What is your PC setup?

[vangaren]

I've recently decided to make a gaming PC build, and I'm curious what other people use or have built themselves.

Case: Thermaltake VHF1000BWS MicroATX desktop case
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811133035

Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-G33M-DS2R. LGA775 Intel motherboard, 1333/1066MHZ FSB, max ram 8 gig DDR2 1066(OC)/800, 1 PCI x16, 1 PCI x4, 2 PCI, 4 USB, 2 PS/2, 1 com, 1 lpt, micro atx form factor
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...k=ga-g33m-ds2r

CPU: (debating one of these 2)
Intel Core 2 Duo E6600, 2.4GHz, 4M L2, LGA775, 1066 FSB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819115003
Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 2.66 GHz, 4M L2, LGA775, 1333 FSB
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...5029&Tpk=e6750

RAM: (found some cheap PC5300, will upgrade to PC6400 or PC8500, and max out with 4 or 8 GB)
PNY 2GB (2x 1GB) Dual Channel PC53000
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage....=1166236338366

Hard Drive: Seagate 320GB 7200 RPM 16MB cache 3 gb/s SATA
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822148140

Video Card: BFH 7950GT 256MB GDDR3 PCI Express x16 OC
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...Tpk=BFG%2b7950

Power Supply: Antex NeoHE 550 ATX12V, modular cabling (needed in a small case like this)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...ec%2bneo%2b550

CD drive: haven't picked one yet

OS: Windows Xp Pro

Only other thing I'm adding is a 2 slot cooling fan that'll fit into the PCI slots in the back of the case to help cool the video card. That and maybee a control panel to monitor/control fan speeds.

Any thoughts on what would help this system run Final Fantasy XI better? I've seen a ton of high quality screenshots from various people, so if you post your system specs in here, include one so we can see how good it'll run the graphics (framerate would be cool too)

[Killgannon]

imo ditch intel, they suck AMD for life.

secondly running everything on a big ole harddrive isnt ideal, more ideally (to me at least) is one smaller drive for the OS and the a larger drive for whatever other shit i wanna save (mp3s movies etc) now you may be asking why...

well if your drive ever decides "fuck you dude im done" and crashes and you have one giant partition (sometimes even if you do partition it) then you lose everything... all those mp3s you downloaded, all those movies, all those porns etc...

again this just my opinion and how i do things, but there ya go

[vangaren]

I've considered using 2 drives set up in a raid 1 setup. Maybee a seagate 160gb. or setup 2 of those in a raid 0 and just backup once a week to a 500gb external drive.gb


Seagate 320gb
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822148140
1700 reviews, 5 stars (eggs), 16mb cache, average seek time 8.5ms, sata 3gb/s connection, $75

Seagate 160gb
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822148230
25 reviews, 4 stars(eggs), 8mb cache, average seek time 11ms, sata 3gb/s, $53

seagate 250gb
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822148261
1 review, 5 stars (eggs), 16mb cache, average seek time 8.5ms, sata 3gb/s, $65

I'll go with the 320gb one because its so used by so many, good cache, good seek time, good price/gb. I can raid 1 it at a later point.

[sekaran]

I'd pick a C2D over AMD's lineup any day right now.

Intel Intel Core 2 Duo [email protected]
Gigabyte 965P-DS3
2048 MB of OCZ PC2-6400
eVGA 8800 GTS Nvidia GeForce 8800
Western Digital Raptor 74.0 GB @ 10000 RPMS
Western Digital 2x500GB 7200RPM SATA

My current setup.

[Epical]

imo ditch intel, they suck AMD for life.

Wut.

[Grandcross]

I just recently built this rig.

Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 2.4GHz (running @ 3GHz)
ASUS P5N32-E SLI PLUS
Patriot Extreme Performance 4GB 2X2GB PC2-6400
evga 8800 gtx ko acs
74GB Raptor
360GB Western Digital harddrive
XiFi sound card

i think thats it.

[Tirrock]

Can you even set up RAID in that case and still have a CD/DVD drive? Micro-ATX cases are tiny. For a gaming system, I'd go with normal ATX motherboard/case, and only do micro-ATX if you're planning on moving your PC around a lot.

I recently got my computer, it has:
Abit I-35 Pro motherboard
Intel e6750 processor
XFX 8800GTS 320MB
WinXP Pro
RAIDMAX SMILODON ATX-612WBP Black SECC STEEL ATX Mid Tower Computer Case
LITE-ON 20X DVD±R DVD Burner With 12X DVD-RAM Write Black SATA Model LH-20A1S - Retail
SAMSUNG SpinPoint T Series HD501LJ 500GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM
OCZ GameXStream OCZ600GXSSLI ATX12V 600W Power Supply - Retail
CORSAIR XMS2 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model TWIN2X2048-6400C4 - Retail

I don't really care for the case or power supply, though. The power supply cables would fit better in a full tower, since there's so much excess cable. The case isn't terrible, but it has a few stupid parts to it.

Edit: I forgot about the "run FFXI better" part. I haven't tried to run FFXI on my new computer, because my 4 year old dell is fast enough to handle FFXI on near max settings. 2.53GHz processor, 512MB PC2700 RAM (lol), ATi 9600XT 128MB. I just can't turn on full shadows in crowded areas. Whitegate AH brings me down to 10FPS with full shadows on. I run it at 1024x1024 background, 1152x864 front (only because any higher and I can't read the HP/MP of party members on this monitor). It doesn't take much to run FFXI like a champ.

[Skyylya]

I just recently built my new PC (an aside, whoever said intel sucks and AMD rocks, what planet are you living on? the Core 2 duo beats the shit out of any AMD right now.)

