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Full Powered, Compact, Gaming Rigs?
Michael Buffington asks: "I frequently go to LAN gaming parties, and because I'm not all that interested in toting my higher power mid tower machine around, I bring my lower powered notebook. I want to build a full powered machine complete with a fast, 3.5" HD, CD-ROM, Pentium III or similar in speed CPU, at least 1 AGP slot, and at least 2 PCI slots (or integrated sound, or network, or both), as small as possible. I've considered going the PC 104 route, but don't know of any vendors who sell complete systems (which I'd be more comfortable with, on the PC 104 route), and honestly don't know the pricing on PC 104. I've also considered finding the smallest motherboard I can, and hand building a machine as small as possible with normal equipment (duct tape being part of the 'normal' equipment). Does anyone have any ideas, examples, or stories to help with my new obsession?"
I wouldn't recommend getting a laptop, as it might end up getting too expensive.
But maybe you could get a carrying case designed for DJs (to hold their mixer and SL1200s (or whatever) in). There should be plenty of room to fit a motherboard and other stuff, also you should be able to do some slight modifications. You'll probably have to drill a few holes too and so on. The point is that you get a suitably large container with a handle (and/or wheels) and install your computer inside that. Then get a small LCD screen which fits in your backpack and you're set to go!
PS. Bush blows goats
First pompous ass?
I have a little computer that I made for Lan parties...here is the specs. PIII 866 Mobo is Aopen Mx3s (one of the smallest boards made with the 815e chipset) + it has onboard sound and LAN (getting rid of two PCI slots) video geforce 2 Pro 64 meg, overclocked to near Ultra speeds. IBM deskstar 45 gig 75000 rpm drive I use onboard LAN, and Sound from Mobo I use a tiny case found here: http://www.caseoutlet.com/case/microatx/newcase.ht ml
Check out the specs...it is roughly 12.5 inches long, 7.5 inches wide and 13 inches tall...VERY TINY!
+ you have the whole penguin thing for Linux!!!
I modified the case by cutting small holes in the side of it and putting in a case-fan in the side to help with the cooling (adding a geforce 2 overclocked to the mix was simply too hot!) I also had to modify the inside a little moving the internal front fan to behind the bezel to make room for the mobo (the case is actually designed for flex-atx, not micro-atx..but the Mx3s fits if you move the internal front fan. I also added a vortex fan to one of the PCI slots on the bottom to increase air-flow from the video card. The Mobo came with 4 usb ports which is very useful for gaming (I use usb mouse, keyboard, joystick, driving wheel and game-commander).
I have people standing around at every LAN party I go to because of the size...I show up with "just a monitor" (this case along with keyboard and etc all fits into a normal backpack.) and proceed to hook everything up. People are amazed. I love watching people Lug around their big cases making two or three trips to their cars. Now I am saving up for a 17 inch LCD and I will really be set!
about one year ago. i set two limitations to the design of my "lan party computer"
1. it must use standard components (to make it easier to find parts to buy)
2. it must be cheap (at least cheaper than a comparable laptop)
this is a list of components that i used to build the system.
i updated parts of the list to reflect what components i would buy if i was going to build it today.
case mini tower $60
monitor 14" lcd $600
motherboard micro atx $100
processor P3 800Mhz 100FSB $160
ram 256MBpc100SDRAM $100
video Geforce2GTS64MB $195
keyboard mini-keyboard $40
mouse cordless optical $70
hard drive 40GB ide $100
cd-rom drive Plextor16/10/40A $250
floppy 1.44MB Generic $10
sound card SB Live Value $40
network card netgear FA310TX $20
cat5 cable 14 feet $20
headphones koss td61 $20
carry strap GearGrip Pro $35
other stuff:
cable bag a small, strong bag to attach to the side of the case to hold all the cables
power cable with 3 outlets that have 3 prongs each to accommodate the power cables for your system and monitor
i attached the lcd monitor to one side of the case and the cable bag to the other side. i put all the cables attached to the computer inside the bag to get them out of the way. then, when i went to a lan party i would only have to take one power cable, one network cable, the mini-keyboard, cordless mouse, and headphones out of the cable bag. everything was already connected at the back of the computer so there was no onsite setup involved.
