suggestions for a new rig??

[legacy-Norad]

Hey,

I'm a n00b on this forum but I need some suggestions on a new rig.

I'm looking for a mid-range comp that can last me for awhile and currently these are the specs I'm looking for:

AMD Athlon 3000+
512MB DDR PC2700 RAM
120GB 7200RPM hard drive
ATI Radeon 9800 128MB DDR

What i'd like to know is... should i get a better processor/switch to P4? What video cards benchmark better in the gaming biz? any suggestions are welcomed. Thanks a bunch!

-EDIT- btw... I'm not really a newb... I actually used to post here (till i got banned for talking Doom 3 beta) :cry:

[legacy-ToyotaSupra]

for a gaming comp i would go with intel

[legacy-Syberdoor]

I personally prefer intel, but even if you take and Athlon XP do NOT take the 3ghz .. take the 2.8 (and there the OLDER modell not the newer) it's a lot cheaper and the fastest amd cpu available....

[legacy-st_trooper]

If you do get an AMD, buy either a 2700 or 2800 along with an nforce2 motherboard, lower the multipier to 11 (you can increase it later) and up the FSB to at least 200.

I got my 2700+ to 2300MHz and was faster than the piece of **** 3200+ (supposedly the fastest CPU available now:rolleyes: ).

[legacy-siniqal]

I have 2 favorite sites that I frequent when scoping out new hardware:

http://www.tomshardware.com

http://www.anandtech.com

All I can suggest is look at all the CPU-related articles you can. My take is that AMD has a competitive price/performance ratio, but Intel is flat-out speed king. I am an AMD owner myself.

Seriously though, mid-range my arse! :haha: Mid-range is more like an Athlon XP2500+ or an Intel 2.4C GHz coupled with a Radeon 9700 Pro.

[legacy-Norad]

Haha thx for the replies...
I think i might go with an Intel P4 2.8GHz... the 3.0 and 3.2 are much pricier than 2.8... any reason why?

Also... does the ATI Radeon 9800 128MB benchmark much better than 9700? what about the GeForce FX 5900 (256MB version)?

Or... should I go back to some of the earlier Ti series from nvidia?

[legacy-Syberdoor]

aso to the price difference: its natural that the best cpu always is about 200$ more expensive than the second best... with the 2.8 it could also be that there are different versions, too... an FSB533 and an FSB800 version might be possible.. and it's locial that the FSB533 modell would be a lot cheaper because of lower FPS as well as HT (The 3.0 CPUs have all HT now I think)

the Fx5900 is in most benchs a hint faster than the radeon 9800, the more the higher the resolution is... people say that the 9800 has better image quality... Personally I do not know that because I never saw one.. I just doubt that you can tell a difference while playing.... so don't give too much about such things I'd say. (Anyway.. give the same about the 4 FPS more with the Fx *gg*)
And going back to the gf4 if you can afford an Fx5900 is no good idea I think... a high end card like the 9800 or 5900 ensures you can play hl2 or doom3 and fits a lot better to the rest of your system I think....

[legacy-ToyotaSupra]

the 9800 is better than the 9700 in every way
as for the 9800 having better image quality at higher resolutions thats true but they arent too good with 800x600 and below

[legacy-Norad]

Well... I think I'll end up getting the ATI Radeon 9800. I wonder whether their will be a big difference between the 128MB and 256MB version though, since 256 seemes like an overkill at the moment. Should Doom3 or HL2 take up that 256, would it be worthwhile to get the 256 instead of 128?

I'm also probably getting one of the FSB800 Pentium 4 processors. Will there be a big difference in FPS between the P4 2.6GHz and 2.8 or 3GHz? (I'm trying to move more towards the economic side)

[legacy-Syberdoor]

Well the Highend Radeon isn't really economic *g* but a videocard is more important than a cpu nowadays so having more expensive card and cheaper cpu is intelligent I think. General they say the 256 Cards have only very little fps improvement... ANyway I do not know about doom3 but you actually can activate features already in ut2003 which would make textures so big that you need 256.... so if they use 2048x2048 textures for futuregames it might be more useful to have 256.. at the moment the performance is almost equal...

Well the difference between 2,6 and 2,8 is first of all the same as between 2.8 and 3.0 (with same FSB @ all cpus) so it's linear... and every 200Mhz give you e.g 500 pts more in PcMark2002 or 33 in 3dMark03... the best price performance ratio at the moment has the 2.8ghz model I think.. anyway you should now that HT is only used in XP or Linux.. (so if you keep hanging on 98.. don't buy it) And if you want to be economic you sohuld also take a Springdale and not a Canterwood Mainboard....

[legacy-Norad]

Thanks for all the input... I ordered my new rig today, specs are:

Intel Pentium 4 2.8 GHz Hyper-threading
512MB DDR PC3200 RAM
80 GB 7200rpm Ultra DMA Hard Drive
16X DVD-ROM Drive
48X CD-Writer
Windows XP Home
ATI Radeon 9800 128MB DDR

I was going to customize it but decided to order one from Compaq :down:
Reason: Price - $500 rebate = $699.99 :up:

I've never really experienced a gaming machine since my older comp was utter crap.

For a normal hardcore gamer... how easy is it to take up 80 gigs on the hard drive? I'm considering upgrading to 160 but i dunno whether i'll need it.

My second concern is my video card. Is there a major difference in performance between the ATI Radeon 9800 and the 9800 Pro 128MB? I haven't yet been able to find a benchmark on the two, but generally, if I play with 4x FSAA, will my ATI Radeon 9800 be even slower than the 9700 Pro?

[legacy-Norad]

*bump*


Hello?

[legacy-Syberdoor]

well I think 700$ for this system is pretty good price...
this 80gig thing is really hard to say... Depends on how much stuff you download, and on how much stuff you keep... For example if you play u2, splinter cell and ut2003 at the same time... you need 10Gb... when you finished u2 and sc after 3 days... you actually can uninstall them and get 6Gb back... but some people keep all games isntalled... and same with mods or mp3s.. some people play everything as long as they like it and delete it afterwards... others keep everything... depends on your what type you are... but, well I think you should get out with the 80Gb at least so long that you can get a 120Gb hd for 120$ or even longer... and you can upgrade anytime.... so no problem ?