Suggestions for Building a computer for MS Vista?

[Taranis]

Hello- let me set the seen for you,

Its April 2007 I finally receive my funds that I borrowed to good old Uncle Sam a year ago, he always waits to the last minute to reimburse his debt! Now with cash in hand I look to build a new Gaming Computer.

So the questions is what should I build, my wife is a computer tech (but she’s not a gamer) so I get a lot of rolled eyes when I tell her I need at least 2gigs of Ram and a GeForce 7600 GT 256 MB. I want to build a machine that will be able to run MS Vista well, although I doubt I would put it on my new machine right away. I can get Vista for free from my wife through her work so that’s not really an issue

So here’s what I was thinking of:

600-watt case and power supply
64 bit Athlon processor
Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe mother board
2 GB PC-3200 DDR Ram
120 GB Hard Drive
Creative Labs X-FI Xtreme Sound Card
Nividia GeForce 7600 256MB GT Videocard

(Most of these suggestons game form the Hard Stuff Section of PC Gamer)

I play mostly Strategy games which used to mean that you don’t need such a high end machine, but nowadays its just as hard to play some TBS games like Civ4 as it is to play Halo! Does any have any suggestions or experiences with Vista that could shed some light on what I really need? I know I won’t be building it for a while but I would like to know ahead of time what kind of cost I’m looking at.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

BTW my old machine specs are, 866mhz P3, 512ram, GeForce 5700 le (yeah its that old) but it’s still going strong!

[Charlatan]

<you're not the only one who can edit your post!>

I think that waiting until Vista is closer to launch would give you a better idea as to what you need. I also think that given that you're a turn-based strategy enthusiast, the absolute need to upgrade wouldn't be too pressing (yeah, I saw what you wrote, and granted, Civ4, HOMM5, etc, are certainly raising the bar, but you can survive with a sub par machine longer in this genre than in the FPS category, fr'instance).

[Cold Blooded]

May or may not be helpful, but MS released Vista minspec (http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/getready/capable.mspx) little while back. Assume 3D hardware requirement is for "Aero" specifically, rather than general OS use.

[Taranis]

I think the HTLM parser had a nervous breakdown when you pasted that text in...

Yeah lol, I had to go through and delete all that stuff so it wasn't such a mess.

[Taranis]

May or may not be helpful, but MS released Vista minspec (http://www.microsoft.com/windowsvista/getready/capable.mspx) little while back. Assume 3D hardware requirement is for "Aero" specifically, rather than general OS use.
Thanks for the link! They recommend 1 GB of Ram but I have a feeling thats not going to be enough for a Gaming Machine.

[Taranis]

<you're not the only one who can edit your post!>

I think that waiting until Vista is closer to launch would give you a better idea as to what you need. I also think that given that you're a turn-based strategy enthusiast, the absolute need to upgrade wouldn't be too pressing (yeah, I saw what you wrote, and granted, Civ4, HOMM5, etc, are certainly raising the bar, but you can survive with a sub par machine longer in this genre than in the FPS category, fr'instance).
TBS games are definitely my favorite genre but I would also love to be able to play some of the newer RTS titles like BFME2, right now my machine wets itself if I try to install something of that caliber!

[Qmanol]

On the Poweruser podcast a week ago, Brad said that 2GB RAM is a good idea, and you may even want more (which means going 64-bit). Also that the handles seems to be an issue in the 32-bit version. At this point, Vista is such a mess that I'd just get the most powerful thing you can sensibly get, (Which your above specs pretty much are) and cross your fingers.

That sound card seems excessive, though. How much is it?

[Taranis]

That sound card seems excessive, though. How much is it?
They have it listed at $110 in their April issue.

Thanks for the response, so 2 GB of ram sounds like a good starting point...lol never thought I would be saying that!

[Coca Cola Zero]

If you're not going to buy the system until April 2007, why don't you just wait until then and then buy whatever is "midrange" the day you buy it?

Buying anything higher than midrange for gaming these days is generally a dumb idea because the release cycles are so long that if you go completely high-end you'll wind up with a system that no games really push (other than allowing you to run in higher resolutions for very minimal quality improvements) until years later when the same system would cost you 25% of what you paid for it when you bought it.

It is cheaper in the long run to just buy a new midrange system every year or two than to buy a super-rig every 3-4 years, and while you might not get the dick waving rights you might otherwise get for the first 6 months when you can run game XYZ in super-high-res with max textures, you also don't have to go through that last year of feeling like every new game runs like crap on what used to be your super computer but is now a chump-box.