i also screwed a piece of plexiglass onto the lcd monitor to protect the screen. (yes it was stupid to drill holes into a monitor that i just spent $900 on at that time, but it worked)
i had a lot of fun with that computer. i even dropped it down a flight of stairs once and the case was bent and all the pci cards popped out of their sockets. i put it back together and it worked fine.
the only downside to building this system was that it weighed about 30lbs. although if you spent more money on a lunchbox case with integrated lcd it would still weigh a lot.
unfortunately i never took any pictures of it for posterity and i ended up dismantling it for parts about 6 months ago, but i'm sure you get the idea.
-stan
Look for an NLX system. The NLX form factor uses a back plane so that it can be mad very small, compact, and easy to cool because the MB is mounted parallel to the PCI slots. These systems have an AGP slot but ususally the card has to be made to fit the NLX form factor, there is a suprising number of these parts around as they never really took off and you can find varieties that use both socket 370 and slot 1. Some of the systems built on this form factor are called book systems because of their small size but it is also used in large rack-mount systems as well, however, you can make a much smaller system with NLX than ATX.
- A.P.
--
Forget Napster. Why not really break the law?
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
--
Forget Napster. Why not really break the law?
"Remember when the U.S. had a drug problem, and then we declared a War On Drugs, and now you can't buy drugs anymore?"
Posted by Kewlhandtek:
I have used the bsi fieldgo portables http://www.fieldgo.com they are great but very pricey, a laptop may be cheaper than these things. I've had one apart, they seem to have very standard pc stuff in them. The military bought lots of these things to run linux out in the field on. So maybe with luck we can pick these things up at surplus sales or on ebay in a few years.
Not since 2000 have we seen a new PC processor come out and current hard drives date back to 1999. The fact is no-one's making components for PC's anymore. You really have to think more about lower clockspeed CPU's for embedded systems, embedded storage devices, and doing more graphics in hardware. This of course is what a console does.
It was probably a fluke, but the last time I played Q3 Arena I kicked some major ass with my PBFW with just the trackpad... I even changed my screen name to "I'm using a TRACKPAD!"
Yes, I actually lug around a system in a rackmount case for presentations. Rackmount cases are designed to take a lot of abuse. They usually come with some nice handles on the front, making them easy to carry. I'd recommend a 2U system. Personally, I have a 4U system, which allows for a full ATX system, but it is pretty heavy.
Software sucks. Open Source sucks less.
Get a P3 1Ghz, 256 Meg, 32 meg Geforce2Go (should be available rsn), 15" lcd.
--I hate people when they're not polite -"Psycho Killer", Talking Heads
If you wanted to make your own chassis, you might thin it down by using riser cards so you can mount the video/PCI cards sideways, but you'll still be stuck trying to find a way to mount the power supply, so it'll still be somewhat bulky.
I think would be difficult to build a system smaller than that for less than the price of an equivalent laptop, mostly because you'd have to find a kick-ass power supply and get other expensive components (SBC motherboards, etc.)
Sure is more palatable to look at a motherboard at lunchtime instead of, well, I just won't go there...
Chris Cothrun
Curator of Chaos
Bleh!
I love my TiBook, but it is not gaming machine. The Rage 128 is slow, slow, slow no matter if Steve Jobs gets up on stage and says its faster than any video card available for PCs.
the problem I have w/gaming on laptops is the small keyboard. Yeah I guess you could tote around your KB w/you (you really wouldn't have a choice otherwise) but it is still a serious problem w/gaming on laptops..
