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frank

Help me pick a computer

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I think what I want is something that just meets the recommended specs except I think I would like 4 gb ram. Anything above that is going to be a waste. My plan now is to go to best buy and maybe some other stores Friday. If I don't find something , I may go with the $539 model unless someone knows of something cheaper/ closer to the specs.

 

Good luck with that. BestBuy has this thing called "overhead". You'll never find anything cheaper at BB than NewEgg or similar online retailers. Furthermore, you're haggling over 75 bucks here or there. The extra 75 bucks is because we're giving you models of PC's, with video cards that meet the requirements of the game.

 

But by all means, save the 75 bucks and buy a POS you'll have to turn the resolution and frame rates way down on to enjoy your Starcrack.

 

Thanks for wasting our time too. I'll remember next time you ask for advice, that you really don't want that at all. Like most women, you just want self assurance.

 

:cheers:

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Thanks for wasting our time too. I'll remember next time you ask for advice, that you really don't want that at all. Like most women, you just want self assurance.

 

:cheers:

 

Relax dude. I asked for advice because I don't know the difference between the various processors and video cards. Actually, you were helpful and there is a good chance I am going with that last one you recommended. I'm just trying to make sure that what I get will work while avoiding paying $100+ extra per computer for stuff I will never use.

 

The rest of the story is that it is really my gf who is :banana: for diablo.

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Good luck with that. BestBuy has this thing called "overhead". You'll never find anything cheaper at BB than NewEgg or similar online retailers. Furthermore, you're haggling over 75 bucks here or there. The extra 75 bucks is because we're giving you models of PC's, with video cards that meet the requirements of the game.

 

But by all means, save the 75 bucks and buy a POS you'll have to turn the resolution and frame rates way down on to enjoy your Starcrack.

 

Thanks for wasting our time too. I'll remember next time you ask for advice, that you really don't want that at all. Like most women, you just want self assurance.

 

:cheers:

 

D!ckslap!! :overhead:

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I'm just trying to make sure that what I get will work while avoiding paying $100+ extra per computer for stuff I will never use.

Mobb is right. For $100+, don't be an idiot. The difference in quality is ridiculous. You might not need all the bell's and whistles now, but in the long-run it's definitely worth the relatively minor extra cost.

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Here's the rig I built a couple of months ago:

 

-Intel i5-2500K processor (unlocked, for her overclocking pleasure), $170-$200

-ASRock Z68 Extreme3 Gen3 LGA 1155 Intel Z68 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Intel Motherboard, $100-$120

-Corsair Vengeance RAM - 8GB (2 sticks), $44.99 on Amazon

 

I used my existing 500w power supply and my existing Geforce GTX 460 vid card. Even with that (relatively) old video card, I regularly get 130+ FPS on World of Tanks, and I can run Skyrim and SC2 on "high" settings, never ever have a problem with performance. I will probably upgrade my vid card when Diablo 3 comes out, but honestly up to this point I have not seen the need. It's all in the processor, and the i5 2500k is very popular with gamers because of its performance relative to price.

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Here's the rig I built a couple of months ago:

 

 

According to this site http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu_list.php

 

Your current video card blows away the recommend ones.

What confuses me is that according to that site, among the Radeon hd cards, 4870>6670>6450>6410d

 

4870 is on the recommended specs. For the most part it looks like higher number is better but not with the 4870?

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Well damn, maybe I won't upgrade then.

 

"blows it away" might be exaggerating since I don't know what I'm talking about, but if I read the numbers correctly, your video card is above recommended specs.

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Are you planning on going with a SSD?

No idea. I would think not since I assume that would be more expensive. I don't play many games so I am already getting more computer than I need just so I can play this one game with my gf.

I'm on a chat session with Dell right now to see what deal they can come up with.

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They are more expensive but if you're building a gaming rig the extra performance is worth it IMO. You'll be bottlenecking yourself with relatively poor read/write speeds while the rest of your system flies. I'd ask the Dell guy about one.

