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Alright, tech monkeys, I need your brains, :P

I'm in the market for a new computer, and my price range is about $1500 right now. Anything more than that, I'm pushing my luck. What I want is a solid gaming PC that isn't going to be ten levels of crap next year. Granted, computers are obsolete right off the production line, but I want an investment that will last.

Right now I'm on TigerDirect searching up systems, and I'm noticing most are coming w/o an operating system. That brings price down, but I'm not sure if that's something I want.

Any opinions on this would help, because its what I'm looking at right now: http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications ... &CatId=114

If you have any suggestions as to what I should pick up, or look for, feel free to make them. A lot of these companies I've never heard of, so I'm feeling leery.

I'm afraid I'm not going to be much help. It wouldn't be hard to have a solid gaming machine that will hold its title as such for three or four years at $1500, but I've long ceased to trust or depend on others to provide me computing power, and instead always choose to construct my own. I do have some amount of familiarity with component manufacturers (for instance, I've got a soft spot in my heart for the manufacturer of the motherboard mentioned on that machine).

It looks, at first glance, to be a very solid bit of kit. A four core processor is a hair of overkill, but it'll theoretically extend lifecycle as games become increasingly multithreaded (you could probably get a more powerful dual core system for the same price or less, so it's a gamble one way or the other). The Crossfire setup is questionably worth the money (Crossfire and SLI are pretty much just excuses to flaunt your wealth -- they don't actually provide very much of a performance increase; you're usually better off getting a single, more powerful card, rather than the pair of cards). The hard drive is small. You could/should get one two to three times that size. But that's a cheap and easy fix. Motherboard should be solid. Looks like it's got an nForce chipset. (Knowing the manufacturer and seeing the on-board RAID options, that's my guess. I don't know the motherboard model specifically.) If so, it's solid (my Gigabyte board is an AMD/ATI chipset, which was a bit riskier of a grab; AMD/ATI aren't known for solid chipsets the way nVidia is). Can't speak for the case specifically, but it does have three large fans in it, so hopefully the airflow's good. Vista Home is your call. I can't offer much opinion on it; I'm still XP Pro on my box.

Well the hard drive isn't much of an issue for me. I barely fill up my 100Gb that I have right now. Not a huge downloader of music or movies. Plus I might be able to move my old one into the new system, if everything is kosher. If not, no loss. I can transfer it all over another way.

I'm still leaning towards this one, but yeah, I'm going to shop a bit more. See if I can't find something of the same speed and lower price. I know the site has some monsters without OSes, but I don't trust myself to install a new one.


Edit: x2

I'm looking at this one now, based on AV's advice to look at dual-cores.

http://www.globalcomputer.com/applicati ... &CatId=114

The main difference that I can see is that it has a Dual Core 3.0GHz processor vs. the cheaper quad-core 2.2GHz. But it only has one 768MB PCI graphics card vs. 2x 512MB Radion ATIs. Oh, it has 500GB of hard drive too, which I suppose I could fill with dirty Blotch art.
Problem is, it only comes with Windows Vista Basic - 64bit.

Also

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications ... tresources

3.0GHz Dual Core, which I like, a terabyte of hard drive, which I probably won't fill but why not, 1GB SLI Graphic Cards (2x 512), and Windows Vista Ultimate which should work. The reviews on that one complain mostly about the case being flimsy, but I don't usually move my tower. That, and I'm assuming the Vista/SLI compatability problem is fixed by now.
Any thoughts?

Well, since its 3:43 AM, I won't be able to do much good here roght now, but Shuttle makes some NICE systems
http://us.shuttle.com

$1,354.00US gets you http://us.shuttle.com/ConfigurePackage. ... YG5-3300-G
with the following options:
GEFORCE 9600 GT 512MB GDDR3 PCI-E
INTEL CORE 2 DUO E8400 3.0GHZ 1333MHZ 6MB LGA775 (default is 2.4 GHz)

These machines have some real nice features
butI am too tired t talk about em. Go read the links, if you don't mind, because I'm for bed now

Let me say this much, Crossfire and SLI (The 2 Video cards working together) is not as good as having one really powerful video card. You are better off buying a 768MB video card. Also despite popular believe 2 512MB Video cards does not equal a 1GB video card. Best off buying one and leaving room to upgrade later when you really need it (Its not like you are going to play Crysis at Max anyways).

