New Computer - Need suggestions on hardware

[Mar-Evayave]

Hey guys, I'm working on getting a new computer. My itty-bitty Dell laptop that is half a decade old at least is starting to attack games like a wet noodle. Time to retire the gecko and get me a dragon.

Okay, maybe not that much of a beast, but still...

Here are my current specs (the laptop):

Dell Precision M65
Windows XP Pro SP3 32-bit
DirectX 9.0c
Intel Core 2 Duo CPU @ 2.00GHz
2 GB of RAM
NVidia Quadro FX 350M
CDRW/DVD
150 GB harddrive

Can't think of anything else off the top of my head, except that most of my graphic settings are low to medium, with a few high/very high settings. In a happy world, my FPS is 20-30. In higher level areas or those with lots of people (RoR, HD, Epic Battles, raids, etc) my FPS drops to 10-20 or even lower. I manage, but it's not exactly fun. Oh, and when HD first launched, I'd crash about once every 30-60 minutes. Sometimes more often. Same story with RoR. Can't remember much further back, though I vaguely recall similar experiences with RoI. Anyway, as with RoI and RoR, give the game a little while and things like crashes and even the worst of rubberbanding gradually deminishes. RoI is peachy, RoR is pretty solid, and HD is getting better.

Now, my new system is not all together. Only have a few things. It is a desktop, though.

Dell Optiplex 745
No operating system yet (shooting for Windows 7 64-bit)
DirectX 9.0c is more or less a given
Intel Pentium D CPU @ 3.40GHz
305 watt power supply
No RAM yet (shooting for 4GB, but considering 8)
No video card yet (this I really need help on)
CDRW/DVD
No harddrive yet (shooting for a TB)

I'm pretty certain I'll get the above operating system and harddrive, and will definitely get at least 4 GB if not 8 GB of RAM. What I really don't know is what video card to go with. I'm not 100% sure how to find out what would be compatible. All I know in terms of the nitty-gritty details on the processor/motherboard is that the entire thing is SATA and the video card slot is PCIE x16.

Anything else I need to share or is this enough to get the ball rolling?

I did some minor pricing on crucial and newegg and it seems like I can get a TB harddrive for about $60-$70. 4 GB of RAM runs about the same, though I did see one bundle of 8 GB for $110 or so. When it comes to the video card, I really don't need (or even want) the top of the line. My budget for just the video card runs up to about $150, so I'm looking in that range. I don't need to have a super computer. xD

[blackjack2138]

These should more than do it for LOTRO and some other light gaming:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814500286

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814130830

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16814133430

These are only Nvidia options as I don't know much about AMD cards.

[Mar-Evayave]

I am only assuming the Optiflex can use NVidia cards. I don't really see any reason it can't, anyway. A number of compatible suggestions were provided on Dell's website in terms of AMD cards. But of course Dell isn't going to be suggesting cards designed to handle video games, so their suggestions have to be taken with a very big grain of salt. xD

Thank-you for the links, though! Definitely going to have my dad take a look at them later. He doesn't really know what video cards are good for gaming, but he is a tech so he'd at least know if they are compatible. He'd also be the one I'd have to ask to find out exactly what processor I have.

[blackjack2138]

if you can tell me what motherboard is in the computer I can tell ya. Thought there is no reason at all it wouldn't be compatible. I would recommend the 8gb if you can swing it . And just for fun, get a small 120gb SSD to use as your boot drive and for installing a game or two on. That make such a difference in how the computer feels.

[anthonyx]

if you can tell me what motherboard is in the computer I can tell ya. Thought there is no reason at all it wouldn't be compatible. I would recommend the 8gb if you can swing it . And just for fun, get a small 120gb SSD to use as your boot drive and for installing a game or two on. That make such a difference in how the computer feels.