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Ok, so I am probably buying one of these. The first is mobb's reccomendation the others are from dell (first is a desktop, second is a laptop) What do you guys think?

 

 

Mobb's newegg machine $549

CyberpowerPC Gamer Ultra 2098

AMD FX-4100 (3.6GHz)

8GB DDR3

500GB HDD

AMD Radeon HD 6670 1GB

 

DELL desktop

1 Inspiron 620 Minitower w/ Black Bezel $607.59 $607.59

317-8404

1 Inspiron 620, Intel Core i5-2320 processor(6MB Cache, 3.0GHz)

317-7004

1 6GB DDR3 SDRAM,1333MHZ - 1x4GB/1x2GB

330-3620

1 Dell USB Entry Keyboard

320-7810

1 No Monitor

320-2541

1 AMD Radeon HD 6450 1GB DDR3

342-2718

1 1TB Serial ATA 2 Hard Drive 7200RPM

 

225-2660

1 XPS 15 $783.99 $783.99

317-9225

1 2nd generation Intel Core i5-2450M processor 2.50 GHz with Turbo Boost 2.0 up to 3.10 GHz

317-6414

1 6GB,DDR3,2 DIMM

331-1669

1 Standard Internal Keyboard - English

320-1672

1 15.6HD TLF WLED LCD L50xX

421-3874

1 Camera Software 2.X, Factory Install

421-3642

1 Basic Stage

320-2118

1 NVIDIA GeForce GT 525M 1GB graphics with Optimus

342-2370

1 750GB 7200 RPM SATA Hard Drive

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They are more expensive but if you're building a gaming rig the extra performance is worth it IMO. You'll be bottlenecking yourself with relatively poor read/write speeds while the rest of your system flies. I'd ask the Dell guy about one.

 

Dell guy said roughly $500 more for ssd.

 

I did learn something about video card numbers. The last two are how advanced it is in that series and can be more important than the first 2. So radeon hd 4870> radeon hd 6450.

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frank - I have no idea what I'm talking about, but I've heard that Intel's processors are generally much, much better than AMD processors. :dunno:

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frank - I have no idea what I'm talking about

 

you should have ended there

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LOL $500 more for SSD? Dell guy confirmed full of sh1t.

 

And if you're going with a regular HDD there's no reason not to get at least one TB of storage.

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Thanks guys. I went with this one.

 

Mobb's newegg machine $549

CyberpowerPC Gamer Ultra 2098

AMD FX-4100 (3.6GHz)

8GB DDR3

500GB HDD

AMD Radeon HD 6670 1GB

 

 

My gf will be psyched because I also bought two 23" monitors. She has an old 15" monitor should would have been happy to keep using.

 

total price with shipping: $1399.94

 

Things I learned:

1. what I mentioned earlier about video card numbers

2. diablo 3 requires more computer (price wise) than I thought it would

3. some of you have different avatars on the full and mobile versions of fftoday. I almost always use my phone, so I never noticed.

4. If I had ordered two days ago, I would have saved $20 and avoided being called a girl. :cry:

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Thanks guys. I went with this one.

 

Mobb's newegg machine $549

CyberpowerPC Gamer Ultra 2098

AMD FX-4100 (3.6GHz)

8GB DDR3

500GB HDD

AMD Radeon HD 6670 1GB

 

 

My gf will be psyched because I also bought two 23" monitors. She has an old 15" monitor should would have been happy to keep using.

 

total price with shipping: $1399.94

 

Things I learned:

1. what I mentioned earlier about video card numbers

2. diablo 3 requires more computer (price wise) than I thought it would

3. some of you have different avatars on the full and mobile versions of fftoday. I almost always use my phone, so I never noticed.

4. If I had ordered two days ago, I would have saved $20 and avoided being called a girl. :cry:

 

Good choice. You'll be very happy with that. It's not overkill, like the 8-900$ machines, but if gives you some extra juice, so you're not in this same spot 2 or 3 years from now. I personally always buy Intel processors, but I haven't read anything bad about that AMD chipset. It seems like a great buy.

 

I always wondered about avatards too. For some reason mine is Kenny Powers on mobile and Keyra Augustin'a arse on PC. I'd prefer it be universally arse!

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I like everything about it except for the lack of SSD and the 500 GB HDD, especially the space thing. Newer games routinely require 10-30 gigs of hard drive space (not sure if you're a WoW player but I read somewhere that game with all expansions installed is going to approach 50 gb). You're going to need to upgrade your hard drive long before that machine has outlived its usefulness, especially if you have a lot of music stored on it. Otherwise, great buy I think, really love the dual monitor setup, it should be a beast :thumbsup:

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I like everything about it except for the lack of SSD and the 500 GB HDD, especially the space thing. Newer games routinely require 10-30 gigs of hard drive space (not sure if you're a WoW player but I read somewhere that game with all expansions installed is going to approach 50 gb). You're going to need to upgrade your hard drive long before that machine has outlived its usefulness, especially if you have a lot of music stored on it. Otherwise, great buy I think, really love the dual monitor setup, it should be a beast :thumbsup:

 

Yeah, I would have liked more memory but couldn't find it in a computer I liked. I think diablo is only 12 gb. The two monitors are because I bought two computers.

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Ah ok I guess I misread, though you were going for a dual setup.

 

I assume you went with the 64 bit version of Windows 7?

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Ah ok I guess I misread, though you were going for a dual setup.

 

I assume you went with the 64 bit version of Windows 7?

Yeah. That's what came with it.

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Whew, that's good. I have a friend who ordered a system a few weeks ago with the 32 bit version. He got 16 GB of RAM. The salesman really did a number on him as 32 bit Windows OS will only address 4 GB of RAM.

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Also I'm just starting to get into multiplayer SC2 so if you ever wanna play shoot me a PM

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Also I'm just starting to get into multiplayer SC2 so if you ever wanna play shoot me a PM

 

I don't know when Ill get it. I really wanted it when it came out but didn't have the computer. Now, it could be months before I get to it because we will be playing Diablo. So, you'll have time to get really good and kill me. But I'll let you know.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Although, I really shouldn't be hanging out with you. Guess why.

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???

 

I agree, I probably won't get D3 when it launches as I still have a lot to do in Skyrim. I'm shooting for Father's Day to give 'em time to work out any issues that crop up at and immediately after launch. But I know that once I get D3 I'll have my head in it for months.

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I got the computers today. There are two problems. First, the headphone jacks on the front of both computers do not work. I can get sound if I plug into the back of the computer. I contacted the manufacturer and they said it is possible the wires came loose during shipping but more likely wires were just not connected to the front but that someone comfortable with opening up the computer could fix it in 5 minutes. That may have been if they just came loose, I'm not sure.

 

Also, the front of the case has a door that swings open. Inside is the dvd drive and covers where additional drives could go I guess. One of theose covers is missing on one of the computers. I don't know if that is a big deal but he said they could send me one.

 

So what should I do? Just send these things back? I don't know about opening these things up, but maybe they could talk me through it on the phone.

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I got the computers today. There are two problems. First, the headphone jacks on the front of both computers do not work. I can get sound if I plug into the back of the computer. I contacted the manufacturer and they said it is possible the wires came loose during shipping but more likely wires were just not connected to the front but that someone comfortable with opening up the computer could fix it in 5 minutes. That may have been if they just came loose, I'm not sure.

 

Also, the front of the case has a door that swings open. Inside is the dvd drive and covers where additional drives could go I guess. One of theose covers is missing on one of the computers. I don't know if that is a big deal but he said they could send me one.

 

So what should I do? Just send these things back? I don't know about opening these things up, but maybe they could talk me through it on the phone.

 

The jacks for your headphones are likely loose wires. Opening up the box and re-connecting them isn't a big deal (don't be intimidated) BUT DO call and have them walk you through it just in case. The missing bay isn't a big deal at all - more aesthetic than problem really. Might even help with airflow. Best of luck - you've got a respectable gaming rig there.

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The jacks for your headphones are likely loose wires. Opening up the box and re-connecting them isn't a big deal (don't be intimidated) BUT DO call and have them walk you through it just in case. The missing bay isn't a big deal at all - more aesthetic than problem really. Might even help with airflow. Best of luck - you've got a respectable gaming rig there.

 

Do you think loose wires would have happened on both computers?

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Do you think loose wires would have happened on both computers?

Sounds more likely they forgot to hook em up. Pop the hood and take a look. It'll either be plugged to motherboard or it won't.

 

I think u made the right choice. The FX 4100 processor is the same one I bought and for that price u wont find a faster CPU. As for the hard drive only being 500 gig - don't sweat it. Hard to imagine u ever filling that up with programs and music alone. Pictures eat up a lot of space, but hell external memory is so damn cheap... and getting cheaper every day.

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Do you think loose wires would have happened on both computers?

 

They probably forgot to hook them up. That said, when I did my upgrade I went through two different mobos (from the same manufacturer - ASUS, same model mobo each time) and BOTH were DOA, so it could be that those two mobos came from the same lot and have the same defect. Not likely, but possible.

 

And for God's sake do not open the case on either rig before ensuring that doing so won't void your warranty!

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And for God's sake do not open the case on either rig before ensuring that doing so won't void your warranty!

 

I concur with this - thus the suggestion on calling them first. More than likely they just shook loose in shipping, but you'll want to talk to a tech and get them to say 'opening your box will not void your warranty' before you do so.

 

Also I'd advocate a TB external for all pics/movies/pron down the line when it becomes necessary. Best to keep that separate from your OS and games/programs.

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It sounds like the headphone jacks not working is unlikely to be indicative of a larger problem? Just wires came loose or never connected in the first place. Either way pretty crappy for brand new computers but I'm going to think about it and if I don't find anything else wrong, I think I will just forget about it and live without headphone jacks. I think I could call up the manufacturer at any time in the future and get walked through it. Probably will never bother with it though.

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I disagree with raplhster. I do not believe the cables have shaken loose. Computer cables usually click in place and then hold pretty tight. You would have to shake a computer violently to get a cable to slip out of place.

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It sounds like the headphone jacks not working is unlikely to be indicative of a larger problem? Just wires came loose or never connected in the first place. Either way pretty crappy for brand new computers but I'm going to think about it and if I don't find anything else wrong, I think I will just forget about it and live without headphone jacks. I think I could call up the manufacturer at any time in the future and get walked through it. Probably will never bother with it though.

 

This is something they probably would not have gone to the trouble of testing before shipping it. It could be that the connectors were never hooked to the mobo, they came loose, the connection on the mobo is bad, both mobos are from the same (bad) lot, or some combination of those. Nothing to freak out about but very annoying.

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I disagree with raplhster. I do not believe the cables have shaken loose. Computer cables usually click in place and then hold pretty tight. You would have to shake a computer violently to get a cable to slip out of place.

 

Not in my case at least. The 1/8" top audio jack on my CM690 case arrived not working. When I pulled the cover off I found the wires connecting the jack were loose - I pushed them in further, heard a click and all was ok. Just speaking from personal experience. I've seen comps arrive with power & led lights not attached as well.

 

Doesn't mean Frank got a bum box, but if everything else is working ok and its just those two jacks I'd be inclined to think it was a connection issue before a bad mobo.

 

Also Frank - you can run a 1/8" splitter out the OUT from your mobo or sound card and plug your headphones into one side and your speakers into the other. They cost about $2 at Radio Shack. You'll be back there plugging in your mic anyway, and its an easy work around to get sound out of both headphones and speakers without having to switch plugs.

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I called NewEgg and told them to send your stuff all focked up, since you were acting like a right kunt. Cheers!

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