«

I'm sure you're all probably sick of reading these type of posts.. *grin*,
however since I built my top of the line (well it was at the time, sigh)
1ghz 256mb sdram (etc) machine, my knowledge of what's going on in the
component world has kinda slipped.

I'm looking for the best processor (best being good value for money, but not
crappy) - over 2.5ghz. I don't know if AMD are still "better" than Intel?

Also I need a cheap motherboard that will handle this processor. I just need
a no-frills one that will do the processor justice - don't need onboard
sound/modem.

Obviously I also need some RAM to go in it. I don't know much about DDR ram,
I'm guessing 400mhz PC3200 would do for what I want - but how much? I was
thinking 1 gig of ram, however others tell me 512 would be fine with that
level of processor.. *shrug*..

I'd like to play stuff like Doom 3 and Half Life 2 on this machine. I'm
completely stumped by graphics cards, I see 256mb cards at around the £50
mark (e.g. the "XFX GeForce FX5200 256MB DDR, AGP8x, DVI, TV-Out - Retail
box" from EBuyer) .. but then I see 128mb cards at £140ish (Connect3d ATI
Radeon 9800 PRO 128MB DDR DVI TV-Out Retail Box)... quite confusing.. what
should I go for?

Or, here's hoping (lol), would my current GeForce 4 440MX 64mb do the trick
well enough?

Thanks for any help..

Rachel

Rachel wrote:
> I'm sure you're all probably sick of reading these type of posts..
> *grin*, however since I built my top of the line (well it was at the
> time, sigh) 1ghz 256mb sdram (etc) machine, my knowledge of what's
> going on in the component world has kinda slipped.
>
> I'm looking for the best processor (best being good value for money,
> but not crappy) - over 2.5ghz. I don't know if AMD are still "better"
> than Intel?
>
> Also I need a cheap motherboard that will handle this processor. I
> just need a no-frills one that will do the processor justice - don't
> need onboard sound/modem.
>
> Obviously I also need some RAM to go in it. I don't know much about
> DDR ram, I'm guessing 400mhz PC3200 would do for what I want - but
> how much? I was thinking 1 gig of ram, however others tell me 512
> would be fine with that level of processor.. *shrug*..
>
> I'd like to play stuff like Doom 3 and Half Life 2 on this machine.
> I'm completely stumped by graphics cards, I see 256mb cards at around
> the £50 mark (e.g. the "XFX GeForce FX5200 256MB DDR, AGP8x, DVI,
> TV-Out - Retail box" from EBuyer) .. but then I see 128mb cards at
> £140ish (Connect3d ATI Radeon 9800 PRO 128MB DDR DVI TV-Out Retail
> Box)... quite confusing.. what should I go for?
>
> Or, here's hoping (lol), would my current GeForce 4 440MX 64mb do the
> trick well enough?
>
> Thanks for any help..
>
> Rachel

To play those games i would say 1gig of RAM minimum, otherwise you will have
lengthy loading times. For the g/card go with the radeon 9800 pro, although
don't go for the 128bit bus models, i.e sapphire, (128mb ram is ok). E-buyer
have good deals on cpu+m/board combo's, an Athlon 3200+ xp would be
suffiecient, although an investment in a 64bit cpu would be
advantageous.



--
Can't beat a bit of Bully

Rachel wrote:
> I'm sure you're all probably sick of reading these type of posts.. *grin*,
> however since I built my top of the line (well it was at the time, sigh)
> 1ghz 256mb sdram (etc) machine, my knowledge of what's going on in the
> component world has kinda slipped.
>
> I'm looking for the best processor (best being good value for money, but not
> crappy) - over 2.5ghz. I don't know if AMD are still "better" than Intel?
>
> Also I need a cheap motherboard that will handle this processor. I just need
> a no-frills one that will do the processor justice - don't need onboard
> sound/modem.
>
> Obviously I also need some RAM to go in it. I don't know much about DDR ram,
> I'm guessing 400mhz PC3200 would do for what I want - but how much? I was
> thinking 1 gig of ram, however others tell me 512 would be fine with that
> level of processor.. *shrug*..
>
> I'd like to play stuff like Doom 3 and Half Life 2 on this machine. I'm
> completely stumped by graphics cards, I see 256mb cards at around the £50
> mark (e.g. the "XFX GeForce FX5200 256MB DDR, AGP8x, DVI, TV-Out - Retail
> box" from EBuyer) .. but then I see 128mb cards at £140ish (Connect3d ATI
> Radeon 9800 PRO 128MB DDR DVI TV-Out Retail Box)... quite confusing.. what
> should I go for?
>
> Or, here's hoping (lol), would my current GeForce 4 440MX 64mb do the trick
> well enough?
>
> Thanks for any help..
>
> Rachel
>
>
My 12 month old system works more than adequately, and components should
be remarkably cheap now:
P4 2.8C CPU - overclocked to 3.3Mhz
1024 Mb PC3200 dual channel Kingston DDR-SDRAM
Gigabyte GA8-IPE 1000 Pro 2, Rev 3 Motherboard
GeCube 128Mb, 400Mhz ATI Radeon 9800 Pro VGA card
Additional system cooling, naturally.
The motherboard is of intrest, it supports up to 4000 Mb RAM, SATA, 8X
AGP slot, dual BIOS, ethernet. It's not blazingly fast, but is rock
solid and reliable.
Two 80 Gb 7200rpm ATA HDDs, with 8Mb cache.
Windows XP Home (soon to be Pro) on Hda
Mandrake Linux 10.1 on Hdb
This system handles Doom 3, UT 2004 etc without batting an eyelid, and
performs complex multimedia tasks excellently.


--
Parko
Registered Linux User #339345
Hmm, a 64 bit system with Mandrake 10.1 64 bit edition OS is looking
pretty good for early next year...

Intel Retail Box Products offer excellent quality and a 3 year warranty.

http://www.intel.com/design/motherbd/cy/

512MB ram should be sufficient.

Get a video card with at least 256MB of RAM.

Pricewatch.com keywords...
mobo: d915p retail
cpu: microprocessors pc 775 retail
ram: system memory ddr2-533
video: video cards pci express 256mb