I would agree with this. The SSD will help in ways you can not imagine yet (comparing it to your old system is unfair). I think 8gb Ram is the best but that is something that you could add later. You are probably looking at a mid range gaming computer that will run LOTRO with no problem. I am an AMD fan at the moment though I could never fault someone going with Nvida. Just stay away from on-board video cards such as Intel HD xxxx. I have seen the AMD APU a10 series run LOTRO and other newer games flawlessly. I mention this because it is cost friendly. (The version I had a hands on with was the a10 7850k). The APU series is a CPU and a GPU combined.

As for operating systems, you can't go wrong with windows 7 but don't let people tell you that windows 8.x is not good for gaming. I made the change with no problems. (I had to update drivers on some things).

Good luck, seeing the world of LOTRO in stunning max settings is an experience worth the upgrade!

[blackjack2138]

I would agree with this. The SSD will help in ways you can not imagine yet (comparing it to your old system is unfair). I think 8gb Ram is the best but that is something that you could add later. You are probably looking at a mid range gaming computer that will run LOTRO with no problem. I am an AMD fan at the moment though I could never fault someone going with Nvida. Just stay away from on-board video cards such as Intel HD xxxx. I have seen the AMD APU a10 series run LOTRO and other newer games flawlessly. I mention this because it is cost friendly. (The version I had a hands on with was the a10 7850k). The APU series is a CPU and a GPU combined.

As for operating systems, you can't go wrong with windows 7 but don't let people tell you that windows 8.x is not good for gaming. I made the change with no problems. (I had to update drivers on some things).

Good luck, seeing the world of LOTRO in stunning max settings is an experience worth the upgrade!

Good point about the AMD APU's. I've never used a desktop version, the my little brother in-law has a laptop sporting an AMD APU and it runs it just fine and med-high settings. I can only imagine a desktop version with more than 2gb ram would be just fine.

[Palentian]

Don't forget to make sure the power supply can handle what ever card you put in it. I think the 745 comes with a 305w PSU. That may not do for higher end cards.

[Namesse]

I tried looking up the Optiplex 745 and it's no longer available, but I looked at what Dell directed me to instead. I'm going to take a slightly different tack than the others and tell you to check out digitalstormonline.com as their systems start at $700, with the heads up that you may not be able to get Win 7.

I saw others on the forum here over the years recommending them and I ended up getting my laptop from them (game machine is a build from a local shop). If your desktop is going to be multi-purpose, you may come out ahead with Dell due to the pricing you can get on other software, DS will give you a machine loaded with the OS only, no other bloat ware. Straight on hardware comparison DS is very competitive with Dell pricing.

Hope I don't confuse you too much with this.

[Arestelle]

I can tell you I'm using a 4-year-old NVIDIA GeForce 330M graphics card in my laptop (512 MB vram) and until I got to Rohan, I ran high graphics settings and tended to get 25-35 fps (Very High for the general setting and 2x or 4x antialiasing, not sure about other settings as I let it auto-select them). Around Rohan I started getting more lag (and in crowds) and I lowered the general setting to High and turned off antialiasing; fps went up but lag remained, so if I read into that right, I think my bottleneck is more my internet connection than the vid card.

Point being, a 4-year-old mid-range card with half a gig of vram is enough for me to run the game at med/high settings. It runs warmer than I'd like, and the fps drops to single digits when I crank up the settings for screenshots; if I could I'd upgrade to a card with 2 GB vram, and I wouldn't get less than 1 GB in a new build.

Also, I agree about getting 8 gigs of ram. And an ssd. I'm running a 7200 rpm hdd and load times are still often painful.

[Brya]

I'll just chime in to agree with what others have said about an SSD. It makes a huge difference, not just for your operating system, but for LOTRO too.

On my beastly PC, comparing LOTRO on an SDD (as my Live install is) versus LOTRO on a regular HDD (as my Bullroarer client is), the difference - particularly for load times - is very noticable.

[GozmitJosh]

again SSD, is well worth the cost to install your OS and lotro on, it reduced my loading times from 5-10 minutes to under 1 minute from the time i start the launcher until i am fully loaded into the game and playing, same with booting windows, shutdown and a very snappy responses from programs and the like.

and again i would upgrade to 8GB ram, lotro takes now 1.6-1.7gb and windows 7 running right now for me with chrome takes ~2gb. With 4GB you will be using 75%+ of the ram, which over the next few years lotro and other programs will be increasing in ram usage, might as well buyu 8gb now if you already plan to upgrade in the future to 8gb.

