Hey guys,

After many many years im thinking of hanging up my game pad and going back to the keyboard and mouse. im just sick of dumbed down console games!

I was wondering If anyone could help me out with buying or building my own gaming PC, preferably it would be one that can run crysis on max settings as that is still considered the paramount isnt it? correct me if im wrong!

Oh yeah id probably be looking for help from guys in the UK just due to currency pricing differences as such.

Thanks alot in advance!


P.S or I would alternatively be looking to upgrade my laptop

Laptop Specs:

Make: Sony Vaio

OS: Windows 7 Ultimate 32-bit

Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo CPU T9300 @ 2.50GHz(2 CPUs), ~2.5GHz

Memory: 4096MB RAM

DirectX 11

[b]Display:[/b]

Name: NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT

DAC Type: Integrated RAMDAC

Approx. Total memory: 1520 MB

Display mode 1440 x 900 (32 bit) (59Hz)



Mark

Good decision!

Unfortunatly i do not live in the Uk.

But i try to do my best: this stuff is all available @ aria.co.uk.

AMD Athlon II X4 Quad Core 640 3.0GHz : ￡76.20 inc. VAT
Asrock N68C-S UCC nForce 630a (Socket AM2+) DDR2/DDR3 PCI-Express Motherboard: ￡31.99 inc. VAT
4GB Corsair XMS3 (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-10600C9 1333Mhz Dual Channel Kit: ￡39.74 inc. VAT
MSI GeForce GTX 460 Cyclone Overclocked Edition 1024MB GDDR5 Graphics Card: ￡143.99 inc. VAT
550W Arianet Black Series Silent ATX2.2 Power Supply : ￡23.99 inc. VAT
EDIT:
or 530W Be Quiet! Pure Power BQT L7 ATX2.3 Power Supply ￡53.65 inc. VAT

I dont choose a tower and a hdd though.. thats your decision

With this setting you should be able to play everything maxed out.

Total : 315,91 ￡ equals: 374,6527 €.

Plugging my own thread again over at gw2guru (although it needs a bit of an update now):

http://www.guildwars2guru.com/forum/buying-building-pci-check-here-t10381.html

The very first basic machine won't likely max crysis 1 and 2 (more likely high or very high at medium resolutions like 1440x900) but the second will. However, at this point in time, i recommend waiting for a month or two so that the new cpu's can come out. Intel's Sandy bridge is amazingly powerful, but has been recalled/delayed due to a chipset boo boo which affects the 3gbps SATA ports (didn't affect me though, so i'm rocking a 5GHz 2500K right now ) and AMD bulldozer is out somewhat soon too.

However, in terms of price, it's really up to you. You can play crysis very well (max) for about ￡550-600 or so, or you could go all out and spend anything up to ￡1k.

Also, the build above is very good, but don't get that PSU, you need something less likely to explode in your face like a corsair CX500

P.S. do note that crysis 1 doesn't work amazingly well with spreading the physics load, so you (annoyingly) need a very powerful dual/quad not to see any slowdown when there's lots of enemies on screen. Crysis 2, i expect, will be better at such load spreading. As it stands you need to be packing something like an i7 (or indeed, an i5 2500K), or a heavily overclocked cpu to not see frame rates drop below 30fps at certain points in the campaign. However the system above will be very good for about 90% of the game, and about 25fps for the rest, so it won't really be worth the extra money for most players.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=FS-237-OK

Whats do you guys make of this setup and which graphics card out of the selection would you recommend if I was to play on my 32" 1920 x 1080 Samsung HD TV?

Not amazing tbh, you're paying a lot for not much. You'll save at least ￡200 building it yourself.

You want at least a gtx460 by the way, and an i5-760/phenom II X6 cpu for that money

Yeah, if you're feeling up for a custom build, that would be the most price effective.

I will second Comfy Chair in saying you should probably get at least a GTX460 and a quad core i5, Cryengine 3 has multicore support so the extra cores will come in handy. From what I hear, the GTX460 gives you incredible bang for the buck.

I dont want to praise myself... but i think the system i have recommended you has probably the best price - performance ratio you can get.
Ive build many systems with the Athlon II Quad 3.GHZ and i have only good things to say about that CPU. Especially to get a quadcore for that price.. The Gtx 460 is also a very good grfxcard for that price... If youre not afraid to custum build a system...
If you really want to max out Crysis in a full hd resolution the only thing i would change would be the grfxcard.
Get a Gigabyte GeForce GTX 560Ti OC 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card ￡199.99 inc. VAT
or for even better performance PALIT Geforce GTX 580 1536MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card ￡389.99 inc. VAT .

The GTX460 is a good choice - decent price and good performance. Get the 1GB version if you're gonna be running in HD. Coupled with a core i5/i7 and 4-6gb of DDR3 should do the trick.

