Hopefully my last computer thread

[elricik]

If you've been following my posting lately, you'll notice I have been asking a lot of questions about computers and keep making the same threads over and over again. This is not because I am a troll, its just because I have bad luck. Every time I am about to buy a computer, some crisis comes up and I can't spend any money due to an emergency or something. But not this time. Due to the current economy in America, no one can get any credit, meaning I cannot get a computer. Until I discovered I still have my dell account, which I have credit on so I can buy a computer from them. I was doing some digging and I found this computer,

XPS 630
Intel® Core?2 Q8300 (4MB,2.5GHz, 1333FSB)

Operating System
Genuine Windows Vista® Ultimate Bonus

Optical Drive
Single Drive: 16X CD/DVD burner (DVD+/-RW) w/double layer write capability

Memory
4GB4 Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM2 at 800MHz - 4 DIMMs

Hard Drive
1TB5 Performance RAID 0 (2 x 500GB5 SATA 3Gb/s 7200 RPM6 HDDs)

Video Card
SLI?, Dual NVIDIA® GeForce® GTS 240, 2048MB

Sound Cards
Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium

So, my question to you Escapist community is, is the XPS 630 a good gaming rig?

 

[Dr. Gorgenflex]

That depends on the price.

 

[Emphraim]

To be honest, it seems very unbalanced. The Graphics card is worthless, and the processor will need quite a bit of overclocking to get games to work at high settings.

The Harddrive is huge, and sound card is good, the memory is good, but that's all worthless without a good graphic card and processor.

I suggest you buy your parts of Newegg and build it yourself so you won't get weird unbalanced builds like this.

 

[sms_117b]

Build it from scratch, the need for a new machine doesn't appear that desperate, as you're using a machine to post, buy one or two parts a month of ebuyer.com or somewhere similar. It'll take about 6 months to get the pieces together that way though.

 

[elricik]

To be honest, it seems very unbalanced. The Graphics card is worthless, and the processor will need quite a bit of overclocking to get games to work at high settings.

The Harddrive is huge, and sound card is good, the memory is good, but that's all worthless without a good graphic card and processor.

I suggest you buy your parts of Newegg and build it yourself so you won't get weird unbalanced builds like this.

Alright, its a good thing I came to the Escapist because I almost bought that computer. Anyway when you guys have some down time could you look at this page and tell me which is the best gaming computer for under 1100 dollars. I would really appreciate it and be indebted to your service.

http://www.dell.com/us/en/home/desktops/cp.aspx?refid=desktops&s=dhs&cs=19

 

[Horticulture]

If money's tight enough that you're buying on credit, consider building your own. It's not terribly difficult, and you can get a comparable PC for half the price.

 

[Alex_P]

If you're buying on credit or if you value your money at all, you should kick down the specs.

For starters...

SLI video card? Huge waste of money. SLI requires an entire second card, a fancier motherboard, and a bigger power supply. For what? You're getting something like 1.5x the performance of one card usually, sometimes more, sometimes less.

Separate sound card? X-Fi Titanium? Many modern motherboards have great built-in sound. Last I heard, Vista won't let you use that hardware acceleration for DirectSound anyway.

Vista Ultimate? That's basically Home Premium with a lot of business-oriented stuff. Do you need stuff like BitLocker and UNIX application support?

-- Alex

 

[Finnboghi]

To be honest, it seems very unbalanced. The Graphics card is worthless, and the processor will need quite a bit of overclocking to get games to work at high settings.

The Harddrive is huge, and sound card is good, the memory is good, but that's all worthless without a good graphic card and processor.

I suggest you buy your parts of Newegg and build it yourself so you won't get weird unbalanced builds like this.

Might want to check your stats there, chief.

Granted the CPU is absolutely horrible, but the 240 is ranked 31st of several hundred high-end cards, not withstanding the fact it's bridged.

It would be possible to get the machine from Dell, and replace the CPU with a quad core.

Provided all your software is properly threaded, of course.

If you do this, make absolutely certain you upgrade the cooling system as well - otherwise your pretty new beast will quickly become a pretty new smoking pile of melted silicon.

 

[Low Key]

It's better than my computer.