[Taranis]

If you're not going to buy the system until April 2007, why don't you just wait until then and then buy whatever is "midrange" the day you buy it?

Buying anything higher than midrange for gaming these days is generally a dumb idea because the release cycles are so long that if you go completely high-end you'll wind up with a system that no games really push (other than allowing you to run in higher resolutions for very minimal quality improvements) until years later when the same system would cost you 25% of what you paid for it when you bought it.

It is cheaper in the long run to just buy a new midrange system every year or two than to buy a super-rig every 3-4 years, and while you might not get the dick waving rights you might otherwise get for the first 6 months when you can run game XYZ in super-high-res with max textures, you also don't have to go through that last year of feeling like every new game runs like crap on what used to be your super computer but is now a chump-box.
Yeah thats kinda of where I'm at now, My machine was top of the line in 2000 (even came with Windows ME..lol) and I have upgraded it as far as I can without swapping out the Motherboard. You make a sensible argument for buying a mid range machine, I will consider it! But that first 6 months of Dick waving rights is a pretty tempting proposition also!

[Coca Cola Zero]

Midrange 4 lyfe, yo!!

[Rimbo]

yeah, time to start thinkin bout this (http://www.apple.com/getamac/)

[Taranis]

yeah, time to start thinkin bout this (http://www.apple.com/getamac/)
LOL....LOL....LOL....ROTFL

[Qmanol]

If I had a need for a laptop, I'd probably get a Macbook. The new macs are very nice, especially now that booting Windows is officially sanctioned. But it'll never take my desktop spot - For some strange reason I like building my own machines still.

[JMR]

I think with Vista I'm going to hold off until it gets its XP equivalent of a service pack upgrade. I really don't relish the thought of being an early adopter of a new OS. I dunno maybe the techies here can change my opinion on that.

[Becoming]

By all accounts it'll be more secure out of the box than xp currently is, but I'm sure that it will be the target of all the internet poison at first just because it's fashionable to pick apart new stuff. There are quite a few features I am very interested in however, so I'm sure I'll end up caving in by next summer/fall.

[Midnight Son]

LOL....LOL....LOL....ROTFL

Yeah, hold out for the new Conroe PowerMacs. Use a real OS to get work done and boot to XP/Vista for games.

[instant0]

Do not buy anything until VISTA is out, except for many a monitor and hard-drives, that is, stuff you can use later.

With VISTA you'll probably want a AMD 64-bit AM2 4800+, 2-3GB 1024/Low-Latency DDR2 Memory, a new Video card supporting DirectX 10, a 1GB USB2.0 Memory stick for SuperFetch (Cache), The soundcard can probably be onboard due to how MS has changed audio in Vista.

Anyway, thats my plan. :-)

[instant0]

I think with Vista I'm going to hold off until it gets its XP equivalent of a service pack upgrade. I really don't relish the thought of being an early adopter of a new OS. I dunno maybe the techies here can change my opinion on that.

I hear this a few times whenever there is a new os..

I think it is superstition.. that the new os will be much worse than the old one until you get a service pack...

I can not remember any os that was worse than its previous version (And WinME was good), although Vista requires much more resources from the computer, so it may not be better -- you just need a faster computer to run it at the same 'speed' as before.

[jfletch]

This year I bought a 3200+ AMD64, a 6800GS videocard, and 2 gigs of RAM. Next year I plan to buy a X2 4800+ and the best DX10 videocard I can get for $250-$300. Picking the CPU is easy for me, as the 939 line is nearing its end, but videocard, we have no idea what will happen.

[DeepT]

Yea this vista thing is annoying me, espeically since they pushed it back. I was planning on making a new box this summer, but then I thought I do not want to install XP and all that only to install vista over it later on.

Of course I do not want to actually get vista the day it comes out, I would like to have it out for a few months so early adopters can go through all the pain of gaming incompatabilities first and give game makers a chance to fix stuff.

So then its not comming out till the end of the year, so I need to delay everything for 6 months. Now I hear it may not even come out by then.

My ATI Radion 9800 pro is starting to show its age. I plan on getting a high end (but not top end) NVidia card, a duel core CPU, and at the very least, 2 gigs of very fast ram. Id like to stick with the shuttle x-form factor boxes too.

[metta]

I have a pal who works at ATI and he says that, using their as-yet unreleased card and a topline hardware config, Vista needs 2GB just to run the OS properly.

Have you seen the little piggies
Crawling in the dirt
And for all the little piggies
Life is getting worse
Always having dirt to play around in.

