08-05-2010, 07:47 PM

I might get some flack for this but I have always had the best luck with ATI. The latest ATI cards are very good and in some recent benchmarks are beating out some Nvidia at the same price point. Currently I am running all ATI here.

08-05-2010, 09:08 PM

Well, it's a bit over-budget, but I completely forgot about getting a copy of Windows 7. That added another 150.

EDIT: Here are the main parts..
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819115215
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128412
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820145218
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814150462
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811119197
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817371031

Feel free to critique my upcoming purchase. Oh, and the power supply came with a FREE anti-static wrist strap! Lucky ME!
The total is coming to about 980 with shipping and all. Keep in mind I have a 500GB HDD, DVD burner, and Windows that added to the price.

08-05-2010, 09:23 PM

Good parts all. I would suggest looking at EVGA cards. IMO, they have the best warranty and usually use very good cooling. Not all that familiar with XFX. I also don't care for Cooler Master cases. I'd suggest looking at Antec on the low end and Silverstone on the high end. Unless you like your PC looking like a Transformer

08-05-2010, 09:26 PM

Originally Posted by dtravis7

I might get some flack for this but I have always had the best luck with ATI. The latest ATI cards are very good and in some recent benchmarks are beating out some Nvidia at the same price point. Currently I am running all ATI here.

Whichever is en vogue at the moment is what I lean toward. Right now it seems like ATI has the best bang for the buck and is the darling of the gamer community. That's not a bad thing either because I've often found that ATI's drivers are more robust.

08-05-2010, 09:36 PM

Originally Posted by cwa107

Good parts all. I would suggest looking at EVGA cards. IMO, they have the best warranty and usually use very good cooling. Not all that familiar with XFX. I also don't care for Cooler Master cases. I'd suggest looking at Antec on the low end and Silverstone on the high end. Unless you like your PC looking like a Transformer

Just a heads up. I at this point am pretty broke extra $$$ wise but GTA4 was totally maxing out my ATI 1950XLT. I had the 256 MB model and GTA4 needs at least 512 MB VRam. Textures were disappearing and all sorts of slow downs.

I needed something NOW and did not have the $$$ for High End which would also need a new Power Supply with 2xPCI-E power also! I was at Best Buy. Saw this XFX. Never heard of it but it was cheap (nice when you are broke ). So I got on a IPad and checked a few reviews. All positive and people were playing GTA4 with settings up pretty high and seemed to love the XFX card for the price. Bought it. GTA4 came alive. Seems like a very good quality card. Well made and especially for the price.

That is my take on XFX anyway.

That's not a bad thing either because I've often found that ATI's drivers are more robust.

There was a time many years back when I remember people literally cussing out ATI for their drivers! They have gotten very good since then at least I have never had issues with them!

08-05-2010, 09:53 PM

Originally Posted by cwa107

Good parts all. I would suggest looking at EVGA cards. IMO, they have the best warranty and usually use very good cooling. Not all that familiar with XFX. I also don't care for Cooler Master cases. I'd suggest looking at Antec on the low end and Silverstone on the high end. Unless you like your PC looking like a Transformer

Thanks for the suggestions, cwa. I don't mind the Transformer look . Main reasons I went for this case was because the HDDs can be pulled straight out from the side of the case. All the previous cases I have had, the hard drives would have to slide out into the rest of the components and after throwing in more PCI cards, I would always have to take those out too if I wanted to get at the HDD. This case also has a switch for the fan LED lights, which I think will be nice for when going to bed.

Basically, I've always had really plain looking cases, I think it's time for me to get one that isn't so plain. Like I said, I really appreciate all the input though! I might go ahead and put the order through tonight and slap it on the old credit card. If I remember when I get it put together, I'll take some pics for ya! I'm pretty excited, I haven't built a personal computer for myself in YEARS!

08-05-2010, 10:02 PM

Originally Posted by dtravis7

I had the 256 MB model and GTA4 needs at least 512 MB VRam.

Seems almost insane to say that a game/application needs at least 512 MB of VRam.

I remember when having 4meg of vram ...and being able to run a 21" CRT monitor at 1152 x 864 (or something like that) in millions of colors made you feel like "king of the hill"!

- Nick

08-05-2010, 10:10 PM

Originally Posted by pigoo3

Seems almost insane to say that a game/application needs at least 512 MB of VRam.

I remember when having 4meg of vram ...and being able to run a 21" CRT monitor at 1152 x 864 (or something like that) in millions of colors made you feel like "king of the hill"!

- Nick

Then this will even make you more freaked!

I bought a ATI Chipset (XFX) card with 1GB Vram. With some things maxed and the rest one notch from Max, it's taking 700+ MB VRAM! No joke. GTA4 has a settings panel that shows how much System RAM and VRam it's taking.

With this new card I went from 12FPS or less to 30FPS+! Not bad for under $100.

08-05-2010, 10:46 PM

Originally Posted by dtravis7

With this new card I went from 12FPS or less to 30FPS+! Not bad for under $100.

Was that 12fps to 30+fps on the same video settings? That is quite an increase...and I'm sure makes the game MUCH more playable!

Yeah...I knew there were 1gig vram cards out there. Just seems to be a little insane to think that if someone has 2-4 gigs of ram & a 1gig vram video card...that the vram on the video card is 25-50% of the total installed ram.

Definitely a great purchase for under $100! It sure would be nice to be able to buy video cards like that for a Mac!

- Nick

08-06-2010, 12:54 AM

Well I just took the plunge and ordered everything. Thankfully, I remembered the Arctic Silver thermal compound. The only thing I don't have is a WiFi card for the computer. Since I have a gift certificate to Best Buy, I might just see if I can pick one up there for a decent price.

Anyone have any good experience with some USB WiFi adapters? I have an N router so that would be preferred.

08-06-2010, 09:09 AM

I have a 1.8GB Nvidia GTX 295 and can't run crysis with full settings at 2560x1600 resolution.

08-06-2010, 09:43 AM

Originally Posted by dtravis7

There was a time many years back when I remember people literally cussing out ATI for their drivers! They have gotten very good since then at least I have never had issues with them!

Last I heard, the Linux community despises ATI for their lack of decent drivers. Always used integrated graphics here (for me, GPUs are the least most important part of my machine - if it can power two displays, it works) so I can't actually confirm that but a quick search will show that nVidia is the preferred GPU of choice for Linux users.

08-06-2010, 01:39 PM

Van, ATI drivers for Windows are quite good of late. The ones for OSX work.

Interesting on the whole Linux thing. Maybe that is why my Power PC Ubuntu has issues booting on my iMac G5 as it has an ATI Radeon. Will have to check into that.

08-06-2010, 02:05 PM

Originally Posted by vansmith

Last I heard, the Linux community despises ATI for their lack of decent drivers. Always used integrated graphics here (for me, GPUs are the least most important part of my machine - if it can power two displays, it works) so I can't actually confirm that but a quick search will show that nVidia is the preferred GPU of choice for Linux users.

You're definitely right on that. nVidia drivers are much better on Linux machines than ATI. ATI has been getting better, but still not as good as nVidia on Linux.

08-06-2010, 02:06 PM

Originally Posted by dtravis7

Van, ATI drivers for Windows are quite good of late. The ones for OSX work.

Interesting on the whole Linux thing. Maybe that is why my Power PC Ubuntu has issues booting on my iMac G5 as it has an ATI Radeon. Will have to check into that.

That's funny. Amongst my geek friends, we've always considered ATI to have the better driver package for Windows. NVIDIA's drivers seem to be in perpetual beta by comparison.