Computer Specs and (?)'s

[XaocRamuh]

Here's what you do:

Go to Alienware.com, and price a good medium line system. Look at each of the parts, write down the model numbers, HDD sizes, etc.. Next, go to Pricewatch.com or Newegg.com, and price out these same parts, at a MUCH lower price. Next, order these parts, and build the system that you want. While Dell makes great business/work PCs, they do NOT make great gaming PCs. Dell is a consumer PC maker. Alienware is a gamer PC maker. Because Alienware is going to cost you an arm and a leg to have them buold the system for you, don't purchase from them, unless you have the money to spend. Just use their site as a guide line and price everything yourself. You'll find that you will save a bunch of money, and get much better products then Dell could ever produce.

P.S.: Substitue Alienware for any gamer PC manufacturer of your choice.

[Shinigami]

Well normally, they don't appeal to gamers , but this system is made just for gamers, specifically. If you'd follow the link and compare a midline alien ware you'd notice they have the same specs bassically.

(yes alien ware is greater though =P)

[Demetrick]

to the OP, you probably can run FFXI at full res. full effects and have no problems. When I upgraded my PC and amped it up, I was pretty impressed at the detail ingame that I missed on my old PC.

My PC (Hardcore alienware area-51 upgrade)
P-IV 3.6, 2GIG RAM, 2x120 Gig drives, i think same video something-256mb. blah blah blah, anyways. only problem is after a couple days the cooling system sounds like an airplane

I don't know how to build a PC, I don't want to learn, I can afford what I want, but that doesn't make me better or worse than anyone.

Geno~ Try and offer "why" those are mistakes rather than being a forum elitist and just say they are. Without edumacating us, we're just the dumber and you'll continue to be pissed at our not-knowing-nor-caring-about-building-a-PC-greatness.

[vudoodoodoo]

It doesn't take much to run FFXI. Your computer can probably run all the newest games at full specs w/o any problems, so don't worry about FFXI.

[Endo]

and on today's animal planet special...

the 1337 nerds defend their territory

buwahahahahahahahha

Almaa @23% BFI now down from 29% thanks a ton

Oh and I built mine:

Athlon 64 3700+
1 GB of dual high performance corsair RAM timing is at 3x3x2 I think(it has lights on it lol)
Radeon X850
MSI K8 nero platinum mobo
120 GB toshiba HD
30 GB Raptor 7200 RPM (want another but just too expensive)
Soundblaster Audigy Gamer platinum edition (this has all kinds of stuff that I have no idea how it works)
Klipch 7.1 surround with 15" powered subwoofer. Sattelites also have noise reduction on each individual speaker.

I really want to get liquid cooling but its just so expensive. Currently I have to take the side off my case after 48hrs or so just to keep the temp stable. FF is designed for dial up and middle of the road cpu anyway. So get what you can afford. Also dont be afraid to try to build your own. Get the parts and its fairly easy to plug shit in to the slots.

[Shinigami]

Lol, I can install items , I just didn't wanna waste my money building a computer, Plus I'm also working most of the time or in college, Didn't have alot of time to play around, Keep those specs coming guys, It's cool to hear about these other parts, who knows maybe it will help someone out.

[Raineer]

P-IV 3.6, 2GIG RAM, 2x120 Gig drives, i think same video something-256mb. blah blah blah, anyways. only problem is after a couple days the cooling system sounds like an airplane

I just built one last week, very similar stats. Intel D925XECV2 mobo with 3.6, 256mb geforce pro PCIx-16 as well.

My god the cooling is so loud, I've never thought of going to liquid but seriously considering it now. Anyone use it and can provide feedback on compressor/pump noise levels? I have like 5 fans in the case and the temps are still higher than Intel's software likes it (like I care) but it's pretty warm.

Edit: Regarding Dell, the problem is that PC makers have different "levels" of mobo's and components they can use. I can show you 2 128meg graphics cards and one is $200 bucks and one is $9.95. And if you compare memory size and latency they are exact matches (and actually neither is lying.) The difference is internal components and the makeup of the boards.

