What are the main Ingredients for top gaming?

[sf05]

Hey Everyone

New to the forum and don't really know much about computers TBH.
I like to play stratergy games on the PC, like AOE3 and the total war games also my sister likes the sims series.

Sadly the computer i have is total S**t and we can't play them to even half their potential and the game often closes as we dont have the requirements to run them.

My sisters birthday is soon and my mum is looking to buy her a new computer, we've been trying to figure out what will be good computer to run the games. The problem is that we don't have a clue what are the key factors to run the games nicely.

People in Pc World say that Ram, Graphics cards, processors are the main things. Is this right? Are there other things that are important?

The computer we've looked at is:

Intel Pentium 4
1GB RAM
Processor of 3.2GHz
80GB Hard Drive
128mb Hyper Memory Graphics card

Sounds good?

Thanks alot
Dan

Ps: I'm looking to build my own computer somewhere down the line so i'll be doing alot of reading up on this forum. I should've down this before asking the questions but i need some help ASAP so i thought it'd be best to post 1st.
Cheers

[BadNoddy]

Hey there, first of, don't always listen to what people in PCWorld say, they can give some crap advice.

Anyhoo, if your are serious for gaming, you need a system that is based upon an AMD processor rather than Intel.

1Gb of RAM is good for most games and an 80Gb HDD is a minimum.

The graphics is the other important part. Look for graphics cards based on NVidia chips or ATi. These are the two leading manufacturers for Graphics card chipsets.

Look at the sigs of other forum members, and you get an idea of the specs that you would need for top gaming at the moment.

[Archaon]

Order one from Kustom. PC World is alright for the odd pripheral or component you need, but I wouldn't buy a system from them. Since the graphics card doesn't have a proper name, chances are it's onboard. And in short, that means it's crap. And that means, it's crap for games.

[sf05]

Hey there, first of, don't always listen to what people in PCWorld say, they can give some crap advice.

Anyhoo, if your are serious for gaming, you need a system that is based upon an AMD processor rather than Intel.

1Gb of RAM is good for most games and an 80Gb HDD is a minimum.

The graphics is the other important part. Look for graphics cards based on NVidia chips or ATi. These are the two leading manufacturers for Graphics card chipsets.

Look at the sigs of other forum members, and you get an idea of the specs that you would need for top gaming at the moment.
I diffently agree with you on the crap advise, i use forums for other subjects and it's not until you listen to the 'real' experts that you realise the crap advise you've been given before.

Okay, i'll look fome some AMD based instead.
I've seen some 2GB Ram systems but it's a bit out of my sister Bday Budget, when i build my own i'll get things bit by bit so i'll get the higher end Ram and other components.

I'll look out for those graphic based systems as well *Off to look them up*

Thanks alot for your help mate :)

Dan

[sf05]

I've checked out the AMD models and there are 5 different models that i've seen. Which is the best version of these?

AMD Athlon
" Athlon 64
" Athlon XP
" Duron
" Sempron

Thanks in advance
Dan

[BadNoddy]

Athlon 64 are the processors for gaming (the others are older and disappering CPU's except the Sempron but thats more for office work). Future proof and not that much in cost either nowadays. The Athlon and Athlon XP have been replaced by the more up-to-date Athlon 64.

Whats your budget as a whole for this and we can give you some better pointers as to exactly what you can get for your money.

Its easy enough to give you a high spec system but the cost may be too hight for you. As for your system when it comes to it, you will most likely want to put that little bit more into it nad have a better system.

[sf05]

Thanks for the help :)

I think i've now concluded that my sisters B'day budget probably/diffently isn't going to buy a system good enough to play her sims 2 game :lol: (Her budget is £300)

When i do build my own i will take my time and buy each piece seperatly so i can get the best. I've got one project lined up before the computer one though which is going to easily run into the K's. I bet some of you guys systems have run well into the K's?

Cheers mate
Dan

[brumster]

I've got a P4 3.06GHz system, it's years old, and it still plays all the games perfectly fine - I'd say your major area to upgrade is the graphics card. There's plenty of life in old processors yet :)

[Trojan]

Well only to confirm with the other guys that AMD (Socket 939 A64 3500 for example) should be your chosen route if gaming is your thing. Intel is good, and will do the job as brumster pointed out, but AMD does perform better in this field.

certainly go for at least 1GB ram, the cost is pretty cheap so the more the better. As for a hard drive the cost difference between an 80gig and a 200gig can be down to just £20 odd quid so have a good old look about. You'll want a decent motherboard preferably an SLi capable board (NVidia) or Crossfire capable board (ATI's answer to SLI) both offer you the chance to add a 2nd matching GFX card at a later date to give you xtra power if needed, my preference is with Nvidia's SLi.

So with that in mind I would opt for an Asus SLI board, there is a few varients of this board 'Delux' & 'Premium' and the plain old 'A8N SLI' the prices vary as some offer certain features and others dont, but all will offer you SLI. The new kid on the block with regard to an SLI enabled motherboard has to be the ASRock (939NF4G) board, this offers you SLI at half the price from the Asus camp, they manage this because they do not use Nvidias NForce 4 chipset, the crafty engineers have managed to create there own chipset that uses SLI. (most boards offer on-board sound, so no need for sound card)

I cannot comment personally on the ASRock board but going by a few reviews it certainly seems a cheap option. Next..graphics, you'll want to purchase a PCI-Express card, now there is many cards in the market place that will fit your needs all claiming to be the best in this...and the best in that. This is where you decide on what route to take, NVidia or ATI, now both offer cards in the low/mid/high range cards, and the best advice is to buy the best you can with what you've got and with this in mind We'll look only at mid/high range cards. I'll only show you the ones that utilise SM3 (Shader Model 3)

(ATI High)

X1900XTX (£330)
X1900XT (£295)
X1800XT (£230)
X1800XL (£200)

(ATI Med)

X1600XT (£120)
X1600Pro (£87)

(NVidia High)

7900GTX (£380)
7900GT (£260)
7800GTX 512 (£530)
7800GTX (£300)
7800GT (£195)

(Nvidia Med)

7600GT (£150)
6800GT (£160)
6600GT (£95)

(prices are a rough guess)

all cards will meet your needs, just depends on how much you want to spend, but my choice in the Med range would be the 7600GT, it gives good performance & value. Next you'll need a decent power supply, dont be fooled into buying generic PSU's claiming 500W and being sold for £20, you dont really want to scrimp on this and would always recommend buying a decent branded PSU (unless your case is bundled with a decent one) like Enermax, Antec, Akasa for example and in the 400W-500W range should be plenty.

all thats left is to buy is a ATX Case (loads to choose from...personal choice) plenty to buy with nice windows to show off your computer componants and a DVD writer.

apologies If Ive missed anything, hope this helps a little...yes I have too much time on my hands ;)

[Stephen B]

I am not saying PC World employees are competent to give anyone advice on system building, but.............

"People in Pc World say that Ram, Graphics cards, processors are the main things. Is this right?"

Is a perfectly valid and accurate statment, but you did the right thing asking here as we can offer advice on tailoring a sytem to your needs far better and cheaper than a high street store which will inevitably try to seel you a pre-built system.

and I concur with the previous comments that an AMD based system, min 1 gig ram and a big HD coupled with an SLI capable card would be your best bet

[seanyc5]

he has only got ?300 remember! best bet would be buy 512mb for now save yourself ?30-40 on that then get another 512mb later and save were you can to get a better gfx card. a 3200+ would be fine i would think and a 6600gt too would give more than adequate results i woukd of thought.
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