Anyone else overhauling the PC for Half Life 2 and Doom 3?
 

For me it's Half Life 2, Max Payne 2, Deus Ex 2, and Call of Duty really. It's going to be a while for Doom 3 and I'm not really into the Doom series anyway.

I'm going from a 2 year old ATI 8500LE to a ATI 9800 Non-Pro that I will bios-flash to a Pro. I'm going from a 1800+ XP to a 2500+ Barton which I will overclock a bit and hopefully hit 3000+ speeds.

That should boost my 3DMark scores a bit and give me some nice eye candy for Half Life 2, hopefully as good as the E3 promo video looked.

I'm debating on going to a 36 gig 10,000 RPM SATA WD Raptor to decrease load times in Battlefield 1942 and other hard drive intensive games like Morrowind. Other than that, I'm set.

Anyone else get the upgrade bug?

I still need to upgrade my PC to play Roller Coaster Tycoon... :(

I'll probably get a new gaming PC once I've finished paying off the last computer we bought (a laptop). I'll most likely just use it for games and keep all the apps on the old one, which is only 2 years old.

If you were to get a "Gaming" PC (I hate to use the term) "rig"... where would you guys buy one? I read an article about the top 5 gaming PC's in Game Informer - but hell they were all in the THOUSANDS - I wouldn't want to pay anything over $1500...yes I'm cheap... but I only want to play a few games of Battlefield 1942 and HL2 on weekends...without slowdown.

I am a demanding consumer :D

Buy one? I say build it yourself and get what you want. You can build a fast gaming machine for under $1,000. It's not too hard, either.


As for the original question, yes I'll be upgrading my computer within the next year to take advantage of the new games. I'm running an 800 mhz Thunderbird with a Radeon 7500. Not the fastest machine nowadays, but it gets the job done on most games available now.

I'd take the time out and learn to build one. You could build an awesome machine for $1500 that could play Half Life 2 perfectly. Heck for about a $1000, you could build a great machine. All you need is a screwdriver. Plus the knowledge is invaluable when you need to upgrade in the future.

If you must go prebuilt, you may want to check out www.ibuypower.com They have a great Reseller Ratings score. I've heard nothing but good things about them and they have great prices.

I am thinking about getting a new vid card for HL2, but probably won't as I need all the money I can get to move across country next month :)

Also, HL2 is 'made' to run on like a 1ghz and Geforce 3 and stuff isn't it? That was the big deal, that it is going to run great, unlike Doom3.

I guess you guys never heard of the "Sony Vaio"

;););)

Thanks for the link Flay! :)

I've upgraded stuff plenty of times at work and at home, but I'm not really too keen on building a new machine from the ground up... I think you have to really enjoy tinkering with hardware for that to be a good experience and in my case it usually just makes me want to Hulk Smash the thing... :D

Gawd, those cases look 2 Fast, 2 Furious... but the prices are good... hmmmm, I wonder which colour is the fastest?

I think I'll be okay. I'll pick up both titles (if and when they finally come out) and upgrade around the performance issues I encounter (if any).

My "Most Wanted" FPS is Call of Duty. I played the demo of that and it ran smooth as silk, so I'm not too concerned.

I bit. Bought an r9800 pro for $356 shipped and sold my r9700 pro for $220 shipped.... Ended up paying what $136 for 9800 pro and then just ordered an $85 barton 2500 to replace the ol xp1900 :D

Call of Duty and HL2 have me psyched. no real interest in doom3...

I'm running a P4 2.6 with 1.5 gig of of ram and an ATI 9700 pro - I think I'll be fine, if not I might go ahead and overclock the ATI.

HL2 is gonna be amazing though... :drool:

goatweed, are you sure you have enough RAM? :)

Yep, I picked up a new box recently, too, and gave the old one to my girlfriend. (Her "current" one was so old, it had Windows 97 on it. The horror.)

Too bad Freelancer only runs on the NVIDIA card in that computer, and not the Radeon card in mine. :(

Even after upgrading, I'm still concerned that I might not have enough RAM for these games. I might end up doubling my RAM from 512 MB PC3500 to a full gig.

Windows 97? Sounds like one of those cheap Turkish knock-offs of American products, like "Crust" toothpaste.

there's no such thing as Windows 97.

Dammit - Groucho beat me to it again - *shakes fist*

Well, I probably won't upgrade - I have a GeForce 4 Ti 4400 and an Athlon XP2000+ with 512MB Ram. To upgrade enough to make a difference, it would be really costly. I'm sure it'll handle it okay - if not, I'll probably just get a Radeon to tide me over.

Oh, sorry... confused Office 97 (THAT existed, right?) with Windows 98.

When I lived in New Zealand, my mother bought a Palsonic microwave...

http://www.palsonic.com.au/menu_files/pal-logo.gif

Even Google just asked me... Did you mean: panasonic ?

http://www.palsonic.com.au/

What are the expected requirements for these games?

I have a P4 2.5 ghz and a GeForce 4 Ti 4200. I haven't played a game on my computer in a while.

I'm holding off as long as possible till release date to upgrade, even after release date if the new gear comes out a week or two after.

My hopes are to see what ati has in store for a 9900. rumors were flying that with the anounce of that they will include hl2 or something.

My system is pretty tricked out right now, all it would need is a CPU upgrade, but the Mobo is already set to handle the upgrade and I have more ram then I can shake a stick at. so all I would need is a Video card upgrade from this Ti4800 (stupid wording for 4200 power) and a CPU AMD processor upgrade. all holding back as late as possible. I want to see the game go gold first.

That's why I bought an Xbox...

I have a 2.2 ghz with 384 megs of RAM and a Geforce2 (yes I know, old and outdated)

no idea how well it will run (if even at all) the forementioned games.

I am probably the only person who isn't excited about HL2. The first one was great, the expansions were cool, but it's just not enough to get me all hot and bothered like everyone else :D
Personally, I can't wait for Thief 3, with Deus Ex 2 a close second.

I never liked the term "rig" either....

Success!

Got my parts from Newegg today. As I type this, I'm overclocked at 2170 Ghz (3000+ speed) and flashed to stock 9800 pro speeds. Stable as a rock!

3DMark2001: 16457
3DMark2003: 5580

Bring on Gordon Freeman.

I have a P4 3.01 GHZ with 512MB PC3200 DDR SDRAM. Where I hurt is the sound and video. I have an NVidia 128meg MX400 and on-board sound. Is this good enough to play HL2 and Doom 3?

You'll need a directx 9 video card to see all the 'pretty stuff'.

:(

I have DirectX 8. Time to read up to see if the card supports DirectX 9. I paid $950 for the comp and I refuse to spend any more money on it this year.

The burden of improving our systems and getting better, smoother graphics is indeed a heavy cross to bear, and not one to be borne lightly. :)