• Log InLog In
  • Register
Liquid`
Team Liquid Liquipedia
EDT 21:19
CEST 03:19
KST 10:19
  • Home
  • Forum
  • Calendar
  • Streams
  • Liquipedia
  • Features
  • Store
  • EPT
  • TL+
  • StarCraft 2
  • Brood War
  • Smash
  • Heroes
  • Counter-Strike
  • Overwatch
  • Liquibet
  • Fantasy StarCraft
  • TLPD
  • StarCraft 2
  • Brood War
  • Blogs
Forum Sidebar
Events/Features
News
Featured News
[ASL21] Ro24 Preview Pt2: News Flash10[ASL21] Ro24 Preview Pt1: New Chaos0Team Liquid Map Contest #22 - Presented by Monster Energy18ByuL: The Forgotten Master of ZvT30Behind the Blue - Team Liquid History Book20
Community News
Weekly Cups (March 23-29): herO takes triple6Aligulac acquired by REPLAYMAN.com/Stego Research8Weekly Cups (March 16-22): herO doubles, Cure surprises3Blizzard Classic Cup @ BlizzCon 2026 - $100k prize pool51Weekly Cups (March 9-15): herO, Clem, ByuN win4
StarCraft 2
General
Team Liquid Map Contest #22 - Presented by Monster Energy Blizzard Classic Cup @ BlizzCon 2026 - $100k prize pool What mix of new & old maps do you want in the next ladder pool? (SC2) Aligulac acquired by REPLAYMAN.com/Stego Research Weekly Cups (March 23-29): herO takes triple
Tourneys
RSL Season 4 announced for March-April Sparkling Tuna Cup - Weekly Open Tournament StarCraft Evolution League (SC Evo Biweekly) WardiTV Mondays World University TeamLeague (500$+) | Signups Open
Strategy
Custom Maps
[M] (2) Frigid Storage Publishing has been re-enabled! [Feb 24th 2026]
External Content
The PondCast: SC2 News & Results Mutation # 520 Moving Fees Mutation # 519 Inner Power Mutation # 518 Radiation Zone
Brood War
General
BSL 22 Map Contest — Submissions OPEN to March 10 so ive been playing broodwar for a week straight. Klaucher discontinued / in-game color settings BGH Auto Balance -> http://bghmmr.eu/ Pros React To: JaeDong vs Queen
Tourneys
[Megathread] Daily Proleagues [ASL21] Ro24 Group E [ASL21] Ro24 Group F Azhi's Colosseum - Foreign KCM
Strategy
What's the deal with APM & what's its true value Fighting Spirit mining rates Simple Questions, Simple Answers
Other Games
General Games
Stormgate/Frost Giant Megathread Starcraft Tabletop Miniature Game Nintendo Switch Thread General RTS Discussion Thread Darkest Dungeon
Dota 2
The Story of Wings Gaming Official 'what is Dota anymore' discussion
League of Legends
G2 just beat GenG in First stand
Heroes of the Storm
Simple Questions, Simple Answers Heroes of the Storm 2.0
Hearthstone
Deck construction bug Heroes of StarCraft mini-set
TL Mafia
Mafia Game Mode Feedback/Ideas TL Mafia Community Thread Five o'clock TL Mafia
Community
General
US Politics Mega-thread Russo-Ukrainian War Thread The Chess Thread NASA and the Private Sector Things Aren’t Peaceful in Palestine
Fan Clubs
The IdrA Fan Club
Media & Entertainment
[Req][Books] Good Fantasy/SciFi books [Manga] One Piece Movie Discussion!
Sports
2024 - 2026 Football Thread Formula 1 Discussion Cricket [SPORT] Tokyo Olympics 2021 Thread General nutrition recommendations
World Cup 2022
Tech Support
[G] How to Block Livestream Ads
TL Community
The Automated Ban List
Blogs
Broowar part 2
qwaykee
China Uses Video Games to Sh…
TrAiDoS
Funny Nicknames
LUCKY_NOOB
Iranian anarchists: organize…
XenOsky
FS++
Kraekkling
Shocked by a laser…
Spydermine0240
ASL S21 English Commentary…
namkraft
Electronics
mantequilla
Customize Sidebar...

Website Feedback

Closed Threads



Active: 9367 users

Optimized Gaming Computer Builds For Every Budget - Page 14

Forum Index > Tech Support
Post a Reply
Prev 1 12 13 14 15 Next All
Shikyo
Profile Blog Joined June 2008
Finland33997 Posts
December 31 2011 21:27 GMT
#261
On January 01 2012 05:39 HyTex wrote:
Show nested quote +
On December 31 2011 11:48 dhe95 wrote:
On December 31 2011 11:31 HyTex wrote:
I'm curious, what would I need to play / stream SC2 on anywhere from Low to High Settings in 1080p at a 1280x1024 resolution? I want to keep the resolution modest because I don't think I'll enjoy playing SC2 on a larger monitor (due to larger eye travel distance to check supply and such).