This is why all us 1337 g33ks focus so much on benchmarking. I won't say that your system is crappy or anything, it just has a chance to be. I work for a big pc company (hint hint) and you'd be surprised at how much the quality of the components can vary from model to model even with the exact same specs.

[Demetrick]

n00b question to the 1337ers.

What is benchmarking?

[Endo]

There are diffrent tests you can run that basically stress your machine and score it. If you go to this page http://www.pcpitstop.com you can register for free and put your cpu through a series of tests all for free. At the end they will show how you scored and what your scores are as compared to other similar machines tested. It will also diagnose problems you may be having IE: cache size, more ram, spyware, virus'. The only problem is that it will only test your video card in 16bit (they are currently working on a 32bit) so set your graphics to 16bit when you run this. Also it conflicts with Norton and Zonealarm so turn those off.

[Raineer]

Basically it's just a program that measures how fast your PC (or it's components) are. Anything can be benchmarked, processor, mobo, memory, HDD's, graphics cards... It's a way to measure a certain setup and compare it to other PC's or setups.

[Mikeal]

Very Nice tengar, You putting it together yourself?

Prescot's are shit.
When they came out, they were actually slower then the prior version of the chip. They even rolled the high end chips out of that model back into the old style.

Shuttle? umm... I shouldnt even have to explain this.

AMD64 is by far the best gaming platform available at the moment.
Asus is my motherboard of choice
ATI/Nvidia... hehe who really cards, it doesnt matter that much really. I use Nvidia somtimes because it has better driver support for other OS's. Currently I have a 9800 256 and I see no reason to upgrade until there is a reason to move my motherboard to mini pci


... buy a dell is kinda of stupid for playing games. Great for people that have no idea what they are doing though. They will come to your house and fix it, which prevents people from calling me, so its never a bad recommendation.

[Amarao]

my computer is literally...the epitome of shit. Vudoo was right a page back when he said it doesn't really take much to run FFXI. I run it on...decent graphics i guess, and i play fine until dynamis when it reaches it's playing limit and explodes.

Any computer, including Shinigami's can run ffxi TONS better than the one I'm on right now.

[Shinigami]

lol =P

[vudoodoodoo]

Very Nice tengar, You putting it together yourself?

Prescot's are shit.
When they came out, they were actually slower then the prior version of the chip. They even rolled the high end chips out of that model back into the old style.

Shuttle? umm... I shouldnt even have to explain this.

AMD64 is by far the best gaming platform available at the moment.
Asus is my motherboard of choice
ATI/Nvidia... hehe who really cards, it doesnt matter that much really. I use Nvidia somtimes because it has better driver support for other OS's. Currently I have a 9800 256 and I see no reason to upgrade until there is a reason to move my motherboard to mini pci


... buy a dell is kinda of stupid for playing games. Great for people that have no idea what they are doing though. They will come to your house and fix it, which prevents people from calling me, so its never a bad recommendation.

omgz u are such teh uber l337 computer g33k.

[Sadler]

The battle between AMD and Intel starts again.....

Everyone went AMD for price, not peformance. Plus there lack of respect to customers makes me Laugh... when you buy a XP3000 64 bit you are only getting 1.8GHz processor speed. I think they have become money greedy fags like intel use to be.

I use to be a AMD fan when it use to be K6-2 and the original Slot athlons but now everyone is blinded by there false advertising and so called "Performance".


Intel have a P4 Xtreme Edition coming out soon which "Will" be 64 bit with Duel Core and Hyper threading.... meaning yes.... you guessed it. Windows will be seeing 4 processors. So for all of those that bought AMD 64bits are gonna get shafted pretty soon

Intel never pushed figures in your face like AMD do so I will happily back them in this war for sheer customer respect.

I make gaming computers for a living so il tell you if your chatting shit you l33t n00bs.

[Endo]

The battle between AMD and Intel starts again.....

Everyone went AMD for price, not peformance. Plus there lack of respect to customers makes me Laugh... when you buy a XP3000 64 bit you are only getting 1.8GHz processor speed. I think they have become money greedy fags like intel use to be.

I use to be a AMD fan when it use to be K6-2 and the original Slot athlons but now everyone is blinded by there false advertising and so called "Performance".


