OKAY..........so I am gathering information for my new computer which i should get in a month or so...........I dont know much about video cards..i see ati things with 128mb and 256 mb of some shit, and there are nvidia, so which should i go with?

Another question: Pentium versus AMD..H!gh says amd, i have no clue.

Clue Me In

-Henry

PS..the dead computer I have been using should hopefully be ready by sunday, its going to the doctor....but it might not be, and my office computer doesnt like to run CZ as I found out testing it last night.......

Alright here we go! :

1. AMD and Pentium. AMD is cheaper than pentium, but Pentium is over all better. AMD is easily overclocked if you know how to do so while Pentium is a little harder to mess with without frying your MOBO or chip. So if your strapped for cash and have the no how go with an AMD processor. If you have some cash to throw around get a good P4 2.? gghz.

2. Video Cards: ATI are cheaper than Nvidia cards. Nvidia in my opinion are over all better cards. Like the AMD side ATI cards are easier to overclock than Nvidia cards. If your looking for power get something with 256mb. The more ram on your card the better off you are. I dont know much in ATI cards except the 9800 pro are good and if your looking Nvidia and want something cheap get the Ti 4600 series. If you have a little extra cash throw down for the GF FX 5900 Ultra series. If you have alot of cash throw down for the new GF 6800 Ultra series.

3. Make sure you have a power supply of at least 420 Watts to run all this new monster machinery. Its kind of pointless to have alot of new high end stuff and not be able to give it the juice that it needs.

4. When your looking at the Grande scheme of things you have two categories of companies that work well together.

AMD & ATI. Vs PENTIUM & Nvidia

All of AMD and ATI products are not low end but affordable to a massive computer buying market. They however in my opinion do not offer as much as the competetion there is nothing wrong with there products. Its all a matter of how much money you have to throw around and if you know how to overclock.

I hope some of this made some sense or helped out in any way.

Just be sure that the computer that you buy supports 8x AGP
you don't want to be stuck with a mobo that can't unlock the full potential of your vid card.

btw: An Msi mobo that supports AMD, and a good Geforce pwns!

L1ve hit the nail on the head in everything he talked about. The Ti4600 card I got from Corpse is spectacular. I love it. It owns. I have no problem with CSS at all, I get excellent FPS in CS and CZ. Very awesome cards. I run a P4 1.6ghz and 512mb DDR with the Ti4600 and this thing F*CKING flys.

You can get those cards dirt cheap now, too. Wait six months, spend $100-150 and get the newer ones, etc. I replace mine every 6-10 months with something hotter and better, but I never buy the $300 cards. They aren't worth it.

Hmm.. the DICK might be in the running for a Vid Card. Prices?

I run a P3 866 MHZ Machine, 512 MB RAM, 40 GIG HD.

Its an old PC but runs CZ great!

Oh, I think I dont have any AGP slots. Maybe only PCI I need to look again.

OK - Here we go

to bounce off the ideas the L1ve started
1. Video cards - Two major types based on the type of slot they go into on the Mainboard, PCI, and AGP. If you have a choice, go with the AGP. But not all mainboards have the AGP slot.

*ATI runs smoother with less problems and also runs cooler

*Nvidia Runs faster with better resoloutions, but runs hotter - you'll need a good cooling system with this

2. Power supply's - 420w and up only....if your gonna build a gaming system, a strong power supply is a must....(besides - how can you add the extra lighting systems for the 1337 look if you don't have the power to push it)

3. RAM - an absoulute must....the more the better, there are 3 major types on the market(PC133, DDR, and RB)

*PC133 - low end, less speed, less power, less money to get

*DDR - the most commonly used in gaming systems, they com in several varying levels of speed(2100, 2300, 2500, 2700, 3100, and 400)

*RB(RAMBus) - Runs cooler and faster then anything else on the market, but is also the most expencive to buy and to upgrade(Must buy 2 RAM sticks at a time - only works in pairs of equal size and speed)

4. Processor - you biggest choice for the whole system. There are 2 main companies out there, AMD, and Pentium.

*AMD while being a bit cheaper can be a very good chip, but you have to have the RAM, VID Card, and Mainboard to back it up.

*Pentium while being the more expencive of the two dose have its advantages. The P4/HT(Hyper Threading) or the P4/HT Extream series would probably be some of the best on the market right now. The HT series is based on the processors multi-threading abilities(working as 2 or 3 processors indapendent of each other) make your system run so much faster then anything else out there on the market. Basically your buying a single processor that's gonna work as multi when your doing more then one program(EX: WindowsXP and CZ) at the same time.