 

[gRiM_rEaPeRsco]

im not sure what credit is, do u buy things with credit then use ur actual money at a later date?

 

[kahlzun]

If you can't afford a computer, can you really afford the sort of high-performance games that you'd need a system like that to run?

 

[SpAc3man]

I dont like it.
you dont need SLI, the GTS 240 is over priced, the sound card is just extra cost and the RAM is 4 1GB sticks which is extra cost considering its cheaper to get 2 2GB sticks, the CPU is pretty average.

To be extremely picky.. the DVD drive is a bit slow. Id get a 22x or 24x but hey it doesnt really matter as long as its a SATA drive

Personally I would recommend an ATI card right now because they are selling really low. either a 4850 or a 4870. For RAM i would say 2 sticks of DDR2 1066 2GB CL5 and CPU probably a 2.66GHz with a bigger cache if you can afford it, not too important though. Instead of 2 HDDs in RAID 0 its worth it to just get a 1TB drive. You dont really need RAID 0 and you will save heaps

Do you have any idea about building your own PC? I highly recommend it and its a great thing to learn. I built my own with hardly any experience apart from helping a friend once and research using google. Its quite easy, its almost impossible to put something in the wrong place

 

[elricik]

Let me reiterate, I have enough money for a computer, but I don't want to blow two thousand dollars away. The reason I am buy with credit is because I only have about five hundred dollars in hand that I can spend freely. So I use credit because you can make monthly payments, that way if theirs some kind of emergency (like what happened last time when I was buying my car) I will still have money to pay out of pocket at an emergency room. Believe me, I have really good insurance, but when you need surgery, even with the deductible, your still paying two thousand dollars out of pocket. So that's why I like credit, its just easier to manage.

 

[dantheman931]

im not sure what credit is, do u buy things with credit then use ur actual money at a later date?

Finally, a question I can answer! Basically, yeah. You're borrowing the money from the company and paying it back in installments, plus interest (the extra on top of the money you've borrowed so the company can make a profit off the deal). Good deal if you can afford the payments, bad deal if you can't. Or if you're the irresponsible type who buys on credit without worrying about how you're going to pay for it; you can get yourself in some huge trouble doing stuff like that, like making it so no one wants to extend you credit when you need to borrow for something that matters (like a car or a house or an engagement ring). Credit companies love to compare notes, y'see, and if word gets around that you're a bad risk, it's a ***** trying to change their minds.

 

[elricik]

I dont like it.
you dont need SLI, the GTS 240 is over priced, the sound card is just extra cost and the RAM is 4 1GB sticks which is extra cost considering its cheaper to get 2 2GB sticks, the CPU is pretty average.

To be extremely picky.. the DVD drive is a bit slow. Id get a 22x or 24x but hey it doesnt really matter as long as its a SATA drive

Personally I would recommend an ATI card right now because they are selling really low. either a 4850 or a 4870. For RAM i would say 2 sticks of DDR2 1066 2GB CL5 and CPU probably a 2.66GHz with a bigger cache if you can afford it, not too important though. Instead of 2 HDDs in RAID 0 its worth it to just get a 1TB drive. You dont really need RAID 0 and you will save heaps

Do you have any idea about building your own PC? I highly recommend it and its a great thing to learn. I built my own with hardly any experience apart from helping a friend once and research using google. Its quite easy, its almost impossible to put something in the wrong place

I've never even considered building a computer, I would probably end up screwing the whole thing up, getting pissed, and wasting a whole lot of time and money. I'm not really that handy, back in high school I barely passed shop and engineering classes. But if its as easy as you say, would you mind maybe pointing me in the right direction as to how I would go about doing it?

 

[Alex_P]

Come to think of it, the RAID also seems a bit weird.

Those 7200 RPM HDs are pretty standard consumer drives. I bought similar 750 MB drives over a year ago for about $100 a piece, so I'm kind of scratching my head wondering why they don't just give you some 1 TB drives now -- they're quite economical. Putting them in a RAID 0 configuration improves their throughput but makes failure more likely (either drive failing destroys all your data). I bet Dell is charging you up the ass for the RAID controller as well.

