Gaming PC experts needed.

[skorpion]

this year for christmas, im possibly getting a new gaming PC or an electric bass (4 stringed guitar thing, not the fish...) im more in favor of the computer, but the bass would be nice. thing is, i have to choose a PC under 800 bucks thats great for gaming. thing is i know nothing about computers and was wondering if anyone out there could point me in the right direction, the type of gaming PC i want is something that can handle a game like WoT in 100% eye candy + advanced/better graphics. or at least something that doesnt crash when i enter a game with more than 50 buildings in it... the bass im definately getting for the B-day if i dont get the PC/vise versa. also, what do you guys think your getting for christmas? im sure someone will one-up me 

[F22RaptorDude]

I'm getting this for Christmas

[skorpion]

I'm getting this for Christmas (Image removed from quote.)

such a tradgedy the first one got burnt.

[F22RaptorDude]

such a tradgedy the first one got burnt.

Look at it this way, if I had done it I would be demanding they give me a new one or give me money for it, i'm being the good guy here and just saving up

[titanic3]

Newegg.com

If you can't build a PC, that's the best place for a cheap, decent gaming rig. If you CAN build, buy your parts from there and build it together, you'll usually save between $100-200.

3 important things for a gaming PC.

Proccessor (CPU)
Graphics Card (GPU)
RAM (Memory)

But you'll also need a good power supply to run it all, 800W is pretty decent.

Intel i7 is one of the best CPUs.
GPUs- you can either go Radeon or nVidia. Both are pretty nice, I myself use Radeon. If you play only those two games, then a Radeon 5770/nVidia GTX260 is plenty good enough to max it. If you play more demanding games, then a Radeon 69xx/GTX460 should be able to run pretty much every game out there.
4GB of RAM is all you need, anything over 6GB is overkill. I know guys with 12GB and it scares me.

If you play a lot of games/make videos/take pictures, then a hard drive is 1TB is plenty of space, and you can always add more if needed, so no big deal here.

Sound cards - an onboard card is fine IMO, usually adding a sound card adds more trouble with drivers and conflicting programs, at least for me anyway.

Motherboard - you should try to get one with at least 2x PCI-E slots for any future upgrades.

Windows 7 Home 64bit is good enough, no need to buy that proffessional stuff.  

[skorpion]

Newegg.com

If you can't build a PC, that's the best place for a cheap, decent gaming rig. If you CAN build, buy your parts from there and build it together, you'll usually save between $100-200.

3 important things for a gaming PC.

Proccessor (CPU)
Graphics Card (GPU)
RAM (Memory)

But you'll also need a good power supply to run it all, 800W is pretty decent.

Intel i7 is one of the best CPUs.
GPUs- you can either go Radeon or nVidia. Both are pretty nice, I myself use Radeon. If you play only those two games, then a Radeon 5770/nVidia GTX260 is plenty good enough to max it. If you play more demanding games, then a Radeon 69xx/GTX460 should be able to run pretty much every game out there.
4GB of RAM is all you need, anything over 6GB is overkill. I know guys with 12GB and it scares me.

If you play a lot of games/make videos/take pictures, then a hard drive is 1TB is plenty of space, and you can always add more if needed, so no big deal here.

Sound cards - an onboard card is fine IMO, usually adding a sound card adds more trouble with drivers and conflicting programs, at least for me anyway.

Motherboard - you should try to get one with at least 2x PCI-E slots for any future upgrades.

Windows 7 Home 64bit is good enough, no need to buy that proffessional stuff. 

i play alot of computer games, the Radeon is a good computer, i have a friend with one and its AMAZIN. i have 8 games installed on this computer, 2 of which can hardly be played. what im really looking for is graphics and memory, i do alot of picture editing and graphics are a must. the sound card im not so worried about as i use speakers most of the time. im no good with all this technological stuff so building my own gaming PC is definately out of the question.

thanks for the info though, really helped.

