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Need PC shopping help

Razael6

Legacy Supporter 3
Joined
Aug 30, 2011
Location
Springfield(Springtucky), OR, U.S.A.
So I want to start saving up for a cheap pc that can play the game Day Z which I think has the same system requirements as Arma 2. I also want to be able to play Guild Wars 2 which requires much higher system than Day Z. My current specs are Athlon XP2500, Radeon 9200, and like 758 MB of RAM, which cant even play minecraft or terraria. So anyway I want the cheapest possible pc that can play those 2 games even if not on normal settings, and I know nothing about computers so can anyone search and find a pc for me, not a Mac but a Windows Pc please. Sorry for lack of indents in this.
 

xxMASSCHAOSx

Legacy Supporter 3
Joined
Aug 5, 2011
Www.newegg.com

I got some really nice prices there, it's a lot cheaper to build it. I'm currently using 2 relatively cheap video cards and they run gw2 pretty well 50-60 fps on high if I had bought my computer built it would have cost about 850-900$ but I got it for 700. Takes about 3 hours to construct depending on your case, and try to scavenge as much from your current pc as possible. Ex: hard drives, ram sticks, video cards, sound/audio cards. But if your using a laptop chances are you are only going to be able to get the hard drive out. Hopefully this helped
 

Dielan9999

Legacy Supporter 5
Joined
Mar 9, 2011
Location
Temple of Melonmancy
So I want to start saving up for a cheap pc that can play the game Day Z which I think has the same system requirements as Arma 2. I also want to be able to play Guild Wars 2 which requires much higher system than Day Z. My current specs are Athlon XP2500, Radeon 9200, and like 758 MB of RAM, which cant even play minecraft or terraria. So anyway I want the cheapest possible pc that can play those 2 games even if not on normal settings, and I know nothing about computers so can anyone search and find a pc for me, not a Mac but a Windows Pc please. Sorry for lack of indents in this.


Get a new graphics card, bump up to 4 GB of RAM or more (if you do more you will need a 64 bit operating system).

I don't know anything about AMD processors :( so I don't know how good the Athlon XP2500 is. As for Radeon cards, the first number is the series, the last three numbers are the model. So your Radeon 9200 is 9th series, 200 model. However it's not HD.

Don't buy a Radeon card if it isn't HD :p They are reusing numbers so 9200 and 9200 HD are completely different.
 

Dazureus

Legacy Supporter 4
Joined
Jan 14, 2011
Location
Texas
So if I'm doing it right your CPU was introduced in 2003 and has a frequency of 1867 MHz. I... don't know what this means as far as what's compatible, I've only been looking into newer stuff for my first PC build (which may not happen for the foreseeable future...). Can you find out what your motherboard is?
 

Dielan9999

Legacy Supporter 5
Joined
Mar 9, 2011
Location
Temple of Melonmancy
So if I'm doing it right your CPU was introduced in 2003 and has a frequency of 1867 MHz.

Definately not desirable. @Razael6 try to get a processor that is mesaured in gigahertz(GHz), not Megahertz(MHz). My laptop's core i7 runs at 1.73 GHz, which is little compared to top-of-the-line processors of today, but is more than enough.
 

Nalestom

Legacy Supporter 3
Joined
Mar 21, 2011
How about this, @Razael6 - give us a budget or a maximum amount of money that you can spend, and we can more effectively give you something to buy.
 

Razael6

Legacy Supporter 3
Joined
Aug 30, 2011
Location
Springfield(Springtucky), OR, U.S.A.
Sorry for triple post here but I have been searching how much 4 GB RAM costs and where to buy it but they all say only compatible with blah... or laptop only or like 2, 2 GB RAMs and to me it makes no sense so someone else can tell me it would be awesome.

EDIT: @Nalestom I have no idea I just want it as cheap as possible and on game debate with those things it says it should run really well with those things but I really want it to be less than $200 or $250.
 

