Hi everyone

I am looking at buying a new computer as mine is hopelessly outdated. I want to build a gaming beast on a budget. What are the minimum specs i should be looking at? Thanks.

What sort of budget mate?

Its hard to suggest without seeing it.

Can you reuse the monitor, Keyboard/mouse/Case etc? That would save a good £180 if posssibe.

On a budget, a mobo with an intel p35 chipset, 2gb DDR2 RAM, single HDD, dual core e8400 or quad core q6600 CPU, graphics card, look into the ATI 4850 or 4870, both amazing cards for the price (which is very decent considering the price nvidia put on their newest offerings)

quote:

Originally posted by Sirrith:
On a budget, a mobo with an intel p35 chipset, 2gb DDR2 RAM, single HDD, dual core e8400 or quad core q6600 CPU, graphics card, look into the ATI 4850 or 4870, both amazing cards for the price (which is very decent considering the price nvidia put on their newest offerings)

The only thing I would change is at current ram prices you might as well get 4gigs and be done with it for a while.

Havnt got a budget as such Xio, willing to pay a bit more but not necessarily top of the shelf gear mate. Dont know much about computer components to be fair. Are currently researching on build-gaming-computers.com so any advice is gladly taken.

You can get a very solid rig for no more than $1,500. I'm assuming you don't want to build it yourself. So check out some configurators at gaming pc sites like Cyberpowerpc or my fav Ibuypower. Oh and stay away from Alienware and Falcon NW, they're way overpriced.

Well, it would be much easier for us to help if you gave us a rough idea of what you're prepared to pay.

But if you aren't on a tight budget, then a good p35 chipset mobo would suit your needs, or even an x38 if you're willing to pay the extra money. Ive had good experiences with Asus and Abit boards, MSI and Gigabyte are also very nice. Motherboards are possibly the most annoying part to choose, so many options that seem to do the exact same thing, not a huge number of reviews, lots of horror stories... Stay away from the nforce chipsets, as the older ones don't compete with the p35, and the newer ones seem to have more problems than the p35 chipset. I dont know about the x38, havn't looked into it seeing as it was out of my pricerange, so I cant help you there. The Asus p5k series is a solid choice, won't disappoint IMO. Or you could look into the Gigabyte p35 series.

For RAM, 800mhz is pretty much standard now, you can go 1066mhz if you're willing to spend the extra dosh (again) but I doubt the performance increase is very noticeable. Corsair, Mushkin and OCZ are good brands to go for, I personally prefer Corsair.

Hard Drives, I was recommended Western Digital, either their Caviar series or the Raptor series. I chose the Caviar, and Im not disappoined. Seagate also make good drives. Size is up to you, Id say nothing less than 250GB.

CPU, mentioned it already. If you plan on keeping it for a long time, quad core may be a better choice. You can always overclock it later on if the stock 2.4ghz is not enough, as the Q6600 can be Oc'd VERY easily. You might want to buy an aftermarket cooler and install it straightaway instead of the stock cooler so you dont have to mess around with that afterwards. Arctic cooler and Zalman make great CPU coolers. So does Thermalright.

Since you arent actually on a budget, go for the ATI 4870, or wait a few weeks for the 4870x2. Performance is almost on par with the Nvidia GTX280 (though not quite there yet) but the price is lower by almost 50% at around $300 I believe. If you do prefer Nvidia, their 9800GTX +1 is a good choice (+1, not just 9800GTX, the +1 is a new version designed to compete with the ATI 4850, which it does decently) or you could pay a bit more for the GTX 260. Stay away from the GTX 280 as it is simply not worth it.

Power. With that setup and one of the cards I mentioned, you'll need a PSU with 2x 6 pin connectors. Id recommend a PSU with no less than 500W, from a good brand such as Antec, Corsair or PC power & cooling. For the GTX 260 you might need something more, not quite sure.

If you have any questions feel free Im no techie, but I'll try answer them as best I can.

Thanks for the advice. A rough budget price, no more than 2500 doller, but thats kiwi dollers which is about 1900 US or 1000 pound.

well, Im not sure about how much hardware costs over in NZ, but you should be able to afford the setup without any problems . My setup in my sig cost me $884 (including speakers [logitech x240] case [antec 900], HDD and CD drive), then an extra $240 for the monitor (samsung 2053BW).

I moved your thread to the Community Help page.

Welcome to the IL-2 forum!

If your on a budget i go with AMD.

AMD Athlon 64 X2 6000+ or 6400+
AMD 790FX chipset mobo.
ATI Radeon HD4850 or HD4870, posibly 2 running in Crossfire.