Hard drives are not much of an issue- you can almost get a 500GB hdd for 100 bucks now (actually you can with the memorial day sale at newegg but its external, they might have an internal as well).

Dual Core processors are a must these days- even quad core, they actually DO work together more so than the video cards with the exception of the old programs that dont support multiple processors.

If you are running vista- you need a lot of memory- and you should get Vista Ultimate edition (Get a minimum of 4GBs of ram- make sure the computer can handle even more- because vista uses nearly a Gig on its own- sometimes more).

Crap, now I'm confused. The three that I've found to be somewhat decent either have the solo graphics card, but with Windows Vista Basic, or with 2 cards and Windows Ultimate.

Hm.

I guess I have more shopping to do. I don't want to mess with trying to swap out cards, OSes, etc... but I want the powah!!

If you guys have any other suggestions for a good, affordableish rig, let me know. I'm going to bum around that shuttle site.

I agree that dual core is a must- that's obvious. I contend, however, that you're really not going to get much performance increase out of a quad-core or higher. Get a high power dual core, but it'll be a while before most applications are written to take advantage of a quad-core cpu. The OS delegation is only so efficient right now, so applications have to be optimized for anything larger than a dual-core, and most aren't.

You want more advice? Build your own rig- dont go looking for a pre made one- you will save a lot of money AND IT IS FAR MORE SIMPLE THAN YOU PROBABLY THINK! My brother had no idea - and just by looking at the parts and the board he could put it all together no problem- considering all the guides online AND the instructions they give ya its a cinch as long as you check with us that everything is compatible.

I can't shop online for crap at times

I know I could probably save upwards of $500 if I bought all the parts on NewEgg.com and assembled it myself, but I'm still not at that level that I can trust myself not to screw something up. I've installed hard drives, graphic cards, and RAM which are so far the easiest for me to do, but beyond that I'm not sure how to do the rest.

*shrug* I might give it a look and compare prices. I just don't want to cook a $300 motherboard the first time I turn the system on.

If you have installed RAM and Graphics cards I can assure you that you are more than competent enough to do everything else and if you had a question we could answer it. Blowing up or frying something is far less likely than breaking something while putting in a card or ram or bending a CPU pin (and THAT itself is very difficult to do unless you try to force it into a socket the wrong way-- and if you feel you are forcing it- you are obviously doing it wrong)

To be honest, fastchapter, if you cook your motherboard, you'll do it before you get the machine on. The only really vulnerable point for a motherboard is when you mount it in the case. But with a decent case, it's not so bad. Also -- if you're dropping $300 on a motherboard, you're probably getting shafted (in a bad way).

Yeah most motherboards are less than 100 dollars and if it is more its got like 2 processor slots and 4 PCI-E slots yada yada and even those are well under 300...

just remember to keep yourself grounded - touch metal before touching the chips/cards/boards etc etc

Also not only can you save money- but you have more options- and THUS - a more awesome computer. So, more awesome, and save money-- eh?

I was guesstimating about the board, :P. Never purchased one on its own. But I do know about the grounding, and whenever I do work on my system I mount the case on a rubber car mat. I'll do some shopping on NewEgg tomorrow to see what the prices compare to, and I know I can still get discounts at Crucial if need be. Uncle in Idaho works for them and has offered before to send over cheap, good quality RAM.

Dunno, it's a daunting task when you've never done it. I know I nearly had a heart attack trying to install my first hard drive, and even when it was secure I was afraid to turn the system on for fear that maybe it ISN'T a slave drive...

Any recommendations for case sizes? I always lean towards big ones since I know airflow is a bit more free than the mediums.

Waugh... Ryan's scared!

Building your own computer is definitely the way to go, as you can get a lot more for your money, or spend less. If you have any questions about building one, I am yet another person who can help you.

I have a question for anyone who knows: Video card wise, which is better: A faster, newer model card, or one that is older/slower, but has more memory? What sort of calculation do I do?

Thanks,


-RobbieThe1st