5. Mainboard(Motherboard) - Many people out there will swear by a specific company or a specific type of board. I will say only this. DO NOT BUY AN ENERGY STAR board. This piece is the main component of your whole system. Everything else's abilities will be routed through this board. Make sure when you buy a MB that it has the plugins for the other components you want on your system(EX: you want a good VID card, you need an AGP8x slot/You want DDR RAM, you need DDR slots on your board). Also make sure you have room for upgrading. If you bought a board today that could only hold 512 MB of RAM, you'd be fucked in a year. My suggestion would be to get something that can take 2-4 GB of RAM.

6. Drives - there are 3 main types of drives on the market

*Burners(Disk drive with the ability to write as well as read)
-CDRW's - should be found at about $30-$50 a piece....easily
-DVDRW's - there are 2 main formats of these, depending on what you would like to do with these DVD's once you are done with them would determin the drive you want. +R Drives will write to only +R Disks. +R Disks are usually cheaper by about 50 cents per disk. -R Drives will only write to -R disks. There is no real difference between the disks other then price and what they will play in. Something else to remember is whatever you are playing the disks in after they are burned. Most Home Theater dvd players will only play one or the other....some both, but rarely.

*ROM's - if you have a burner you have no need for one of these unless you just want a dual drive system.

*Floppy Drives - Found at about $5-$10 - do not neglect to get one of these. Granted that they are almost extinct, in the case of a catastrouphic emergency with you system, you will need one of these to fix it.

7. Hard Drives - The more GB's they have the more space you'll have to save files and objects to. For a Gaming system I would recommend an 80 GB or more. Basic HD's are IDE Drives(Yes I know there are several others and if you know this you shouldn't be bothering to read this). IDE Drives come in 3 Main speeds based on RPM's of the actual disks inside(5400{don't buy for a gaming system}, 7200{Basic - most people use}, and 10,000{Oh hell yes!!}).

8. Cooling Systems - an absolute must for any gaming system. DO NOT BE LEAD TO BELIEVE THAT A PROCESSOR FAN AND A CASE FAN IS ENOUGH! For a basic cooling system all you really need to do is add about 3 more case fans. The next step up would be to add a couple ram cooling strips and Vid card cooling strips in. There is also Liquid Cooling systems. Some use water, some use liquid nitrogen, I wouldn't recommend either one. The slightest problem with that cooling system and your whole box is fried.

9. Externals - Mostly for show, but also for good use.

*Keyboard - some are fans of the wide spread, some are not, you decide what you like and go with it.

*Mouse - Style dosen't matter at all...go with what you like. but I will say that an optical mouse with an optical mouse pad

When deciding what you want for a system make your decisions in this order...

Processor
RAM
VID Card
Mainboard
Drives
Cooling systems
Case(not mentioned because they're all the same)
Externals
Decoration(Lighting systems)

Well....I think that just about wraps it up......speakers, headphones and monitors are basically what you make of them....and there are too many out there to name them all....

See the next installment.....How to put it all togeather!

My Dream Machine.

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Im reading what my computer is from the front as im typing it so here you go: Its an Emachine.
2800+ Amd athlon xp processor.
120 Gb
512 mb
Nvidia geforce4 graphics.........Runs great and all......We got another emachine that is a little newer but this is the one I use because the other one is net worked off this one so this has the faster internet.

I don't think a made a mistake unless it's a run on sentence but I'm not sure

*shudders*

Emachine......eeeeeeeeewwwww

wow emachines lol thats pretty bad to tell you the truth but if it lets you do what you want to do then oh well....

Its not the best but all the computer games I get I can play..... They load up fast and I lag maybe like once every other week maybe thats because I got broadband hmmmmm........Its has lots of the stuff my dad uses...

LIKE MORTGAGE RATES AND INTEREST PAYMENTS?

No he keeps that on the old emachine. He doesnt want it hooked up to the internet cause you can steal information....

AMD > Intel. I just like AMD. The 64 FX chips out-do any intel chips performance wise.

Nvidia > ATI. again a personal preference. Nvidia has better support for their cards.

Ok uhm, basically, you need to wait and go with a pci express board and card, even the lower end cards (fx5750) are gonna MATCH the 6800 from nvidia, concidering its like triple the bandwith per pin, wich means more speed = more power = higher fps = smoother play. But, if you dont want to go pci express i would go with a 6800 , im not sure if they have the ultra of that out yet, but the 128mb version with 256bit should be just as good as the 256mb version, seeing as u dont really utilize the full 256mb of ram with the aloted agp 8x bandwith, there may be a slight difference, like 10-15 fps, but ur gonna get 200+ fps anyway and its gonna be more than enough.