I'm looking at making my computer easier to haul around as well. I leave a 19" monitor, mouse and keyboard at the gaming site so I don't have to lug any of them around, but still grab my main case and take it to play games on a weekly basis. I find that the weight is much more annoying than the size of a mid-tower case.
The guys here at work just got in some aluminum cases and I think it may just be about time for me to upgrade to one. They run about $200, which is a little high for a quality case but they are very light. My current case is 45 lbs, the aluminum ones here are like 12 (both empty). Bolt a handle on and your set.
If you're intersted, details on the cases are available.
OOOOh yeah pc104 = ISA bus. Perfect for all that high powered gaming!
Look I get 8fps in Q3A, but my box is smaller than my head!
After I get four F1-races, I'm going to start on 16 Faceball 2000s and a few more four player adapters.
Does anyone remember when two player PC games connected with a simple null modem connection? I played so much Populous this way...
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You can wait 'till July when OS X will be bundled or install it yourself.
The selection of games should be better by then too.
MSBPodcast.com The opinions expressed here are my own. If you don't like 'em... Think up your own stuff.
Zuh?
Mouse?
Trackpad is *the* ultimate killing device. Back in my Q1 days, I was the absolute master of the triple rocket frag. That was on a trackpad. I tried going back to a mouse, and while I'm not bad, I'm nowhere near as good as I was on the pad.
See, the wonderful feature is that my accuracy was through the roof. Rocket just under the feet to send him up, a second just as he starts to fall (and thereby still in the blast radius), and then a third as he's falling back down, but this one to the actual body. Bled off most of the armor and health, and then...
SPLUT. Shower of gibs just before he hits the ground.
Fear the trackpad.
Raptor
Raptor
"Procrastination is great. It gives me a lot more time to do things that I'm never going to do."
Why does the front page have a picture of the guts of a Compaq Contura 410 series notebook on it? The fastest of those was a dx2-50, if i recall correctly.
This is just like television, only you can see much further.
All your Dell 5000e are belong to us.
Thanks for the info, i've been out of the loop and not keeping up ever since i stopped my website.
I would probably agree with pcgamer - hell, video in laptops has been crap for years.
is it available yet? do you know what line it's going in?
I know that nvidia has the geforce2go mobile chip. Ati will probably come out with a new laptop chip as well. Those two are probably your best bet.
However, it does take a while to get a new video chip in a laptop because each individual model has to get certified (this is what nvidia told me). So, even though the nvidia chip is out now, it might still be another four months or so until you see it in action.
Now, if you have money, i would suggest this route - microatx. You can get some pretty sweet plastic cases that are very small, and decent motherboards from good manufacturers like Asus. Pair this up with a flatpanel and you'd have a trick gaming machine for sure.... if you're really into hacking you can mount the flatpanel in the side of the case, but you might need to get a slightly bigger case for that.
So, if you don't want to wait, go microatx. if you do, just keep your eyes open until a laptop with the gf2go comes out.
Of course I can't think of many games that would know how to take advantage of the 2nd monitor.
I can. Multiheaded gaming is not all that uncommon. It's quite neat, but to be honest I would prefer it over THREE monitors as opposed to two. The reason I say this is that in Quake 3 the crosshair is divided evenly between monitors, and that is a pain for railgun use.
Try to hack my 31337 firewall!
I just became the owner of a Toshiba 2805-S402 with a GeForce2 Go (16MB)...
It's a 850MHz PIII with a 15" LCD...
Firewire, integrated ethernet, integrated modem, integrated smartmedia reader, integrated 8x DVD/4x CDR/RW burner, two free PCMCIA slots, etc.
Came with 128MB ram, add another 128 for ~$50 after a quick search on PriceWatch.com...
This laptop cost me ~ $2500 (retails for $2599) and probably offers better gaming performance than any currently available laptop.
The Geforce2 Go performance is more or less like a under clocked (143MHz) Geforce2 MX. It plays Q3, Black and White, etc. very well.
Sometime around the end of this month Dell will also have a laptop (Inspiron 8000) with a Geforce2 Go priced roughly at $2650 for the base model.