[Testis]

Check out ibuypower.com cyberpowerpc.com magicmicro.com and make a custom pc.

[Mar-Evayave]

if you can tell me what motherboard is in the computer I can tell ya. Thought there is no reason at all it wouldn't be compatible. I would recommend the 8gb if you can swing it . And just for fun, get a small 120gb SSD to use as your boot drive and for installing a game or two on. That make such a difference in how the computer feels.

I'll get back to you on the motherboard. I don't have the tech skills to safely dismantle the tower and find out. xD I would like 8GB if possible, but it sorta depends on how much $$$ it totals at. Not only do I have to finish out the computer and accessories, but I also still need to get a desk to put it all on. >.< I never thought buying a desk would be so hard.

... Just stay away from on-board video cards such as Intel HD xxxx. I have seen the AMD APU a10 series run LOTRO and other newer games flawlessly. I mention this because it is cost friendly. (The version I had a hands on with was the a10 7850k). The APU series is a CPU and a GPU combined.

As for operating systems, you can't go wrong with windows 7 but don't let people tell you that windows 8.x is not good for gaming. I made the change with no problems. (I had to update drivers on some things).

Good luck, seeing the world of LOTRO in stunning max settings is an experience worth the upgrade!

It has an on-board Intel card, but it is designed in a way that the integrated card will be deactivated when I put a "real" card in. I really am not keen on Windows 8 at all, and I won't touch Vista to save my life, but 7 is supposed to be Vista with all the fixes, so that seems like the best choice for me at the moment. And yeah, I'm really eager to be able to stop cutting back on my settings. ^_^

Don't forget to make sure the power supply can handle what ever card you put in it. I think the 745 comes with a 305w PSU. That may not do for higher end cards.

I'm not savvy when it comes to things like that, but my dad is, so when I "choose" a card to go with, he'll be able to put his stamp of approval on it in terms of compatibility.

I tried looking up the Optiplex 745 and it's no longer available, but I looked at what Dell directed me to instead. I'm going to take a slightly different tack than the others and tell you to check out digitalstormonline.com as their systems start at $700, with the heads up that you may not be able to get Win 7.

I saw others on the forum here over the years recommending them and I ended up getting my laptop from them (game machine is a build from a local shop). If your desktop is going to be multi-purpose, you may come out ahead with Dell due to the pricing you can get on other software, DS will give you a machine loaded with the OS only, no other bloat ware. Straight on hardware comparison DS is very competitive with Dell pricing.

Hope I don't confuse you too much with this.

Given that it's a hand-me-down from my dad's workplace (I'm not actually buying it directly from Dell), that doesn't necessarily surprise me. I was able to find a support page for it on Dell's drivers & updates page. At this point, the only reason a new computer is within my grasp is because I was able to get the tower/motherboard/processor from my dad's workplace for free. My budget unfortunately can't afford a totally different system, particularly at $700+. I'm aiming for spending no more than $300 for the graphics card, harddrive, memory, etc. I don't need top of the line, and even the Optiplex 745 will be better than my itty-bitty laptop. Something went bad in the system and it was gutted, but my dad (who is a wizard at salvaging things) got what remained, made sure it was in working order, and brought it home. We just need to get replacement parts for what's missing. I appreciate the suggestions though!

Point being, a 4-year-old mid-range card with half a gig of vram is enough for me to run the game at med/high settings. It runs warmer than I'd like, and the fps drops to single digits when I crank up the settings for screenshots; if I could I'd upgrade to a card with 2 GB vram, and I wouldn't get less than 1 GB in a new build.

Also, I agree about getting 8 gigs of ram. And an ssd. I'm running a 7200 rpm hdd and load times are still often painful.

Someone else suggested that getting a video card with some RAM built right into it (1-2 GB as you say) helps considerably. I'm definitely going to keep this in mine. Thanks!

