The $1500 Killer Gaming Rig
02.21.08 - 03:38pm
It’s that time again, another hardware recommendation! I slacked off earlier this month so I’m simply pushing forward a single rec aimed at you gamers out there. New to this though will be me assembling a similar system at Dell.com to compare and show whether it’s worth your time to hand-build your own PC. As per the title, I trimmed this build down to sub-$1500 which is a bit steep but at the same time it’s a computer that could easily last two years of mid to high-spec gaming and half a decade for casual gaming.
What It Takes to Frag
The latest and greatest games have really cranked up the GPU requirements and DX10 hasn’t helped this either with it’s excess overhead. Widescreen gaming has also taken off and with “gaming” monitors of 20″ or greater, some games simply drop to a crawl due to overstraining the GPUs. With that in mind, I have window-shopped a custom machine that should easily churn through all those pixels while letting you focus simply on the game and not your frame rate. Note, this build is for just the tower, you will need to provide your own monitor and input devices.
To The Batcave Newegg!
To simplify things and ease any interested individuals in actually building this I’ll simply list all the Newegg links and current prices. You’ll see a few notes and two prices at the end of the build, the current Newegg prices and then the real price if you shopped around. The focus on this computer is solely gaming so there is no quad-core processor or high-bin DDR2 but rather a fast dual-core and plenty of DDR2 to feed Vista. Vista was also selected as it’s the future as we need to accept it, XP had a fantastic run but DX10 is in, DX9 is out.
- CPU: Intel E8400 3GHz 6MB L2 Cache, $240 from Newegg, $204 from MicroCenter
- Mobo: Gigabyte X38-DS4, $205 from Newegg
- RAM: Wintec AmpX 2×2GB DDR2-800, $83 from Newegg
- GPU: 2x Sapphire HD3870, $370 from Newegg
- HDD: Seagate 7200.10 500GB, $110 from Newegg
- PSU: OCZ 700w GameXStream, $135 from Newegg with $35 MIR
- Case: Antec P180 Silver, $115 from Newegg
- OS: Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium, $110 from Newegg
- CPU Heatsink: Thermalright Ultra 120, $60 from Newegg, $40 from Tankguys
- GPU Heatsinks: 2x Artic Cooling Accelero S1 Rev2, $48 from Newegg
- Optical: Lite-On DVD Burner, $25 from Newegg
Total from Newegg: $1500.27, Street Price: $1385
Dude, You’re Getting a Dell
Dell provides a crucial service for those computer illiterate consumers that simply need something that works. Dell empowers the average consumer by giving them decent computers with competitive prices, so let’s see how they stack up against the little monster I’ve created. I tried to spec this machine as close to the custom build as possible but due to the hardware limitations of Dell, it falls slightly short.
- CPU: Intel E6850 3GHz 4MB L2 Cache
- Mobo: Unknown
- RAM: 4×1GB DDR2-800
- GPU: Nvidia 8800GT 512MB
- HDD: Seagate 500GB 7200.10
- PSU: Unknown
- Case: Dell XPS Chassis
- OS: Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium
- Optical Drive: DVD Burner
- Sound-Card: Sound Blaster X-Fi XtremeGamer
Total from Dell: $1759
Conclusion
So how does this all stack up? With Dell.com you pay a $250 premium for a slower processor and half the video card power. In return you gain 1 year of in-home service and a question component warranty after that. Given the unknown motherboard, overclocking would be iffy and I guarantee the Dell PC will run louder and hotter than the custom rig. I can attest to how awesome the gaming rig is, it is after all based on parts I currently own. There is an upcoming review for a nearly identical build, so if you are interested in something like this build, check back in a weeks time. For $1500 I’d say you will be very impressed with the power you have, it’ll churn through Crysis with ease even at high resolutions.
Good article, I own a high end(ish) Dell and overall I am happy with it. It is quieter than anything I have built myself. There are some things maybe you should mention like you do get some extra stuff with Dells like some (albeit crappy) software and the KB and Mouse which were pretty decent but the mouse had really bad drivers.
I agree with your conclusion still. I should say that I wasn’t in the market for an all out gaming rig and if I was I would put it together myself.
I’ve never been a fan of Dell mice but their keyboards aren’t half bad. What I didn’t show in this article was an identical build to what I would imagine was inside the Dell box, it was around $1100. The reason why I said this build would be quieter than anything you can build is that I run a nearly identical setup on my desk, caseless, and I run the GPUs passively and 1 fan on the CPU and 1 fan over the RAM/NB. Doesn’t get any quieter than that. The one thing the Dell does have is that in-house service, great for non-computer people.
I can see your point there. One of the big disavantages for me, is not having the ability to tinker with the hardware for fear of invlidating the warranty, something i’m used to doing.
The DIY option is great value for money though. I personally wouldn’t have thought you could put something together that powerful so for less than a high end Dell before reading this. It is even possible for someone to shave a bit off that price by maybe opting for cheaper cases, different OS etc.
Oh it just gets plain nasty if you run it caseless and really shop around for mail in rebates. I’ve always wondered what Dell’s warranty is on components after your Dell specific warranty ends. What if your memory dies, are you tough out of luck even though the commercial version has a lifetime warranty? My only experience with this was with Apple, my Seagate hard-drive has a 5 year warranty between Seagate and Apple but Apple only had a 1 year warranty between myself and them as I forgot to purchase Applecare. It’s stuff like that which make me hate manufacturers like Dell and Apple. They wanted $220 to replace an $80 hard drive, I laughed in their face and upgraded the hard drive from 60GB to 120GB =D
could this play flight simulator x on ultra high?
I honestly don’t know, I have zero experience with Flight Simulator X. Sorry I can’t be of more help.
That would still be considered a nice comp!
You are a fan of Dell.
Not a bad choice.