Gaming PC

[smoke-n-root]

Okay......I want to build a gaming PC.....

I'm not a tech, and dont know much about computer parts.....where do I start and what products can you guys recommend.

I'm willing to spend, but dont know what to get.......

Thanks in advance for any advice!!:peace:

[phx]

I'm willing to spend

A bold statement!

You can build a decent one for $1500 that will handle just about any game...or a damned supercomputer for $6000...or more.

[SniperNoSniping]

You can build a decent gaming computer for under 600 bucks for crying out loud.

And if you never built a computer or tinkered with them, I wouldnt recommend building it yourself.

[phx]

lol yes you could at that... if you stay away from I7

[SniperNoSniping]

You could get AMD quad cores for under 200 bucks.

I dont really care for Intel anymore.

[Dogbut]

Try Newegg.com - great pricing and selection.

If you don't have a 64 bit OS - you don't need a quad core as 2 of the 4 cores are never used if you don't have a 64 bit operating system. A dual2core will give you more bang for the buck. Without 64 BIT OS, you don't need more than 3GB of memory, but 4 GB Dual channel works well. You're better off with a 3.0Ghz dual core than a 2.4Ghz Quad (about the same price).

Think about video cards - do you want NVIDIA in SLI mode or ATI in Crossfire, or single card mode. I get about 370 FPS in BF2 with my rig:

All from Newegg:
Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3P Motherboard (will not support crossfire in windows xp)
Intel Dual2Core E8400 3.0Ghz Overclocked to 4.1Ghz
Gigabyte Radeon 4870 1GB GDDR5 256 bit 2.0 x 16 Video Card (just one card)
4 GB Corsair XMS DDR2 800 Dual Channel memory
2 Western Digital WD1001FALS 1 TB 7200 Hard Drives
OCS 750 Watt Power Supply

I have a watercooled case - think about cooling your system - if you play a lot it will get hot. This MB and processor combo runs cool for me. The video card puts out serious heat. I like this card because it has a built in true HDMI output port - stunning picture quality.

Newegg also has a "wish list" feature where you can pick items and add them to the list, - great for pricing out a system. You can have multiple wish lists.

Hope this helps...

[Dogbut]

Also - check out the thread in General Chat - Where do you play at? There are a couple of different systems spec'd in that thread - may give you more ideas...

[SniperNoSniping]

If what Dogbut says is true, about the quad cores. I'd say listen to him. I didnt know about the quad core only fully working on 64bit.

[sTaRzAtNiGhT]

just give me your money and i will get you one :D :D
:peace:

[SniperNoSniping]

If you let tiff buy your computer it will look like this:

http://www.geekologie.com/2007/08/20/Mac-G3-Beer-Server.jpg

[Dogbut]

More thoughts about video cards, and gaming gear... The difference between Nvidia SLI and ATI Crossfire both require 2 identical processor cards) - SLI refreshes 1/2 the screen per card - (top / bottom halves) Crossfire interlaces pixels per card - smoother.

I was an Nvidia SLI fan for many years, I recently switched to ATI in single card mode. Reason - most MB's with 2 PCI x2 Express slots will run the primary card at 16x and the second card at 8x - this holds true for both ATI and NVIDIA.

You would be better off with a single video card with two processors - like an ATI 4870x2 or 4890x2 running at 16x. Some MB's will advertise 16x but when you read the fine print... if you run in SLI or crossfire mode - both cards run at 8x - why bother running two cards - at half speed? You really need to read the manufacturer specs on MB's when shopping. A decent MB will run $150 but that is going to be 16x - 8x. A great MB will run $250+ Newegg provides links to the MFG page for each item, so it is easy to research - read the fine print when it comes to the PCI Express slots!

Pick a card with the highest amount of onboard memory -minimum 512mb of GDDR3 or better, and read about the number of "pipelines" - more is better. An ATI 4870x2 with 1gb of GDDR3 or GDDR5 memory will kick @ss. A 4890x2 will rock even harder - but you pay $$$.

Gaming is all about speed of processing - MB, Processor, memory, video card.

I also suggest that you purchase an audio card - Soundblaster, etc. Most MB's come with built in sound... great.. but if you use it, you are using your CPU to handle the sound, which takes horsepower away from handling the game. Sound cards are cheap and well worth the investment.

Something to think about... Purchasing the most expensive components will not necessarily yield the best performance.

