Computer? Home built or name brand?

[Finkledbody]

Win7 professional x64 (don't need ultimate, the additional features on that edition are pointless for home use) $130
Case $90
Asus mobo $95
16Gigs of DDR3 $105
after market CPU fan $30
DVD drive $30
500Gb HD $55

Cheap ram on that end, same ram that would come in pre-built

AMD quad core processor $90

Personally I wouldn't go with a AMD processor, and in no way is that comparable to what came in my tower. A Intel i7-2600k is way above and beyond that in so many ways. Considering they are both quad core is equal. But the i7 has hyper threading giving it 8 threads... It far outweighs anything in its $400 price range IMO for processor only.

Power supply $90
1GB DDR5 Video card $105.

What Brand is your video card?
Probably not strong enough to play some of the games I do on high settings.

You also didn't mention software. $200 for windows brings your rig to almost $1100. So we pretty much spent the same and Mines better


I agree with what alot of what ya'll are saying though. Especially with pre-builts that are less than $1000 dollars for the tower alone. But we are gamers, we are on a gaming website We shouldn't even be thinking about these cheapos.

What I'm talking about is pre-built gaming computers... You really can't beat the price. Of Course there are going to be a million examples of bad choices for pre-builts. I'm not suggesting any of these. lol

I guess I'll just talk for my tower only.. Theres no way it could be priced out for anything less than $2100 at the time I purchased it 9 months ago. So the $1200 (tower only, I already had the monitors, a keyboard, a logitech gaming mouse, and 7.1 soundblaster speakers.) I paid for it is a smoking deal. Just can't be beaten.

I have spent alot on the other components though.

$400 on the HD 1080p widescreen and $750 on the sony 26" gaming monitor.
Logitech mx580 (i think?) mouse - $100
Logitech g35 headset - $140
Soundblaster 7.1 speakers - $300

[Finkledbody]

And just to add, the fact is. The only reason I bought this pre-built this time is was I know parts, it was a buy of the century. The last computer I built a few years ago cost me an arm and a leg. But it was a beast for its time. I saw this one and went for it.

Home build specs:

Windows Vista Pro
Can't remember the mobo but it was a Asus socket 775 I believe
Intel 2 Quadcore Q6600
8 gb of Cosair DDR2 w/heatsinks
2 650 mb 10k RPM Seacoast HD's
Nvidia 9800 gt video card
Soundblaster spound card
Blu-ray player
16x Dvd-burner
4-channel manual fan controller (I love these things. lol)
1000-watt ps (took it out and put in new computer)
Cooler Master Case

Spent well over $2100 on this tower. Spent the most on the mobo, processor, video card, and hds. Still have this tower, use it as a Minecraft server mostly. But sometimes I'll use it for gaming when my girl is using my main tower.

[Dhalin]

Cheap ram on that end, same ram that would come in pre-built



Personally I wouldn't go with a AMD processor, and in no way is that comparable to what came in my tower. A Intel i7-2600k is way above and beyond that in so many ways. Considering they are both quad core is equal. But the i7 has hyper threading giving it 8 threads... It far outweighs anything in its $400 price range IMO for processor only.



What Brand is your video card?
Probably not strong enough to play some of the games I do on high settings.

You also didn't mention software. $200 for windows brings your rig to almost $1100. So we pretty much spent the same and Mines better


I agree with what alot of what ya'll are saying though. Especially with pre-builts that are less than $1000 dollars for the tower alone. But we are gamers, we are on a gaming website We shouldn't even be thinking about these cheapos.

What I'm talking about is pre-built gaming computers... You really can't beat the price. Of Course there are going to be a million examples of bad choices for pre-builts. I'm not suggesting any of these. lol

I guess I'll just talk for my tower only.. Theres no way it could be priced out for anything less than $2100 at the time I purchased it 9 months ago. So the $1200 (tower only, I already had the monitors, a keyboard, a logitech gaming mouse, and 7.1 soundblaster speakers.) I paid for it is a smoking deal. Just can't be beaten.

I have spent alot on the other components though.

$400 on the HD 1080p widescreen and $750 on the sony 26" gaming monitor.
Logitech mx580 (i think?) mouse - $100
Logitech g35 headset - $140
Soundblaster 7.1 speakers - $300

You still didn't comment on what I said about two computers, one being top of the line, and the other being "close, but not quite" but yet half the price pre-built yourself?

Okay, so that Intel CPU you mentioned is a little more powerful... at nearly 4x the cost. How much would you actually notice that in day-to-day usage of the computer? You mention hardcore gaming set at the highest settings, well my beef with that is:

1). You're using a lot more electricity and putting out a lot more heat requiring more cooling

2). You're not like going to notice the difference while playing the game that much during intense situations (especially for First Person Shooter games). Are you really going to notice that the treeline in the horizon looks a little more realistic while someone's plugging you in the back with a machinegun? There are times I intentionally reduce the game's settings just a tad to get smoother FPS for this reason.

