MoNkEy MaGiC
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Registered: 12th Apr 03
Location: West - London Drives: Corsa GSi
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had my pc 4 years and its a "bit" out dated and bloody SLOW!! 
so thinking of upgrading to this....
3GH AMD Athlon with Windows Me
1024MB DDR ram
120GB hardrive
256MB Radeon graphics
DVD re-writer/player,CD re-writer/player, 3.5 floppy drive
all in nice silver tower with 6 usb ports
 i reckon this is a BEAST of a PC!!! what u think????
[Edited on 20-06-2004 by MoNkEy MaGiC]
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Go3asy
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Registered: 11th Jan 04
Location: Scotland,Alloa(Stirlingshire)
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all that with 1024mb RAM and XP
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MoNkEy MaGiC
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Registered: 12th Apr 03
Location: West - London Drives: Corsa GSi
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oh yeh, 1024mb ram too, forgot to add it!! edited it ^^^
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MoNkEy MaGiC
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Registered: 12th Apr 03
Location: West - London Drives: Corsa GSi
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how much u reckon the above PC spec would cost in the shops roughly???
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AndyCorsa
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Registered: 24th Oct 03
Location: Macclesfield, Cheshire
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120gb hard drive? Would you ever use that? Thats bloody big!
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Andrew
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Registered: 5th May 04
Location: Skoda Octavia Estate, Ford Puma
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Watch out for slow DDR RAM and cheap Graphics Cards. Try and find out the complete spec mate and U2U me  It looks alright though.
eBay have some systems going cheap at the mo, have a look there. Top of the range Desktops go for around £300 and Laptops for £600.
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Russ
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Registered: 14th Mar 04
Location: Armchair
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quote:
Originally posted by AndyCorsa
120gb hard drive? Would you ever use that? Thats bloody big!
i use more than that 
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Russ
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Registered: 14th Mar 04
Location: Armchair
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quote:
Originally posted by MoNkEy MaGiC
3GH AMD Athlon with Windows Me
firstly, windows ME is the _SHITTEST_ operating system ever created.
and secondly, theres no such thing as a 3ghz amd chip, theres the 3000+ but that is knowhere near 3 gig...
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Chris E
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Registered: 7th Jul 03
Location: Birmingham
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Spec sounds good mate, but as already mentioned the graphics card and memory needs to be carefully selected - AMD 3000+ works well with 333Mhz memory I think (your looking at PC2700 and above at least).
And whatever you do - dont use Win Me as already mentioned - it causes problems left right and centre, especially with network settings and Internet Explorer.
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Dan B
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Registered: 25th Feb 01
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120Gb is nothing, I've already easily filled 300Gb, and could carry on going (and before anyone asks, absolutely none of it is porn)! 
As quite a few people have already mentioned, make sure the graphics card is a decent make (ie. not an ATI  ) and that the DDR memory is fast enough (I can get hold of either 400MHz 1Gb chips or two 466Mhz 512Mb chips).
Windows ME? On that system? You may aswell pay £50 for a crap spec if you're going to use WinME. Depending on what you're going to use it for, you should be looking at either WinXP (the Fisher Price Windows for newbies), Win2k (the most stable version, mostly for apps & networking), or Win98 (solely for gaming). Or, if you're brave and know your stuff about computers, dual-boot it with one of the above versions of Windows (for gaming) and a flavour of Linux (for stability and apps/networking).
And, judging by today's standards, that spec you have is an "average" machine......I spec'd a machine, just out of interest, as a "beast" machine - the price of JUST the parts? £6,500!
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andy hirst
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Registered: 18th Apr 02
Location: Rochdale, Greater Manchester
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if you insist on getting an unreliable pc then its not too bad, but use windows XP.
Dan is right about the drive, ive got 1x60gb, 1x80gb and 1x160gb Lacie Drive and im running short of space.
If you just want straight out reliablility and power then get an apple mac, you seriously cant do any better. I've had/built Pc's for years i know how shit they are and how stressfull they can be. I have had a mac for two years and not had one single problem, i also have all the apps i need.