A dual2core processor at 3.0Ghz with a 4870x2 1gb video card and 4 mb of memory will out perform a quad core processor at 2.4Ghz with two 4870 1gb video cards in crossfire mode with the same 4mb of memory if running on Windows XP Pro - if you go with the 64 bit OS, the performance will be comparable on some games.

Why..2 of the 4 cores in the quad won't be used at all... but you would have paid for that privilege. The two video cards would be running at 1/2 speed - nice to find out after spending all that money on them - but they sure will heat up the inside of your PC.

The dual core2 will use both cores, it will run much faster at 3.0 versus 2.4 (examples) and the single card with two processors will run at 16x...

In the above eample, the quad core machine would see nothing but the vapor trail of the dual2core in a race...

[shorty-g|rl]

If you let tiff buy your computer it will look like this:

http://www.geekologie.com/2007/08/20/Mac-G3-Beer-Server.jpg

LMFAO CHARLES, YOU ALWAYS FIND THE FUNNIEST SHIT AND THIS IS TRUE ABOUT TIFFY,LOL:12:

[sTaRzAtNiGhT]

hahaha Charles your funny!
and Bass E Shhhhhh!

[Dogbut]

Tiff - can you build me one with a beer tap and a frozen shot dispenser???? Deep Purple would be the perfect color.

[rado]

Just get what I have and you'll be good for the next 3-4yrs.



Processor:
Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 CPU 920 @ 2.67GHz (8 CPUs), ~3.4GHz
Memory:
Corsair Dominator 12288MB RAM
Hard Drive:
x 2 300 GB VelociRaptors Raid 0, x 3 500g storage
Video Card:
Evga GeForce GTX 280 x2 in Sli
Monitor:
UltraSharp 2408WFP 24-inch Widescreen
Sound Card:
Speakers (Creative SB X-Fi)
Speakers/Headphones:
SENNHEISER HD 485
Keyboard:
Logitech G15 keyboard
Mouse:
Logitech HID-compliant G9 Laser Mouse
Mouse Surface:
FUNC INDUSTRIES Archetype
Operating System:
Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit (6.1, Build 7600) (7600.win7_gdr.090722-1835)
Motherboard:
Evga x58sli
Computer Case:
Antec twleve hundred

[smoke-n-root]

Just get what I have and you'll be good for the next 3-4yrs.

How much does that cost???

[lxcpikiman]

please the the most expensive isn't always the best.
give a few mins and will get you something very good at a price range of about $1500-$1800 and about the same performance as fenix's PC which i'm thinking that is cost more than $2000.
IMO spending more than $2000 on a computer is just too much.

[phx]

Processor:
Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 CPU 920 @ 2.67GHz (8 CPUs), ~3.4GHz
$280


Memory:
Corsair Dominator 12288MB RAM
$340


Hard Drive:
x 2 300 GB VelociRaptors Raid 0, x 3 500g storage
$460


Video Card:
Evga GeForce GTX 280 x2 in Sli
$600


Monitor:
UltraSharp 2408WFP 24-inch Widescreen
not sure probly around $200 min


Motherboard:
Evga x58sli
$250 maybee?

thats $2130 right there

[SniperNoSniping]

please the the most expensive isn't always the best.
give a few mins and will get you something very good at a price range of about $1500-$1800 and about the same performance as fenix's PC which i'm thinking that is cost more than $2000.
IMO spending more than $2000 on a computer is just too much.

I strangely remember posting something here before. It either got deleted or I never sent it.

For once Im going to agree with you. expensive isnt always the best, and I figured that out when I bought my GeForce 7950 GX2. I spent 600 dollars on that, and it ended up being a dust collector cause it gets too hot.
But what I said was. spending over 600 dollars for a computer is too much.
You can get a decent gaming computer for under 500 bucks.

Everyone wants more, bigger better.

Listen, I dont care what you do, you dont need a Terabyte of HD space.
If you do, you either need to lay off the music/movie downloading, or stop downloading porn.

You need 4gb's of ram.
a duel core processor
A reliable motherboard to carry it.
500 GB's of disk space with maybe a 320 GB backup secondary HD
and a 512 video card

You dont need 8 GB of ram
Quad core processors
A motherboard that does everything short of wipe your ass
2 TB Hard drives and duel 1 gig video cards.
YOU DONT.
And its an over kill if you do, cause I can bet my ass half of that shit available isnt even being used.

THATS IT.

So say you do get it all.
You spend all that money, waste what? two to three grand on a computer? Just so you can say "NAH NAH MY COMPUTER IS FASTER THAN YOURS"

Ya okay.

You know what I got?

