I need advise buying a computer

[devil-fire]

with the release of half-life 2 and about a year since i got my last chunk of computer, its high time i got a new one. I am aiming to get at least 30 frames per second on the newer 3Dgames like Doom3 and Half-Life2 with most of the details on (im currently getting 3-12FPS on doom3 on the lowest detail level ) iv got a price range of about $1,700 Canadian dollors (1,425 USD)

i basicly want to get everything from new speakers, new mouse/keyboard/monitor/case/everything so I am thinking that an all-in-one package deal will get me a discount but I am not sure.

here is what i was thinking of


Motherboard Soltek 865PRO-775
RAM KingMax 256MB DDR433 X 2
Hard Drive WD 160GB 7200rpm 8MB Cache
Floppy Drive 1.44MB FDD
DVD-RW Lite-On 8x DVD+/-RW
Case Antec SLK3700AMB ATX Case
Video Card Sapphire 9600 Pro 256MB
Sound Card SB Audigy ES 5.1
Monitor Samsung 710V 17" LCD Black
Keyboard Microsoft Multimedia Keyboard
Mouse Logitech Cordless Optical Mouse
Speakers Logitech Z-640 Speakers
CPU P4 3.4E Socket
(http://www.canadacomputers.com/systems.html )

all this comes to 1620 Canadain so i got a little bit of trade-up room here



so what do you guys think? I am not up to date on the lastest and greatest technology or terminology or the greatest performace/price pieces so any advise is good advise

thanks guys!

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I bought a top of the line Dell laptop with the full 3 year warranty [I have two from Dell]. In my line of work the laptop takes a real beating. The support, constant updates, and the free replacement parts has been invaluable; way beyone the $300 price for the full warranty. Since I depend on my computer to make a living, I, and in my experience most people in my field find a package Dell to be the best option. For three years you can forget about it as an expense.

Also, I would get more RAM. In my experience you can never have enough RAM and hardrive space.

 

[GENIERE]

That’s way too much money for that system; easily overmatched by systems less than $1000.00 US which include the 64 bit AMD CPU’s. Try this site for best prices; select PC-Windows under the systems column:

http://www.pricewatch.com/


Gamers usually want two (2) SATA HD’s setup for Raid (1) operation. SATA drives are faster in normal operation and Raid (1) operation almost doubles that speed. Raid (0) operation provides automatic data backup if that’s a concern. I’d by a PC games magazine or visit gamer websites to get an idea of what constitutes a good game machine. A good game PC usually makes an excellent all-purpose PC. If you have no need for portability, I would not consider a laptop.

...

 

[singleton]

ASUS K8V-X $105
Athlon 64 3000+ RETAIL $190
2x Samsung 512MB PC-3200 DDR400 SDRAM $210
2x Western Digital 80GB w/ 8MB Cache $154
1.44MB Floppy Disk Drive (Black) $16
LG GSA-4160B 16x DVD+/-RW, Dual Layer (Black)$92
Antec SLK3700AMB w/ 350W PSU $93
ATI Radeon 9800 Pro $250 (from futureshop..currently lists higher but they have sales on it all the time)
Viewsonic P95F+ $319
Microsoft MultiMedia Keyboard $20
Logitech MX-510 Red Optical Mouse $39 (from futureshop)
Logitech Z-640 5.1 $69
------
Sub-total before tax 1557

- Athlon 64 perform better in games. It is a lower model than the 3.4 but the cost saving is worth it for other components.

- If you want to be a baller and play all the latest games from now and the ones not even out, you'll need 1GB of memory not 512MB. Thats just the way it goes. Play Farcry, Doom3 or HL2 with 512 and you'll cringe.

- The reason for 2 harddrives is simple. Raid striping gives a good 30-40% performance advantage (instead of reading and writing to a single drive, you do it to two drives in tandem, so there are good gains but its not perfect because there is overhead and thus its only 30-40%). Same amount of space, though... 160GB. You want fast drives so games load faster in between maps and so forth.

- Why go 8x DVD+/-RW when you can go 16x :P

- ATI Radeon 9800 >>> Sapphire 9600 Pro. First of all, Sapphire manufacturers clone cards of ATI but they are nowhere near the quality and the performance even between same models is nothing alike. An ATI Radeon 9800 is much faster than Sapphire Radeon 9800. The only benefit the Sapphire has is more memory but because its a cheap azz clone it will use slow memory and thus negate the benefit really.

- The CRT is just my personal choice. I've had 2 LCD but still came back to my 19" Sony G420 because I found it easier on my eyes, better for coding, and brilliant colours for gaming. Oh and the refresh rate. If you get a mediocre LCD your gaming will suffer. Stick to a tube. The Viewsonics professionals are decent models.

- If you're a gamer you want a gamer's mouse. The Logitech MX-510 is top of the game right now.

