Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => Hardware and Software => Topic started by: BigGun on April 30, 2002, 12:37:06 PM
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I am currently looking at getting a new system & am seriously thinking about a system from alienware. If I should have a big concern with alienware, please say so. Below are the specs on a system I picked out, then some questions concerning video cards and windows xp home or pro. Constructive advise on anything with the system below is welcome & appreciated.
Dragon Full-Tower Case (340-Watt PS) (Space Black)
Intel® Pentium® 4 Processor 1.8GHz 400MHz FSB
512MB DDR SDRAM (PC-2100)
107-Enhanced Windows Keyboard (Space Black)
Microsoft IntelliMouse Explorer USB (Space Black)
60GB Seagate Barracuda ATA IV 7200RPM 2MB Cache
NVIDIA® GeForce4 Ti 4400 w/128MB Dual Monitor
KoolMaxx Video Cooling System (Standard Chrome)
SoundBlaster LIVE! 5.1
16X /48X IDE DVD-ROM Drive w/Software MPEG-2 Decoder
Creative Inspire™ 5.1 5300 Speakers - Black
Aliencare Toll-Free 1-Year 24/7 ONSITE Warranty
Microsoft® Windows® XP Home Edition
One Question which Video Card is good one to get, seems to be tradeoff of $$. Below are the specs on the different cards available to choose from. The +/-$$ are based on the card in the above system. Advice on one of these cards is welcome.
MSI G3 Pro-VT64D (-$32)
Memory: 64 MB
Memory Type: 460MHz DDR
RAMDAC Speed: 350 MHz*
Max Resolution: 2048x1536
Refresh Rate @ Max Res: 75 Hz
Slot Type: 4x AGP
TV-Out: Yes
Special Feature: Video-In
PNY Verto™ GeForce3 (-$19)
Memory: 64 MB
Memory Type: 460MHz DDR
RAMDAC Speed: 350 MHz*
Max Resolution: 2048x1536
Refresh Rate @ Max Res: 75 Hz
Slot Type: 4x AGP
TV-Out: Yes
Special Features: nfiniteFX™ Engine
PNY Verto™ GeForce3 Ti 500 (+$38)
Memory: 64 MB
Memory Type: 500MHz DDR
RAMDAC Speed: 350 MHz*
Max Resolution: 2048x1536
Refresh Rate @ Max Res: 75 Hz
Slot Type: 4x AGP
TV-Out: Yes
Special Features: nfiniteFX™ Engine
VisionTek Xtasy 6564™ GeForce3 Ti 200 (-$70)
Memory: 64 MB
Memory Type: 400MHz DDR
RAMDAC Speed: 350 MHz*
Max Resolution: 2048x1536
Refresh Rate @ Max Res: 75 Hz
Slot Type: 4x AGP
TV-Out: Yes
Special Features: nfiniteFX™ Engine
NVIDIA® GeForce4 MX 440 (-$139)
Memory: 64 MB
Memory Type: 400MHz DDR
RAMDAC Speed: Dual 350 MHz*
Slot Type: 4x AGP
TV-Out: No
Dual Monitor: Yes
Engine: NVIDIA Shading Rasterizer
Triangle per Seconds: 34 Million
Fill Rate: 1.1 Billion Texels/Sec
Operations per Second: 1.23 Trillion
Memory Bandwidth: 6.4GB/Sec
NVIDIA® GeForce4 Ti 4400 ($0, built into system above)
Memory: 128 MB
Memory Type: 550MHz DDR
RAMDAC Speed: 350 MHz*
Slot Type: 4x AGP
TV-Out: Yes
Dual Monitor: Yes
Engine: NVIDIA nfiniteFX™II
Triangle per Seconds: 125 Million
Fill Rate: 4.4 Billion AA Samples/Sec
Operations per Second: 1.12 Trillion
Memory Bandwidth: 8.8GB/Sec
ATI® Radeon™ 7500 (-$146)
Memory: 64MB
Memory Type: 460MHz DDR SDRAM
Engine: Charisma
RAMDAC Speed: 350MHz
Max Resolution: 2048x1536
Refresh Rate @ Max Res: 75
Slot Type: 4x AGP
TV-Out: Yes
Dual Monitor: Yes
One other question is windows xp home edition or professional? Is XP pro worth extra $61?
