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"PC buying advice....."

Posted this in the gaming forum and then realised this place existed, so ummm here's the same post again.

Looking into getting a PC and to be honest I know jack all about computers these days. So I'd be greatful of any advice you can give me on specs to be looking for. I want a good PC that won't need to be upgraded for a while, doesn't have to be top of the range though.

Oh and also where's a good place to look for one? I'm the sort of idiot who buys the first one he sets eyes on when he walks into PC world so I really could do with some advice.

Oh and please don't tell me I'd be best off making it myself. I know it'd probably work out a lot cheaper but I have neither the time or the L337 skills for something like that.

Cheers for the help...if you helped.

Bear in mind what Alastair just said - that is some good info. EDIT - although I will slip in a suggestion for a Logitech MX1000 mouse - unbeatable in my opinion.

£1000? Do you know anyone who is good at PC-building? Ask them to build you a machine and save some cash. A few of us here could do it, but you'd really need someone local, for support etc.

Custom-built PCs > all this Dell/Mesh crap.

Cheers for the posts, definetly muchos helpful to me. I'm slowly getting the hang of all the different specs and what to look for but it'll take a while.

Still, I'm not gonna rush into buying the 'puter. I'll wait till after E3 just to make sure Microsoft aren't gonna do anything amazing with Xbox 2, by then I should have tired of Chaos Theory so I'll sell my Xbox to help with the costs.

Out of intrest what do you guys think of the Sapphire Radeon X800 Pro 256 mb graphics card?

Tiltawhirl wrote:
> Out of intrest what do you guys think of the Sapphire Radeon X800 Pro
> 256 mb graphics card?

I want it, that's for sure :D

If you can get the VIVO version, it's possible to get it to perform close to an X800 XT.

Yeah I have Tthe Sapphire X800 XT PE, excellent card so I am sure the Pro will be decent. Go to google and put in X800 Pro benchtes**ts. It will basically show you what frame rate you will get with different processors etc at different settings. If you are going to scrap console gaming altogether then it is worth going all out on a PC that will run s**tuff at decent settings.

Seriously, you could build it yourself. There is nothing to it. The only tricky part is making sure you don't have deathmonkey hands when applying some thermal pas**te to your CPU. The res**t is like someone has already pointed out, like expensive lego.

Brand names are jus**t sh*t to be hones**t. If you wander into PC World and have a look at their bench mark £1500 PC's, they have £40-50 graphics cards in them with really crap generic RAM, a crap case, no possibility of future upgrades due to no expansion slots etc. Not only is it cheaper but you can cus**tomise it completely and get better s**tuff for your dosh. Tis a bit of a myth why more people don't do it as it really isn't that difficult. Ins**talling Windows is pish and only involves a couple of DOS commands and a couple of mouse clicks and the res**t is done automatically.

Providing you don't play Star Wars music whils**t trying to fit your daddy long schlong into the CD drive I am sure you will s**tay perfectly normal, completely un-geekified ;)

If you're using XP, I don't think there are any DOS commands. Simply put in the disk and turn on the PC (assuming BIOS is set to boot from CD Drive). Windows tutorial will guide you through partitioning etc.

True, I think the bootbale XP CD's actually take you through the fdisk commands before formatting.

Piece of pish.

If you wouldn't feel comfortable with or wouldn't know how to replace something like a DVD drive, sound card or memory stick then definetly definetly definetly do not consider building your own PC. What most of the guys on this thread are forgetting is that during builds things often go wrong, and if you don't have the expertise required to diagnose the problem then at best it's going to cause a lot of frustration, at worst it'll be an expensive disaster. My advice to you would be to go pick up one of those massively-fat PC magazines from your local newsagent - these are crammed with adverts for practically every known computer brand, and flicking through these will give you a good idea of what you might want and what you don't. Also the magazines often do roundups of current computers which are interesting reads if you're in the market.

If you do know of anyone who is more technically minded and may be able to build it for you, give them £50 or whatever and ask them nicely. You'll get a much better deal, and someone to call if it goes wrong.

Hairy mu*f. Stick with the local dudes and see what they offer first.

The X800 Pro cards are poor to be honest. They cost too much for too little performance and the VIVO mod to XT is a lot of hassle. It gets quite complex due to some new technologies that have come in lately, but if you get a computer that has the most up to date motherboard, then it will likely use a type of graphics card connector called PCI-Express instead of the older AGP.

The best value for money gamers video card out there right now is the ATI X800XL. It costs the same but is a lot faster. However, I don't think any of them are available for motherboards that use AGP.

Since I imagine you want to play games and want best bang for buck, as opposed to the best for some types of video encoding, go for an AMD Athlon 64.

Put it this way, for your grand you shouldn't accept anything less than:

Athlon 64 3500
1GB of RAM
ATI X800XL
200GB hard drive

as that lot, along with fancy motherboard was around £700.