How many corners can I cut on the $800 build due to the smaller resolution? Would an i5 2400 suffice, since I don't plan on overclocking? Can I choose a cheaper graphics card, and if so, what would you recommend? Is the additional cooling fan necessary, given I do not plan on overclocking?

Thanks for the help in advance. =)

you stream what's on your screen, so if you're playing at 1280x1024, you can't stream 1080p


This holds true even if the encoder can change the output resolution? (Adobe FMLE 3.2, for reference). I don't know much about streaming, but I want to make sure I don't end up buying a video card that is far too powerful for what I wanna use it for.

um

if you are watching a 50s film thats really bad quality with a super mega turbo HD tv, what kind of a picture do you see?

If you are listening to a 24 kbps super low quality mp3 with a 2000$ hifi stereo set, how good is the sound quality going to be?
League of Legends EU West, Platinum III | Yousei Teikoku is the best thing that has ever happened to music.
HyTex
Profile Joined August 2011
United States67 Posts
December 31 2011 21:29 GMT
#262
On January 01 2012 05:48 Josh_rakoons wrote:
Show nested quote +
On December 31 2011 11:31 HyTex wrote:
I'm curious, what would I need to play / stream SC2 on anywhere from Low to High Settings in 1080p at a 1280x1024 resolution? I want to keep the resolution modest because I don't think I'll enjoy playing SC2 on a larger monitor (due to larger eye travel distance to check supply and such).

How many corners can I cut on the $800 build due to the smaller resolution? Would an i5 2400 suffice, since I don't plan on overclocking? Can I choose a cheaper graphics card, and if so, what would you recommend? Is the additional cooling fan necessary, given I do not plan on overclocking?

Thanks for the help in advance. =)

For streaming in 1080p you'll probably need a 2500k...


If you read my processor choice and the succeeding sentence, you'd know I have no intentions of overclocking, so my question really becomes "Can the i5 2500 stream 1080p?". And if I absolutely must OC to stream 1080p, then I'll just stream at 720p or a lower bitrate until the technology needed becomes more affordable, which is several years down the road.

Does the 0.2GHz differential between the 2400 and 2500 really increase the performance by that much?
Myrmidon
Profile Blog Joined December 2004
United States9452 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-12-31 21:34:18
December 31 2011 21:31 GMT
#263
I'm not sure how the above (edit: Shikyo's post) is related to the discussion.

The issue is that if you're playing at 1280x1024, your video card is rendering frames at 1280x1024. You can add black bars and upscale this to 1920x1080 in theory, but there won't be 1920x1080 worth of actual source information. With some encoders, in practice, this could possibly make the end result look nicer, but it's definitely not going to be the same as starting from 1920x1080 of actual source information (aspect ratio aside even).

edit: a Sandy Bridge quad core at i5-2500 clock speeds isn't going to handle streaming 1080p that well. Yes it will be okay in some situations, but maybe not with more action, not with more aggressive (for lower bitrate) encoding, and so on. Possibly consider a Xeon E3-1230 or i7-2600 if you absolutely won't overclock.
Shikyo
Profile Blog Joined June 2008
Finland33997 Posts
Last Edited: 2011-12-31 21:34:24
December 31 2011 21:32 GMT
#264
no, generally i5 2400 is regarded as the best cost-to-performance ratio processor if you overclock, but afaik theres some sale atm for 2500. Either way they will probably stream 1080p allright, but you probably should look into overclocking for absolute best settings

On January 01 2012 06:31 Myrmidon wrote:
I'm not sure how the above (edit: Shikyo's post) is related to the discussion.

The issue is that if you're playing at 1280x1024, your video card is rendering frames at 1280x1024. You can add black bars and upscale this to 1920x1080 in theory, but there won't be 1920x1080 worth of actual source information. With some encoders, in practice, this could possibly make the end result look nicer, but it's definitely not going to be the same as starting from 1920x1080 of actual source information (aspect ratio aside even).

If you play at 1280x1024 and output at 1080p it doesnt magically change it into 1080p so its basically about the output being able to only be at best as good as the input o_o and no you dont need extra gpu power to do that either
League of Legends EU West, Platinum III | Yousei Teikoku is the best thing that has ever happened to music.
HyTex
Profile Joined August 2011
United States67 Posts
December 31 2011 23:46 GMT
#265
@Myrmidon: Shikyo's analogy refers to my question about using a lower bitrate or changing the resolution instead of getting a more powerful processor, if I'm reading it correctly.

