Check out this link:

http://www.fonerbooks.com/r_power.htm

Good question about the power supply, the 350W one is effectively probably short for the customised version you mention above : in most desktops I saw with these components the power supplies are 650W ones…and more than that, Nvidia itself recommends 550W as a minimum with this graphic card… Well, it should start with a 350W one I suppose (HP won’t sell something that doesn’t work logically…), but I am somewhat surprised it works, and such a power supply won’t help future upgrades.

About the Gateway computer, the hardware proposed just don’t fit a gaming box in my opinion, especially if you want something evolutive : the Core 2 Quad processors are on a socket 775 platform which won’t allow any upgrade (it just has been replaced by the LGA 1156 platform used by the Core i5/i7) and the GT 220, despite its misleading 1GB of VRAM is definitely not a gaming card but more a HTPC card (performance-wise it is merely a 9500GT with more technologies supported by hardware).

Concerning processors, I would recommend a quad-core since the extra cores will be exploited by games in the near future I think. To simplify, the number of cores can be viewed as the number of processors linked together in one package : dual-core=> 2 processors, quad-cores=> 4 processors. To compare processors, frequency is not the only thing to consider, the generation matters also : a 3GHz Core 2 Quad and a 3GHz Core i7 won’t provide the same performance, for example. For games, the minimal configuration is what is needed for the game to work smoothly at low details generally, so if a game needs a 3GHz processor and you have a 2.66 dual or quad-core one, the result will depend of the game :

-if the game can use the 2/4 cores, no problem (unless it specifically wants a 3GHz quad-core of course), the processing speed will be taken off the other cores

-if it is limited to one core by design, it will work, but a little slowly, possibly not smooth enough if other parts of the configuration are below the minimal specs needed (but this type of games is becoming less and less common these days with the generalisation of quad-core processors)

With your budget, I think it will be easier to find a suitable configuration with an AMD base, as the platform (the couple processor+motherboard) is way cheaper than intel’s currently and equally evolutive (well, at least here in France, I don’t know the prices in the US, so it may not apply). I won’t be able to advise a model of computer directly as I don’t live in the US so don’t know what is available in computer stores there, but I can give some advices about some parts.

Try to find a computer with a Radeon 5750 or 5770 if you can: they are the only affordable Direct X 11 cards at the moment, and as such I can only but recommend them when the goal is gaming. 6-8Gb of RAM is also advisable I think to be on the safe side in the long term, especially with Windows 7.

Finally,I would advise going for a quad-core processor with a as high frequency as you can afford, just be sure to avoid socket 775 (Core 2 Quads) and AM2+ CPUs as these platforms are likely not to be upgradeable in the future, prefer LGA 1156 or AM3-based ones which should allow upgrades at least until late 2011 (according to the roadmaps), that is to say Core i5/i7 or Athlon/Phenom II X4. The only difference between Athlon and Phenom is the L3 cache non-existent for Athlons, but it doesn’t make a huge performance gap in games apparently, so I would advise going for Phenoms if you plan to do video encoding (or just have the money of course), but if you are short in terms of budget overall, Athlon II X4 CPUs can be one way to reduce the bill without sacrificing too much performance for your primary usage (for games, the graphic card is more important than the CPU, to a certain extent of course, but at same clock speed and number of cores, 6Mb of cache doesn’t make that much of a difference). Especially since two more models are planned soon in the Athlon II X4 lineup according to some news (635 and 640) which are expected to be 2.9 and 3GHz quads and should cost less than their equally-clocked Phenom II counterparts.

Processor
Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-860 processor [2.8GHz, 1MB L2 + 8MB shared L3 cache]

Memory
8GB DDR3-1333MHz SDRAM [4 DIMMs]

Hard Drive
640GB 7200 rpm SATA 3Gb/s hard drive
Graphics Card

1.8GB NVIDIA Geforce GTX 260 [2 DVI, HDMI and VGA adapters]

Those things bring the price of the computer to $1279.99 on HP website for customizing and like I said the power supply is only 350 watts. But, those are what I was looking for in a computer, cause I want it to be able to run anything with ease and I think that should maybe, hopefully be able to do that.

Also boxes from most OEM’s, Dell, HP who ever, usually have smallish power supplies.

