a new pc

[Madxgraphics]

I'm not the one building the machie, Fanciscade is..The site he was on is one of them custom build sites..You specify, they build.....

Anyway been through the Malware problem already, well had a mate sort it out before he started, as the ins and out of software are his department....He changed some files form .exe to .txt to stop the malware starting up and in doing that I no longer have the crystalxp home page that is embedded in it...I'll find out what files they were and post them for those that want to know.....I'm not knocking Vista completely by the way...I think it just depends wat sort of machine it is running on, seems in my experience lower grade,price range seem to have the problems...I do think though in a year or so it is going to live upto its name....

 

[Abarbarian]

That Vista emulation program actually contains a very subtle malware program that doesn't make itself known for a while, I know, I tried it. Looked great for a few weeks then I ended up doing a fresh install.

What problems did you have with the Vista Inspirat ? I'm very interested as I'm running it and do not seem to have any problems . If its doing naughtys in the background I'd like to knoe .

 

[floppybootstomp]

What problems did you have with the Vista Inspirat ? I'm very interested as I'm running it and do not seem to have any problems . If its doing naughtys in the background I'd like to knoe .

It kept freezing for a few seconds and Antivir found something and kept offering me the 'deny access' solution.

I do remember it was a very subtle exploit which I did eventually track down to that program.

On reinstallation without it - no probs.

Sorry I can't be much more help but it was a fair few months ago now.

 

[MeMateBigDave]

Franciscade - Firstly £400 is not a lot of money for a games PC and if you wish to be gaming at a reasonably high-end then you may wish to consider extending this budget if possible. In reality for this price you will struggle when trying to run any FPS/RPG demanding titles that are new such as Crysis, Supreme Commander, COD4, Rainbow 6 etc.

If you are limited by this budget then the key components to ensure are as good as poss are the CPU and GFX card. The Radeon 3650 is poor in todays standards and will need an upgrade in the near future - you can pick up a XFX GeForce 8800 GS Alpha Dog XXX for less than £100, pretty good power to money ratio

Athlon CPUs are good value for money but again you may want to up the speed from the one you have chosen. At the end of the day the setup you have picked is fairly good value for money (I'm sure you could trim a few quid here and there) but it won't deliver stunning gaming performance for any 3D demanding titles. If you are looking at more sedate and less graphicaly demanding games then this satisfy your needs.

Dell IMHO make good machines and ensure that all components work together and are fully supported, however for this guarantee and support you pay a premium, one that in my opinion is far too high and anyone with basic skills, Google and some spare time can fix themselves. However having a RTB warrantly is always best but there are many cheaper than Dell. Also they are really geared to the business and home user rather than gamers.

Some other custom gaming pc sites you can try are:

http://wired2fire.com/

http://www.cyberpowersystem.co.uk/

http://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/

Good luck

 

[franciscade]

thankyou all for contributing to my search, those are some excellent sites with great offers, ill need some more time obviously to make a final decision. as you were saying mematebigdave, about slow pc's.. this is my current spec:

(laptop, my only pc)
OS: xp professional
510mb RAM
Inteal R Pentium R processor 1.73ghz
ATI mobility radeon X300 128mb..


as you can see.. im really desperate, as the only games my pc can run. are either on the source engine with very low graphics settings, or jedi knight games.. which are very easy to run and even then i need to turn the graphics down alot.

 

[floppybootstomp]

Here's another place worth checking out, they're trustworthy:

http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/home.html

 

[floppybootstomp]

In fact if you could stretch to £450.00 you could get this machine with Win XP Home Edition which is quite fair:

http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/specpage.html?PC-1158

 

[franciscade]

i found a nice one from cyber power system i think heres the spec.

