Azu, IMO your build isn't worth the extra $200 (yours already has a dvd player/burner included though (but no ram?)) . It has the same CPU, the graphics card is quite a bit better. Also, a bigger HDD and PSU. Not really worth $200 more IMO. Also I believe he said he wanted to get a low cost high performance computer, his budget was $400, maybe $500 sometime later. Just my 2 cents.
Okay. Somewhat big bump. I found out not too long ago that an online friend of mine is pretty good when it comes to computers, so he's been helping me a bit with configuring a good computer. I still don't have the money yet, mostly thanks to me spending a bunch of money lately on the county fair and what-not, but I'm very close to getting the required amount back. Here's my build for now. CPU: AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-M68MT-S2P AM3 Power Supply: Antec EarthWatts EA-500D Green 500W ATX12V Hard Drive: Hitachi Desktop 1TB 32MB 6.0 GB/s Internal Memory: G. Skill Ripjaws Series 8GB (2x4GB) CD/DVD Drive: ASUS 24X DVD Burner Case (At least my choice): NZXT Apollo Black Mid Tower Okay. Some might be wondering about the graphics/video card. Thing is, I'm not getting one...yet. The reason being is that my friend said that the Motherboard's on board graphics is capable of running quite a few older games (he says at least 4 years old+), and at the moment, I'm not playing anything that requires high definition graphics. . Mostly sprite animated and maybe some lower quality 3D graphics. Although, I'm sure it should be able to play Playstation and Dreamcast games, right? Plus, I'm using the money to get a much more powerful CPU. Once I save up some more money, I'll buy a graphics card. I dunno which one to get yet, however. As for the case, that's something me and my friend can't agree on yet. While I want the Apollo case, he thinks I should choose either the COOLER MASTER HAF Mid Tower or the Antec Three Hundred Black Steel ATX Mid Tower. Both are good, but the reasons I want to get the NZXT case is because I want something fancy, but of high quality (he thinks the Apollo case is a thin steel/plastic piece of junk or something like that). Plus I'm kind of getting tired of the generic black boxy look of cases, and I want something different, y'know? I did look around numerous reviews of the case, and it sounds like it's something that would be good to have. I'm thinking of getting it, but I'm not too sure yet. Depending on the amount of money I have when I get the parts, I might put a bit more out to get one of a different color like Silver or even Blue. We'll see. The Apollo case is something good, right? I should've mentioned this earlier, and I'm sorry, but about Windows 7. The version I'm using right now isn't exactly legal. I mainly got it via...well, y'know, because this computer mostly ran on Windows Vista and they aren't that good. However, my friend did show me something good. Microsoft is selling Windows 7 Professional for only $29.99 if you are a student at a college, and I am a community college student, so I'll definitely get that. Also, my friend told me he never actually heard much about the hard drive I mentioned, mainly because it's a single 1TB Platter and said it should be faster than most others. ...Could someone maybe explain it to me? I was going to get something else that's 1TB, but they were either sold out or high price. So, a single platter is a good thing? If I'm right from past calculations, all of this, without shipping and taxes should cost me around $456.92 (Recalculating Prices. I think I got something wrong.). Which isn't bad. What do you guys think of this build? It'll be a couple more weeks until I buy the parts, but I would like your opinion, please. EDIT - Okay, checking again. If I'm right, without Shipping and Taxes, it should be around $451.92. Still, not bad, right?
I entered my PC into it and it thinks I need 538W PSU. I have been running it with a 300W PSU for a long time... good PSU then, especially since its barely blowing out any warm air haha Nice page though ^^
I don't know if integrated graphics'll be enough for dreamcast/playstation emulation. I don't have any experience with them, but as far as I know they usually are pretty much shit. However, it's better to get a better cpu and upgrade your graphics card later for now, I suppose. About the hard drive, it says SATA 6gb/s, but your motherboard does not hava a SATA 6gb/s controller. It should work fine if you connect it to a SATA 3gb/s slot, I do not know if there's any performance loss (I don't think there'll be any/much, but I'm not sure). For the case, I don't think you have to worry at all. I'm using a cheap budget case, have both my CPU and GPU overclocked, but they still don't get too hot. Overall it's a good pc, especially for that price.
Well, I do remember trying to play a couple of games in the past on this computer. They had a few hiccups, but it was still playable, and this is a Dell Inspiron 537. So, I'm thinking it might be able to play them a bit more smoothly. Hopefully. If not, I can wait a bit longer and get a graphics card. I admit, I was a bit worried when I heard about the whole SATA thing, but I looked it up. A lot are saying that no Hard Drive have went beyond the 3GB/s (or hardly ever), so I'm guessing I'm okay in that area. Plus they're almost always compatible, or so people says.
Playstation's fine, Saturn's kinda iffy at times (if you've got a dual-core setup), Dreamcast is very unreliable. This is with an Intel 945 Express chipset, and is 4 years old. You likely can get much better stuff than this these days.
