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"My (planned) Gaming rig"

Ok. I've been doing a lot of research recently and I plan to build a new computer from parts brought from the ludicrously cheap e-buyer. (Thanks to Uncle Albert)

However - This is where you lot come into play - This is only a plan for what spec I want - Please make any suggestions/changes and additions to anything that I may of missed out. I'm not exactly the cleverest person when it comes to choosing parts - All the different spec's and stuff are a tad daunting.

MSI KT4V-L SKT A 8X AGP DDR/Sound/lan/USB2.0 Motherboard - £45.48

AMD ATHLON XP2800+ 333MHz FSB Barton 512kb L2 Cache OEM - £102.51

PC3200 512mb 400MHz DDR RAM - £49.99

Soundblaster 5.1 Live OEM - £20.96

Seagate Barracuda 80Gb 7200rpm UDMA100 Hard Drive OEM - £54.99

Sapphire Radeon 9600PRO 128MB DDR DVI-I TV-Out Lite Retail - £116.16

JNC 4JA 121(a) Red ATX Midi Tower Case 300w PSU - £11.75

Liteon 52x24x52 IDE Internal CD-RW Drive Retail Box - £26.50

Aopen 16x48 IDE DVD Drive Retail Box - £19.99

Alps Floppy Disk Drive 1.44MB 3.5 inch internal OEM - £4.70

Coolermaster CP5-6J31C Socket A Upto XP3000 AMD Approved - £4.91

Chic 870 Scrolling Mouse PS/2 - £1.32

PS/2 Keyboard for Windows UK Version - £1.40

AC Power Lead (Kettle Type) Suitable for ATX PSU - £0.99

USEDSamsung 17 Monitoir SM753S 17 FST .23 70KHz MPR2 - £60.26

Logitech S2-50 2w RMS Speaker Beige OEM - £7.25

Ex VAT = £535.15
Inc VAT = £628.86

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Questions.

1) Is this setup decent? Can you suggest any changes
2) What the monkey does OEM mean
3) Is the motherboard ok for this setup?
4) What about the graphics card?
5) Would this be suitable for running games like Rise Of Nations or Half Life 2?
6) Have I missed anything out (cables/leads etc)
7) Is the case suitable? Or do I need something better?

Thanks.

gamezfreak

You can get the same one for £22 here:

http://www.aria.co.uk/ ProductsList.asp?Submit=Search&Category=13


They have quite a good selection of heatsinks.

The heatsink looks really good, but the fan doesn't have huge airflow (20CFM max). For the price you should really be able to get better. That said, I'm sure it does the job more than aptly.

The heatsink is probably good enough for it not to require a hugely powerful fan.


That and a few case fans should be more than adequate. I'll have a quick look around for you.

TFT/LCD are nice n flashy an everything - But you have to fork out loads! I'd rather spend the money on a decent CRT.

CRT's are'nt that chunky - Some of the buggers are fairly cheap and can easily pump out a decent enough picture at a high resolution.

If I had the cash i'd probably go for an LCD. But I don't.

Anyway.

Found a really cool copper heatsink and fan for the CPU and a few "silent" fans for the case.

http://www.overclock.co.uk/customer/product.php? productid=16837&cat=295&page=1

(Remove space)

That and a few case fans should be apt enough should'nt it?

No-one I know buys pre-built PCs. One of the monitors I used cost over £500, more than the rest of the components put together. This hideously expensive monitor still suffered from ghosting effects, as did the cheaper ones I've used.

One was a 17" CTX
One was a 17" Samsung
The other two were 15" AOC's.

The Samsung one was the most expensive, although it's probably cheaper now considering this was around 3 months ago.

Needless to say that when I see the problem noted by dozens of sources in the media for myself on four seperate occasions I tend to agree.


Maybe I just notice it more than others.

Memorandum wrote:
> Considering one of them cost more than the rest of the PC together
> did, I should hope not. It had a response time of 25ms and still
> didn't perform to my liking. And like I said, this is a well
> documented problem with TFT monitors, apart from my personal
> experiences, there are plenty of PC magazines and websites which will
> back me up.

Eh ? This only cost an additional £260 on top of the base price -

I paid £1209 for;

17inch digital TFT monitor
2.6 Ghz P4 with hyperthreading
512mb ram (400mhz)
ATI Radeon 9800 card
Soundblaster Live 5.1
80GB Hard drive
Floppy
16x DVD Rom
52x CD Writer
2.1 Speaker/subwoofer system
Cordless Logitech keyboard+optical mouse
Lexmark printer
Windows XP Home + Norton Antivirus
All cables/windows disc etc
Delivery

I'm not saying you are wrong, just that I'm sitting here playing Raven Shield, Viet Cong, Vice City, Breed Demo, and a host of other games, all on max settings, and it's flawless. Whilst I'm no PC expert I have been using them for over 6 years and I know a good display when I see it.

£350.

T'is a little pricey if you ask me. You get get a top graphics card for that price.

CRT's are bulky buggers - But there is still life in em. Good quality aswell.

I will be getting a TFT as soon as possible, far more convenient to carry around to LANs etc than a 19" CRT..Apply the same principle to that as to any other purchase, you get what you pay for, spend more money to get a decent one and you wont have any issues with ghosting or blurry text. You can get a very nice Samsung 17" for £350, which I'd recommend to any gamers or people who use monitors for DVDs as a superb monitor for the job.

CRT is the way to go to save a lil cash.

It even says in this months issue of PCformat (yes I casually read it)

So i'm with Memmers on this small arguement.

I think a point worth noting on the CRT v TFT debate is that I used to get eyestrain after about 30mins on my old 17" CRT, when running at 1024x768 @ 85Hz. I now use a 17" TFT, running 1280x1024 @ 75Hz and can go for hours on end without any pain in my eyes whatsoever.

For me, this makes the extra premium and slight 'ghosting' worth it. :)

Practical Magic wrote:
> You must have used a crap TFT then, this one from Dell (17inch) rocks,
> Dell uses rebadged Samsung ones - no motion blurring, no smudging,
> 75HZ refresh, 1280x1024 resolution, no flicker, crystal clear and way
> better than any CRT I've seen.

Considering one of them cost more than the rest of the PC together did, I should hope not. It had a response time of 25ms and still didn't perform to my liking. And like I said, this is a well documented problem with TFT monitors, apart from my personal experiences, there are plenty of PC magazines and websites which will back me up.

> CRT is dead, when upgrading why would anyone want the equivalent of a
> small stack of bricks on the desktop when you can have the wonderful
> space savingness of TFT ?

And why would you pay £500+ for a good TFT monitor when you can pay £130 for a 19" CRT capable of 2048x1568 at 85Hz or 1600x1200 at 100Hz?

The price is far too much to justify some saved space.