[gyrene81]

skorpion, just look in the hardware section of the forums, plenty of people have posted what they put together themselves and how much it cost. for $800 you could build a nice system, buying a retail unit would get you mediocre. you have access to the internet and all the information you need for assembling a system is out there, a child could do it.

[skorpion]

skorpion, just look in the hardware section of the forums, plenty of people have posted what they put together themselves and how much it cost. for $800 you could build a nice system, buying a retail unit would get you mediocre. you have access to the internet and all the information you need for assembling a system is out there, a child could do it.

well, i dont want to have to assemble my own present on x-mas morning...not being greedy or anything, but there are some really nice retail gaming PC's out there. and if you knew me, you would know that i put the "pro" in "procrastinate" when it comes to assebling stuff.

[Pigslilspaz]

Radeon is just the GPU, and i'd suggest nvidia anyways. Also a good soundcard is always good, improves quality regardless of your speakers.

[skorpion]

Radeon is just the GPU, and i'd suggest nvidia anyways. Also a good soundcard is always good, improves quality regardless of your speakers.

well, unless the game is playing death metal/AIC, then im not too worried

[TequilaChaser]

Windows 7 Home 64bit is good enough, no need to buy that proffessional stuff.  

I disagree with your saying that Win 7 home Premium is enough......

I would say the minimal would be Win 7 Pro 64 bit,  you are not limited on your maximum Ram as much


and what is wrong with 16 GB's of Ram?  it works very well for me on  quite a few programs, heck I probably could double that and still use more for 2 programs I use

If I was building a PC these days, I would not use a 32 bit OS at all, I think windows 7 32 bit might possibly be the last 32 bit OS MS puts out, if not now none after Windows 8, anyway

if you going to use a 32 bit OS might as well stay with win XP in my opinion........

but we all have our own opinions

main necessitys:  PSU  - CPU  - GPU - RAM - OS - CASE with proper cooling & good heat sinks for the CPU & GPU

edit:  I didn't pay much attention to the topic title,  I am not a Gaming PC Expert, but I have stayed at a Holiday Inn Express several times  


TC

[phatzo]

Skorpion, check your PMs.

[titanic3]

Tequila, the problem is RAM doesn't affect gaming THAT much, not even half of what a good CPU or GPU would put out, 4GB is plenty enough, 6GB is fine if you really want that extra bit of performance. Anything over and you might as well be spending that money on a new GPU/CPU. Yea, you can load up windows in 1 second with 12GB of RAM, but then you could also wait an extra second with 4GB and be able to run games with higher fps on abetted GPU.

Of course, if money is not an issue, then buy all the RAM you want. But on a $800 budget, it's better off spent elsewhere.

[skorpion]

Skorpion, check your PMs.

thanks for letting me know. will message him later

[TequilaChaser]

Tequila, the problem is RAM doesn't affect gaming THAT much, not even half of what a good CPU or GPU would put out, 4GB is plenty enough, 6GB is fine if you really want that extra bit of performance. Anything over and you might as well be spending that money on a new GPU/CPU. Yea, you can load up windows in 1 second with 12GB of RAM, but then you could also wait an extra second with 4GB and be able to run games with higher fps on abetted GPU.

Of course, if money is not an issue, then buy all the RAM you want. But on a $800 budget, it's better off spent elsewhere.

Yeah I am aware of that, I had went of the direction and had refered to other programs other than just gaming , my bad.......  my AutoCad and some of my graphix programs can easily handle 16 to 32 GBs easily......

as far as gaming, I was very surprised how much a SSD drive helped improved my gaming performance over a regular ol HD with spinning plate/platters ......

I don't see that anything over a 1 Gig of RAM video card helps Aces high, for Aces high the CPU is the main factor. You should get the highest GHz cpu you can that is Dual core Intel ( or AMD even though you still only have use of a single core on AMD )......

going for those 2.6 GHz quad or six core CPUs  is worse than going for a 3.2 or 3.4 GHz  dual core ........ ( and a good PSU )

edit: the extra ram does come into play when wanting to use the High Res Textures package and use the higher shadows settings ( for both the System Ram and the GPU Ram )

just saying


TC