Intel have a P4 Xtreme Edition coming out soon which "Will" be 64 bit with Duel Core and Hyper threading.... meaning yes.... you guessed it. Windows will be seeing 4 processors. So for all of those that bought AMD 64bits are gonna get shafted pretty soon

Intel never pushed figures in your face like AMD do so I will happily back them in this war for sheer customer respect.

I make gaming computers for a living so il tell you if your chatting shit you l33t n00bs.

[Septimus]

The battle between AMD and Intel starts again.....

Everyone went AMD for price, not peformance. Plus there lack of respect to customers makes me Laugh... when you buy a XP3000 64 bit you are only getting 1.8GHz processor speed. I think they have become money greedy fags like intel use to be.

I use to be a AMD fan when it use to be K6-2 and the original Slot athlons but now everyone is blinded by there false advertising and so called "Performance".


Intel have a P4 Xtreme Edition coming out soon which "Will" be 64 bit with Duel Core and Hyper threading.... meaning yes.... you guessed it. Windows will be seeing 4 processors. So for all of those that bought AMD 64bits are gonna get shafted pretty soon

Intel never pushed figures in your face like AMD do so I will happily back them in this war for sheer customer respect.

I make gaming computers for a living so il tell you if your chatting shit you l33t n00bs.

Lujan, you know I love it when you start talking neardy.

[Shinigami]

YES IT"S HERE MY COMPUER IS HERE, and holy shit, it's fucking huge, it's like 2 feet tall and a foot wide, and weighs about 48 pounds... jesus it's soooo sweet, *blinded by the new computery goodness*

[Mikeal]

The battle between AMD and Intel starts again.....

Everyone went AMD for price, not peformance. Plus there lack of respect to customers makes me Laugh... when you buy a XP3000 64 bit you are only getting 1.8GHz processor speed. I think they have become money greedy fags like intel use to be.

I use to be a AMD fan when it use to be K6-2 and the original Slot athlons but now everyone is blinded by there false advertising and so called "Performance".

Intel have a P4 Xtreme Edition coming out soon which "Will" be 64 bit with Duel Core and Hyper threading.... meaning yes.... you guessed it. Windows will be seeing 4 processors. So for all of those that bought AMD 64bits are gonna get shafted pretty soon

Intel never pushed figures in your face like AMD do so I will happily back them in this war for sheer customer respect.

I make gaming computers for a living so il tell you if your chatting shit you l33t n00bs.

Your right about one thing, k6-2 was the shit in its time.

You make gaming systems for a living, and your going to by a p4 EE.
Nice, idea, find me a game with multiprocessor support for 4 cpus?
I dont think one exist. There isnt even many that will run 2. FFXI is slower in MP machines.

p4EE will be stupid expensive too.

Only getting a 1.8Ghz cpu... Are you still of the moronic generation that relates CPU speed directly to mhz/ghz?

any moron can put a computer together. any moron can read pc shopper and get the parts with the highest stats. mmm k?

[Sadler]

Your right about one thing, k6-2 was the shit in its time.

You make gaming systems for a living, and your going to by a p4 EE.
Nice, idea, find me a game with multiprocessor support for 4 cpus?
I dont think one exist. There isnt even many that will run 2. FFXI is slower in MP machines.

p4EE will be stupid expensive too.

Only getting a 1.8Ghz cpu... Are you still of the moronic generation that relates CPU speed directly to mhz/ghz?

any moron can put a computer together. any moron can read pc shopper and get the parts with the highest stats. mmm k?

I live in a world of Exp and Facts. Benchmarks have proven to me that Pentium machines currently out perform what AMD and its market have to offer.

Also the 4 CPU thing was just a fact, since there is only afew "Products" that even use 64bit technology. Lemme guess "But games out today support it".... how can games play on a 64 bit platform if the 64 bit operating system is still in beta stages. HERE IS SOME BULLETS..... THEY JUST HAVENT MADE A GUN FOR IT YET!

I havent had one complaint yet about the advice I give and I have proven alot of narrow minded monkeys wrong in my time.....

But I guess I should end this the open minded way

AMD or INTEL? Its personal Pref