Gaming

[Cuthroat]

I have read through alot on these boards and you guys certainly know your stuff. My question has been asked many different ways with many different answers so I'm hoping that you can give me a straight answer on this one.

I'm an avid gamer, but am running an older system, got a free emachine athlon xp 1800 768 pc2100 ram with a geforce 4ti 4200 64mb ram on it. I used the computer for everything and its now older and has never been reinstalled. So start up and restart take forever along with alt tabbing in games. So my question is this>

I've been looking at new systems and although i would really love that velocity I've seen at best buy with all the bells and whistles, it seems to me that a out of the box system with lets say amd 3200 with a gig of ddr2 ram and pci express with a simple 150 or 250 gig hard drive would be excellent if I buy it and add a new nividia 6800 or 7700 256 card?

I've read alot about building your own, but im not sure I have the knowledge to totally build it from scratch.. So here I am stuck with what to do. Buy a preset up gaming system at 2000k or buy a name brand at 800 to 1000 and put a 400 card in it. What are the downsides going the second way? What will I be missing?

 

[BSill]

You can do your homework and have a computer savy friend aid you in your new rig construction.

You could custom ordered a dell XPS gaming desktop

You could custom order a alienware gaming desktop.

You could custom order a gaming machine from tigerdirect.

Personally custom built rigs blow any store rig out of the water. IMO i'd do your homework and have a friend or us, help build you a rig.

 

[PhillipBelcher]

CutThroat,
This Is the Pro's & Cons To Each Systems Available to you!

Manufactured PC & Manufactured Custom PC-
Pros-
Everything is built for you.
Warranty. (Expensive & Limited)
Cons-
Not always exactly how you want it. (Case, Fans, Lights)
Your Paying up the rear for them to build it.
Sometimes you have to add hardware, to the pre-built.
machine to be able to get it where you want it.
Sometime Hard To Upgrade, and usually voids the Warranty.

Custom PC-(You Build)
Pros-
You Build it the way you want it- In Every Aspect
You Can Build it so its Easy To Upgrade
You Save alot of money
You Gain The Experiance to build your next, or upgrade
Cons-
In My Opinion There Isn't Any

My Opinion is to learn to built your own, We will all help you.

 

[BSill]

A-men to that Philip. We will be MORE THAN WILLING to answer any questions you have. How is a person supposed to learn without asking anyways right? lol. Take Care

Brian

 

[Cuthroat]

Ok next question then. Since its my first build, and my knowledge is limited, would I be better served, by grabbing a barebones system with case/ps/ram then add in dvd/cd floppy/hard drives vid cards?

I would love to just grab a case and start from scratch, but its complicated if you have never done it and im not sure communicating like this would be enough to get me through it.
Rather then give me a list of all the componets I would need, do you guys have a list of donts.. Dont get this type of ram, dont get these types of MB.. Dont get this type of hd, and so on.. I think that would help alot.?

 

[PhillipBelcher]

Heres a nice, well written Walkthough to building your own pc
http://www.pcmech.com/byopc/

 

[Vampire_Slayer]

system with lets say amd 3200 with a gig of ddr2 ram

AMD processers cannot use ddr2 as of this time. Just thought I would point that out before you start looking for parts.

 

[Cuthroat]

wow.. good point I did not know that. so go with ddr400? Or would I be better off with pent4.. Most people have told me amd is the way to go in gaming?

 

[Vampire_Slayer]

Yes get ddr400, and yes AMD is THE processer to get for gaming.

 

[Scottj017]

"The diamond-studded Pentium 4 670 has no excuse for getting shown up by the Athlon 64 3500+. Yes, the P4 670 is the fastest Pentium 4 for gaming, just edging out the P4 Extreme Edition 3.73GHz, but it's still not very quick compared to the competition."

-Techreport.com

Note that the 3500+ is $400 cheaper than the 670.