The sale on the i5 2500 ends tonight. Sadly, I'm not quite done choosing parts, which means I'll most likely stick with the i5 2400 and deal with the inability to stream in 1080p (I'm getting a monitor that supports 1920x1080 in case I ever decide to upgrade or replace a part).

So, to understand correctly, if I were to input 1280x1080 and output at the 1920x1080 resolution that you normally record at for 1080p, I would end up with a much worse picture quality (due to the image being stretched in a similar manner to a photoshop image)?
Shikyo
Profile Blog Joined June 2008
Finland33997 Posts
January 01 2012 00:22 GMT
#266
afaik you'd get the same image quality and black bars
League of Legends EU West, Platinum III | Yousei Teikoku is the best thing that has ever happened to music.
Myrmidon
Profile Blog Joined December 2004
United States9452 Posts
January 01 2012 01:12 GMT
#267
Yeah with 1280x1024 input and 1920x1080 output, you would just need to stretch it, which just requires some interpolation. At least if you're working with the uncompressed images then it seems like it should be an affine transformation that's reversible (without loss of quality) I think?

If you're resizing a lossy jpeg--which is encoded in blocks of a certain size I think--or something like that, then that's a lossy to lossy conversion, so quality is lost in the resizing. I don't at all work with images in practice though, so I'm just guessing.

Theoretically after upscaling, the output of the encoding process might be better in some sense than if you didn't upscale, depending on how the encoder handles it. This is a huge waste of bits though--you're much better off just streaming the native resolution using more bits in the first place.
YouMake
Profile Blog Joined February 2010
United States262 Posts
January 17 2012 06:30 GMT
#268
I'm looking to start streaming, what build would you guys recommend i look at if i'm also wanting to do that?
It's time to kick ass and chew bubble gum, but all out of bubble gum! - Duke Nukem!
DrNebula
Profile Joined November 2011
United States16 Posts
February 08 2012 05:17 GMT
#269
just followed the 700$ dollar build, turned out awesome! went with a 3.3 GHz intel core i5 and i went with a gtx 560 graphics card instead, so i strayed from the build a little bit but thanks for the guidance!!
ShatterZer0
Profile Joined November 2010
United States1843 Posts
February 08 2012 15:44 GMT
#270
I just bought the $400 build, had everything come to my place... and realized something... How on earth do I put this together? How do I install an OS? Why am I so dumb?

PLEASE HELP >.<
A time to live.
Medrea
Profile Joined May 2011
10003 Posts
February 08 2012 15:52 GMT
#271
Various videos on youtube will show you how to assemble a computer.

Installing an OS is as simple as putting the disk into the disk drive, setting the disk drive as first boot device, and turning the power on.
twitch.tv/medrea
MorpheusEU
Profile Joined December 2011
21 Posts
February 08 2012 16:01 GMT
#272
@ShatterZer0: I'm sorry that I cant be a huge help, but if you don't know anything about building computers (like me), you should've bought it at a website where they put it together. Things you can do know is try and find guides to build a computer on the internet (cost less $$), or search for someone or some store that is willing to put it together.

Now that I'm making this post, is the 800 dollar build good enough to stream or do I need to make some changes to it?
skyR
Profile Joined July 2009
Canada13817 Posts
February 08 2012 16:09 GMT
#273
The $800 configuration is enough to stream but these builds are severely outdated in terms of pricing.
Praetorial
Profile Blog Joined May 2011
United States4241 Posts
February 26 2012 18:58 GMT
#274
On February 09 2012 01:09 skyR wrote:
The $800 configuration is enough to stream but these builds are severely outdated in terms of pricing.