£332.00 ex. VAT
£390.10 in. VAT
(before all applicable rebates)
CASE: Raidmax Sagitta II Mid-Tower Case (Black Color with Black front panel)
CPU: (Socket AM2) AMD Athlon™ X2 4200+ Dual-Core CPU w/ HyperTransport Technology
MOTHERBOARD: (Socket AM2)MSI K9N Neo-F V3 nForce 560 Chipset DDR2/800 SATA-II RAID 16x PCI-Express MBoard w/GbLAN, USB2.0, &7.1Audio
MEMORY: (Req.DDR2 MainBoard)2GB (2x1GB) PC6400 DDR2/800 Dual Channel Memory (Mushkin Value Select or Major Brand)
VIDEO CARD: NVIDIA GeForce 8400 GS 512MB 16X PCI Express
VIDEO CARD 2: NONE
LCD Monitor: NONE
Hard Drive: Single Hard Drive (250GB SATA-II 3.0Gb/s 8MB Cache 7200RPM HDD)
Data Hard Drive: NONE
Optical Drive: SONY DUAL FORMAT 18X DVD±R/±RW + CD-R/RW DRIVE DUAL LAYER (BLACK COLOR)
Optical Drive 2: NONE
SOUND: HIGH DEFINITION ON-BOARD 7.1 AUDIO

^ this comes with xp and microsoft works.. ill need that for school stuff

Does a PCI Wireless 802.11g 54Mbps Network Interface Card combined with ONBOARD 10/1000 NETWORK CARD let me access wireless internet by just.. scanning as normal for access points?

 

[Abarbarian]

i found a nice one from cyber power system i think heres the spec.

£332.00 ex. VAT
£390.10 in. VAT
(before all applicable rebates)
CASE: Raidmax Sagitta II Mid-Tower Case (Black Color with Black front panel)
CPU: (Socket AM2) AMD Athlon™ X2 4200+ Dual-Core CPU w/ HyperTransport Technology
MOTHERBOARD: (Socket AM2)MSI K9N Neo-F V3 nForce 560 Chipset DDR2/800 SATA-II RAID 16x PCI-Express MBoard w/GbLAN, USB2.0, &7.1Audio
MEMORY: (Req.DDR2 MainBoard)2GB (2x1GB) PC6400 DDR2/800 Dual Channel Memory (Mushkin Value Select or Major Brand)
VIDEO CARD: NVIDIA GeForce 8400 GS 512MB 16X PCI Express
VIDEO CARD 2: NONE
LCD Monitor: NONE
Hard Drive: Single Hard Drive (250GB SATA-II 3.0Gb/s 8MB Cache 7200RPM HDD)
Data Hard Drive: NONE
Optical Drive: SONY DUAL FORMAT 18X DVD±R/±RW + CD-R/RW DRIVE DUAL LAYER (BLACK COLOR)
Optical Drive 2: NONE
SOUND: HIGH DEFINITION ON-BOARD 7.1 AUDIO

^ this comes with xp and microsoft works.. ill need that for school stuff

Does a PCI Wireless 802.11g 54Mbps Network Interface Card combined with ONBOARD 10/1000 NETWORK CARD let me access wireless internet by just.. scanning as normal for access points?

Once again that graphics card will be pants for gaming . The rest of the specs look fine , but a 4800 or a 5000 cpu would be much better .

As to school , you should be able to use Open Office , its free and is every bit as good as Microsoft products .

 

[Abarbarian]

Its worth spending time looking around . There is these sort of deals on offer ,


http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Systems/AriaNet/AriaNet+AMD+4000++PC+Package+?productId=29389

You would need a decent graphics card with that though .

 

[franciscade]

ok, iv done another search and found one like this :

Processor (CPU)
AMD ATHLON™ 64 X2 4200+ (2.2GHz) 2 x 512K L2 Cache (Socket AM2)

Memory (RAM)
2GB CORSAIR DDR2 667MHz - LIFETIME WARRANTY! (2x1GB)

Motherboard
ASUS M3A: AM2+, DUAL DDR II, S-ATA II, 3 PCI, 2 PCI-E

Operating System
WINDOWS® XP HOME SP2 (inc CD & Licence) (£49)

USB Options
6 x USB 2.0 PORTS (4 REAR + 2 FRONT) AS STANDARD

Memory - 1st Hard Disk
160GB SERIAL ATA II HARD DRIVE WITH 8MB CACHE (7200rpm)

2nd Hard Disk
NONE

RAID (HDD 1 & 2)
NONE

1st CD/DVD Drive
20x Dual Layer LightScribe DVD Writer ±R/±RW/RAM

2nd CD/DVD Drive
NONE

Graphics Card
512MB GEFORCE 8600GT PCI Express + DVI + TV-OUT

2nd Graphics Card
NONE

Sound Card
8 Channel Realtek ALC883 High Definition Audio

its cheaper too. The hard drive is alot smaller, but i dont have that much stuff to put on it, and the graphics card is better, you think it could run some newer games?