Dazureus

Legacy Supporter 4
Joined
Jan 14, 2011
Location
Texas
Raza, the socket type on the CPU you picked is different from what you have now. It wouldn't work if you got it and probably wouldn't even fit into the motherboard. :/
 
S

ShizzDawgg

In order to even attempt Guild Wars 2, you'll have to probably spend around $350 and most of the game will be on mid-low settings.

Also, i'm 90% sure that any PC you buy that's premade for less than $200 will not contain a graphics card, would you be up to possibly building your computer? Oh, and you should try and do some chores for your parents/neighbors or something, the extra money wouldn't hurt. xD
 
S

ShizzDawgg

If you don't really care about the graphics as much, seeing your a little tight with your budget, i'd go with a...

GeForce GT 430 (gpu)

Pentium G620 2.6 GHz (cpu)

Both pass the system check on the website you said that you used. Together they'd cost you about $120, but it's ok because they are 2 MAJOR components to invest in if you plan on playing games.
 

Nalestom

Legacy Supporter 3
Joined
Mar 21, 2011
The real issue here is that your motherboard isn't compatible with any new processors that would be worth spending your money. Therefore, in order to upgrade further, you'll need to upgrade your motherboard as well.

I did a bit of searching for you and found a fairly nice combo for a cheap price. It's not the best, but it'll get you much closer to where you'll want to be when it comes to Guild Wars 2. You'll also need a relatively nice graphics card for cheap - I found the Radeon HD6670, which is a fairly nice buy for only $80.

As for RAM, you don't want to get too fancy, since memory is very rarely a system bottleneck. This little piece should do you well - I've never found a problem with Corsair memory, and for only $25, you're not going to find a much more reliable brand for 4GB.

The only other issue is that your power supply unit (PSU) might not be powerful enough to support the new processor and video card (the video card especially, considering you didn't have a very powerful one come with the computer in the first place.) I need you to do two things: 1) check the label on the side of your power supply and see how much wattage it can support, and 2) check any unused cables coming from your power supply and see if you can find a PCI-E power cable, which looks like this. Your power supply is usually located in the back top corner of your computer case. Make sure that the power supply is turned off using the red 1/0 switch in the back before you start poking around, or else you run the risk of getting quite a nasty shock if you don't know what you're doing.
 

Razael6

Legacy Supporter 3
Joined
Aug 30, 2011
Location
Springfield(Springtucky), OR, U.S.A.
1)Well there is multiple places on it where it says somenumber W, but at the top it says 330W so I assume thats the wattage.
2)I am not frankly sure there is some white tipped ones with a similar end but only one row and the row has 4 holes and I think there is 3 of those cords. But there is a lot of unused cables so I'l keep looking and see.

Also there is a Radeon 6530D that comes with the CPU in the combo which can run Guild Wars 2 just fine so there should be no reason to buy he 6670 unless when I get the game and its laggy. But anyway thanks a lot for the help Nalestrom as I said though i'l keep looking to see if there is a PCI-E.
And @ShizzDawgg even though my young age I am a soccer referee and could make probably 100 bucks in one tournament but at the moment I only have $50 but there is a few tournaments coming up within the month, and I can work at my moms house and get money.

EDIT: And Nalestrom are this motherboard and this CPU+GPU and this RAM the same as the ones you linked? Because my dad prefers not to order things and use credit card on internet so it would be simpilar to buy in store since all 3 of those things together is like $212 bucks which is $80 more but if I have enough I will buy it in store.
 

Nalestom

Legacy Supporter 3
Joined
Mar 21, 2011
@Razael6 - You were looking at the right number on the power supply, but 330W is awfully low. It would probably work, but I place no guarantees on it. As for the cable, what you were looking at were called Molex cables - very different from PCI-E cables, as Molex cables were often used to power hard drives, CD/DVD drives, and (more often nowadays) fans.