3). Again, is it really worth the extra money?

Another thing you brought up, is the video card. Two cheaper cards linked together via SLI or the like is likely going to do better than one single card that costs 2x-3x more. So, if one card cost him $105, he could buy two for $210 and that'd give you about equal (or maybe better) performance than a single $300 or more card if you really had to see those better-rendered trees in the horizon that badly.

And then there's something to be said of game companies. Remember Skyrim? My custom-built 'best bang for the buck' computer from almost three years ago plays Skyrim on "High" without a hitch. Again, like I've said earlier in the thread, I've looked closely at screenshots of High, Ultra High, and completely maxed settings. The difference was so negligible, that it took me several double takes to notice what exactly the difference was. Mostly shadows that were just slightly more rounded, a few trees were drawn in just slightly higher texture, and snowflakes glowed a little more (and hindered your view more).

Yet, Skyrim's graphics are on par with many of these other games that take ridiculously strong computers to run. I think Bethesda has the right idea here, powerful computers on the market do not give game developers excuses for shoddy/inefficient programming practices. If Skyrim can give you those kinds of awesome graphics with much less strain on your computer, then I'm sure other peoples' games could do the same if they were designed/programmed/rendered properly.

tldr: Either way, a custom-built with slightly cheaper parts isn't going to be that much weaker than your 'beast' pre-built and it will use a heck of a lot less electricity.

Oh and about software: He didn't list Win7 because he probably had Win7 from a previous machine and re-used its license. Not 100% legal, but yet, if you destroy the old copy and/or re-use the HDD in the new setup, nobody is going to know about it. That's something you can't do with a pre-built.

Edit: Woah, what!? I didn't even notice what else you said you spent...

$750 for a 26-inch monitor? *blinks* You got ripped off, I hate to say. I bought mine for $400.
The mouse? I went with a Naga, about the same thing and only $75.
The headset? That's close to what I paid for my Banshee, it was $120.

The speakers? With a GOOD Headset (like the Banshee), you don't even need speakers really. I don't even have a pair of speakers hooked up to my computer at all; I've found that I don't even need them with such an awesome pair of headphones. Unlike a lot of headsets, they cover both ears entirely, and still have a mic, as well as very high quality sound. Every little shuffle of someone's feet in Skyrim, I can hear it. It does nicely for letting me know there's a guard pacing back and forth on the other side of a wall! I can also hear people talking to each other from a few rooms away lol.

That's very hard to do with a pair of speakers unless you turn them up so loud that other sounds (like combat) are loud enough to cause your neighbors to complain to the cops about loud noise.

[tjl]

Personally I wouldn't go with a AMD processor, and in no way is that comparable to what came in my tower. A Intel i7-2600k is way above and beyond that in so many ways. Considering they are both quad core is equal. But the i7 has hyper threading giving it 8 threads... It far outweighs anything in its $400 price range IMO for processor only.

To each their own. There are so few applications out there that are even programmed to use hyper-threading that it wasn't worth the extra money to me.

What Brand is your video card?
Probably not strong enough to play some of the games I do on high settings.

its an older Radeon HD, with 1gig of really fast ram. It's more than enough for anything I do. It ran Deus Ex quite well on full settings. I'm not really a huge gamer though, so I could save money on this part.

You also didn't mention software. $200 for windows brings your rig to almost $1100. So we pretty much spent the same and Mines better

I mentioned software, it's the first item on my list. Win7 pro. Not really gonna get into the "mines better" thing, we obviously have different computer needs. But the money I didn't spend going with a pre-built gamer rig is already going toward new upgrades. Like my solid state HD I got a few months ago.

[Finkledbody]

To each their own. There are so few applications out there that are even programmed to use hyper-threading that it wasn't worth the extra money to me.its an older Radeon HD, with 1gig of really fast ram. It's more than enough for anything I do. It ran Deus Ex quite well on full settings. I'm not really a huge gamer though, so I could save money on this part.I mentioned software, it's the first item on my list. Win7 pro. Not really gonna get into the "mines better" thing, we obviously have different computer needs. But the money I didn't spend going with a pre-built gamer rig is already going toward new upgrades. Like my solid state HD I got a few months ago.

Lol. i was just messing about mine being better. you have a very nice rig. id use it. thats for sure.

[Finkledbody]

from almost three years ago[/U] plays Skyrim on "High" without a hitch. Again, like I've said earlier in the thread, I've looked closely at screenshots of High, Ultra High, and completely maxed settings. The difference was so negligible, that it took me several double takes to notice what exactly the difference was. Mostly shadows that were just slightly more rounded, a few trees were drawn in just slightly higher texture, and snowflakes glowed a little more (and hindered your view more).