It's faster than a single drive, but I'm not sure it's faster in a way that'll matter 95% of the time. In my experience, hard drive throughput isn't the major performance constraint in gaming. (You do really feel it when your computer starts swapping to disk, but for consumer desktops the best way to address that bottleneck is to get more RAM on the cheap, not a faster drive.)

-- Alex

 

[gRiM_rEaPeRsco]

im not sure what credit is, do u buy things with credit then use ur actual money at a later date?

Finally, a question I can answer! Basically, yeah. You're borrowing the money from the company and paying it back in installments, plus interest (the extra on top of the money you've borrowed so the company can make a profit off the deal). Good deal if you can afford the payments, bad deal if you can't. Or if you're the irresponsible type who buys on credit without worrying about how you're going to pay for it; you can get yourself in some huge trouble doing stuff like that, like making it so no one wants to extend you credit when you need to borrow for something that matters (like a car or a house or an engagement ring). Credit companies love to compare notes, y'see, and if word gets around that you're a bad risk, it's a ***** trying to change their minds.

Then why dont u just have patience and get the thing when u can afford it outright, u would save money and theres less hassle.

 

[akmarksman]

As someone who's built computers using off the shelf and done repair work on a bunch of Dells..
I put together a system on the cheap for gaming.

Spoiler

SYSTEM COLOR Piano Black edit
PROCESSOR Intel® Core? 2 Quad Q8200 (4MB L2, 2.33GHz, 1333FSB) edit
OPERATING SYSTEM Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium Edition SP1, 64-Bit edit
OFFICE SOFTWARE Microsoft® Works 9 edit

Dell Recommends
Office Home & Student.

Lets you create great-looking documents, spreadsheets and presentations quickly.
Upgrade to Microsoft® Office Home and Student 2007 [add $99 or $3/month1]
WARRANTY AND SERVICE 1Yr Ltd Hardware Warranty, InHome Service after Remote Diagnosis edit

Dell Recommends
Keep your warranty working longer.
Upgrade to 2Yr Ltd Hardware Warranty, InHome Service after Remote Diagnosis [add $79 or $3/month1]
SECURITY SOFTWARE McAfee SecurityCenter, 15-Months edit
MEMORY 4GB Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 800MHz- 2 DIMMs edit
HARD DRIVE 750GB Serial ATA Hard Drive (7200RPM) w/DataBurst Cache? edit
MONITORS 21.5" Dell S2209W Full HD Widescreen Monitor edit
OPTICAL DRIVE 16X DVD+/-RW Drive edit
VIDEO CARD ATI Radeon HD 4350 512MB edit
SPEAKERS No Speaker Option edit

Dell Recommends
Multimedia Speaker System delivers an ideal combination of performance and value
Upgrade to Bose Companion 2 Series II Multimedia Speaker System [add $110 or $3/month1]
KEYBOARD AND MICE Dell Consumer Entry USB Keyboard and Mouse edit
MEDIA READER Dell 19 in 1 Media Card Reader edit
MODEM 56K PCI Data Fax Modem edit
My Accessories
DATASAFE ONLINE BACKUP Dell Online Backup 2GB for 1 year edit
ALSO INCLUDED WITH YOUR SYSTEM
SOUND CARD Integrated 5.1 Channel Audio
MOUSE Mouse included with Keyboard purchase
Adobe Acrobat Adobe® Reader 9.0
Inspiron 537 ST Inspiron 537 Slim-Tower w/ Black Bezel
Network Card Integrated 10/100 Ethernet

for $889

Quad core,21.5" HD monitor,good capacity hard drive..etc.
============================================================================

Below is a Inspiron 546 with upgraded stuff (AMD Quad Core,maximum RAM..)
cost is $994

Spoiler

REVIEW MY SUMMARY
Congratulations! Your system is ready to be built.
We have some recommendations for you highlighted in green below.
Software & Services
SYSTEM COLOR Piano Black edit
PROCESSOR AMD Athlon? II X4 620 (2.6GHz, 2MB) edit
OPERATING SYSTEM Genuine Windows® Vista Home Premium, Easy Upgrade to Windows 7 Home Premium edit
WARRANTY AND SERVICE 1Yr Ltd Hardware Warranty, InHome Service after Remote Diagnosis edit

