New Computer for old man
 

My topic title about says it all. I am a one game gamer. I have been waiting for SH4 ever since it was announced. I am 57 years old and do not know if I want to spend $1600.00 at Bestbuy buying a super gamer computer for just one game. I now have a P4 2.4gig, 1 and 1/2 G memory and a 256mb Ati X800 pro video card. I think to be able to appreciate the beauty of this game I need to upgrade the above mentioned items. Right now I play on medium graphics with no check marked boxes and no AA. My monitor will support the higher resolutions so that is not a problem. I thought updating just my memory and processor speed would do but not according to BB. My video card is AGP and will not fit in the Acer 1500; which contain 2 gig of 5300 DDR memory and a dual core Athlom amd 4400 processor. Therefore they suggested a geforce Nvidia 256mg card the 7800 to go with this Acer unit. By the time their geek squad and sales tax and 2 year warranty is added on I am up to $1400, The other $200.00 goes to 2 gig more memory totalling out to 4 gig total. I need the opinion of you fine folks here as that will determine if I am a crazy old fool or not. Any bad or good criticism would be useful. Thanks in advance Bw Chaney:know:

I wouldn't go for a 256mb video card.

You'll want at least 512mb to make the whole purchase worthwhile.

Seems pretty pricey but at the end of the day if your going to spend $1300 on a PC why not add a few hundred and make it significantly better.

Can't advise you on a better place to shop as I'm not on your continent :) but I find that once you know the names of the parts you want for a PC, you can go to smaller shops and they will do it cheaper.

Also, if you know someone who will put it together for you, you save a lot of money.

If you are intelligent enough to play Silent Hunter and work out a firing solution, then building your own PC will not be a problem, and I daresay you could do it for a lot less than the figure you are being quoted there if you bought all the components yourself and put them together.

You already have the necessary tools to find out all you need to know in order to build a machine (i.e. a bit of a search on the internet to determine which components are compatible with which other ones). But if you've not contemplated doing this before, I can recommend the following book as a good source of information (see link), and it should give you the confidence to build something from scratch.

http://www.amazon.com/Complete-Idiot...6865208&sr=8-4

The title won't do much for your ego, but it is a very good book.

Putting more RAM or another AGP graphics card in your current PC will probably turn out to be false economy, in that the AGP format is rapidly giving way to PCI, which means that you'd need a PCI-compatible motherboard if you want performance. This is not necessarily a bad thing, as a more modern motherboard will support faster bus speeds, thus enabling you to put more efficient RAM in.

If you do decide to build a PC from scratch, there will be several components you could salvage from your current PC and incorporate (most likely the case, the hard drives, although probably not the power supply as a faster graphics card will probably draw more power - don't forget you might need to stick a better cooling fan in too). However, even having to do that will make it somewhat cheaper than going for a pre-built new PC, as you won't be buying components you already have.

On the other hand, if building something is not for you, I would suggest doing a wider search on the web for something. It always pays to shop around. One advantage to buying a ready-made system would of course be that you could go for something with Microsoft's new Vista operating system pre-installed, as this is generally the cheapest way to buy an operating system, given that new-build PCs usually get hold of Vista for a pittance. Doing this would go some way towards future-proofing your PC a little bit (which is always a good thing when you bear in mind that the Silent Hunter series tends to have a long life and be the subject of many graphics-hungry mods from people).

i would not buy any kind of computer from bestbuy, or any factory produced computer in the first place. if you want a computer for playing games at max detail, look at websites, such as this one www.cyberpowerpc.com , and have a custom built computer, built just for you, for the same price, but twice the computer. you can build the computer at your finger tips, have it shipped to you in proberly about two weeks from purchase! you will not be dissapointed. plus, my computer i purchased from the website above, came w/ a 3 warranty! if you buy from bestbuy, or any factory produced computer for that matter, you will be dissapointed in time, believe me, ive been there.

do not buy a "factory built pc" such as HP, compaq, sony, etc. for gaming.

i really hope you "shop around" before commiting to the above!

good luck!

Factor

I have a 2.8Ghz P4 HP PC that I made sure had upgradable slots. Only to find out the powersupply isn't so upgradable. I tried a generic 430W PS and it wouldn't boot:damn:

I've put in 2 gigs of PC3200 ram and a nVidia 7600 GS 512 MB video card, plus a second hard drive and in spec'n it out, the 250W HP powersupply should be frying by now, but it's holding steady (crossing fingers).

I have a bud that buys his PC's from a local shop and tells them what he needs and they build it. If it crashes, he takes it back and they get it running again. Overall price, he gets more for his buck than buying off the shelf, plus the face to face contact when something goes wrong.

I'm slowly trying to build my own 3.4ghz P4 and gut this HP, but money and life is always an obsticle:shifty:

that's where I'm buying all my parts for the new PC:rock: :rock:

Whenever I read these threads I always wonder if any of the contributors are viral marketers. :-?

That said, whatever you do, bwchaney make sure you buy a SABRENT Black 1.44MB 3.5" External USB Floppy Drive Model SBT-UFDB! Only Sabrrent provides the power and affordability a one game gamer really needs! Such a magnificent and stylish floppy drive can be convieniently shipped to your old man! Buy one today! And tommorow! Next Wednesday would also be a great time to buy a SABRENT Black 1.44MB 3.5" External USB Floppy Drive Model SBT-UFDB! Be sure to check out Sabrent's other fine products!

On a related note, does anyone have a sugestion on how to spend the 150$ I just made?

i had a bar tab the other nite that was about 150 bux! the next day.......uh, i didnt feel so good.

on a side note, i dont see the harm in trying to point someone in a direction that would save him alot of money, and gain him alot of hardware.

im just trying to help a fellow gamer.

Guilty concience, eh? :p


On a serious note, I use Newegg and have no complaints. I bought Nvidia, but you should probably go ATI so you can have AA and HDR.

I'm sixty three and about to retire.Built my own puter,and if I can do it,anyone can!You will save a lot of money,and the savings will allow you to build a faster puter.Runnining a AMD dual core +5000,Gigabyte SLI board,four gigs Corsair ram,two evga 7950's for video,and a Sound Blaster Audigy for sound.Most my parts came from Newegg.I used Tigerdirect for some parts,but had a problem with one of their supervisors,and he closed my account.Beware of Tigerdirect!Again build your own.Make sure you research all your parts so that they will work togather,memory etc.
Pocatellodave

Another ping for newegg.com. I've bought all my stuff from them over the years and haven't had a single concern or problem. :up:

I buy all my parts from Newegg, also, and have nothing but praise for them.

Newegg for my personal parts.

I build systems at work for people, amongst other things. Newegg generally has their pc parts priced cheaper than our wholesalers do.:doh:

If you buy the parts yourself, you can easily get a dual core AMD budget gaming machine for less than $800 and still have quality parts. You can still buy Windows XP OEMs for it too if you don't want to mess with Vista yet.

Do Not buy a prefab for gaming unless you get a real sweat deal on an AMD machine. Since Intel, for obvious reasons, doesn't make motherboards for AMD - the manufacturers are forced to get halfway decent boards such as an Asus I saw recently in someone's new HP Vista system. Cheap Intel boards..:damn::down:

If you're uncomfortable messing with the stuff, you can check out custom build sites such as the one mentioned above or even check your area for Computer shops and do the same face-to-face.

I can't give any computer advice; I'm just responding to complain about your topic title. I just turned 57 myself and I'm just a kid!:p

So watch who yer callin' "old man"!:rotfl: