Good Or Bad Gaming Pc?

marktruman2001 · Mar 4, 2004

Im thinking of buying this computer, I play mostly games, high detail, full resolution, should i take the plunge?

AMD Athlon 64 3400

2 GB Corsair PC 3200 DDR RAM

256mb Gainward Cool GF FX 5900 Ultra/1600 Xp 2.2ns DDR, Water Cooled

ASUS K8V Deluxe Motherboard

2 x 250 IDE Western Digital Hard drive 7200RPM

2x 250 SATA IBM DESKSTAR hard drive

Soundblaster Audigy 2 ZS PLatinum Pro

Sony DRU-530A DVDRW Dual Format drive 8x

52X Sony CDRW

21 INCH TFT/LCT Liyama Pro Lite

Creative Inspire 7.1 Speaker sytem

What would you change? if anything...

OpenGL · Mar 4, 2004

I have a system slower then that and can play with full detail with good fps, so the question if its good or bad for gaming? its very good for gaming, just(here comes the ati fanboyism) get a 9800XT if you can if you cant its still a kickass gaming rig

other then that its great.

marktruman2001 · Mar 4, 2004

yeah thanks

i was in a dilemma over which gcard to get, i posted in another forum to ask. I was also gonna get athlonfx51 too.

Agent_Mull · Mar 4, 2004

Looks good, tho 2gb of ram is a little over kill. Most people dont even use one.
I would get a 9600xt/9800np, but thats just me.

marktruman2001 · Mar 4, 2004

is 2 gig too much?

Agent_Mull · Mar 4, 2004

Yeah, most people never use more than 1 gb when gaming even. It cant hurt, but if you want to save money, you might want to drop down to 1gb.

marktruman2001 · Mar 4, 2004

I dont mind about the money, i just want the best of everything, i just found out the athlon 64 motherboard only has 3 dimm slots, upto 2 gig, so maybe i should try the athlon fx51 chip!

marktruman2001 · Mar 4, 2004

http://www.hollycomputers.co.uk/acatalog/Athlon_64_AMD_Silver.php

thats where im configuring it from!

Agent_Mull · Mar 4, 2004

Ok. I just didnt want you to over spend.

In theory amd 64s could support up to an Exobyte of ram. an exobyte is a Billion Billion bytes of ram. Hows that for playing BF1941.

marktruman2001 · Mar 4, 2004

wow thats a lot! what would you choose...athlon 64 or the p4 3.2ghz extreme edition? Im in 2 minds, or 3..with the athlon fx51

nefariouslogic · Mar 4, 2004

if you get the fx-51, you'll have to get ecc mem. In other words, you'll be much happier with the A64 3400. I think a gig of xms 3200 (twinx) is plenty... unless you need to burn dvds, render images, encode mpegs, capture videos, rip a cd, while playing games at full res. (really its overkill)
If I were spending the money, I wouldn't opt for a terabyte of storage... I'm working with a 40GB WD special ed. I'd get two 120GB Maxtor SATA drives in RAID 0, and maybe one of those WD 10000 RPM (raptor?) drives for running programs and such on. (os and other basic programs).
Also, unless you need a sound card for recording and editing audio, just get the audigy 2 zs (no platinum unless you really want that remote) It is still 7.1THX certified, so you can use it perfectly with that gigaworks speaker system.
Definitely the 9800XT!
my 2cents.

marktruman2001 · Mar 4, 2004

is ecc mem bad?

OKJEFF4 · Mar 4, 2004

ECC Registered memory is very expensive compared with non-ECC Registered memory. ECC Registered means the memory is stable and etc and is used in server platforms. That's why the A64 FX51 uses it, the FX is really an Opteron.

-S

tom10167 · Mar 4, 2004

If you ask me the 3400+ is not a good processor. It's twice the price of the 3200 for a small increase in performance. If you're one of those kids that needs the best, then get an FX-51, duals. Also, a 5900? You'd be much happier with a 9800 pro. Also, why are you getting 2 250gig- Ide drives? Just storage? I'd get two Raptors, and run them raid 0, and then get two 250gig drives for storage, or just run SCSI, again, you have to set SOME budget, even if it's $10,000, because there's always something more expensive.

OKJEFF4 · Mar 4, 2004

tom10167 said:
If you ask me the 3400+ is not a good processor. It's twice the price of the 3200 for a small increase in performance.

Maybe the performance margin is small now, but later on that double cache amount will come in very handy.

If you're one of those kids that needs the best, then get an FX-51, duals.

Click to expand...

Kind of rude.

Also, a 5900? You'd be much happier with a 9800 pro.

Click to expand...

There are lots of reasons to get a 5900 over a 9800. Linux support, 2d image quality, compatibility, etc. Just talk to Larva about the FX5900 vs Radeon 9800.

Also, why are you getting 2 250gig- Ide drives? Just storage? I'd get two Raptors, and run them raid 0, and then get two 250gig drives for storage, or just run SCSI, again,

Click to expand...

What if he downloads TV series, and etc. I know I do and I've only been at it for a week and I've already filled 25 GB on my HDD. Maybe he's a mIRC junkie.

-S

marktruman2001 · Mar 4, 2004

I do use up a lot of space, And Ive come into quite a bit of money, so i dont mind the costs, i just want the best i guess.

Chewy · Mar 4, 2004

I'd pick the athlon 3400 over fx51 any day

1GB RAM is plenty, besides you can always get more later.

I'd go with the 9800 pro/xt I've seen more favorable reviews about the 9800XT over the 5900.

One last thing, check this link before you dive in! New stuff on the horizon, you 'might' want to wait a few months, at least until some reviews come out on the new stuff.

http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=1985

Smirabi · Mar 4, 2004

stick with one gig, but dont settle for 3200 speed, i mean, if you've got the money, try 3700 or so, that way you can get a better overclock, if that's something that you are considering.

i would also vote for the ati over the nvidia

why buy it from them when you can buld it yourself? ooh that's right, i forgot that cost is not an issue... in that case, enjoy your new rig

CeeDeeJay · Mar 4, 2004

My Two Cents

I would lose the 2 gig and go with one gig of ram. If you ever use more than a gig then you can think about adding another.
You might think about going with the 3200 or 3400 instead of the FX.I would go with one of them now and then when the new tecnology(pci express.new generation of vid cards,new memory and new socket sets as well as new motherboards) arrives then I would break the bank. This way you can have a top machine now and another top machine down the road. Of course you still might want the fx now and the new stuff later but I would still go with 1 GIG of ram just make sure it is the best you can find.
As far as choice of vid card the 5900 Ultra and the 9800xt are so close I would buy the one you like best (meaning Nivida or ATI)
But I think if you read enough reviews they will give the lead to the ati vidieo processing unit. But both cards are so close I would buy the name I liked the best(coke or pepsi).

skitlets · Mar 5, 2004

coke =). my personal preference, but dam pepsi has britney and beyonce. not fair!!! cmon coke, hire some hotties!!!!

sorry, off-topic. i know

Good Or Bad Gaming Pc?

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