside it (storage wise) its pretty compact, it's Bitfenix's first M-ITX chassis too.

 

[EndlessWaves]

Pretty sure I can bump that down, that just a quick search, but it doesn't seem like I can get an intel Mini-ITX setup down closer to my idea target of £250 Even with a 2nd hand GPU I don't think I'd make that much difference.

Going for a Sandy Bridge Pentium instead of an i3 will knock off a good chunk, the main things you'd lose (apart from a little performance) is quick sync which significantly speeds up lower quality video conversion.

 

[fendershredder]

Going for a Sandy Bridge Pentium instead of an i3 will knock off a good chunk, the main things you'd lose (apart from a little performance) is quick sync which significantly speeds up lower quality video conversion.

Could you suggest link? would be greatly appreciated.

I seem to have found a nice Gigabyte board, with a AMD 945 Quad and a AMD 7750 (+ the ram and a cheap hard drive) that though eBay and similar internet places I can get down to around £250, I don't think I'm going to beat that tbh.

Thanks for the help

 

[EndlessWaves]

The list here gives an overview of the range and there's a review of three of the models here.

Looking at the other bits that card is a bit expensive for a 7750, for £5 scan have a 7770, and there's an ASRock Socket 1155 ITX motherboard here for a tenner less.

 

[fendershredder]

The list here gives an overview of the range and there's a review of three of the models here.

Looking at the other bits that card is a bit expensive for a 7750, for £5 scan have a 7770, and there's an ASRock Socket 1155 ITX motherboard here for a tenner less.

Damn that's sweet, thanks for that

Looks like I've got a few good options for the build now, now all I need to do is find a good deal on a matching white monitor, keyboard and mouse lol.