Gateway, IMHO, is equal to, but no better than any other OEM. ALL of them have issues of some sort.

Give us a price please.

I dont really have any friends or family that knows anything about computers, otherwise I think I might enjoy the learning process involved with making my own computer, but as of now having no knowledge it seems like a scary thing to tackle and I would be afraid of screwing things up.

Ron, you brought up a gateway desktop computer. I have heard from family and others that it is a horrible computer. That if anything goes wrong, to replace anything cost a ton BUT also that there are a lot of programs that cant even be run on gateways that can on other computers. Now is that information correct, I mean it kind of seems odd for that to be true, but what is your guys experience in this area?

I have a question about processors. There are some processors that are dual core and then quad core. There are dual core processors with say 3 ghz, and then a quad core processor with 2.66 ghz, which processor is better or faster?Also some games will say it requires a processing speed or processor with 3 ghz, if I had a dual core or quad core processor of 2.66 or 2.8, would it then not be able to run that game because it isnt 3 ghz?

Your information and thoughts are greatly appreciated and I want to thank you in advance and I look forward to your input.

Florian – thanks for sharing your expertise with us as well.

Well, since I am in the process of selecting a new gaming box to buy myself, I will try to give an advice.

First, I have to agree with Ron : what limits is budget above the rest, generally.

To me, the brand doesn’t matter much, as what matters is only the hardware used : same hardware, same performance, as you guessed it.

The case can matter, depending of the configuration inside (especially since gaming implies powerful CPU/GPU, and the more powerful they are, the more heat they produce generally , and some cases are better than others in terms of cooling capabilities), but if you want a pre-built system, it will have been selected to be sufficient by the manufacturer normally, no need to worry about that (unless you matter silence…but in that case, a custom system is better suited, so you know what to expect).

Concerning hard disks, the RPM is the speed of the drive : more RPMs means faster disk access, but it is generally only important, in my opinion, when planning to have two disks (one for the system and one for data) because if 10000 RPM disks (for example) are useful for the system drive (so applications/OS load faster, but they are now superseded by SSDs for that matter), the premium over standard 7200 RPM disks is way less justified for data disks where the gain will be less noticeable. I don’t know what gain to expect for gaming and can’t say if the gain is worth the extra though, having no disk faster than 7200 RPM myself.

By “RADEON 1″, judging by the benefits, I suppose you mean “RAID 1″? If so, this consists of having two identical disks mirror each other (providing backup in case one disk dies, effectively). It can be useful only if you have no external drive to do backups yourself in my opinion, and/or want an automatic backup system. The premium comes from the second disk and the RAID controller needed for this type of configuration to work properly.

Concerning prices, I don’t think they will drop soon (apart for what is now previous generation hardware if I can say so) as all major hardware companies are in the process of launching their new products. Apart from classical Christmas deals, of course.

From HP, depending on your budget, two configurations appear interesting to me for a gaming machine. The HP Pavilion Elite e9250t first : with a customised graphic card (I would advise getting the 1.8GB NVIDIA Geforce GTX 260 here if you can afford it, especially if you have a monitor with a resolution higher than 1680*1050, or the 4850 if not, the others are not gaming cards anyway) and taking advantage of the rebate on RAM to take the 8Gb, you have an upgradeable platform (the Core i5 is on intel’s latest one which is planned to be used until 2011 at least) and a powerful card (although only Direct X 10 compliant, Direct X 11 cards from Nvidia are not there yet and Ati’s ones not proposed within HP desktops it seems).

The Pavilion Elite e9200z customised with a Phenom II 945 and a 4850 is also a valid choice, especially if you use a small screen (resolution 1680*1050 max I mean), and is cheaper.

From Dell, the only interesting one for me is the second model of the Studio XPS 8000 line : customised with 8Gb of RAM and a GTX 260 or GTS 240 card it is similar to the HP Pavilion Elite e9250t, but slightly more expensive at equivalent hardware.

The only thing I don’t like about these configurations is the lack of Radeon 5800/5700 cards…which would be better suited with Windows 7 since they support Direct X 11. So if you can find a computer with one of these cards compatible with your budget, with 6-8Gb of RAM and a Core i5/i7 or Phenom II 945 processor, go for it, it should last you longer as the graphic card should be obsolete later than a GT200/Radeon 4000 one (as they just have been launched).