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MoNkEy MaGiC
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Registered: 12th Apr 03
Location: West - London Drives: Corsa GSi
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hmmmm im very confused with some of the replies ive got  so here it goes, stick with me.....
my old pc was a Windows 98 second edition, P3, 700MH, 128MB SDRAM, 32MB geforce 400mx graphics....this was a good and reliable pc BUT very outdated so i upgraded the.....memory to 512MB SDRAM and changed to Windows ME, which was much better in my opinion than WIN 98 however the pc "WAS NOT" that much faster??
although it is true it has been giving me trouble with Internet explorer 6! but is stable now!
my mate did all this for me "over a year ago", he has been making and selling pc's his whole life and apparently he said Windows ME is "GOOD"
the pc he is making me will have all good parts, good ram and graphics and i will not need to much memory on hardrive as ive only used half my 40GB drive and ive had it for 4 years
[Edited on 20-06-2004 by MoNkEy MaGiC]
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vibrio
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Registered: 28th Feb 01
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you also have to look at what you want fomr a PC. I have a P2 400mhz with 384mb ram and a 8gb hdd. I only use it for the internet really. I don't play games on it. if I was upgrading I'd not really care about the speed difference between different types of DDR ram. I would get ram which was suited ot the machine. from ebuyer you can get a nicely speced (2.6 AMD, 512 RAM, 120GB HDD) set up using parts from your old machine (keyboard, moniter, mouse,floppy, CD drive) for under £280
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MoNkEy MaGiC
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Registered: 12th Apr 03
Location: West - London Drives: Corsa GSi
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ok guys considering what you lot have said and advised ive changed the spec, so wat u think now??
i ONLY use it for, Games, Internet, Downloading and occasionally microsoft office...so i want somthing pretty fast and powerfull...
(2.7GHz?) 3000+ AMD Athlon Windows XP
1024MB DDR ram 400MHz speed at least (fast and good quality)
120GB hardrive
256MB Radeon graphics ATI (fast and good quality card)
DVD re-writer, CD re-writer, 3.5 floppy drive
all in nice silver tower with at least 6 usb ports
and earlier i meant this is a BEAST machine compared to my OLD and CURRENT PC  as it is quite a jump for me
i can get this machine for about £400??
(using my own mouse, keyboard, moniter and speakers)
please post your opinions on this pc spec and advice or corrections
[Edited on 20-06-2004 by MoNkEy MaGiC]
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Tim
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Registered: 21st Apr 00
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quote:
Originally posted by MoNkEy MaGiC
256MB Radeon graphics (fast and good quality NOT ATI)
So why do you want a Radeon graphics card which isn't an ATI board?
Just curious why considering ATI cards are usually very stable/quick/well-made (they did design the Radeon chip) 
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drunkenfool
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Registered: 7th Feb 03
Location: Hereford Drives: Audi R8 V8
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quote:
Originally posted by AndyCorsa
120gb hard drive? Would you ever use that? Thats bloody big!
I was gonna say consider getting a bigger HDD. I got 300GB which is getting full.
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MoNkEy MaGiC
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Registered: 12th Apr 03
Location: West - London Drives: Corsa GSi
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quote:
Originally posted by Tim
quote:
Originally posted by MoNkEy MaGiC
256MB Radeon graphics (fast and good quality NOT ATI)
So why do you want a Radeon graphics card which isn't an ATI board?
Just curious why considering ATI cards are usually very stable/quick/well-made (they did design the Radeon chip)
i dont know mate, your saying Radeon ATI are good, wereas somebody earlier said that i should stay clear of ATI? so im not sure you see
and also i dont know much about Radeon/ATI or watever?? my mate just said he will give me a Radeon 256mb graphics with it?
[Edited on 20-06-2004 by MoNkEy MaGiC]
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James_DT
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Registered: 9th Apr 04
Location: Cambridgeshire
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ATI make the Radeon chip.
Other manufacturers make video cards based on the Radeon chip, but it's still essentially ATI.
ATI are good, but I prefer nVidia based cards.