Okay...something isn't right here. It looks like the prices for the Hard Drives has actually increased. I don't remember the prices being THAT high. I swear the hard drive I've chosen was around $70, and now it's $140? What the fuck? Sometimes the prices don't even match. I don't get it. Maybe it's something with FireFox? ...I guess I caught them while they were doing a sale or something. Crap. The prices are all those hard drives are massive. I might have to order from a different site or something (or get one with less memory, but I kind of want to get a 1TB Drive). EDIT - Looks like it's on some other sites like TigerDirect too. I'm getting...really confused here. Well, that's fucking great! This explains why the price increased! DX http://www.bangkokpost.com/learning/learning-from-news/263456/floods-hard-drives-jump-in-price
Hey Jay, I'm new here - but I've been building computers for years. Have you considered AMD's F1 socket? It incorporates the gpu INTO the cpu die. This would essentially give you high end graphics, and a quad core CPU at low power consumption, low thermal output, and overall lower price. This "APU" technology is similar to the design used in the newer model xbox 360's. (I wish amd had been selling these before my latest build :P) here's the APU: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103942 As far as hard drives go - the price jump is unfortunate. I say pick a reputable selller on ebay
I never even heard of that to be honest. It does sound like a pretty nice device to have. Although, it is a little too late for now, since I already ordered my parts and I'm low on money. I have just enough for Windows 7 on discount. Thanks for informing me about this product. I'll definitely keep it in mind once I do my graphics upgrade. As for the hard drives, I did purchase a Samsung 1TB for $99.99. The price jump is kind of...bleh, but $100 for a 1TB drive...eh, I can deal with it.
High end? It has better integrated graphics than intel, but it's far from high end. I guess it's more between low end - midrange. It performs between a 6450 and a 5570, so for example the hd 4670 and 5670 which were discussed here earlier perform better than it (not by a lot, but they are better). The cpu which he ordered is faster too (once again, not by a lot, but it is better). The AMD APU's are decent, have a lower power consumption, but aren't better than cpu wise, and the gpu isn't that great for serious gaming. IMO the amd phenom II and a (decent/midrange) gpu later is the best choice (I believe it's possible to put in another gpu and crossfire it with the integrated gpu on the APU though. Not exactly sure on how that works though.)
Yeah, I guess high-end was a bad term to use. I would prefer this CPU in particular though - thing is a beast at overclocking (if you need the performance). I know a phenom II + high end radeon is better - that's what I've got in my rig, but I was also thinking of cost savings because he was on a budget. I guess for me, I'd prefer to have a quiet, efficient rig over a gaming beast. I believe the APU would achieve this. *on a side note, carrierhack - you seem to have hardware experience. Do you know anything about unlocking cores on a phenom? I could use some advice with mine :P
I think you're better off asking Oerg866 asking that, because I've never had an amd phenom II and thus have never unlocked a core/read about unlocking cores. Since he has unlocked 2 cores on his amd phenom II X2 (see this post). About the APU, of course an amd phenom II + high end gpu is better, it's a lot more expensive too. The thing just is, if he'd put a mid range/high end gpu in it later, and thus the integrated gpu wouldn't be used anymore, he'd pay $10 more for a slower cpu. I don't know how well it overclock compared to the phenom II though, so you might be able to get it to run (quite a bit) faster than an (overclocked) amd phenom II it it overclocks well (and have decent cooling).
Well, the new parts came in. It took hours, but I finally managed to get this computer fixed. I do want to thank you guys for helping me out. I'm loving what I'm seeing so far. Worth every penny. I guess I still need to get a new graphics card still, but, that probably won't be until sometime next year. Oh yeah, I did get a Samsung Spinpoint 1TB Drive to replace the other choice, if I haven't mentioned it. Again, major thanks! ^^
My apologies about double posting, but I need a bit of help here with something. Didn't want to make another topic. I'm in the process of installing most of my old stuff back (along with a couple of new things), and I added a few games. The funny thing here though is the graphics. If I play something like say...Angry Birds, the quality is in my eyes, perfect. It runs very smoothly too. But when I play something like Plants vs. Zombies or Roller Coaster Tycoon 2, while they do play smoothly and sometimes faster, the graphics appear to be kind of blurry. I also just noticed that if I take PvZ out of full view, the quality goes up! I dunno if it's the games, or the graphics on the motherboard, but I would like to know if there's any way to improve the graphics a little bit. I have been told about the CMOS or sometihng, but I dunno whst exactly am I supposed to do. Could someone help me out? By the way, the on board graphics on the motherboard is a NVIDIA GeForce 7025. I know on board graphics aren't that great, but the quality of a couple of these games seem worse than on my original PC. Unfortunately I never did figure out what kind of graphics or whatever it had.
If it looks blurry it's probably because the game doesn't support your monitor's native resolution. Most old games do not support high resolutions (with a few exceptions, for example GTA III), especially 2D games. Angry Birds isn't an old game and probably supports your monitor's resolution, but games which don't do this get stretched, which makes it blurry. And if you mean running windowed with taking out of full view, that's because it won't get stretched if it's not ran in fullscreen.
You should have access to an NVIDIA control panel, assuming you have the correct drivers installed. Turn off monitor scaling for if the resolution is incorrect. If it's not blurry anymore but has borders, CarrierHack is bang on the dollar. The other solution is to use a good CRT. :v:
