Gaming Hardware

[Angelspit]

Anyone here has a Dell XPS? What are your impressions? My current PC (also a Dell) has been my most reliable ever but it's getting a bit old now. I'm not sure if I should be looking at the 630 for games or if the cheaper Studio will be enough.

[Ed Robinson]

AS, I have an XPS410 bought April 2007. Choosen mostly for photo work on old family pics. I have used it for gaming and no complaints. I did increase RAM to 4GB and should have gone to Vista 64 bit, I have a friend who plays a lot, and he upgraded and tells me you wouldn't believe the difference it made.

Good luck whatever you choose.

Ed

[Angelspit]

During my last purchased I pumped up the processor, up to a 2.2 Ghz Pentium 4, and combined with a memory and a video card upgrade a few years later, I managed to play the latest games without too many problems until two years ago. I hope to find such a long-lasting core again this time.

Thanks for the reply, Ed.

[Borsuc]

You want pre-made PCs or custom-made ones from components?

[Caradoc]

iBuyPower makes some nice, affordable gaming rigs.

[Angelspit]

I'm considering picking the following rig when I get my tax refund:

AMD Phenom™ II X4 940 (I was originally planning to go with Intel, but the 940 is faster than a Q8200 and cheaper than a Q9550)
Vista® Home 64 Bit (sorry XP)
4GB Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 800MHz
1TB - 7200RPM, SATA 2 3.0Gb/s, 16MB Cache
Sound Blaster® X-Fi™ Xtreme Audio (is it worth the extra $100 over integrated audio?)
1x ATI Radeon HD4850 512MB (cheaper than the HD4870)
750 W Power Supply

I don't play a lot of demanding games, but I want a system that will last several years with a few upgrades (8 Gig of RAM, a second 4850 in SLI). It's a Dell XPS 625 by the way. I know that I could build something cheaper on my own, but I don't have the time to shop and assemble individual components.

Any thoughts?

[Kalah]

That looks like a serious piece of kit, although I guess the video card could me more extreme... One question, mate: is it liquid cooled?

[Angelspit]

I can live without maximum settings and games with high system requirements, so I guess I could last a while with a single 4850.

The cooling is the "XPS Standard System Cooling" that's delivered with most (if not all) XPS gaming systems. I'll probably chat with a sales person for more info.

[Pol]

I will be having my computer completed tomorrow. The PSU was the last one.
But it's HTPC, so I guess that it doesn't relate to the gaming rigs.

PS Good choice for the CPU Angelspit, now maybe that graphic card would deserve to be shifted a bit up. HD4890 will be released in April, likely to the end, about 20th.

What about non-DELL HIS IceQ Edition?

[darknessfood]

Perhaps you can get other coolers? Most of the time, the standard coolers are crap. This is a good site for it, if you want it <CLICK>...

[Angelspit]

HD4890 will be released in April, likely to the end, about 20th.

I wonder how much it will cost. Alternatively, a HD4870 would be a good step up the 4850, wouldn't it?

[Pol]

It would. But not in the sense getting as first hd4850 and then upgrade to hd4870. That wouldn't be economical wise.

Aaa, getting directly hd4890 could be a good move. And also in USA (& Canada perhaps too) will be again discounts. I remmeber that ati is having some discounts based on your citizenship - you will aquire them only if you're from the right country. Still, according the uncorfirmed rumours they applied in one or two shops in the whole country. Considering this country is USA, getting these card cheap can be quite hard task to accomplish.

[Kalah]

Hey, AS, you didn't buy a new rig yet, right? I was grazing the thread and noticed that you're going with Vista... Are you sure you don't want to wait for that next Windows thing that's coming? Vista blows...

I also looked at some reviews, and the XPS machines have received good reviews in Norway; the biggest problem was delivery times, since Dell underestimated demand, if you can believe that.

[Angelspit]

Yeah, I might wait for Windows 7. The previews are interesting so far. I've been watching the sales and the offerings of video cards on the Dell site but I'm in no hurry.