I recommend going with one of these two laptops if you're going for compact gaming.
My only gripe about this laptop, and all other laptops, is that laptop hard drive performance is nowhere near as good as a cheap 7,200 RPM Desktop harddrive...
Yes, it does...
I swear I didn't click submit twice. Oh well, serves me right for using all caps on an off-topic post anyway.
Might I suggest http://www.emjembedded.com/ as a source for all things embedded. They seem to have a helpfull staff and show prices online. They also have a WIDE range of small computing devices and accessories.
Toshiba is now selling laptops with NVidia's GeForce2 Go chipset (basically a GeForce2 MX squeezed into a laptop). Sounds like the easiest route to me! It's got built-in ethernet and sound, too. And a built-in subwoofer? (I'm skeptical on this piece, but who knows?)
The problem is that that particular model of Graphics Card is *NOT* a 3d graphics card. Oh it's toted as such, sure. But deep down it isn't one.
I think the tests I ran on it said it didn't even support all the DirectX functions that most (if not all) the rest of the graphics cards in the world support.
The newer Dells can ship with a 32meg ATI Rage3dish card, which I hear is a thousand times better.
I *severely* don't reccommend Compaq Laptops.
:)
Why?
I was shopping around for a laptop last year. My main two choices (retail) were Compaq and Toshiba.
Now part of the requirements for this particular purchase were that it run Linux. BSD would be a plus, but Linux was a requirement. Not only that it run Linux, however, but also that it run X on Linux.
I'd read up on Linux on laptops and had narrowed it down basically to one of three machines: A Compaq, an IBM and a Toshiba. I tried them all out at various stores and discovered that for the most part, they were all the same. The Compaq was really cool (I like the placement of the speakers and such) and the Toshiba seemed reliable. I was replacing a Toshiba Satellite Pro that finally went dead on me--or rather, the onboard memory did, and you can't replace that without a new board, which would run about as much as a used laptop.
But I digress.
I was about to buy it when a burst of something hit me. I asked if I could try installing some software on the test machine and they said "Ok." I popped in my Debian install CD, rebooted and just stared. The visible screen was reduced to about 1/5 normal. Mind you I got all 80x25 characters, but they were TINY!
In awe of this, I popped out the CD and booted back into Windows, opened a command prompt, hit CTRL-ENTER (turns it fullscreen) and got the exact same display.
As it turns out, even switching the resolution made it use less of the screen, and thus the icons were smaller.
Tried the same thing on the Toshiba and got the same results.
Tried the same thing on the IBM, and it worked just like it should--fullscreen 80x25, etc.
Needless to say, I went with the IBM.
Now I eventually took it back (the manager was REALLY cool about this) because running X required using the Framebuffer X server, which frankly sucks. Ended up with a Dell Inspiron 7500 and couldn't be happier.
Oh, and it *does* change resolutions correctly
I don't know about you, but my EN SFF is a P3 733 with an onboard TNT2. it works fine for games :)
EOM
Look here for some info on the case.
If you're running Linux or UNIX and not using hardware accelerated 3D, you can use your laptop as the "monitor", by using it as an X terminal (or using VNC if you like that better). If you need HW accelerated 3D or are using windows, you will still need to drag a monitor around :(.
I've got a similar problem - I need a piece of kit that can take a soundblaster live pci card (or similar with soundfont support), has a hard disk, keyboard,mouse and a display (probably lcd) - this is so that I don't have to carry a desktop pc to practise just so I can record and playback stuff with decent sound quality. any ideas?
It was nice, but he did say he had a problem with cooling the thing... but then again, I figure you can always do liquid cooling. I was thinking about doing one like that myself. It's the one and main reason I don't go to more LAN parties, other than the distance and sleep deprivation and bad food thing ;-)
Good Luck.
Sig missing. Reward.
Look for a decent flex atx case and mb.