2.0 Ghz Duel core AMD x2
4 Gbs ram.
Geforce 9600 GSO
250 GB HD with a 150 GB backup.

You know what I need to upgrade on that?
The Duel core to another Duel core slightly faster. Probably a 3.0 Ghz and a bigger secondary hard drive for my backup shit and games.

My computer runs BF2 in 1152 by 864 in 70 mhz refresh rate, with everything on high at about 85-110 FPS.

Even when I had windows 7 And I had to run it in the highest resolution cause if I didnt I got the wide screen bars on top and bottom, I still had everything on the highest detail and was still getting 50-60 FPS

[usmc_chick_79]

well put charles, really most of the best stuff is never utilized, more for bragging rights than anything. Windows does not used over the 3.something gbs so don't bother waste your money on extra memory, put that money into a better processor. I took my old rig and refreshed it, $80 (normally $130) for Asus Motherboard, $40 for amd processor, I had the graphics card, but you can get good ones for under $150.00. Husband had extra memory but I got it on sale several months ago for 4gb for $30.00. If you have a good store near by and can buy in pieces as on sale, you can save alot of money. I prefer to save everytime I can, that is just me.

[rado]

Actually I do need and use what I have. 4 gigs is crap now a day. Start up photoshop, adobe premiere and after effects running at the same time for movie editing and have bf2 running in the back ground for idle players + 2 running servers that stream and encode media on the fly to ps3 which I use daily , you will see your ram shoot up to 8-9gig of used ram space, plus vent and other programs running.etc etc.That is my daily ram usage. I had to upgrade to 12 gigs because 6 wasn't enough for me. I'm not the type of guy who like turning off programs so my games can run better. Ya ,you can get any 400-500 dollar pc to run bf2 but it is not cut out for me. To each their own. My pc is not just for gaming and I don't regret spending the cash on it to have some good stuff, so I won't be complaining later that my pc can't run this or that program or game.

[phx]

in response to usmc's post....

32bit windows cannot use more than 3 gig of ram, 64bit can use as a lot more

[Dogbut]

Charles - My point exactly - the most expensive is not always the best... it may not even be faster. 512MB or more memory on your video card is a good thing though.

I have twin 1TB drives - I design web sites as a side business, I also make training videos, and create custom programs - a lot of video files. I use one for my main drive, the second is simply a backup - a cloned drive through Farstone's clone drive software. If the primary fails, I switch to the back up and I am instantly back in business.

If you are running windows XP - you don't need more than a dual2core and 3MB of good ram (Corsair XMS, OCX, etc.) The faster the Ghz on the processor the better (3.0Ghz is nice). Also - compare the size of the memory cache on the processor - bigger is better.
Like Tiff says - size does matter.... LMAO

The 3rd and 4th cores of quad core processors only get used if you have a 64bit OS. And then ONLY if the software is designed to access them.

I tested this myself - I tried a quad 2.4 Ghz and a Dual2core 3.0Ghz processor on my rig. The quad was a HUGE disappointment - the Dual2core outperformed the quad and ran much cooler.

Running 2 video cards in SLI mode is for bragging rights - and I have found that one really good card will out perform two cards in SLI. If you want insane graphic speed, better to have a twin processor single card (ATI 4870x2 or 4890x2) - but certainly not needed for playing most games including BF2. I tested this as well, and my single ATI 4870 (not x2) with 1GB of GDDR5 memory consistently gets 360+ FPS playing BF2.

Most motherboards will run the first video card at 16x - the second at 8x, some MB's will reduce both cards to 8x - that is why a really good single video card at 16x will outperform two good cards in SLI or crossfire mode - most of the time.

Don't overlook the power supply - the most overlooked PC killer out there... Yes, a cheap power supply can send nasty surges to your components and fry them. Most premature component failure can be traced back to the power sent to it. This is also the reason many people have trouble overclocking their processors - the system becomes unstable if the power supply can't handle the load.

If you purchase a new PC case for $60-$70 and you get a 500 Watt power supply - seriously look at replacing it with a decent 600-750 Watt PS. You'll be glad you did.

[Dogbut]

This will rock for a moderate price:

Processor: $167.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115037

MB: $164.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131317

Memory: $94.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820145229

Video Card: $169.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814125256

Hard Drive: $69.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136320

CD/DVD Burner: $32.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827118030

Power Supply: $79.99
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817341019


Total: 780.93

Doesn't include rebates - or case, keyboard, mouse, or headset.

