Help from Computer buffs!

Chat about stuff other than Transformers.
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Sociopathic Autobot
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Help from Computer buffs!

Post by Sociopathic Autobot »

CPU
AMD Athlon64 3800+ (62W) (2.4 GHz) Socket AM2 Processor $125.95 (An)

Motherboard
Gigabyte GA-M55SLI-S4 - nForce4 SLI (Athlon64/X2/FX/Sempron) PCI-E Socket AM2 $125.95 (An)

Hard-Drive
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 250GB - SATA 3Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM $95.95 (An)

Memory
Crucial Rendition 1GB PC2-5400 DDR2 DIMM - OEM $130.95 (An)

Video Card
EVGA E-GEFORCE 7900 GS 450MHZ PCI-E 256MB 256BIT 1.32GHZ GDDR3 Dual DVI-I HDTV Out Video Card $231.71 (NCIX)

DVD Drive
LG GSA-H22N (Black) 18x DVD±Writer - OEM $36.95 (An)

Case
ACT A502 (Beige) Mid Tower Case w/Front Side USB, Audio & FireWire $29.95 (An)

Total: $777.41


These are the items I am planning on using to build my new computer. I just need to know if this is going to be decent for running games =-o
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Civ
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Post by Civ »

For your CPU, does that also come with a heat sink and a fan? Reason I'm asking is the first time I bought a custom computer, it didn't have these and the damn thing kept overheating, which would trigger a long, annoying buzzing sound and then it would go into shutdown. I used to play games and after about an hour or so, this would happen.

Other than that, it looks like you have all the necessary stats and I'm assuming you already have an operating system disk. Do you know if everything is compatible with each other? And finally, do you know where you're buying this from?
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slartibartfast
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Post by slartibartfast »

Once again, I don't know much about computers. but running something like The Elder Scrolls IV : Oblivion will need

Minimum Requirements:
Windows XP
512MB System RAM
2 Ghz Intel Pentium 4 or equivalent processor
128MB Direct3D compatible video card and DirectX 9.0 compatible driver;
8x DVD-ROM drive
4.6 GB free hard disk space
DirectX 9.0c (included)
DirectX 8.1 compatible sound card
Keyboard, Mouse

Recommended Requirements:
3 Ghz Intel Pentium 4 or equivalent processor
1 GB System RAM
ATI X800 series, Nvidia GeForce 6800 series, or higher video card

I'd say you've gone for a pretty good trade-off between performance/price. But you might find you're running short on processor speed and RAM in a year or two. Also, windows XP won't run DirectX 10... well, neither does vista yet and you've probably got a couple of years before directx 10-exclusive stuff hits the shelves. but vista is pretty ressource hungry.
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Ravage
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Post by Ravage »

I would say just see if you can find something a bit faster in the CPU range for about 75 bucks more and I would consider another gig of ram. But even with those upgrades you should still be able to keep it sub-$1000.

Outside of that at least for the next year or so thats not half bad.
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Denyer
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Post by Denyer »

Originally posted by Civ
For your CPU, does that also come with a heat sink and a fan? Reason I'm asking is the first time I bought a custom computer, it didn't have these and the damn thing kept overheating, which would trigger a long, annoying buzzing sound and then it would go into shutdown. I used to play games and after about an hour or so, this would happen.
You actually got a modern processor to run for more than a few seconds/minutes without a heatsink without burning out?

Sorry M, not really a gamer -- the state of play in the UK is that for a general system, it's usually more cost-effective to buy built than make right now. Gamers are probably the main market for self-builds, as the off-the-shelfs won't cut it for high end gaming and those that do are aiming at a niche audience and commensurately expensive.

Stuff a notch or two behind bleeding edge is usually a safe bet, though.
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Civ
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Post by Civ »

Originally posted by Denyer
You actually got a modern processor to run for more than a few seconds/minutes without a heatsink without burning out?


Yep, and kept it running for 7 years. I had the sides off of the tower and a fan blowing into it. I should have just bought a damn heat sink and fan for the computer; however, life kept throwing other problems my way so it was put on the backburner. Now that I have a new computer, I made damn sure I have a heat sink, a fan, and tower case that allows for the funnelling of air through the CPU.
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Denyer
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Post by Denyer »

Originally posted by Civ
Yep, and kept it running for 7 years.
Ah. That sounds more plausible. Nowadays one would burn out in seconds, back then they wouldn't cook eggs to the same extent...
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