So if hypothetically I were to be in the process of checking out parts for a computer, this would not be the place to look?
FOR GREAT JUSTICE! Bans for the ban gods!
skyR
Profile Joined July 2009
Canada13817 Posts
February 27 2012 17:01 GMT
#275
These builds serve as a good starting point. Hopefully you'll learn something from looking through these builds and come up with something more recent and ask for opinions in the Computer Build Resource Thread to get it improved upon / fixed / ready for purchase. But to purchase an exact build out of the OP would be a bad idea if you care about value.
Joeramos
Profile Joined March 2012
1 Post
Last Edited: 2012-03-04 11:38:45
March 04 2012 11:38 GMT
#276
I want a computer build that can play ANY PC game at great quality and speed. I can just keep one game on the computer at a time, that's no problem. I have an external hard drive of 1TB so storage isn't much of an issue but I don't want it to be a hassle every-so-often. Which build here would anyone here recommend so that I can play ANY game with absolutely no performance problems?
Signet
Profile Joined March 2007
United States1718 Posts
March 05 2012 03:50 GMT
#277
This has been a very helpful thread... I would have had a difficult time figuring this stuff out myself. Thank you very much for all the effort you've put into this.
tQDanTe
Profile Joined January 2008
United States270 Posts
March 15 2012 15:22 GMT
#278
Are these builds still up to date?
UniqueKnowledge on PSN; Sup
MisterFred
Profile Joined October 2010
United States2033 Posts
March 15 2012 15:56 GMT
#279
They're still pretty good guides & starting points, especially at the lower price points (the higher ones need different video cards). And of course the builds work. But specials change each week, so I generally suggest posting in the Computer Build Resource Thread, filling out the survey in the OP of that thread.
"The victor? Not the highest scoring, nor the best strategist, nor the best tactitian. The victor was he that was closest to the Tao of FFA." -.Praetor
MaV_gGSC
Profile Blog Joined November 2010
Canada1345 Posts
March 15 2012 16:56 GMT
#280
I bought the 900$ budget and I could not be any happier :D Cheers TL
Life's good :D
Prev 1 12 13 14 15 Next All
Please log in or register to reply.
Live Events Refresh
Next event in 8h 41m
[ Submit Event ]
Live Streams
Refresh
StarCraft 2
PiGStarcraft385
RuFF_SC2 80
Ketroc 73
PattyMac 13
StarCraft: Brood War
GuemChi 5145
Artosis 737
ggaemo 51
Bale 37
NaDa 17
Dota 2
monkeys_forever658
canceldota146
Counter-Strike
tarik_tv5081
Heroes of the Storm
Khaldor158
Other Games
summit1g17270
JimRising 533
ViBE85
Organizations
Other Games
gamesdonequick1098
BasetradeTV140
StarCraft 2
Blizzard YouTube
StarCraft: Brood War
BSLTrovo
sctven
[ Show 17 non-featured ]
StarCraft 2
• Hupsaiya 148
• davetesta17
• Adnapsc2 11
• IndyKCrew
• sooper7s
• AfreecaTV YouTube
• Migwel
• intothetv
• LaughNgamezSOOP
• Kozan
StarCraft: Brood War
• STPLYoutube
• ZZZeroYoutube
• BSLYoutube
Dota 2
• WagamamaTV284
League of Legends
• Doublelift3585
Other Games
• Scarra663
• Shiphtur122
Upcoming Events
Afreeca Starleague
8h 41m
Wardi Open
8h 41m
Replay Cast
22h 41m
Sparkling Tuna Cup
1d 8h
Kung Fu Cup
2 days
The PondCast
3 days
Replay Cast
3 days
Replay Cast
4 days
CranKy Ducklings
5 days
BSL
5 days
[ Show More ]
Replay Cast
5 days
Sparkling Tuna Cup
6 days
BSL
6 days
Replay Cast
6 days
Liquipedia Results

Completed

CSL Elite League 2026
RSL Revival: Season 4
NationLESS Cup

Ongoing

BSL Season 22
ASL Season 21
CSL Season 20: Qualifier 2
CSL 2026 SPRING (S20)
StarCraft2 Community Team League 2026 Spring
Nations Cup 2026
PGL Bucharest 2026
Stake Ranked Episode 1
BLAST Open Spring 2026
ESL Pro League S23 Finals
ESL Pro League S23 Stage 1&2
PGL Cluj-Napoca 2026
IEM Kraków 2026
BLAST Bounty Winter 2026

Upcoming

Escore Tournament S2: W2
IPSL Spring 2026
Escore Tournament S2: W3
Acropolis #4
BSL 22 Non-Korean Championship
CSLAN 4
Kung Fu Cup 2026 Grand Finals
HSC XXIX
uThermal 2v2 2026 Main Event
RSL Revival: Season 5
IEM Cologne Major 2026
Stake Ranked Episode 2
CS Asia Championships 2026
Asian Champions League 2026
IEM Atlanta 2026
PGL Astana 2026
BLAST Rivals Spring 2026
CCT Season 3 Global Finals
IEM Rio 2026
TLPD

1. ByuN
2. TY
3. Dark
4. Solar
5. Stats
6. Nerchio
7. sOs
8. soO
9. INnoVation
10. Elazer
1. Rain
2. Flash
3. EffOrt
4. Last
5. Bisu
6. Soulkey
7. Mini
8. Sharp
Sidebar Settings...

Advertising | Privacy Policy | Terms Of Use | Contact Us

Original banner artwork: Jim Warren
The contents of this webpage are copyright © 2026 TLnet. All Rights Reserved.