[laisabeck]

What are Gaming Hardware requirements nowadays? Any system expert here? My kid wants to play these two games Red Dead Redemption 2 and World of Warcraft: Shadowlands. Actually, I'm building a complete gaming setup and environment for my boy's 16th birthday.

[Pol]

Red Dead Redemption 2 Recommended PC Requirements

• Operating System : Windows 10
• CPU: Intel Core i7-4770K / AMD Ryzen 5 1500X
• RAM: 12 GB
• Graphics card: Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060 6GB / AMD Radeon RX 480 4GB
• Storage Space Required : 150 GB
• Dedicated Video Memory: 4 - 6 GB

Recommended Specs for Shadowlands on PC

• Windows 10 64-bit
• Intel Core i7-6700K / AMD Ryzen 7 2700X
• GeForce GTX 1080 / Radeon RX Vega 64
• DirectX 12-compatible GPU with 8 GB VRAM
• 8 GB RAM
• 100 GB SSD
• Multi-button mouse with scrolling wheel

So, you should go above that. It doesn't make sense to tailor in only on these two games, better to tailor it for the future.

The requirements are kinda old, so translated to today hardware specs we can go with:
Intel + Nvidia
OS: Windows 10 64bits (Not Starter, Normal alias in old terms Premium are the right ones)
CPU: CometLake LGA1200, DDR4 - i7 3.7GHz a nebo i9 2.9GHz, 8 Cores is enough, best seems Intel Core i7-10700KF (boost 5.1GHz, without integrated GPU)
Chipset: Z490 chipset optimally, like GIGABYTE Z490 GAMING X or any other alternatives. (Asus Z490-P) The "gaming" boards have usually higher durability, higher freq for memory and possibility to overclock. (The last thing you probably won't use. )
Memory: DDR4 16-32, 32 is "cheaper"
Don't be afraid of G.Skill, Corsair, Crucial, A-Data and ofc Kingston. It's all very similar. What does matter are frequency, cooler and dimensions with cooler - to fit under CPU cooler, depending on layout. True perfomance you will see only from the tests.
Good example is "Corsair 32GB KIT DDR4 3600MHz CL18 VENGEANCE RGB PRO SL Black" or "Crucial Ballistix White 32GB (2x16GB) DDR4 3600 CL16", as for timing lower is better, freqency is better higher, XMP profile is recommended

GPU: Haha, I don't see available any GTX or RTX cards in our shops atm, maybe you will be more lucky. RTX 3060 is ofc ideal but you can go below - if the cards would be available at all. Previously it was 2080. However take in consideration that 1050 or 1060 are not a good investment.
Case: I recommend BeQuite or Coolermaster
PSU: Depends on the GPU mostly, most likely 600W I again recommend BeQuite because of being pretty silent.
Coolers: Tower Sandwith cooler, like Fera 3 HE1224 (on site they claim LGA1200 compatibility https://www.silentiumpc.com/en/product/fera-3-he1224/, you migt need one extra 14" cooler with extra clips)
As well you might need one additional Cooler close to HDD and GPU area.
HDD: 500GB SSD +1x 2TB classic hdd 7200rpm


AMD + AMD (GPU can be used in previous setup as well)
OS: Can be the same
CPU: AMD Ryzen 5 5600X (Zen3//AM4 socket)
Chipset: X570, boards like ASUS PRIME X570-P - AMD X570 (https://www.asus.com/support/Download-Center/)
Memory: Can be the same
GPU: Vega 3/4 or previous generation. Don't see them accessible as well.
Case: Can be the same
PSU: Can be the same
Coolers: Can be the same
HDD: 500GB SSD +1x 2TB classic hdd 7200rpm


Not seeing some normal graphic card is a serious issue, the same is also true for amazon.com. But two or three weeks should fix that. Still it will be hard to get one.

[KayBur]

As for me, if you are already faced with a lack of resources on your computer, then you should save up some money and buy a new computer that will have enough power for several years in advance. It is simply unreasonable to buy a computer with parameters that are enough today.