Shopping for a New Computer

Just posting to get this to show up in the My Replies Section.

-Twilight Storm

$300.00 for a gaming rig? You must be dreaming...lol!!

$300.00 buys a modest email and IM machine. Or a fair gaming graphics card.

Newegg.

For 500 or less, you're looking at a midrange Phenom2, a micro atx AM3 mobo, and a midrange graphics card.  You can do a decent gaming machine for 500 easy, 300 is seriously pushing it.  If you have to buy a case, forget it.

Hit Toms Hardware up for graphics card charts, good info that will let you pick out a good performer that isn't pricey.

If you can blow a thousand bucks, get an 1155 chipset, sandybridge is awe inspiring price for performance right now, the 2600k can hold it's own against the X58 based processors they're still selling for a grand, and nothing AMD has is even on the radar.

I'm not really looking for high end gaming hardware, just something that'll run the games I have.  (WOW, Sins, FEAR, The Witcher, etc.)

-Twilight Storm

Just curious, can $300 really get you something enough better than the old rig to be worth it?  Or do you have to because old rig died or got taken over by a family member ?

If you don't have to, probably wait a few months and

1:  save more money in the meantime

2:see if AMD's new "A" or "FX" processors fit your needs & budget

3:  wait for Sandy Bridge prices to come down

Among processors currently available, I'd hate to see anyone spend money on anything but Sandy Bridge, but they are out of your budget for now.

Check out Techspot & Tom's Guide for entry / budget recommendations before heading to NewEgg.

You and others might checkout ecollegepc, I just ordered from them and so far prices/email question response has been good.

probably save up more money and do some smart shopping..500 will get some something fairly decent but 300 you will get to still play some solitaire games n other games on low settings

Here.

If you're budget conscious, Ebay is your best bet. The search I set up there will find anything with:

2GB+ RAM

100GB+ HD space (The games you listed won't fill it, so you're good to go)

Windows XP/Vista/7 or Unspecified/Not included operating system. If you have a computer you're replacing that has a current windows license, borrow an OEM disc from someone and use that code to put it onto the other computer. If you have issues Windows isn't that much comparitively.

No graphics card was specified. You can get a decent NVidia card for less than $50 at Best Buy. I ran on that card for years and it ran WoW/Fear/The Witcher and just about everything fine. I also played Mass Effect 2 and a lot of newer games on it as well.

At least a dual core processor or better. Some games like ME2 physically require a multithreaded processor to function. It was the only reason I moved from my overclocked 3ghz single core into the quad core range.

DVD drives and everything else can be easily added later.

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Your next best option is to find out what the best processor your current motherboard can handle is, and grab it off of Ebay. Then get a decent mid-range video card like what I mentioned before. Grab a 450+ watt power supply. I recommend just splurging here so that you're ready for future upgrades. I bought a 450 and ended up having to move up to a 600 a few months later for a new graphic card. Then determine the best and fastest RAM your motherboard can handle and get what it'll take. Pay attention to dual channel. It's better to have matching 1GB sticks for 2GB dual channel paired than a 1 and 2 set that can't be accessed as quickly. Lastly, get a case that has lots of room for future upgrades and has some good air flow. A case that is pre-configured for optional liquid cooling would be good.

Once you're set up on that end, every time you have a bit of cash you can toss new parts in. Motherboard/CPU bundles are fairly cheap, and you can get them with more RAM nowadays too.

This is the method I took personally. My chain of computer progression started with an IBM 8088 with 640KB RAM, DOS 5.0, and a 10MB hard drive. 16 color VGA output and I was rocking QBasic, ZZT, and Oregon Trail.

Now I'm running a 2.3 GHZ quad core, ATI Radeon HD 5850, only 2GB DDR2/800, but I'll be moving up to 4x 1GB 1066 pieces soon, and 80/150/320GB hard drives. (Operating System/Programs/Storage setup).

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Before committing on EBay, if you choose that route, definately research each piece of the machine to make sure you're not getting a recalled motherboard or something that's not compatible with something else. IE an Intel board with NVidia chipset that someone claims to have set up ATI Crossfire on, or SATA drives on an IDE only board.

Price isn't everything. I use the reviews on NewEgg to check out any part that is currently on the market. If it has poor reviews, I don't touch it.

And Craigslist is an invaluable source. People may put computers up in the free section saying "Free if you want it for parts". I'm actually typing this on a Satellite L505 that is just now reaching a year and a half old. A girls dad got mad and threw it against the wall while it was on. Trashed the hard drive. I took it for "Parts". Everything else was fine - The top doesn't align perfectly when it shuts, and some of the side doesn't snap together right, but it's never crashed on me since installing a new hard drive and reseating the cables and RAM. I have several laptops I've received the same way. In fact, all my computers except for a netbook I purchased for business use started as freebies that I replaced a few parts in to get started. Even my gaming machine.

$300 for a decent gaming rig? .... Yes, easy....as long as your gaming stays with 'Solitaire'.

Spend double that and you'll get a half-decent Graphic Card.

