Just ordered a Dell Inspiron 530. Unfortunately, to get their $350 off deal, I had to go with Vista home premium. They wouldn't give it to me with XP. Here is the set up:
Intel Core Duo E6550 (4mb L2 cache, 2.33 ghz, 1333 FSB)
2gb ddr2 sdram at 667 mhz - 2dimms
20 inch widescreen digital flat panel (1650 x 1080, 5ms)
320 hard drive (7200 rpm)
128 Nvidia GeForce 8300GS
Integrated 7.1 channel audio.
I figure vista, integrated sound, and the budget video card are the weak links here. Also only carries a 300W power supply. I hope I can skate on the sound card until creative gets Vista drivers out. The vid card and power supply may need to get upgraded shortly, (yes, vid card is PCI-e.) Also reading up on the widescreen and AH. Sounds like a dedicated button for "look down at instrument panel view" is necessary, lol.
I figure this ought to run ok - certainly better than my four year old pentium 4 with 1 gig of ram. Also, the 10 year old Sidewinder gameport joystick is being replaced by a Saitek X52. I'm sure I'll have questions about that (like do you use the SST programming, or just run it through the game? Any profiles out there I should look at? etc.) I feel like a kid at christmas. Oh, wifeack hasn't found out about the X52 yet. Tis better to ask foregiveness than permission.
