So I have been putting off buying a new PC for a while, mostly because all I play on my desktop is wow (360 and PS3 provide the rest).

My frame rates arn't all that amazing anymore and my mothers computer back home is really old so I figure I am going to give her my current one soon and buy a new one myself.

One of my friends told me to wait for this geforce 9800 card thats coming out at the end of Feb. Anyone know anything about it? Is is going to be worth me waiting until then to get it?

I'd like to be able to play just about anything on it. Assume I'd spend up to like 3 grand on it because I can't see it being worthwhile to spend more than that these days. Also, I got one of those nifty Dell 30' for xmas so I'd like to take advantage of it at some point.

We seem to have lots of people that know about hardware. Anyone got some advice?

3k? 1.5k can get you a quad core + 4 hard drive raid10 and 4gb ram with decent video card. To try push crysis to the maximum level just not worth it right now.

Where would I purchase said computer?

I haven't bothered to really take a look into hardware for a very long time. I am basically worthless at this point.

I have always had alienwares, I know everyone says they are overpriced - build your own blah blah. I just want something that works, price isn't the concern.

I think Seigfried is implying building your own system for that price. You can get quite a bit more bang for your buck by building your own. Plus this allows you to put in the exact parts you want in to it. If you do your homework researching parts, building your own system isn't that daunting. I've built about 8 since 2002 for home and work and I will never buy a retail system again. Take a look at http://www.tomshardware.com as starting point to find out if building your own system is something you might want to do. http://www.Newegg.com is a great place to look up parts and prices, plus the customer comments/feedback on a part can be useful. I also think they are probably the best place to order parts from in general and they have good return policy if you have a problem.

I looked around tomshardware. I have known about newegg for years.

Anyway, the thing that scares me about building my own computer isn't putting together the computer or getting everything running, but getting the right parts in the first place.

It seems like people are always talking about how x isn't compatible with x and y doesnt work when you use x etc. Buying a computer from a company you have the whole "this is fucked up you fix it" card too. Though I have never really had to call tech support besides a power supply issue, the idea of something going wrong and having no idea whats wrong scares me.

Just buy well known brand part and you will not have problem.

interesting.

many thanks for the input.

3k is a bit overboard imo. Ha. You can spend that on a computer but it still won't perform as good as an Xbox 360 or PS3... so why?

Why spend 70 grand on a car?

Why spend a million on a house?


Where you draw the line is all a personal thing.

Not really. 3000 dollars on a computer is way beyond necessary. The performance you'd squeeze out of a 1750$ system and a 3000$ system is minimal at best.

I'd rather have a $3000 pc over an XBox any day.

Anyway, Bupas, if you want a hand configuring a system layout, give me a shout here or at sordideuphemism on the gee-mail.

That's crazy, considering Xbox 360s and PS3s out-perform any PC on the market. Ha. To each their own though. =)

There have been several improvements over card and system architecture since XBox's and PS3's releases. I do not believe you are reading the same technical releases I am, sir. Regardless, enjoy your consoles.