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Get the GeForce 4 Ti 4400. Nothing else comes close for the $.
XP Home vs. Pro depends on your personal needs. If you want to run a home LAN, get pro. Check Microsoft's site, the have a little thingy that will ask you questions and recommend which version you should choose.
Nice system. I wouldn't buy that CPU unless I planned to OC the snot out of it. For the same $ you could get a faster AMD system, or get one just as fast for less money.
Also... do you plan to watch DVD's on your machine? If not, why get a DVD drive? Personally, I think I'd swap that out for a decent burner instead.
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Ok...
Here is the same system except switched out Intel for AMD processor, the price is almost identical.
Dragon Full-Tower Case (340-Watt PS) (Space Black)
AMD Athlon XP 2000+ Processor 266Mhz FSB
Cooler Master DP5-7H53F High-Performance HSF
512MB DDR SDRAM (PC-2100)
107-Enhanced Windows Keyboard (Space Black)
Microsoft IntelliMouse Explorer USB (Space Black)
60GB Seagate Barracuda ATA IV 7200RPM 2MB Cache
NVIDIA® GeForce4 Ti 4400 w/128MB Dual Monitor
KoolMaxx Video Cooling System (Standard Chrome)
SoundBlaster LIVE! 5.1
16X /48X IDE DVD-ROM Drive w/Software MPEG-2 Decoder
Creative Inspire™ 5.1 5300 Speakers - Black
Aliencare Toll-Free 1-Year 24/7 ONSITE Warranty
Microsoft® Windows® XP Home Edition
One thing on noticed on this system is the mb on has 2 usb port instead of 4 on first system. How does this AMD compare to the Intel system? what about AMD XP 1800+? 1900+?
Thanks in advance
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Originally posted by Lephturn
Also... do you plan to watch DVD's on your machine? If not, why get a DVD drive? Personally, I think I'd swap that out for a decent burner instead.
Don't really plan on watching movies on the machine. To take the dvd drive off only reduces the price by $70. If I add the CD-Rom they offer it is +$127, to add the CD-RW is +$171. I currently have a CD-RW that I could throw into the machine. The DVD-Rom seemed the cheapest avenue, maybe I am mission something?
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Well overall, AMD's "####+" rating will relate to equivalent P4 speed generally. IE, an Athlon XP 2000+ will be generally slightly faster than a P4 2 Gig. Some games particularly will favour the P4's (such as Quake 3) and some will favour the Athlons, (such as flight sims that use a LOT of FPU like AH). It would be fair to compare the 1.8 Gig P4 to the Athlon XP 1800+, they would be very close in performance.
I think the best bang for the buck in the Athlon line is right at the 1900+ mark right now. I'd go with that. It will be faster overall and in AH I'd bet than the P4 1.8 you priced before. The two systems compare pretty well othewise... they'd be quite close in performance, although an XP 2000+ would be faster than the 1.8 Gig P4.
As for the USB ports.... well yep I suppose it does have 2 less USB. This could be easily solved with a USB hub if you have more than 2 USB devices though.
As for the DVD, if you are not watching movies on it a DVD drive is a waste of money IMO. If you DO plan to watch DVD's on your computer, then be sure to get a hardware decoder instead for better performance. Other than movies, there is almost nothing coming on DVD yet for the computer. The only exception I know of is Microsoft's Developer and Technet subscriptions. Otherwise a DVD ROM drive is a waste of $ in my view. A regular old CD-ROM drive should be at least $50 cheaper than a DVD-ROM drive.