When you are dropping that much money, do it right :)

And these prices were pretty much all from Canadacomputers.com. I go there all the time, pretty good prices except when they make you wait around for 30 mins before service. Damn isles are so narrow and small I have anxiety attacks :/

 

[devil-fire]

ASUS K8V-X $105
Athlon 64 3000+ RETAIL $190
2x Samsung 512MB PC-3200 DDR400 SDRAM $210
2x Western Digital 80GB w/ 8MB Cache $154
1.44MB Floppy Disk Drive (Black) $16
LG GSA-4160B 16x DVD+/-RW, Dual Layer (Black)$92
Antec SLK3700AMB w/ 350W PSU $93
ATI Radeon 9800 Pro $250 (from futureshop..currently lists higher but they have sales on it all the time)
Viewsonic P95F+ $319
Microsoft MultiMedia Keyboard $20
Logitech MX-510 Red Optical Mouse $39 (from futureshop)
Logitech Z-640 5.1 $69
------
Sub-total before tax 1557

- Athlon 64 perform better in games. It is a lower model than the 3.4 but the cost saving is worth it for other components.

- If you want to be a baller and play all the latest games from now and the ones not even out, you'll need 1GB of memory not 512MB. Thats just the way it goes. Play Farcry, Doom3 or HL2 with 512 and you'll cringe.

- The reason for 2 harddrives is simple. Raid striping gives a good 30-40% performance advantage (instead of reading and writing to a single drive, you do it to two drives in tandem, so there are good gains but its not perfect because there is overhead and thus its only 30-40%). Same amount of space, though... 160GB. You want fast drives so games load faster in between maps and so forth.

- Why go 8x DVD+/-RW when you can go 16x :P

- ATI Radeon 9800 >>> Sapphire 9600 Pro. First of all, Sapphire manufacturers clone cards of ATI but they are nowhere near the quality and the performance even between same models is nothing alike. An ATI Radeon 9800 is much faster than Sapphire Radeon 9800. The only benefit the Sapphire has is more memory but because its a cheap azz clone it will use slow memory and thus negate the benefit really.

- The CRT is just my personal choice. I've had 2 LCD but still came back to my 19" Sony G420 because I found it easier on my eyes, better for coding, and brilliant colours for gaming. Oh and the refresh rate. If you get a mediocre LCD your gaming will suffer. Stick to a tube. The Viewsonics professionals are decent models.

- If you're a gamer you want a gamer's mouse. The Logitech MX-510 is top of the game right now.

When you are dropping that much money, do it right :)

And these prices were pretty much all from Canadacomputers.com. I go there all the time, pretty good prices except when they make you wait around for 30 mins before service. Damn isles are so narrow and small I have anxiety attacks :/

what is the "Logitech Z-640 5.1" and the "Antec SLK3700AMB w/ 350W PSU"? the later is a powersupply right?


thanks for the info guys!

 

[PrudensOptimus]

Logitech Z-640 5.1 is a very good 5.1 speaker system. 5.1 means 5 speakers and 1 subwoofer. The 5 speaker is distributed 2 front, 2 back, and 1 in the center in front of ya.
Also, I suggest you get an Audigy4 soundcard if you are really into 3D gaming, otherwise get a M-AUDIO Revo 7.1 soundcard for better music enjoyment on PC.

 

[Argentum Vulpes]

The AMD 64 chip is a good chip, however I feel I must point out somthing. Currently windows dose not a 64-bit opperation system. This means there will be processing power that will not be ulitized from your chip. Microsoft dose have some rummors that a verson of XP with a 64-bit core is being worked on, and will be put on the market Q2/Q3 of next year. Because of this if you are looking to save some money look for a 32-bit AMD chip. Also if you want to get a AMD chip look for a board with a nForce 4 chipset. This nifty littel bit of tec will alow you to run two vid cards for one montor. It basicly works that each card is given half of the montor to work on and then the two singnals are gathered and sent down the regular montor cable, so no fancy montor is needed.

Now some things to consider for an Intel chip. First is that if your computer is going to be used for other things than games Intel chips are hands down the best at multitasking. I could on my computer run media player, be burring a disk, and plugging away on photoshop. The AMD system would start complaning at me the second I opened up anything over two programs, so far the only I choked up my Intel system was by running three engerning analisis programs at the same time and was working on a video editing program at the same time. Also you can run your memory in dual-channel mode on a Intel chip. This will in general give you a 20-30% bost in memory speed.

As for where to buy componets from I like Newegg.com for buying stuff. The site has a compleat slection of computer stuff, and a great ability to search for the exact parts you need

Well that is my two cents

 

[singleton]

It doesn't matter if windows fully utilizes the 64-bit or not. The fact is that when in 32-bit mode the Athlon 64 STILL smokes equivalent Intel Pentium 4 in gaming (what the op wants to do).

;)