 

[floppybootstomp]

It wouldn't run Crysis but it would run HL2, as examples.

What make of power supply?
Size of power supply?
Case?

Supplier? (Who's selling it?)

Price?

 

[franciscade]

http://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/index.php?page=form&&select=amd2


here you go, i customised it with this. the power supply was the standard one 350w

And, i wouldnt mind not being able to run crysis yet. I can always upgrade parts when i have more money (and get a job) I'd be mainly looking into running the source engine at full graphics settings and the dawn of war games at full. But obviously there may be a new game that comes out i might wanna play, so it doesnt have to be a supercomputer, just 'capable'

oh, and the price came to... 385 i think... i closed the page i had up.

 

[Abarbarian]

Google for some reviews on the 8600 graphics cards or any graphics card and you will be able to see what games they play and how they perform . Reviews usually come with easy to read graphs or charts showing performance in a patricular game along with comparisons with other cards .

 

[floppybootstomp]

Well, it's all looking good really, except for the Power Supply.

Note it says 350W 'peak'. That means it's probably only a true 250 watts and it's likely a generic PSU of poor quality.

See if you can find out what make the PSU is and what it's constant power rating is as opposed to peak.

It really is worth paying a little more for a decent PSU, everything in your computer depends on it.

Other than that though, as I said, not bad at all.

Also ask the supplier how quick they can deliver I hear PC Specialist can drag their heels over delivery.

Mind you, the Novatech one I linked to at £450.00 knocks spots off of it

 

[franciscade]

ok, well theres choosable options for faster 'rush' delivery for around 30 pounds! so, i reckon it will take a week or so at least . but yeah.. i actualy need to get the money first (someones sending it from france)

and the power supply, im sure i can get one cheaper locally, ill probably get that one and see how it goes, if its a load of rubbish, then by then ill hopefully have some extra cheese n be able to afford a new one.




cheese = money

 

[Electronics & Photo Fan]

Only just seen this thread.

I'd recommend getting a better PSU; I have a system sitting here (literally on my lap) in which the cheap brand PSU has died; taking with it the motherboard, and after putting the CPU in another motherboard, it appears the CPU is dead too. That 350W rating is peak, which means it's a thrashed-out, absolute maximum rating which is not a working figure.

"Note it says 350W 'peak'. That means it's probably only a true 250 watts and it's likely a generic PSU of poor quality."

I would strongly agree, flops has nailed this one, and I cannot honestly see how a 250W PSU is going to power a dual-core system with a decent graphics card (by the way have you taken the point of the people telling you that is not a good card you have selected there). 250Watts is the sort of size PSU you'd find in a Pentium Three/Early P4 system.

A cheap brand PSU is not worth the risk, if it is underpowered it could fail and damage things as soon as it's switched on, or it could fail after months, like this one I have here, even if it's not underpowered. Also, to further add to the problem, the voltages it supplies to the motherboard and components could be wildly out, and how it would react to mains spikes (I'm taking about the normal everyday ones) is anybody's guess.

Just wanted to offer my advice.

 

[MeMateBigDave]

The novatech option looks good value, has a dual core cpu and 8800 GT card which should handle a fair whack of games at decent settings.

One other thing to consider is how big your screen is, if you are going any larger than 19" then the native resolution is likely to increase putting more demand on the gfx card, so best to keep this to a min.

 

[Alf]

Wouldnt it better to get a 9600GT? seeing how they offer much more perfomance than a 8600, and at a resonable cost.