You 'may' need a little more than that....you know, like a computer and stuff....;)

Mostly the responses I expected, just thought I would ask. (I'm not particularly picky about having the games on top settings for the most part, Just wanting the games to run with minimal graphics issues.)

TBH, I would normally wait, but until now all I've had is an ACER Laptop, and it died a while back.  (Gonna take it to a shop soon, but once a laptop starts to go like that, it's not got long left before it's kaput, repairs or not)

300 was wishful thinking, I was just trying to see if there was something I was missing.  Guess I'll just hit up the local stores and hope for the best, though I will be checking out that link from Tydorius first, thanks.

Thanks for all the input though.

-Twilight Storm

$300 can get you a great graphics card. A $600 price tag for a GPU is meant solely to entice the unintelligent with more money than sense.

You can build a decent computer for $500. $300 is low, but I could build my old desktop (currently residing as the living room dvr/movie database) for that easily. It outputs in 1080p without a hitch, and is capable of playing current games at med/high settings. It's not going to win any benchmark tests compared to current rigs, but it's no slouch either.

Take a look at this and see what you can learn from it. It's not the best in the world, but it's better than most I've seen.

http://i1002.photobucket.com/albums/af150/The_FalconO6/CurrentLogicalPCBuyingGuide/Guide.png

Most importantly, local stores are usually not your friend if you're looking to build your own PC. You're obviously on a tight budget, so why would you waste money for absolutely no reason when every dollar counts?

• AMD Athlon II X4 645 3.1GHz Processor

• 4GB DDR3 system memory

• 1TB SATA hard drive

• 24X DVD /- burner

• 10/100/1000 Ethernet

• ATI Radeon HD 5450 Graphics Additional Features:

• 6 x USB 2.0 ports, 1 x VGA port, 1 x DVI port, 1 x headphone jack, 1 x microphone jack, 1 x line-in jack, 1 x RJ-45 Ethernet port

• Software:

• The CyberpowerPC Gaming Ultra GUA103SE features Genuine Microsoft Windows 7 Home Premium 64-Bit Edition (To learn more about the features of Windows 7, click here)
• Microsoft Office 2010 preloaded (purchase of a Product Key required to activate a full Office 2010 suite)

• 1-year parts and labor limited warranty with toll-free tech support
• Restore discs are no longer included with PCs. We recommend you use the installed software to create your own restore and backup DVD the first week you use the CyberpowerPC Gamer.

• Power cord
• Xtreme Gear USB keyboard
• Xtreme Gear USB optical mouse
• Quick Start Guide and documentation

Any input is welcome, and thanks for all the replies. 

Very nice T Storm....enjoy..

Everywhere I look that system up it has 4+ star reviews, so it looks like a good winner for you! That will definitely cover the games you specified without issue, and it'll handle Starcraft II easily as well.

Thanks for all the help guys, I'll go ahead and order it.

-Twilight Storm

Just buy some AMD Phenom X4 CPU, some cheapish AMD board for it, 4GB of DDR3 RAM, and Nvidia GTX460 and you are all set. That CyberPower PC does have unfortunately pretty shitty GPU, i would avoid that, if you want the machine for gaming. 

Okay, just ordered the computer, and a 32" tv that claims to be monitor-capable.  (I'd have gone smaller, but I needed a tv for my xbox anyway, 32 seems like a nice compromise.) 

Supposed to arrive at the store in 7-10 days.

(Hope they don't screw up like with my brother in laws tv...they had to reorder it twice before it got there...)

-Twilight Storm

please help understand: whats the "GPU", and whats poor about it on the rig being discussed here?  I'm looking, as well.  Thanks

GPU ....Graphic Processor Unit, aka 'Graphic Card'.

Lots of things impact on the quality/result of Gaming, but the most important is that which 'draws' the screen.

Others include...ram [amount and speed], CPU, Motherboard, and Soundcard...;)

Is this a new trend/no-so-new trend?   32" TV's are the same price (or even cheaper) than the 24" and 27" monitors nowadays.  Is it making more sense now to just get a low-end TV rather than a high-end monitor?  How do the refresh rates, resolutions, contrast ratios, etc. compare?   I assume these TV's are accepting HDMI inputs and you can hook it directly to your video card?

It does not make sense to spend more - unless you check the DPI. Most of those 32 inchers only do 720 DPI, and you want a more than that for a computer (1080 is HD, and 1280 for a computer is minimum).

Where did you buy it from? 500 dollars is around my budget.

Then it seems like 36" is where this starts to make more sense.  Compensate for the DPI by adding more I.  A hypothetical shrink of that 1080 DPI 36" TV down to 24" would get you 1620 DPI.  HD 36" are sitting around $550.  24" monitors are around $350.   But you get to reuse that 36" TV as a TV.  Might make sense depending on your setup.  But I can see how this would NOT catch on as a trend just yet.

Not quite sure what you mean, but no it would only get you 1080 pixel rows to work with.  They'd look better up close because they'd be tighter, maybe that's what you mean.