They usually have two pci slots, and if you look hard enough you can find one with a decent embedded video card. I have seen one with the ati rage -whatever- in it. (they are all rage "something".) Ok, so embedded video isn't great, but it is the form factor that matters, not the power right?
Cuchullain
"If sharing a thing in no way diminishes it, it is not rightly owned if it is not shared." -St. Augustine
You could try this one (PIII, Rage Mobility)
If you can crunch the system down small enough, it'll fit, along with the various cables & accessories, into a reasonably-sized backpack. Then you can carry it while carrying your monitor, and only have to lug around two things (backpack & monitor).
hardly...
in portland, oregon its 9:40 and im already drunk!
.sig wanted: Must be concise, funny, and display my cleverness.
Yikes, I hadn't looked at their pricing, we have one of their systems for work. I know you can find just the bare cases for around $3000 and then build the PC yourself. This will get a kick butt system for <$5k. I can't stand laptops because of the lack of upgrade path.
Do really dense people warp space more than others?
Acme Portable
Do really dense people warp space more than others?
Another site forensic-computers has lunchbox stuff as well. There are many others. The advantage of a lunch box over a laptop is that it will be upgradeable with new chip, graphics, etc. The price should be about the same as a mid-high laptop. They aren't as portable as a laptop but give better performance for gaming and are more portable than a standard PC. I have one at work and can vouch for the performance capabilities.
Do really dense people warp space more than others?
I was reading hardocp.com, and noticed this link, which looks to be exactly the kind of info you're after.
i 010405a-1.htm
The Making of a Portable Athlon
http://myhome.netsgo.com/wesleycrushr/Hardware/gu
chris
Here are some urls for you if you wanna build a nice gaming box...
p c
c
l ue_3dcard_roundup_10-00/
p er_he_video_shootout_10-00/
The urls explain themselves sorta.
These two are buyers guides for computers...
http://www.sharkyextreme.com/theguide/value_game_
http://www.sharkyextreme.com/theguide/high_game_p
Now I suggest you look at these next ones for video cards since 3d cards are very essential to gamers. My card is a Hercules 3d Prophet2 GeForce2 GTS 64mb. If you plan on getting an NVdia card I suggeset getting any of the Hercules 3d Prophet Series. They are the best for gaming in my opinion. If you want TV out/in, dvd playback, and some decent 3d, you can go with the ATI Radeon, but I can't endorse it since I've never used it, I've only heard other people's stories.
Anyways here are the urls.
http://www.sharkyextreme.com/hardware/articles/va
http://www.sharkyextreme.com/hardware/articles/su
That's about it...
Disclaimer: I don't feel like running a spell check or grammer check on myself. I'll leave it up to the Anonymous Cowards to point out my mistakes or broken urls or whatever.
-PovRayMan
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Check out my blackbox styles
So did he keep the keyboard and accessories in the slide out drawers visible in the second picture?
load "linux",8,1
1: Why would you want to have more than one graphics card?
Bearing in mind AGP is designed to optimise 3D texture transfer, the argument of a 2d and 3d card is irrelevnt, and pointless with modern cards.
If the system was to switch between work and games, then, and only then, can I see an argument for two cards. But for a games specific machine, nope.
2: To quote the AGP 2.0 specification (footnote 3, page 27)
In other words, one AGP card (the target is the motherboard, master is the card) has to be switched off during AGP transfers.
There is a reason AGP is a Port, not a Bus.
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a G4/500 cube!
--- C00l
Their focus is on industrial, ruggedized systems -- ones that you could install an oscilloscope PCI card in, for example. Some have 5 1/4" internal bays, and these are usually the ones sporting the ISA/PCI expansion capability, too.
- The "FlexPAC" offers PIII processors
- The "TransPAC" is their PC-104 offering
- And the "MegaPAC" reminds me of the old Osborne lugable (just with modern innards).
- Portables product page.