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BgMaw,
I bought a 1.4 Athalon from Alienware last June. Sounds like you on the right track but for $195 I would also get the 3 year on site warranty. What component in a computer costs less than $195? They sent a tech (local contracter) to my house in Hawaii to install a new motherboard and power supply. That's what I call service and that's why I buy from Alienware.
DJ229 ;)
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Leph, you are mostly right. The rating is vs a Northwood cored P4. That 1.8 Ghz P4 he had originally is not a Northwood, but rather the older Willamette. (Northwood 1.8s are labeled 1.8A.) An XP 1500+ would be faster than that a Willamette 1800 Mhz CPU.
(Take a look at a recent CPU review on http://www.anandtech.com to see how it breaks down. A 1900 or 2000+ will perform very closely, and generally between a 2 Ghz to 2.4 Ghz Northwood P4. The XP 2100+ is just the slightest bit slower than a 2.4 Ghz Northwood overall.
One thing that may make some difference in pricing - AMD is releasing a new Athlon XP core on the 2nd. This will likely result in price drops on the rest of the XP line. Unless you want this right away, it wouldn't be a bad idea to make sure you are getting a MB that can support these newer processors for better future upgradability. It's likely AMD will release a 2200+, along with some lower speed grades. These lower grades would be a good deal.
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I just bougth new system..Why not the ATI Radeon 8500??
And Pleasse buy Intel..i bougth a few thousand dollars of there stock when it was at 19 a share!! weeeeee..lolollo
You are going to be stoked any way you go with new sheeattt...!!!
BiGB...................BGBMAW :)
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Why not the ATI ?
Because currently the GF4 series kinda blow it away.
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This is a personal reference, but IMO a totally black computer is butt ugly..
From the list above I'd ditch all Intel stuff and WindowsXP HOME immediately. It's a POC.
If you want a fast and reliable OS I'd take W2k pro. If you must take XP, at least pay the extra to get the pro version. XP home is considered to be a major security risk for the users, not to mention you can't use it for your work for example if needed.
The Gf4 is a good choice for a displaycard, keep it.
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Alien ware is a very expensive place to buy a PC..
Like twice as expensive as buying it in canada...
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Geforces have an mpeg2 decoder built in. I believe radeons do also. Theres no need to buy a seperate hardware controller, unless they feature options you want or need (not sure what thouse would be).
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Only ATI cards have hardware MPEG-2 decoders onboard Starbird. The GeForce series of cards do not have this feature AFAIK. It isn't really important, as most DVD drives are bundled with software Mpeg-2 decoding programs that support a much wider range refresh and resolution options. (PowerDVD is an example.) At one time, when CPUs weren't nearly as powerful as they are today, the video quality from the hardware decoders was better than software decoders. That is no longer the case. Both are about the same in quality, with a big advantage to the software based decoders in features. Their only disadvantage is higher CPU utilization (imagine that - software based requiring CPU resources :D ).
My opinion on the Radeon 8500 card is the same as most of ATIs products in general. Good image quality and excellent reliability, hampered by generally buggy drivers and slow updates. The GF 4 series of cards are also much faster than any other series of graphics cards available today. I'd recommend a GF 4 Ti 4400 (or a 4200 when they are available to save a little money).
ATI is rumored to be gearing up to release a new card soon as well, so it's hard to say how long they will release driver updates for their earlier cards. (Another nVidia advantage is that their drivers can be used on almost all their graphics cards from the TNT 1 all the way to the GF 4.)
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Hmm, coming from you Lephturn I know you suggested the hardware decoder for a good reason. What is it exactly?
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Bloom a hardware decoder does more than just decode the picture. It also gives out 5.1 surround sound etc. features which are impossible with normal software decoders.
I think this is the primary reason. I wouldn't get a DVD for computer anyway because a proper dvd-player nowadays is cheap, easyer to use, silent and less prone to malfunction since it has nothing to do with a pc.