The "CPU" is actually an APU - it stands for Advanced Processing Unit. It's a next-generation type of processor that is not only able to perform hard mathematical calculations like a normal CPU (Central Processing Unit), but is also able to perform graphical calculations - a process that, for years, was assigned either to a separate graphics card (like the one I linked you) or to a built-in graphics chip on your motherboard.

Now, I just finished a nine-hour Guild Wars 2 marathon with my trust Powercolor ATI Radeon HD5770. At the moment, I've overclocked it to a GPU clock of 875MHz and a memory clock of 1225MHz (a "clock" is essentially the speed of the graphics card, although your FPS in games can be affected by a whole lot more than just your clocks.) The whole time I played Guild Wars 2, I had almost all graphical settings off except for high-resolution textures, which were set to High. I was usually idling at around 30-40 FPS. When things got REAL busy - as in, huge fights between players and monsters and such - I dropped to around 10-20, sometimes even down to 5 FPS.

When it comes to graphics cards, there are a lot of factors that can play into the efficiency of a graphics card (the temperature, the GPU and memory clock ratio, the voltage limitation, the stability and efficiency of the graphics drivers, and so on.) However, the Radeon 6530D that is included in your APU only has a GPU clock of around 445MHz - just over half of my what my graphics card currently was. Simple mathematics should be enough to tell you that if you rely entirely on your APU for next-generation gaming, you're not going to have a good time.

That's why I recommend purchasing a separate graphics card altogether - the HD6770 I linked you is relatively cheap, has a stock GPU clock of 800MHz (keep in mind that my 875MHz was OVERclocked - meaning, I manually modified the GPU clock so that it was higher than normal - If you overclock it yourself, which is an extremely easy process to do if you know how to use Google, you should get a good bit higher than mine,) and is guaranteed to be able to easily run just about any game out there at a solid 40+ FPS - Minecraft included!

Part of building, modifying, and upgrading your computer is finding the balance between how much money you're spending and how much power you're getting. Ideally, you want to get the most "bang for your buck" - as in, you want your computer parts to be satisfactory for as long as possible without spending too much money. Referee an extra soccer game or two for that graphics card, and I guarantee you won't be disappointed.

As for buying the computer parts from Best Buy...Eh. Whatever floats your boat, man. It's going to be a bit more expensive, but from the looks of it, it's the same product that you're getting. You might want to keep in mind that the chances of your local Best Buy having all three of those parts (four, if you decide to get the graphics card!) is very slim - Best Buy has a very limited selection of in-store computer parts. You would probably end up buying the parts online from Best Buy and having them ship it to you anyway. In that case, you might as well just buy them from Newegg - you would end up saving money, and Newegg is an extremely reputable retailer.
 

Razael6

Legacy Supporter 3
Joined
Aug 30, 2011
Location
Springfield(Springtucky), OR, U.S.A.
Thanks for info on G-Card, il look quickly for the PCI-E cord before I leave, and il try to get the stuff at newegg than but I wont be able to get it for like a month before I found out I only have $25 bucks atm and I have to have 61 to pay for my soccer jersey but I will work at my moms to pay that, than I have 2 tournaments to ref this month than I should have enough money. Thanks for all the info.
 

Nalestom

Legacy Supporter 3
Joined
Mar 21, 2011
Thanks for info on G-Card, il look quickly for the PCI-E cord before I leave, and il try to get the stuff at newegg than but I wont be able to get it for like a month before I found out I only have $25 bucks atm and I have to have 61 to pay for my soccer jersey but I will work at my moms to pay that, than I have 2 tournaments to ref this month than I should have enough money. Thanks for all the info.

Chances are, your power supply doesn't have one. Which means you'll also have to buy a new power supply to replace your current one, or else you won't be able to use your new graphics card at all.

I recommend this one. It should provide enough of a boost to power your graphics card, plus it's relatively cheap and is modular (meaning you can pick and choose what cables you have attached to it - usually you can't do that, resulting in a bunch of unused cables that sit around in your computer and get in the way.)

Best of luck! =)
 
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