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MoNkEy MaGiC
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Registered: 12th Apr 03
Location: West - London Drives: Corsa GSi
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quote:
Originally posted by James_DT
ATI make the Radeon chip.
Other manufacturers make video cards based on the Radeon chip, but it's still essentially ATI.
ATI are good, but I prefer nVidia based cards.
yeah ive got a OLD geforce 32MB Nvidia graphics card at the moment and it is outdated but a bloody GOOD graphics card as i can still just about play new more demanding games with it today
so you reckon Nvidia are better than the Radeon?
which "Nvidia graphics" card in particular would you reccomend instead of the 256MB Radeon im getting for my PC spec?
[Edited on 20-06-2004 by MoNkEy MaGiC]
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James_DT
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Registered: 9th Apr 04
Location: Cambridgeshire
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If the Radeon is a 9500 or better (ask your mate), use that one, it'll be great.
If not, I'd get an nVidia GeForce FX 5700 or 5900.
[Edited on 20-06-2004 by James_DT]
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MoNkEy MaGiC
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Registered: 12th Apr 03
Location: West - London Drives: Corsa GSi
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ok cheers mate,
Radeon 9500 or better
nVidia Geforce FX 5700 or 5900
are they all 256MB cards??
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PaulW
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Registered: 26th Jan 03
Location: Atherton, Greater Manchester
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quote:
Originally posted by MoNkEy MaGiC
had my pc 4 years and its a "bit" out dated and bloody SLOW!!
so thinking of upgrading to this....
3GH AMD Athlon with Windows Me
1024MB DDR ram
120GB hardrive
256MB Radeon graphics
DVD re-writer/player,CD re-writer/player, 3.5 floppy drive
all in nice silver tower with 6 usb ports
i reckon this is a BEAST of a PC!!! what u think????
[Edited on 20-06-2004 by MoNkEy MaGiC]
WinME will be useless, plus its still based upon the 9x kernel, so anything above 512Mb RAM isn't supported and will just fuck things up. Your best with XP if you want to keep up to date & use 1Gb RAM.
better spec...
AMD Athlon-XP 3200+ (200FSB x 12 (2.2GHz))
Abit NF7-S Rev 2 Motherboard
1024Mb PC3200 DDR
250Gb 7200rpm SATA HDD
ATI Radeon 9800XT 256Mb DDR3 Graphics
Dual-Layer DVD+/-RW Drive
3.5" FDD with built-in 6-in-1 Card Reader
Some fancy-ass-case you like the look of.
Win XP Pro (more secure than Home edition, as home can be hacked & get full admin access in less than 30 seconds)
Also, you 'could' get 2 250Gb SATA HDD's & run them in RAID-0 config. Muchos quicker than 1 drive!
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Dan B
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Registered: 25th Feb 01
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Current 256Mb cards I can pick up (there's probably more):
nVidia GF6800
nVidia FX5200/5500/5600/5700/5900/5950
ATI FireGL
ATI Radeon 9200/9550/9600/9800
ATI Radeon X800
3D-Labs Wildcat
Even more confused now? The battle between ATI and nVidia, in most cases, will just be personal preference. Some cards are better for some games, others for other games, but overall they're about the same.
For suggestions for Nvidia replacements, it would depend on your budget just for the card itself:
Decent-spec ULTRA-version of the GF6800, you're looking at a fraction over £420; decent-spec ULTRA-version of the FX5950, you're looking at a fraction under £300 (bit this should come down now the GF6800 is available).
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PaulW
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Registered: 26th Jan 03
Location: Atherton, Greater Manchester
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ATI-X800 can be got for £00 plus its a better performer than the Nvidia GF6800
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Nath
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Registered: 3rd Apr 02
Location: MK
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quote:
Originally posted by RussSxi
quote:
Originally posted by MoNkEy MaGiC
3GH AMD Athlon with Windows Me
firstly, windows ME is the _SHITTEST_ operating system ever created.
and secondly, theres no such thing as a 3ghz amd chip, theres the 3000+ but that is knowhere near 3 gig...
AMD Athlon XP3000+ is 2.16ghz, hardly nowhere near.
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