Watching movies from a pc is extremely inconvenient.. Computers often are noisy, you have to boot them and start applications to watch a movie.. Unless you pay extra there's no remote control.. etc.
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Bloom, no offense intended, but how long has it been since you actually installed and used an ATI card?
The latest ATI driver for the Radeon family is rock solid. At least for every app I can find. Even Maya works flawlessly on the latest driver. NVidia has yet to produce a driver that does not have issues with Maya.
Look at some basic stuff. NVidia drivers are a pain to update. You have to go through some third party utility to get rid of thier drivers if you want to upgrade drivers. Not so with ATI.
NVidia has that stupid refresh rate bug in XP and W2K, not so ATI.
ATI released a new DX8.1 driver for the old Rage line of cards, so longevity of support is not an issue. ATI's hardware interface is based on the Rage line. The Radeon line just extended it, so it is not painful for ATI to update the Rage drivers when they update the Radeon drivers.
Driver updates for the Radeon family has been coming about once every 2 months and with each one they actually fix problems without introducing new ones. That is a feat in of itself.
I never think twice about upgrading an ATI driver, because it is so painless to move back to an older driver. I cannot say that for NVidia.
I have both line of cards here, as I use what works best for any given application. I have more troubles with NVidia cards than any of the Radeon systems here. Typically we have to go through 3 or 4 drivers for a NVidia card to find one that works in the application we need it for. Never have had that problem with the Radeon cards.
Animal calls me pro-ATI. I really do not care what video card it is. I use what I have to to make an application work best in my environment. I have a pretty good mix of ATI and NVidia products here and we do have fewer issues with ATI right now than NVidia.
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It has been a while Skuzzy. I've been busy for the past few months on other projects, so I haven't spent any time with ATI cards newer than the first generation Radeons.
I'll take your word that they have improved. I'll give them another try when I get the chance. I've just had so many bad experiences with ATI drivers in the past that I have a hard time recommending them to others.
Performance wise, the Radeon 8500 doesn't stack up well versus the GeForce 4 Ti 4200 (let alone the 4400 and 4600).
You are right about the post-23.xx series Nvidia drivers being troublesome though.
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BigGun I was looking at the Alien website last week. The machines look cool but you can get an equivalent machine for ~$500 less at places like mwave.com.
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For example, this is the same system except for the case and the video cooler. Same system at Alienware is over $1600. Video cooler is like tits on a boar anyways unless you are an overclocker.
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The rest of it...
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Hmm...thanks..i think i will check that site out too.
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Mwave not might have the support of Alienware though. I have never bought a complete system from them, just barebones machines and motherboard/cpu combos. Everything I have got from them was first class though.
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Funkedup is right, there are many places cheaper than Alienware and Mwave is a good company, but I don't believe Mwave offers any warranty at all. I can afford the extra $500 (actually $695 with 3 year warranty) and it is worth it to me for the service they provide. For 3 years I don't have to worry bout ANY components failing. They Fedex the parts and a local tech installs them in my home. I don't even pay for shipping. Troubleshooting often requires trial and error replacement of expensive components. I am sure glad I don't have to worry bout that. Of the bigger OEMs I am impressed with Alienware. I have a Dell laptop and their service is no better than Alienware and it costs more. If you want to save some $$$ and aren't concerned with warranty, then Mwave is an excellent choice.
DJ229
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...cont Only complaint with Alienware tech support is that sometimes it can take up to a couple hours for them to get back to you, but at least they don't put you on hold and it is toll free. They are open 24/7 and an operator takes your name ,etc and they WILL get back to you. It just depends how busy they are.
DJ229
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Good point Dave. I am a build-it-yourself guy so that stuff doesn't matter to me. But if I didn't feel confident building and troubleshooting it myself then it would be nice to have the security of that warranty and tech support & service from Alienware. Their computers look damn cool too. :)
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I ended up going with Alienware system, actually my wife purchased it for me. Thanks for the comments everyone. It actually ended up being a good deal. BestBuy is currently getting all the demo models upgraded from Alienware. They still have some demos that are in warehouse, new in box. The price from BestBuy is over $500 less than if I tried to purchase from Alienware. Now I just have to wait till Monday!!!