I'll just chime in to agree with what others have said about an SSD. It makes a huge difference, not just for your operating system, but for LOTRO too.

On my beastly PC, comparing LOTRO on an SDD (as my Live install is) versus LOTRO on a regular HDD (as my Bullroarer client is), the difference - particularly for load times - is very noticable.

An SDD is like those miniature chips you stick into phones, cameras, mp3 players, etc., correct? Is that the same sort of thing you are talking about? Could someone explain to me how those things actually work, and what their pricing tends to be?

again SSD, is well worth the cost to install your OS and lotro on, it reduced my loading times from 5-10 minutes to under 1 minute from the time i start the launcher until i am fully loaded into the game and playing, same with booting windows, shutdown and a very snappy responses from programs and the like.

and again i would upgrade to 8GB ram, lotro takes now 1.6-1.7gb and windows 7 running right now for me with chrome takes ~2gb. With 4GB you will be using 75%+ of the ram, which over the next few years lotro and other programs will be increasing in ram usage, might as well buyu 8gb now if you already plan to upgrade in the future to 8gb.

Good to have an idea of how much memory gets chewed up. I tend to multitask a lot, so I'll frequently have VLC media player, TeamSpeak and/or Vent, Firefox, and whatever else I wanna have open. That's why I have an unwritten rule about not playing games that don't support windowed mode. xD Though I'm not getting rid of my laptop, so I hope to be able to play fullscreen for a change and have my laptop for all the rest. But thanks for putting the memory-usage into perspective for me. I'm leaning more than ever towards getting the $120ish pack of 8 GB. It seems like a good price, and I imagine if I'm getting a 64-bit system it would probably need more than 32-bit systems. My laptop is 32-bit.

[blackjack2138]

[QUOTE=



An SDD is like those miniature chips you stick into phones, cameras, mp3 players, etc., correct? Is that the same sort of thing you are talking about? Could someone explain to me how those things actually work, and what their pricing tends to be?



[/QUOTE]

An ssd is like a giant flash drive that is installed just like a normal hard drive.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820147247 here is just an example of an SSD. they range from about 50 bucks all the way up to 1000 if your crazy. I have a 120gb and its great, but its a bit small for my liking.

[Sapience]

I'll just chime in with some general guidelines that will help.

Lean towards an NVIDIA card (650 GTX or better if it's in the budget, if not something 570, 580 range is good).
8 GB System ram
SSD HDD
64 bit OS (I suggest Win 7 if you can get it).
Intel Core i5 or i7.

This will put you in the ball park of what you see in the streams in terms of the rig I use at home and work. If you want specifics.

Core i7
16GB Ram
2x 250GB SSD HDD
NVIDIA 650 GTX 2GB
Windows 7 64Bit

That's the machine I run at work. Home is about 90% the same minus the SSD adn the processor (I have a first gen i7 at home, a current gen here at the office, so it's a bit faster).

[Arestelle]

Someone else suggested that getting a video card with some RAM built right into it (1-2 GB as you say) helps considerably. I'm definitely going to keep this in mine. Thanks!

Any separate video card will have its own ram. It's just the onboard/integrated graphics that share memory, so if you're getting a vid card, you'll get vram - just a q of how much.

I was just pricing SSDs myself, and it really does vary depending on brand, size, and whether you're looking at low or high end ones. The smallest ones (<100 GB) and the pro/elite versions seem to run $1/GB or more. The ones I was looking at are more lower or mid range and are more like $0.50/GB, like Crucial's M500 series ($220-240 for 480GB is the one I'm price watching now; the 120GB version is ~$75) and Samsung EVO. But I'm looking for a laptop ssd; don't know whether they make desktop-sized drives (& if so what those are priced like) or you'd have to get something to mount the drive in the larger desktop slot.

Found this spec sheet on the Optiplex 745, btw: https://www.dell.com/downloads/globa...5techspecs.pdf
Didn't realize you had to look for DDR2 memory, so your $120 sounded high for 8GB, but I guess DDR2 is rarer now. Also, that spec sheet lists four form factors. Which one do you have? (Regardless, seeing the specs on all those, I'd echo the earlier remark about the power supply. Unless someone replaced it with a better, I think it's going to struggle.)