[instant0]

@Metta: .. that would .. really suck.

Why cant they just make Vista a faster, better version of XP than making it a OS requiring 3 times as much resources to do the same stuff.

Oh whell, by the time it is released, minimum spec machines probably have 2GB ram anyway.

Yet another reason to wait with any purchases until it has been released.

[steve]

I have a pal who works at ATI and he says that, using their as-yet unreleased card and a topline hardware config, Vista needs 2GB just to run the OS properly.
It's also in beta, which generally requires more RAM.

[DeepT]

Will vista be native 64 bit? It seems to me that by next year 64bit cpus will be the defacto-standard for new PCs. Maybe even now buying a high-end PC from best buy will have a 64 bit CPU.

If the minimum ram will be 2 gigs, to me that would imply that there might not even be a 32 bit version of vista available.

[steve]

Will vista be native 64 bit? It seems to me that by next year 64bit cpus will be the defacto-standard for new PCs. Maybe even now buying a high-end PC from best buy will have a 64 bit CPU.
There will be 32- and 64-bit versions. Intel is still pushing tons of 32-bit CPUs, even to those new happy Mac fans.

[DeepT]

If 2gigs is really a mimum amount of operating ram for a vista machine running video games, those 32 bit users will be screwed since they can never go above 2 gigs of ram.

[steve]

If 2gigs is really a mimum amount of operating ram for a vista machine running video games, those 32 bit users will be screwed since they can never go above 2 gigs of ram.
Sure they can. Isn't the limit 3GB? I also have a 32-bit XP machine here with 4GB.

[Fugitive]

Sure they can. Isn't the limit 3GB? I also have a 32-bit XP machine here with 4GB.
The default is 2GB, but you can move the boundary up to 3GB by adding a switch to boot.ini. That's just a per-process limit though. If you have more than that in the machine it can still get used by the kernel and other processes, but just not more than that in a single process.

[instant0]

http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/system/platform/server/PAE/PAEmem.mspx

"The maximum amount of memory that can be supported on Windows XP Professional and Windows Server 2003 is also 4 GB. "

"The virtual address space of processes and applications is still limited to 2 GB unless the /3GB switch is used in the Boot.ini file. When the physical RAM in the system exceeds 16 GB and the /3GB switch is used, the operating system will ignore the additional RAM until the /3GB switch is removed. This is because of the increased size of the kernel required to support more Page Table Entries."

"The /3GB switch allocates 3 GB of virtual address space to an application that uses IMAGE_FILE_LARGE_ADDRESS_AWARE in the process header. This switch allows applications to address 1 GB of additional virtual address space above 2 GB."

[Bill Dungsroman]

Yea this vista thing is annoying me, espeically since they pushed it back. I was planning on making a new box this summer, but then I thought I do not want to install XP and all that only to install vista over it later on.

Of course I do not want to actually get vista the day it comes out, I would like to have it out for a few months so early adopters can go through all the pain of gaming incompatabilities first and give game makers a chance to fix stuff.
Ditto.

[Rimbo]

http://joyoftech.com/joyoftech/joyimages/829.gif (http://joyoftech.com/joyoftech/)

[MikeJ]

600-watt case and power supply


Is a 600-watt power supply the new recommendation? Yikes. Are we moving to a world where your PC draws more juice than your electric oven?

[Midnight Son]

Max power draw of the 17" imac: 63W. Sweet!

http://www.silentpcreview.com/article594-page4.html

(Damn, it's getting too hot to wear my turtleneck!)

[Backov]

I can not remember any os that was worse than its previous version (And WinME was good), although Vista requires much more resources from the computer, so it may not be better -- you just need a faster computer to run it at the same 'speed' as before.

You continually impress me with your Igor-level posts. Please tell us more about how WinME was good.

[Taranis]

Is a 600-watt power supply the new recommendation? Yikes. Are we moving to a world where your PC draws more juice than your electric oven?
I looked closer at the column and I think it suggests 600w Case because they had a dual video card set up in that machine, which I wouldn't do but it would be nice to have a case that would handle it if later on down the road I decided to go with a dual set up.

[steve]

Max power draw of the 17" imac: 63W. Sweet!
Well duh. It's basically a laptop.

And seriously, dude. Are you going to post in every PC thread about how much you love your Mac? Because if that's the case, I guess I'll need to skip every tech thread now.

[steve]

I looked closer at the column and I think it suggests 600w Case because they had a dual video card set up in that machine, which I wouldn't do but it would be nice to have a case that would handle it if later on down the road I decided to go with a dual set up.
No two current SLI videocards require a 600w power supply. PS recommendations are usually nuts.

