Building a PC

Off Topic
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[quote]Petedacook wrote:
But, my understanding is that WOW is a cutting edge graphics intense game. Correct me if I am wrong. [/quote]

I didn’t mean to imply that WOW isn’t good gameplay-wise (I’ve avoided it as it’s more addicting than Evercrack I hear, though), but the graphics portion isn’t nearly as demanding as your Oblivions, your Doom 3’s, etc. If you take a look at a game card review on a tech site like anandtech, note the games they tend to use for rating new cards, those are the more graphically intense ones.

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Since you are getting a geforce 8… get the fastest processor you can buy. The latest quad core from intel.

The card is a monster. You won’t be able to take full advantage of it without a beefy processor and at least 4gigs of ram.

Ram and CPU are your biggest bottlenecks.

23

[quote]Petedacook wrote:
LOL

I read your first paragraph and saw $2,000.00. I stopped there.

With the peripherals I had from my last build, I got RAM, case, MObord, and procesor out the door for less than $500, and I play WOW, while watching you tube, copying movies from cable, and duplicating DVD’s using DVD shrink.

Are you really thinking $2,000.00 to build a gaming system? [/quote]

$2000 is for everything(monitor, new keyboard etc).

The video card is a good chunk of my build budget. I have no intention of messing around with World of Warcraft so I am far from an expert on it, but my understanding is that it doesnt push the performance envelope very much(that is not to say anything about how enjoyable it is to play).

For a respectable system toward the high end, you need $1500 to $2000 and as another poster mentioned above, the real jaw-dropping stuff is $3000+.

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I would definately recommend buying the parts from one or two places rather than all over to save on shipping.

I like the prices at newegg and will probably build my PC from them exclusively.

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[quote]eengrms76 wrote:
The only advice I can give you is for gaming, nothing less than a 21" or 22" [u]WIDESCREEN[/u] LCD monitor will do. You can get them for around $300 on newegg.

The monitor is the thing you look at the most on the computer, so I always make sure when building a PC I start there.[/quote]

Getting games to run properly widescreen is a bitch.

This is a terrible idea.

Invest in dual monitors. I use two 19" LCDs. I couldn’t ask for a better setup.

Samsung make beautiful screens.

26

[quote]JD430 wrote:
Here is my dilemma:

I’m considering making an attempt at building my first PC. I want something pretty high-end PC for gaming, maybe as a media center and to take advantage of the cool features of windows vista.

I budgeted around $2000 to $2200 for the project(system and monitor).

Alienware and Dell were way too expensive for what I wanted so I wrote them off.

However, I just found out that Gateway is making new gaming PC’s(FX530 series) and the prices look pretty good. If I replace the video card in the one I want with an envidia 8800 GTX it still comes in around $2200, without the potential hassle of doing this from the ground up.

Does anyone have any thoughts on these new Gateway PC’s? Some guys on another board said forget them, they’re a rip off but they didn’t give any solid reasons.

Any other advice on this topic would be appreciated as well.

I can post my proposed build if need be(and as long as that won’t send the nerd meter spiraling out of control here on T-Nation).[/quote]

A word on the building your own vs buying thing.

Last summer my parents gave 1000 to buy a computer for college as my graduation/birthday/going to school/next five birthdays present.

Let me tell you, I had every intention of stretching that 1000 as far as it could go.

At any rate, Dell ended up being my best bet. They run some pretty clutch sales from time to time.

At any rate, I ended up buying some parts aftermarket (RAM, my second monitor). However, for the system (even the graphics card, at the time, an nVidia 6800) I simply could not beat Dell’s price, even assembling it by myself through Newegg/Tiger Direct.

Additionally, if something breaks, I can just go after Dell rather than dealing with 8 different companies. I have a 3 year do-anything-you-want-and-we’ll-still-replace-it warranty.

Not that I like Dell, I just like getting shit on the cheap.

Consider it.

PS: the specs on your machine look pretty tight. In reality, I think you’re overpaying for horsepower you won’t use. Tune back a few items and save yourself a bundle. That’s my two cents.