Area 51 System Specs:
Dragon Full-Tower Case (340-Watt PS) (Conspiracy Blue)
Intel® Pentium® 4 Processor 2.0GHz 400MHz FSB w/ 512KB Cache
256MB RDRAM PC-800
107-Enhanced Windows Keyboard (Conspiracy Blue)
Microsoft IntelliMouse Explorer USB (Conspiracy Blue)
60GB Seagate Barracuda ATA IV 7200RPM 2MB Cache
NVIDIA GeForce3 Ti 500 w/64MB 4X AGP
KoolMaxx Video Cooling System (Standard Chrome)
SoundBlaster LIVE! 5.1
16X /48X IDE DVD-ROM Drive w/Software MPEG-2 Decoder
AlienAutopsy: Automated Technical Support Request System
Aliencare Toll-Free 1-Year 24/7 ONSITE Warranty
Microsoft® Windows® XP Professional
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Originally posted by bloom25
Hmm, coming from you Lephturn I know you suggested the hardware decoder for a good reason. What is it exactly?
Whoops, missed this one a while back.
Well, basically, hardware decoders just are generally higher quality, smoother, and you'll have less problems watching movies in my experience. If you really want to watch DVD's on your computer, I think it's worth getting a hardware decoder for the extra features and better quality. However, I have not tried the software decoders on the more modern CPU's... like over 1.5 Gig. It may well be that you'll get decent performance with a software decoder if you've got lots of RAM and a beefy CPU. Generally speaking though, I feel that most computer vendors are selling DVD drives just because it's an easy sell, and most folks will never use it. But, now that the price of DVD drives is coming down, the difference is becoming less of a big deal. Still, up here in Canada, a cheap CD-ROM is about $49, while a cheap DVD drive is $85. Forty bucks is forty bucks... I'll spend it on other parts of my system. :)
I still don't own a single DVD drive at home... and I've got 4 machines. One day I might renew my MS Technet subscription and have to break down and buy a DVD drive I suppose. But other than that, I have not seen a need for one.
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I pretty much agree on the DVDrom, i can't say I plan on watching movies on computer, but the demo system came with it, no ability to customize.
One question I have is what is RDram vs. SD or DDram? This system only came with 256k RDRAM, I figure I can easily add more if needed.
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Looks pretty good overall. I personally would have gone AMD, but that's mainly because once again Intel has made the original Northwood chipsets incompatible with future P4s as of this past Monday.
(That means your motherboard isn't going to be able support anything beyond a 2.4 Ghz 400 Mhz (100 Mhz QDR) FSB P4. This is the 3rd time Intel has done this with the P4 since its release. In the time that Socket A has been in use for all AMD Athlon based CPUs, Intel has used 6 incompatible socket designs. Specifically Slot 1, Socket 370 (coppermine), Socket 370 (tualatin), Socket 423, Socket 478 (A type P4s), and Socket 478 (B type P4s) have all been used and are not compatible. The 2.533 GHz P4 and the 2.4B and 2.2B released Monday have a 533 Mhz FSB (133 Mhz QDR) and are not supported on "older" socket 478 boards. It *may* be supported on boards with the new SiS chipset though... )
RDRAM = Rambus DRAM. This is a high speed serial bus ram design that gives top performance on Intel P4 based systems (around 5 - 10% faster than PC2100 on i845D boards). That's the good news. The bad news is that RDRAM MUST be installed in pairs and is currently more expensive than DDR SDRAM per module. Intel may also be dropping RAMBUS by the end of the year.
The only real complaint I would have is only 256 MB of ram and a GF 3 (rather than GF 4) video card. You should be happy with it though.