Gtx 460 FTW! I bought mine a month ago and couldn't be more satisfied. It's the EVGA SC 1Gb edition, stock overclocked to 763MHz. It was great performance stock but i've upp'ed it to 825MHz and 2200MHz on the RAM (4400 effective) and I currently run Crysis 1 on very high, 2xAA @1680x1050 averaging 32ish FPS. With 4x AA it averages at 28ish, and at 8x AA I average about 24, but explosion intense scenes/the frozen scenes sometimes bring it down to to 15 for 4x and 10-15 for 8x and thr game is beautiful enough at 2x so I stick to that. The best part is that my System isn't even anything special:

Q6600 G0 @ 3.0GHz
Asus P5N-D mobo (do NOT buy this board - go with a rampage or something that's future proof)
4Gb Corsair DDR2-800MHz RAM
GTX 460 (specs above)
700W OCZ Silent PSU
22" HD Samsung

For your purpose, do what the previous guys said - get an i5 or i7 (an i7 will give you plenty more years of life over an i5 though). DDR3 is cheap as anything now, so i'd recommend the upgrade (but DDR2 will serve this game just fine). Definitely get 4Gb though if you plan on using AA.

All in all, the 460 is amazing. And it's SLI scaling is between 70-90% depending on the benchmarks you look at. I assure you that you'll love the card!
And it will help you love the beauty of Crysis and Crysis 2!

Of course you can spend much more money on a system.. the system i suggested is more a price - performance model and not really top notch high high end.

@kwikfingaz

Did you know that the Gtx 460 isnt even on the same performance level as the old Gtx 280?

@bigboulder:

First off: the cards aren't even in the same category. The 280 was released as "the fastest single gpu card on the market" the 460 is the successor to the 260 which are "price-performance" cards. Also, A 460 is about $150-200 chepaer depending on when and where you buy it.

Second: the 280 doesn't beat the 460 by much, and in regards to my system, it would probably improve Crysis performance to 4x smooth, MAYBE.
it also runs disgustingly hot and consumes almost 80-100W more power. Overclocked to the speeds I have, my 460 never it's beyond 70. A 280 at the same % overclock runs between 80-90 on stock cooling (which is what I'm using).


Third: 280 has worse SLI scaling (not to mention it's terrible price/performance ratio makes SLI 280s a terrible choice budget wise.

Just leave your laptop as it is. They svck.

The first two things you should consider for a new rig are the PSU and the computer case. These two things are the most future proof components of any rig, so it ok to buy them early.

PSU:
Don't cheap out on your PSU. I recommend getting at least a 750 watt PSU, so you'll have enough watts to feed whatever power hungry devices come out in the future. Here are two lists of quality PSUs.

http://www.eggxpert.com/forums/thread/323050.aspx
http://www.overclock.net/power-supplies/183810-faq-recomended-power-supplies.html

Running Total: ~$100 USD

Case: Don't get anything less than a full tower. The only limit to your rig should be the money in your pocket, not the size of your case. The standard full-tower is the HAF 932.

Running Total: ~$230 USD

Monitor:
For gaming, you'll want a true 120Hz monitor. TRUE 120Hz monitors will display 120 frames per second vs the standard 60 FPS from 60Hz. Your picture will be smoother which gives you a significant advantage. Here's a link that lists true 120Hz monitors: http://www.nvidia.com/object/3d-vision-requirements.html

Running Total: ~$550 USD

Mouse:
The Logitech MX518 and the Razer Deathadder are the best two mice EVER made. Don't get anything else.

Running Total: ~$600 USD

Keyboard:
The thing to look out for in keyboards is "how many keys you can press at the same time before the keyboard just starts ignoring you." Open up notepad and try it with your current keyboard. Press and hold down a letter, then another letter, then another. For gaming, you want to be able to press a lot of keys at the same time. This is known is Key Rollover or NKRO (the higher the better). Next I've got to tell you about mechanical keyboards. The keyboards most of us are using are rubber domes. That means under your keyboard is something that looks like this:


There are lots of reasons why people say they svck. You can look them up yourself. The alternative is to get mechanical keyboard (this is how they made keyboards back in 1985. You'll want to get yourself a mechanical keyboard with brown switches. They offer the best balance between typing and gaming. If you MUST get a rubber dome keyboard, the sidewinder x4 is the best option as it offers the highest key rollover. Use the PS/2 connection instead of the USB if your keyboard offers it. For mechanicals, this company called XArmor is releasing the U9BL-s, which will probably be the least expensive brown switched keyboard on the market.