[usmc_chick_79]

Actually I do need and use what I have. 4 gigs is crap now a day. Start up photoshop, adobe premiere and after effects running at the same time for movie editing and have bf2 running in the back ground for idle players + 2 running servers that stream and encode media on the fly to ps3 which I use daily , you will see your ram shoot up to 8-9gig of used ram space, plus vent and other programs running.etc etc.That is my daily ram usage. I had to upgrade to 12 gigs because 6 wasn't enough for me. I'm not the type of guy who like turning off programs so my games can run better. Ya ,you can get any 400-500 dollar pc to run bf2 but it is not cut out for me. To each their own. My pc is not just for gaming and I don't regret spending the cash on it to have some good stuff, so I won't be complaining later that my pc can't run this or that program or game.

I agree if you need more then go ahead spend the cash, the majority of people do not run everything at the same time, so a good computer can be built for a decent price. That was all I was saying, sorry if it seemed any different. I think your rig is awesome, but you know for most people it would be way overkill and under-utitilized.

[SniperNoSniping]

Yeah, I failed to point out theres certain times when a super computer would come in handy.

So yeah, If you're gonna be doing what Fenix is doing or what Dogbut is doing, or some kind of work that requires a fast computer, sure.
if you're gonna just be surfing the net, watching movies, listening to music, and playing games, you dont NEED a 2500 dollar+ computer.

And
I run 4 gig ram on the off chance the motherboard accepts more than 3. It wont be much more, but it might.

I know people have said their computer wont accept anything higher than 3 gigs or 2.7
But mine is running 3.50 gigs, so I guess I was lucky.

[usmc_chick_79]

nobody has mentioned anything about my new rig...:(

[SniperNoSniping]

Also, that computer Dogbut spec'd out a few posts up is a good one. You should take what he says into serious consideration.

That OCZ company, is a good company I swear by their PSU. And I'd have everything OCZ in my computer if I could.

My RAM and my PSU are both OCZ and they work like a champ.



CHICK
I LUV UR RIG!
ITS AWSUM.


No seriously.
It is.
I'd rather have a duel core, but other than that, I wish I had it. :x

[rado]

I agree with Dogbut about the psu. I think that is the most important component for any pc build and I would suggest you look into this preferably over ocz as I had 1 already die on me.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139005

[SniperNoSniping]

Yeah, but just because one died doesnt mean their whole line is shit.
Sometimes you just get a faulty one. One that they didnt take much time to make.

My dad told me once 'You never buy a car that was made on a Friday or a Monday. Cause on Friday they're all half-assing the job so they can get home. And on monday, they dont want to be back at work so they still half-ass it.'

And from what I've experienced that saying can go for anything that's made by a human and not a machine. So maybe you just got a poorly made one that time.
Cause I have a 750W OZC PSU and I've been running it for 5-6 years now, with not one complaint. Not to mention when I built my dad a gaming rig he wanted to use my Geforce 7950 GX2 and I used a 650 PSU made by OCZ and it didnt go bad. And when I first used my 7950 I had 2 PSU's made by Powerup of the same wattage (650W) get burned out by that video card.

But I guess its personal taste and personal opinion on what brand parts people want to buy.

[Dogbut]

Chick - I'm glad you got your rig built and the MB looks to be a good one. I've built about 150 PC's and repaired / upgraded hundreds more... I know all about the frustration when a new component fails out of the box. Good to see you back in the game last night...

Just one question, what were you and your hubby doing in the back of the shed at the North Docks last night anyway??? LOL - all 3 of us were killed at the same time defending the flag...

[lxcpikiman]

Corsair is a very top manufacturer for PSU
I would spend a few bucks on a quality PSU than rely on a somewhat good PSU.
and you are all right.
do not estimate the weigh the PSU has on a PC.
2 no name PSU's had died on me, I was lucky that the other component were undamaged.
so I bought a good Corsair PSU the 520HX I spent a good amount on it but it was very well worth it
And usmc, you PC is very good for anybody who doesn't do crazy stuff, like video editing/rendering and stuff like that.

[Dogbut]

You're right Piki - a good PSU is a very good "insurance" investment ifor your PC. You wouldn't buy a nice 48" LCD TV and plug it into an extension cord with frayed wires would you? Of course not.

But many people buy expensive PC components and put them into a fancy PC case with a cheap $20 power supply that came with the case. If you only spend $75 for a new case - how much of that do you think went into the PSU?

I also agree that Corsair makes a great PSU, I tried OCX on my last build - and I love it. I can overclock my 3.0Ghz processor to 4.1Ghz and the system is as stable as can be. Time will tell on the durability factor.