[Belnavar]

I highly recommend an SSD. They make a huge difference not only to load times for the game, but for your entire experience of your PC (including boot and shutdown times). Once you get one, you'll never go back to a HDD.

A few years back SSDs were more of a luxury product, thanks to their expensive nature and the fact that capacities were not as high as HDDs. Now there are SSDs with 4TB of storage (although they're aimed at the enterprise market and are very expensive), and the smaller capacity ones are much more affordable. There are mSATA SSDs for laptops.

Personally I have a 128GB SSD with Windows on, and a 500GB SSD with all my games and most other software on.

-Bel

[Mar-Evayave]

An ssd is like a giant flash drive that is installed just like a normal hard drive.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820147247 here is just an example of an SSD. they range from about 50 bucks all the way up to 1000 if your crazy. I have a 120gb and its great, but its a bit small for my liking.

That's a bit of a bite into my wallet. xD That's something I can get later down the road, right?

I'll just chime in with some general guidelines that will help.

Lean towards an NVIDIA card (650 GTX or better if it's in the budget, if not something 570, 580 range is good).
8 GB System ram
SSD HDD
64 bit OS (I suggest Win 7 if you can get it).
Intel Core i5 or i7.

This will put you in the ball park of what you see in the streams in terms of the rig I use at home and work. If you want specifics.

Core i7
16GB Ram
2x 250GB SSD HDD
NVIDIA 650 GTX 2GB
Windows 7 64Bit

That's the machine I run at work. Home is about 90% the same minus the SSD adn the processor (I have a first gen i7 at home, a current gen here at the office, so it's a bit faster).

Thanks, Sapience! I am indeed going to get Windows 7 64-bit. I'm not brave enough for Windows 8 yet. ^_^ The machine can only take up to 8 GB, so that's what I'm shooting for. I'll take a look at those video cards, though, and see if my wallet can swing that. My processor is a Pentium D @ 3.40GHz; how does that stand up against an i5 or i7?

Found this spec sheet on the Optiplex 745, btw: https://www.dell.com/downloads/globa...5techspecs.pdf
Didn't realize you had to look for DDR2 memory, so your $120 sounded high for 8GB, but I guess DDR2 is rarer now. Also, that spec sheet lists four form factors. Which one do you have? (Regardless, seeing the specs on all those, I'd echo the earlier remark about the power supply. Unless someone replaced it with a better, I think it's going to struggle.)

lol Found that just this morning with my dad. And I have the MINITOWER version. My dad apparently has an Optiplex 745 Minitower for one of our servers in the basement and, while he doesn't remember specifically what power supply mine has (without opening it up to see) he's pretty confident that it's the same as the one in the basement, which is 305 watts.

I highly recommend an SSD. They make a huge difference not only to load times for the game, but for your entire experience of your PC (including boot and shutdown times). Once you get one, you'll never go back to a HDD.

A few years back SSDs were more of a luxury product, thanks to their expensive nature and the fact that capacities were not as high as HDDs. Now there are SSDs with 4TB of storage (although they're aimed at the enterprise market and are very expensive), and the smaller capacity ones are much more affordable. There are mSATA SSDs for laptops.

Personally I have a 128GB SSD with Windows on, and a 500GB SSD with all my games and most other software on.

-Bel

Well, between $120 for memory, $75 for harddrive, $100-$150 for video card, $100-$150 for operating system, and any other odds and ends (and a desk... still need that, and a chair), I'm already hitting the top of my budget. An SSD is probably not going to meet roll call this time around.

[Idiotvillage]

A 300W power supply is not going to be sufficient for a modern gaming graphics card. Most mid range type cards seem to recommend 500W minimum, the cards blackjack listed have 400W recommended. I suggest thinking carefully before investing money in such an old machine. Old machines are more likely to fail and it will be a struggle to find parts to repair them. A modern budget tower will utterly wipe the floor with a pentium D. Since you have access to newegg I suggest looking at their clearance desktop pcs http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...98&isdeptsrh=1 find a reasonable under budget tower and maybe add a graphics card to it? If you compare the cost of the individual parts you plan on buying with the features the clearance towers have I think you will find the towers much better value.