EVGA GeForce 8800 GTX 768MB PCIe w/Dual DVI
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications ... =E145-8000

Corsair XMS3 2048MB PC10600 DDR3 1333MHz (2x1024)
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications ... u=C13-7082

Lite-on White 52xCDRW/16x DVD Combo Drive
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications ... u=L12-1046

Intel Core2 Duo E6600 2.4Ghz Socket 775 (atm OC'd to 2.65ghz only)
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications ... -DUO-E6600

NexTherm ICS8200ML Black AC Cooling Case No PSU
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications ... =S457-1048

Asus P5K3 Deluxe WiFi Intel P35 Socket 775 Motherb
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications ... Sku=A455-2

Corsair HX Series CMPSU-620HX 620W Power Supply
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDe ... ode=373110

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6822148140
Seagate 320mb 7200.10 16mb cache 7200 rpm HDD (got it at retail store, not ordered )

There's a few things I shoulda done differently. i.e. I shoulda gotten the e6750 so I could make use of the 1333mhz FSB that the e6600 isn't rated for (didn't find out til to late, DO YOUR RESEARCH BETTER). Everything else is fantastic. Problem I have right now is that a lot of my parts are so new that there isn't a lot of info out and a lot of the PC monitoring programs don't recognize them properly. Like, cpu-z can't read my RAM properly and reports fucked up latency's that are different than the bios. So my overclocking effort is going slowly, I might just focus on the CPU and raise the GPU a couple mhz and leave the RAM alone for now. Gonna work on it more when i get more freetime.

This runs anything and runs it well, was expensive but not ridiculously expensive. Maybe at xmas i'll get the e6750 and sell the e6600 or use it and build my fiance a PC as her laptop is quite dated.

Edit: For whoever asked, I wouldn't really worry about setting up a RAID unless you know you're going to be making use of it. RAID doesn't help every aspect if your computer, it actually has pretty limited real world use for the casual gamer. RAID will increase the speed of your reading info from each drive since it access both at the same time. It is good if you do a lot of multi drive, multitasking with video editing etc... but if you're just gameing, you're really better off getting a single drive, or two drives if you want your OS on a standalone drive and using that. There's a lot of debate on using raid vs. not using raid and people stand on both sides. Also it increases the risk of drive failure (albeit slightly, it's still there). As I said before, unless you know the uses of RAID and what you'll be doing is going to make use of it, don't bother setting it up as it's not really gonna help the majority of PC users out there.

[Amele]

imo ditch intel, they suck AMD for life.

Wut.

If I was buying now, C2D for sure. - AMD's been lagging since the 939's really. (AM2 was a joke.)

depending on what AMD does with AM3 (and if they make their ship dates) the story might be different in four months.


I've got a 939 system atm. (it's a little over a year old now.)

opteron 185, SLI 7800GTX, 2 GB 3/3/3/7 400MHz DDR.
(it's overclocked about 10% atm. 2.6->2.85, 400->438ish, etc.) still standard voltages.

[Kinto]

2x eVGA 8800GTX stock
QX6700 OC'd to 3.0ghz
CoolIT freezone CPU cooler
eVGA 680i revision
2gigs of corsairXMS2
150gig raptor for games/apps
500gig HDD for music/photos
Coolermaster 850w PCU
Coolermaster Stacker 830 case (modified side fan exhaust to accmodate CPU cooler)


Any C2D > AMD CPUs.

[Amele]

Any C2D > AMD CPUs.

ehh. this isn't quite true either.

if you mean "any C2D > AMD CPUs in comparable price ranges" then yes. but the worst C2D is not better than the 'best' AMD (or even a middle range AMD really.)

[Vertabreaker]

This is my AMD rig:

Motherboard: Asus M2N32 SLi-Deluxe Wireless Edition
CPU: AMD Athlon 64 X2 6000+ 3.0 GHz Dual Core
RAM: 2 GB of CORSAIR XMS2
Graphics Card: 2 x 512MB Evga GeForce 7950 GT KO
Moniter: 2 x Samsung 20.1in Widescreen LCDs
HDD: 2 x 200GB 7200RPM SATA
DVD: Lite-On Dual layer DVD/CD-R/RW combo drive.
Case: Antec full tower(Heavy as a bitch lol)

Currently building a C2D case and going to sell my AMD parts.

[Kinto]

Any C2D > AMD CPUs.

ehh. this isn't quite true either.

if you mean "any C2D > AMD CPUs in comparable price ranges" then yes. but the worst C2D is not better than the 'best' AMD (or even a middle range AMD really.)

I should've worded it better, basically what you implied.

[Ferien]

Finally overhauled my rig last month, either the CPU or Mobo fried and they were 4 years old so I figured it's better to just buy new ones. Here are my specs now (the important ones at least):

Mobo: ASRock 4CoreDual-VSTA LGA 775 VIA PT880 Ultra ATX
CPU: Intel C2D E6420 2.13GHz
Video Card: EVGA GeForce 7800GS 256MB 256-bit GDDR3 AGP 4X/8X
RAM: DDRAM 512X2|64X64 C2 3500 ELDC OCZ%
HDs: 2x 80GB 7200 RPM Maxtors (SATA RAID0) for games, 1x 160GB for Windows/Storage

Bought the mobo because I didn't want to replace my video card and RAM at the same time as my CPU/Mobo, and it supports AGP and PCIe as well as DDR1 and 2, so it's a pretty good stepping stone. CPU blows away my old P4, even with the 25% OC I had on the old one.

Really, REALLY need a RAM upgrade though. Shit's killing me.