Unless you plan on overclocking, running a dozen hard drives, etc., a 500w power supply is probably adequate. I've been using one with 2 7800GTX cards and an Athlon FX-60, which isn't exactly the most energy efficient system on the planet.

[Taranis]

@ Rimbo,

Sorry dude I just can't buy a Mac, my wife would divorce me!! And waiting around for the newest games to be released (if at all?!?!?) on a Mac would seriously put a damper on my gaming experience!

[Taranis]

No two current SLI videocards require a 600w power supply. PS recommendations are usually nuts.

Unless you plan on overclocking, running a dozen hard drives, etc., a 500w power supply is probably adequate. I've been using one with 2 7800GTX cards and an Athlon FX-60, which isn't exactly the most energy efficient system on the planet.
Really thats good to know, thanks for the info!!

[Taranis]

Do not buy anything until VISTA is out, except for many a monitor and hard-drives, that is, stuff you can use later.

With VISTA you'll probably want a AMD 64-bit AM2 4800+, 2-3GB 1024/Low-Latency DDR2 Memory, a new Video card supporting DirectX 10, a 1GB USB2.0 Memory stick for SuperFetch (Cache), The soundcard can probably be onboard due to how MS has changed audio in Vista.

Anyway, thats my plan. :-)
I just hate having to buy a computer around this time! Vista really throws a monkey wrench in everything!

Yeah I guess a DirectX 10 video card is an essential purchase to get the full benefit from Vista. I never thought about getting an onboard soundcard, but I heard how much better it was going to be with Vista Thanks for the suggestions!

Does anyone else have a bad feeling about video card slots in the near future? I think after Vista has been out for a year or so there will be a new slot to replace the PCI express slot!

[steve]

Yeah I guess a DirectX 10 video card is an essential purchase to get the full benefit from Vista.
If you do buy a system now, your choice of a 7600GT over something more expensive is a good one, what with DX10 cards coming... er, at some point.

I wouldn't lose any sleep over PCI-e disappearing in the near future. They've barely made the leap from AGP.

[Midnight Son]

Well duh. It's basically a laptop.

And seriously, dude. Are you going to post in every PC thread about how much you love your Mac? Because if that's the case, I guess I'll need to skip every tech thread now.

Well, it's my wife's mac. I'm waiting for the big horsepower.

[Midnight Son]

@ Rimbo,

Sorry dude I just can't buy a Mac, my wife would divorce me!! And waiting around for the newest games to be released (if at all?!?!?) on a Mac would seriously put a damper on my gaming experience!

Have you heard of "Bootcamp?"

[Rimbo]

You continually impress me with your Igor-level posts. Please tell us more about how WinME was good.

Actually, if you acquired WinME from a high-end OEM (e.g. Sony) who did thorough driver testing and patching before shipping it, WinME was significantly better than Win98.

Everyone else was fucked, though.

[Rimbo]

@ Rimbo,

Sorry dude I just can't buy a Mac, my wife would divorce me!! And waiting around for the newest games to be released (if at all?!?!?) on a Mac would seriously put a damper on my gaming experience!

Why? It's not like Macs aren't able to run Windows or anything. (http://www.apple.com/macosx/bootcamp/)

[steve]

Why? It's not like Macs aren't able to run Windows or anything. (http://www.apple.com/macosx/bootcamp/)
If your goal is to buy a desktop system that will allow you to game for a while, I'm not sure one powered by a Radeon X1600 is the way to go.

[instant0]

You continually impress me with your Igor-level posts. Please tell us more about how WinME was good.

Tell me how WinME was bad.
-- insert some random insult here --

[Bill Dungsroman]

Well, it's my wife's mac. I'm waiting for the big horsepower.
"It's my wife's Civic. I'm saving for an F-150."

[Midnight Son]

"It's my wife's Civic. I'm saving for an F-150."

In your case, would it be a moped while you want a scooter?

[Wheelkick]

http://www.quartertothree.com/game-talk/forumdisplay.php?f=10

[Bill Dungsroman]

In your case, would it be a moped while you want a scooter?
One day MS, you'll learn why snipers only shoot once.

[Coca Cola Zero]

One day MS, you'll learn why snipers only shoot once.

b3cuz they r campin f4gz?

[Midnight Son]

One day MS, you'll learn why snipers only shoot once.

You want to tell me how my former job works? Don't make me laugh, boyeeee.