Dell Recommends
Keep your warranty working longer.
Upgrade to 2Yr Ltd Hardware Warranty, InHome Service after Remote Diagnosis [add $79 or $3/month1]
SECURITY SOFTWARE McAfee SecurityCenter, 15-Months edit
MONITOR 23" Dell S2309W Full HD Widescreen Monitor edit
MEMORY 8GB Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 800MHz - 4 DIMMs edit
HARD DRIVE 1TB Serial ATA Hard Drive (7200RPM) w/DataBurst Cache? edit
OPTICAL DRIVE 16X DVD+/-RW Drive edit
VIDEO CARD nVidia GeForce GT 220, 1024MB edit
SPEAKERS Dell AX210 1.2 Watt 2.0 Stereo Speakers edit

Dell Recommends
Multimedia Speaker System delivers an ideal combination of performance and value
Upgrade to Bose Companion 2 Series II Multimedia Speaker System [add $90 or $3/month1]
SOUND Integrated 5.1 Channel Audio edit
KEYBOARD & MOUSE Dell Consumer Entry USB Keyboard and Mouse edit
FLOPPY & MEDIA READER No Floppy Drive or Media Card Reader Included edit
MODEM No Modem Option edit
My Accessories
OFFICE SOFTWARE Microsoft® Works 9 edit

Dell Recommends
Office Home & Student.

Lets you create great-looking documents, spreadsheets and presentations quickly.
Upgrade to Microsoft® Office Home and Student 2007 [add $99 or $3/month1]
DATASAFE ONLINE BACKUP Dell Online Backup 2GB for 1 year edit
ADOBE & ENTERTAINMENT Wild Tangent Games edit
ALSO INCLUDED WITH YOUR SYSTEM
Inspiron 546 MT Inspiron 546 Minitower w/ Black Bezel
Mouse Mouse included with Keyboard purchase
Network Card Integrated 10/100 Ethernet
Adobe Software Adobe® Reader 9.0
Miscellaneous Thank you for Choosing Dell

Im currently running a AMD Athlon 64x2 at 2.6Ghz with 4GB DDR2-800.nvidia 9800GTs running in SLi and they have 512MB DDR3 each.
I was running Farcry 2 just fine.Same with Call of Duty Modern Warfare..infact running COD4 on my PC spoiled my experience for COD4 360 version..mostly the graphics.

About the only thing you would need to upgrade is the video card in the future.

 

[dantheman931]

im not sure what credit is, do u buy things with credit then use ur actual money at a later date?

Finally, a question I can answer! Basically, yeah. You're borrowing the money from the company and paying it back in installments, plus interest (the extra on top of the money you've borrowed so the company can make a profit off the deal). Good deal if you can afford the payments, bad deal if you can't. Or if you're the irresponsible type who buys on credit without worrying about how you're going to pay for it; you can get yourself in some huge trouble doing stuff like that, like making it so no one wants to extend you credit when you need to borrow for something that matters (like a car or a house or an engagement ring). Credit companies love to compare notes, y'see, and if word gets around that you're a bad risk, it's a ***** trying to change their minds.

Then why dont u just have patience and get the thing when u can afford it outright, u would save money and theres less hassle.

Good question. If you can afford it, it's usually preferable to do it that way, and it's conceivably possible if you're talking about something like a computer. If you're looking to buy something big like a car, though, it's not always possible to wait until you've got that kind of cash ready to plunk down; if your old car dies, for instance, you're stuck walking until you can get your hands on a new car.

Truthfully, though, it's because people are impatient by nature and they want things as soon as they see them. If you're responsible about paying off what you owe and you don't mind paying a little extra for the convenience, there's nothing wrong with buying on credit. It's just a matter of not being an idiot about it.

 

[Alex_P]

Then why dont u just have patience and get the thing when u can afford it outright, u would save money and theres less hassle.

If you can get the product at 0% interest, buying it on credit isn't costing you any extra money unless you fuck up the payments (at which point they usually revert to a crazy rate like 25%).

Paying it off on time can help build your credit history a tiny bit, too -- and, ultimately, everyone in the modern economy needs a credit rating for certain things. So, with 0% interest, it's not altogether a bad idea.

-- Alex