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Underground > Games & Gameplay >

Gaming rig advice.

The Return Of Rothkoid

00:53 / 15.01.07

Given that there's a bunch of PC-building people out here, I thought I'd ask for a little advice about building a new PC. (Or buying one, specced as advised - if it comes to $100 difference between me assembling it and someone else assembling it and it coming with a warranty, I'm choosing the other bloke.)

Anyway. What I'm keen to do is to get something that's going to kick arse at current gen games (F.E.A.R. and the like) and not die too badly at more intensive new games. (Crysis, maybe the new Flight Simulator - who knows?) I'm also wanting to use this for music creation, so I'll probably get a dedicated soundcard of some sort, as well as a shitload of drive space - the latter not being too worrisome as drives are relatively cheap these days. But I suppose, in general the watchwords are "quick and quiet".

So, I've sort of been leaning towards a Core 2 Duo 6600 (for price/performance) and something nVidia for the vid card setup. While an 8800GTX looks pretty impressive, I'm not quite convinced that they're exactly essential purchased as yet - I was thinking maybe a 7950GX2 or a couple of 512MB 7950 cards run in SLI mode. (Speaking of which - can someone give me the lowdown on SLI? Is it worth it, or what? And in addition are any ATI cards a canny purchase?)

I guess I've been reading around a lot of computer mags, but wanted to get some ideas from people who've actively put this sort of thing together recently. Basically, I want something that's going to be piecemeal upgradeable and won't need a wholesale junking in three years. What're your recommendations, both in terms of "best to buy" and "best to buy if you're not inordinately wealthy"?

So. Lemme know what you reckon. I'll be looking to build this box in the next three months or so, and advice will be most appreciated.

11:26 / 15.01.07

I recently built a pc from scratch.

CPU: AMD Athlon 64 Dual Core 4800+
MOBO: Asus A8R32-MVP Deluxe
Memory: 1GB (2x512) Corsair TwinX XMS DDR
Harddrive: 250gb Western Digital
GPU: ATI Sapphire X1950XTX 512MB
Monitor: 20" Viewsonic VX2025wm Widescreen

Origionaly got an ATI X1900, with DX10 comming out soon I didnt want to waist money, but it broke after a week so got the X1950, and it was worth the extra money just for the better fan they have on it, the X1900 sounded like it was going to take off. Not too bothered about DX10 now anyway I think it'll be at least a year before they have some decent DX10 cards out.

I've been playing the Supreme Commander beta lately on full detail, only slows down when there is a lot of units on screen (like 500).
Battlefield 2142 looks great, only slowdown is when the map first loads and it puts everything in memory, after that it runs smooth.
Computer boots up fast, if I was to turn it on then go for a pee, when I come back it'd be idle in windows.

I want to get a Western Digital Raptor 150GB to put the OS on and use the other for data, and get 2 more GB of Ram. But it's running fine as it is. It cost just under £1000. (Which is a hell of a lot of money for me, so trust me I did a lot of research before buying anything) Hope this helps.

The Return Of Rothkoid

21:30 / 28.01.07

See, this gets into the whole crux of the debate, I suppose: AMD or Intel? (And, to a lesser extent, ATI or nVidia?)

I've read equally compelling arguments for both chips - but it seems that AMD's prices aren't that competitive at the moment, given how much something like a Core 2 Duo 6600 pumps out.

What're your thoughts? Or anyone, who may've had experience with both. Prior to the Core 2 Duo line's unveiling, I'd been pretty keen on an AMD rig. Now, I'm not so sure.

17:57 / 29.01.07

I hear AMD have some new chips comming out soon, not just the same type of chip but faster I mean new tech, so the prices of the older stuff should come down soon. AMD have also bought ATI so that can only be a good thing right?

22:13 / 30.01.07

I'm a fan of AMD. I'm still running on a 2.2 Ghz 32 bit Athlon machine with some fast disks and plenty of ram (1.5GB)

But Core 2 Duo is the best bang for the buck today if you're buying a new computer. an E6600 is the way to go, if you are brave enough to overclock to 3 Ghz, you have a monster machine on your hands.

Get a midrange graphics card (7600?) and you'll be fine for most everything.

DX10 cards are not advisable to buy atm. that's why i say get a cheap midrange card now - by the time the DX10 games are out and there is more DX10 capable cards, you'll be able to make a more informed purchase (and cheaper, most likely since you'll have more than the super hot and power hungry 8800GT/X to choose from)

07:03 / 26.02.07

Hmm. What would be the most game-friendly laptop around 13~ inches screen size on the market at the moment? And what about the windows vista being bundled with new models? Anyone notice any compatibility problems?

15:48 / 26.02.07

I've had no Vista-related problems yet. Common belief is that you need 2 gig of RAM if you've got Vista and want to play games, but I'm on a solitary gig and everything I've tried so far - bar Dark Messiah of Might & Magic, which is widely recognised as being bugged to fuckery - has been fine.

The Return Of Rothkoid

21:53 / 06.03.07

Yeah, I played around with a friend's laptop (as he's a Mac convert to Win and has no idea about installing stuff, etc) and found that the whole "if it doesn't work, pretend I'm using Win XP" thing solves most problems. It's more elegant than I thought, though I won't upgrade until there's some patching going on.

Another vidcard question: who's had experience with either SLI or Crossfire? Reading more about it, a crossfire setup may be a good choice - opinions?