[Mar-Evayave]

A 300W power supply is not going to be sufficient for a modern gaming graphics card. Most mid range type cards seem to recommend 500W minimum, the cards blackjack listed have 400W recommended. I suggest thinking carefully before investing money in such an old machine. Old machines are more likely to fail and it will be a struggle to find parts to repair them. A modern budget tower will utterly wipe the floor with a pentium D. Since you have access to newegg I suggest looking at their clearance desktop pcs http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...98&isdeptsrh=1 find a reasonable under budget tower and maybe add a graphics card to it? If you compare the cost of the individual parts you plan on buying with the features the clearance towers have I think you will find the towers much better value.

Even the ones on that page (those under $500-$600 anyway) have power supplies of 300W or less. :/ Putting together the cost of operating system, graphics card, memory and harddrive and the costs I've been seeing, I'll be spending about $500 or thereabouts, just on the computer. All of the computers in that neighborhood on that link aren't much different at all.

[GornaxElsie]

You might consider looking at a Dell or HP. Something in the $500-700 range would be good enough for a decent LOTRO machine and probably last you for quite a while, given what you currently do.

I tend to buy either one generation back for cost savings (at least as far as motherboard and CPU) and top end everything else and then run it for another couple of generations before I feel the need to upgrade. It gives me time to save for that upgrade, usually three to five years, depending on technologies that come out in between.

Yes, that upgrade may be $700-$1000, but I've been able to save $200 a year for it.

[Mar-Evayave]

How does this system look?

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicati...Sku=C477-G1411

It's the upper end of my price range and has Windows 8.1 (meh) but otherwise...?

[Godmog]

How does this system look?

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicati...Sku=C477-G1411

It's the upper end of my price range and has Windows 8.1 (meh) but otherwise...?

The GPU is very limited (http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gp...GeForce+GT+610) and honestly i wouldn't suggest a complete system. Dont look for an expensive Dell tower if you have an 550$ cap The biggest issue is the Operating System which take 20% of your budget no matter if you pick Win 7 or Win 8.1 :/

Power:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicati...&sku=T925-5002

DVD-Devise:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicati...=LQR-101777441

RAM:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicati...6&sku=K24-9918

GPU:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicati...=JIE-102301619

HDD:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicati...ku=TSD-1000AS7

Case:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicati...&sku=U12-41570

CPU:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicati...4&sku=A79-4134

Board:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicati...&sku=M452-6238

in summary 500$ excluding OS and taxes. With OS ~600$. If you go for a lower power supply (maybe 400W or 450W can fit already), less RAM (4 GB can fit for Lotro unless you want massive multiboxing ), smaller and/or slower HDD you can easily reach your 550$ budget.

[Mar-Evayave]

I'll reiterate that I'm not looking to be able to play in godmode graphics or anything to that nature. Considering the stats of my current laptop, it really is not going to take a lot to "wipe the floor" with my laptop's stuff. xD And with the machine on tigerdirect that I linked, if the only thing that's not so swell is the graphics card, I can always upgrade that further down the road if it's not to my liking.

[Arestelle]

How does this system look?

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicati...Sku=C477-G1411

It's the upper end of my price range and has Windows 8.1 (meh) but otherwise...?

The specs make it sound way better than putting a bunch of money into a rather old pc, though I'm seeing some iffy reviews about CyberPower on a very similar build at Best Buy: http://www.bestbuy.com/site/cyberpow...ustomerreviews

There's a similar build for a similar price by ASUS, if Best Buy's an option for you. I tend to trust ASUS more than most other brands, & the one 3-star review on this just seems to be complaining about the graphics card because they wanted to play games that really require more than 1gb video memory. "Asus - Desktop - 8GB Memory - 1TB Hard Drive"