Running Total: ~$680 USD

Sound:
Headphones will give you a lot more sound quality for the price vs. speakers. So go with headphones. If you want to spend 50$, don't get anything other than the JVC HA-RX700s. Further up the price ladder, your choices expand to the ATH-AD700s and the Sennheiser HD555. You'll need a sound card as well. I slightly recommend getting a PCIe sound card, because of the way todays mother boards are designed. If you get a PCI card rather than a PCIe card, you'll end up blocking one of your other PCIe slots, which can come back to haunt you. The best inexpensive sound card is the ASUS Xonar DG (PCI). As you climb up the price ladder your choices expand to the Xonar DX and crazy over priced ones you probably don't want to spend money on.

Running Total: ~$800 USD

Graphics:
There is no video card that can max out crysis at 60 FPS yet. Anyway, 99% of games are being developed for the xbox360's crappy hardware, so there's no need to overspend on your GPU. Besides, if you ever game competitively, you're going to use low graphics and low resolutions anyway (especially in crysis). That said, because you're getting a 120Hz monitor, you do want a GPU solution that'll give you at least 120 FPS on all low settings and minimal resolution. A GTX 460 will handle that for you in about 90% of games (just not crysis).

Running Total: ~$950 USD

Memory/RAM:
Just make sure the RAM you get is at least 1600MHz, anything less will limit your potential overclocks. Get at least 4GB. Some CPUs prefer "tri-channel" memory (that just means they want you to use three memory sticks instead of two). For those, get 6GB.

Running Total: ~$1050 USD

CPU:
The CPU will determine what kind of motherboard you have to buy and what your RAM configuration should be. I'd say get nothing less than the i5-750 / i7-920. Crysis in particular is a VERY CPU hungry game. You want the best CPU possible, and you WILL have to overclock it to at least 4.00GHz.

Running Total: ~$1275 USD

Motherboard:
You'll need one.

Final Total: ~$1500 USD

Sorry about your wallet! There are ALWAYS sales for computer parts. So with rebates etc. you won't be paying anywhere near this much.

￡805.00 sample rig (without GPU) using Aria.co.uk and Amazon.co.uk.

PSU: OCZ StealthXStream 2 700W - ￡67.38
http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Power+Supplies/700-950W/OCZ+StealthXStream+2+700W+Power+Supply+?productId=40945

Case: HAF 932 - ￡104.99 This is ridiculous. Shop around and you'll find a better price guaranteed.
http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Cases/Full+Tower/CoolerMaster+HAF+RC-932+Gaming+Full+Tower+Case+-+Black?productId=33726

Monitor: Samsung SyncMaster 2233RZ - ￡189.00 (If I could only convince you to buy one thing, it would be this. beautiful monitor)
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Samsung-SM2233RZ-Monitor-Gloss-Black/dp/B001TH77I6/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=computers&qid=1297043133&sr=8-1

Mouse: Logitech MX518 - ￡26.00
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Logitech-MX518-Optical-Gaming-Mouse/dp/B0015R8M7U/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1297041611&sr=8-1

Keyboard: Sidewinder x4 - ￡33.59
http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Peripherals/Keyboards/Gaming+Keyboards/Microsoft+Sidewinder+X4+USB+Gaming+Keyboard+-+Black+%28JQD-00006%29?productId=40170

Sound card: Xonar DG - ￡26.00
http://www.amazon.co.uk/ASUS-Xonar-PCI-Audio-Card/dp/B003ZXDOL6/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=miscellaneous&qid=1297041722&sr=8-1

Memory: 4GB Corsair XMS3 - ￡38.99
http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Memory/DDR3+Dual+Channel+-+PC3-12800/4GB+Corsair+XMS3+%282x2GB%29+DDR3+PC3-12800C9+1600MHz+Dual+Channel+Kit+-+CMX4GX3M2A1600C9+?productId=37570

CPU: i5-2500k - ￡169.19
http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/CPUs+%2F+Processors/Intel+Core+I5+%281155%29/Intel+Core+i5-2500K+3.30GHz+%28Sandybridge%29+Socket+LGA1155+Processor+-+OEM+?productId=43635

Motherboard: ASUS P8P67 Pro or Gigabyte GA-P67A-UD4 - ￡147.00
http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Motherboards/Intel+1155+P67/ASUS+P8P67+Pro+Intel+P67+%28Socket+1155%29+DDR3+PCI-Express+Motherboard+?productId=42939
http://www.aria.co.uk/Products/Components/Motherboards/Intel+1155+P67/Gigabyte+GA-P67A-UD4+Intel+P67+%28Socket+1155%29+DDR3+PCI-Express+Motherboard+?productId=42994

Well that was quite a mouthful.

No way will you need to spend over ￡1k for a computer OP. Apart from the PSU (of which something like a corsair CX550 or so, since it need 2 pci-e 6 pins), bigboulder has a very good system planned out for you and i thoroughly recommend going for that

Also, cuad, you are seriously overspending on a lot of areas for gaming.

No not really. 1500 USD is under 1000 Pounds anyway.