4GB DDR2-1066 should be more than enough RAM for any game.

Good cases dont have to cost much money, just make sure they got a decent airflow from fromt to back trough them.

I would use Samsung DVD drives and harddrives because i found them to be really good and tests also prove that.
If you want a better harddrive than i sugest the new Western Digital 300GB 10.000Rpm VelociRaptor

You might want to get a Soundblaster X-Fi XtremeGamer but keep in mind they only work under Vista with OpenAL sound or DirectSound3D wich is converted by Creative ALChemy.

And dont forget a decent powersuply to power it all.

Wireless keyboards and mice are nice but not really suitable for gaming unless you got models with a stand that charges them.
Battaries run out really fast wen gaming.

And finaly i would really recomend Vista 64bit as the OS for your now rig.

He mentioned his budget is around $1900, I'd say with that money, he has enough to go for a better intel solution

ATI seems to have made a winner with their 4000 series though.

keyboards and mice are pretty much up to personal taste. I know someone who plays with an old ladybird style mouse (i think logitech) and is one of the best gamers I know, she does way better than anyone Ive met who uses a gaming mouse. But yes, as a general rule, avoide wireless for gaming (and even just for regular use!)

For cases, look at coolermaster, antec and lian-li, I find them to make some of the best cases. That isnt saying other brands arent worth considering though!

I don't know but from what I've read from REAL user's the AMD 9850 BE combined with ATI's latest cards with 4 gig of ram on an optimized mobo is pretty tough to beat price to power wise. Yeah Intels "faster" but at twice the price. Don't throw AMD totally out the window just yet, they're starting to get their act together.

Da Worfster

Twice the price? Where are you getting your prices from?

the Q6600 costs $195 on newegg, and the 9850 costs $235.

Please note I have nothing against AMD. Heck, I like them. I'm just pointing out facts.

Thats quite a crazy budget, you should be able to get something very nice.

Are you up to building it yourself or would you want to buy it ready built?

With that budget, building it yourself you will be able to get a very nice system.

Q6600 doesnt even come close to a AMD X2 6400+ for gaming performance.

And the X4 9850 BE also beats the Q6600 for most games.

With the new X4 9950 on the way things are only going to get better.

Right now he be better of with a X2 6000+ or 6400+ (Black Edition) because there are still no games that really use multiple cores.

AMD is more bang for your buck and he can than use the money he saves with AMD parts to buy other performance related stuff like a VelociRaptor 300GB hard drive and other stuff.

quote:

Originally posted by NDS_Camp.:
Right now he be better of with a X2 6000+ or 6400+ (Black Edition) [B]because there are still no games that really use multiple cores.{/B]

Here's a list of games that use multiple cores:
http://www.rage3d.com/board/showthread.php?t=33902850

And I would add to that the upcoming SoW series....

quote:

Originally posted by NDS_Camp.:
Q6600 doesnt even come close to a AMD X2 6400+ for gaming performance.

And the X4 9850 BE also beats the Q6600 for most games.

With the new X4 9950 on the way things are only going to get better.

Right now he be better of with a X2 6000+ or 6400+ (Black Edition) because there are still no games that really use multiple cores.

AMD is more bang for your buck and he can than use the money he saves with AMD parts to buy other performance related stuff like a VelociRaptor 300GB hard drive and other stuff.

What about the e8400? its only about $25 more than the 6400+ and performance is better.

and again, with a $1900 he really doesnt need the money saved on the difference between intel and AMD... (especially if he decides to go quad core, in which case the savings of going with AMD will be negative)

Thanks alot for the help everyone, a lot of fat to chew on now! I would like to build it myself but since i have limited computer know how would i be bitting of more than i can chew?

Ive not seen any game that benefits from having more than 2 cores yet, most of those optimed games use 1 core for the game and leave the rest to the system.

Dont know who dreamed up that list but Crysis and Dirt defenatly use only 1 Core that way.
Everyone io know who checked CPU usage on the coreas noticed the same thing, only one core really gets used.

You can change it so that it does use more cores but i found that the FPS comes slighly down than especialy wen you got a lot of things running in the background or if you get a lot of sounds or explosions around you.

Optimized for Multicore means the game only tries to use 1 core out of 2 or 4, not that it uses all cores.
It might be that some games are optimized to use 2 cores wen your using a Quad Core but so far i have not seen this.


As for the E8400, it a great CPU but again with some games the X2 6400+ is better.

But its not just the CPU that makes the price, good Intel socket 775 Mobos are more expensive also than the AMD counterparts.


As for building a rig your self its not that hard if you read the Motherboard manual really carefull and keep it with you during asembly of all the parts.