Yet, Skyrim's graphics are on par with many of these other games that take ridiculously strong computers to run. I think Bethesda has the right idea here, powerful computers on the market do not give game developers excuses for shoddy/inefficient programming practices. If Skyrim can give you those kinds of awesome graphics with much less strain on your computer, then I'm sure other peoples' games could do the same if they were designed/programmed/rendered properly.

tldr: Either way, a custom-built with slightly cheaper parts isn't going to be that much weaker than your 'beast' pre-built and it will use a heck of a lot less electricity.

Oh and about software: He didn't list Win7 because he probably had Win7 from a previous machine and re-used its license. Not 100% legal, but yet, if you destroy the old copy and/or re-use the HDD in the new setup, nobody is going to know about it. That's something you can't do with a pre-built.

Edit: Woah, what!? I didn't even notice what else you said you spent...

$750 for a 26-inch monitor? *blinks* You got ripped off, I hate to say. I bought mine for $400.
The mouse? I went with a Naga, about the same thing and only $75.
The headset? That's close to what I paid for my Banshee, it was $120.

The speakers? With a GOOD Headset (like the Banshee), you don't even need speakers really. I don't even have a pair of speakers hooked up to my computer at all; I've found that I don't even need them with such an awesome pair of headphones. Unlike a lot of headsets, they cover both ears entirely, and still have a mic, as well as very high quality sound. Every little shuffle of someone's feet in Skyrim, I can hear it. It does nicely for letting me know there's a guard pacing back and forth on the other side of a wall! I can also hear people talking to each other from a few rooms away lol.

That's very hard to do with a pair of speakers unless you turn them up so loud that other sounds (like combat) are loud enough to cause your neighbors to complain to the cops about loud noise.

you make a lot of good points! im on my phone now so i cant break it all down and answer one by one. so for now ill just say.

the monitor is.not a rip off if u saw it. you'd understand, hehe. the refresh rate.is faster than any monitor ive ever.compared it to since the day i bought.it in 2004. ohi shoulda mentioned that part. lol. I go through hardcore gamer phases. what can i say.

agreed with the speakers comment!! thats for sure. definitly dont need them, but some days when my fiancee wants to sit at the computer and watch me play my game while we watch netflix. its helpful in this situation. my headphones cant fit over both our heads

i wish i were home so i could break it down more. i like what ur saying sooon though

[Dhalin]

RE: Finkle: Ahh, I suspected it had something to do with Refresh rate, to be honest I never really saw much difference.

I have a monitor on this computer (in my bedroom) that's a standard LCD monitor and I have an HDTV in the gaming room.

I run WoW and Skyrim on both and I can't really tell the difference (other than the fact the TV is a 36-inch while my monitor is only a 24inch).

I've also watched movies on both and they seemed pretty much the same too. *shrugs*

To each their own I suppose.

[Finkledbody]

RE: Finkle: Ahh, I suspected it had something to do with Refresh rate, to be honest I never really saw much difference.

I have a monitor on this computer (in my bedroom) that's a standard LCD monitor and I have an HDTV in the gaming room.

I run WoW and Skyrim on both and I can't really tell the difference (other than the fact the TV is a 36-inch while my monitor is only a 24inch).

I've also watched movies on both and they seemed pretty much the same too. *shrugs*

To each their own I suppose.

Indeed. i have been able to tell with just a handful of games over the years. mainly fps, and complex games such as the elder scrolls series.

i can truly tell the.difference in color also and the depth of the graphics. my 22" 1080p widescreen that i paid right around $400 (in 09' when i built my quadcore computer) for is just not anywhere in the same class. sad part is, i bought that with the hopes i would get better video to watch movies on over my old 22" led widescreen i had before. it was a marginal improvement. really can only tell on the best of movies like iron man, bad boys, etc.

[Dhalin]

Indeed. i have been able to tell with just a handful of games over the years. mainly fps, and complex games such as the elder scrolls series.

i can truly tell the.difference in color also and the depth of the graphics. my 22" 1080p widescreen that i paid right around $400 (in 09' when i built my quadcore computer) for is just not anywhere in the same class. sad part is, i bought that with the hopes i would get better video to watch movies on over my old 22" led widescreen i had before. it was a marginal improvement. really can only tell on the best of movies like iron man, bad boys, etc.

*nods* To each their own, again..

I wouldn't pay $300 for a noticeable difference "only only a few movies/games"... I nearly could buy two monitors for that and have them side-by-side so I could browse the internet while playing an MMORPG or some-such. lol.

But like I said to each their own.