What if you were looking for a PC that is prebuilt? Any ideas on the best gaming PCs on the market? Is Lenovo any worth?

cuad has a very nice guideline set up, I agree with mostly all of it.

You do not want to get a prebuilt pc... you can save hundreds of dollars by building it yourself and you should not be scared about messing it up. If you look at some tutorials and read all the instructions, building a PC is seriously a piece of cake. It is no more than expensive lego's.

I originally got my gaming pc pre-built by cyberpowerpc.com , but started building them myself when I realized how I can get everything I like myself and still save loads of money.

cuad has a very nice guideline set up, I agree with mostly all of it.

You do not want to get a prebuilt pc... you can save hundreds of dollars by building it yourself and you should not be scared about messing it up. If you look at some tutorials and read all the instructions, building a PC is seriously a piece of cake. It is no more than expensive lego's.

I originally got my gaming pc pre-built by cyberpowerpc.com , but started building them myself when I realized how I can get everything I like myself and still save loads of money.
Talon's right, Pc building is still more cost friendly and give's you a slight insight into the world of Pc gaming and stuff. But that would still take some time, and no pre-built Pc's are rather better....

No not really. 1500 USD is under 1000 Pounds anyway.

Maybe the conversion rate got me still, the setup you've put out is what i've got, and i consider myself far beyond a standard gamer in terms of having to have 'the pretty' So it all depends on the OP's budget and tendency to go 'zomg! a jaggy! Kill kill!'

If he's got a lot of money to spend on the build, yours is great (kinda, mine cost ￡800 overall with a hd5870 [if i include it as it's release price when i bought it). If he just wants to game and isn't that fussed about balls to the wall performance, then bigboulders is great (bar the PSU).

@ kwikfingaz

I didnt want to tease you pal ... i know the 280 has a lot of technical flaws like the heat development for example.Therfore i use the accelero extreme cooler for my 280.. now my temps beat any stock cooler of almost every grfxcard.( Though i had to ruin my tower to get that giant son of a bich into the PciE- Slot)
Youre also right about the price of the Dx10 Gen. Cards. Some are even more expensive than the high end fermi cards...

I agree about the cpu heavy physics issue in crysis. Go high on your cpu and medium on ram and graphics card. You can easily plug in a couple of sticks of ram or change out a graphics card in the near future to give you a boost with crysis 3, but it is a pain in the butt when your cpu starts bottlenecking (like mine is now). I'm stuck with a core 2 duo and can't upgrade because of my socket and my mobo cant be upgraded (which also prevents me from going from ddr2 ram to ddr3). Therefore, my gtx 465 runs at about 70 percent with everything on high in crysis wars (and with a solid 60 fps on most maps), but when I get in a server with about 15 players i get bottleneck glitchiness because my cpu runs a constant 100 percent.

No not really. 1500 USD is under 1000 Pounds anyway.

Maybe the conversion rate got me still, the setup you've put out is what i've got, and i consider myself far beyond a standard gamer in terms of having to have 'the pretty' So it all depends on the OP's budget and tendency to go 'zomg! a jaggy! Kill kill!'

If he's got a lot of money to spend on the build, yours is great (kinda, mine cost ￡800 overall with a hd5870 [if i include it as it's release price when i bought it). If he just wants to game and isn't that fussed about balls to the wall performance, then bigboulders is great (bar the PSU).

oh yes this is way above standard; I'd say he could go pro with this rig. I do want him to get himself an enthusiast machine cause not only will it last a long time, it will have a strong resale value. Any money he recovers will eat up a huge chunk of the cost of whatever upgrades he might want in the future, so he'll be using his money more efficiently in the long run. Sadly, I know from experience that this method is much much nicer on the wallet.

Just stick to building a future proof rig to be safe...

The only problem is that future proofing is a lie ^^ Buying mid ranger parts more often generally works out a fair bit cheaper

Expensive rigs are for enthusiasts only tbh. There's not much point in the average gamer paying ￡1k, ￡450 is perfectly fine. The extra ￡550 will likely only cause it to last an extra year compared to the standard 3.

Yeah... maybe a CPU and Ram can be future proof if high end ( for example the Q9650 is still fast as hell) but for grfxcards you cant be effectively buy futureproof. Even if youve bought a GTX 295... you cant use tessalation for example... though the card itself is a real blast even today.

Thanks for all the suggestions guys even though coming back to PC gaming from an age were you just popped it in and installed lol (Quake 3) I have to say its pretty daunting since technically I am a new player in terms of modern PCs but realistically I think il just be looking for a pre built computer because i wouldnt want to attempt to build a PC especially since theres so many different variables.

ive built a normal PC before but not a gaming rig so il buy a custom made one from overclockers, since they basically "tune"your computer to squeeze out the all the machines power. sounds good to me!

But thanks anyway, appreciatted (but you people do speak a whole other language haha)