The only thing that stopped me when I used to look at these was the price -- they were twice what other computers of the day were. But that was 6 to 8 years ago.All of these sport (of course) integrated keyboards , trackpoint mice, and LCD panels.
Of course, you could just look at their
Happy hunting!
"...America's great minds of today, teaching America's great minds of tomorrow. Poor bastards." -- A Beautiful Min
Oddly enough, "Running With Scissors" is in my CD drive right now here at work... though the Truck Drivin' song is playing... what a great disc.
--
"It's tough to be bilingual when you get hit in the head."
-This sig intentionally left blank
A bit more flexible option than the laptops people are suggesting.. You can find cases at elan vital and aopen. Asus has numerous boards in microatx. Here's their KT133 based one.
If you want even smaller, you can go FlexATX. Motherboards are scarce, however. I think Tyan has one, but no AGP slot on there.
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Yup, that's the only way to go. It's MUCH better than lugging around even a small tower becuase you still need a monitor, keyboard, etc... and that gets bulky. Personally, i've resigned myself to renting a uhaul and taking my 19" monitor and full tower case with me. With the size (and raw unrestrained power) of that thing, the intimidation factor makes up for the transport hassle.
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Opportunities multiply as they are seized. --Sun-Tzu
First, the processor has to be taken into consideration. I picked a Duron 700 at the time, and grabbed a micro-ATX (or whatever the smallest form factor is, I don't recall) board for this. It had integrated audio and ethernet.
I grabbed a decent 30$ power supply. Anything decent should suffice.
I grabbed a geforce2mx, for economical reasons in part, but also because it's relatively 'short' and was only 85$ at the time.
All I put in this thing was a CDROM drive, since floppy drives are virtually useless nowadays.
I took an old compaq presario case, and cut it up a bit, and slapped the board in it. Not exactly what I was looking for, but next time I'll do things differently...
Next time, I'll get moderately thick plexiglass and use that for the entire frame, while using metal L braces to connect the 4 sides. cutting the metal to fit for the ATX form factor board was a pain in the ass, and plexiglass is quite sturdy, not to mention a heck of a lot easier to work with. Provided you don't want a high level of complexity in case shape and design, you can rip out the normal bay mounting points from a normal case, and connect them in relatively easily to the plexiglass. I'd probably recomment 1/4th inch plexiglass, provided you support everything well. (putting metal strips along the the side that has the motherboard might be advisable).
This way, it not only looks awesome, but it's small and portable. You could even throw a black light into it, get some clear fish aquarium tubing, and make a closed-circuit tube full of antifreeze and put it around the seams of the case - you'd have a very nice glowing system. (I plan to do something similar.) Ideally, you can also make one of the sides easily removable or on a hinge, so hardware upgrades are feasable.
Something I've got in my design template is a small compartment near the bottom where all the system cables are easily retracted and extracted without too much mess and table. You might want to design something like that for yourself. (mouse and headphones fit nicely as well.)
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CAIMLAS
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
Only if the game you are playing relies on the numpad, or the INS/HOME/PGUP box layout. You should be able to remap the keyboard to use
QWE
ASD
ZXC
instead of the numpad.
-- The act of censorship is always worse than whatever is being censored. Always.
I'm assuming I'll get flamed for suggesting non-x86 arch, but if you can run your games on Mac hardware, they have very portable systems.
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Regardless of the specs you mentioned the largest componet is going to be your monitor.
A normal, everyday mini case with more than what you requested is half the size of a decent gaming monitor.
How about getting a good quality lap top from Dell or another brand name with the new Nvidia or ATI mobile graphics chips and a good compatible sound card?
The surprise isn't how often we make bad choices; the surprise is how seldom they defeat us.
Next time in your rush to get first post, you might consider RTFA first...the author is already bringing a notebook around with him. He wants something more powerful that's still small, as you can't exactly get a 1.33-GHz Athlon with a 15k-rpm Ultra160 hard drive in a notebook (OK, so you don't exactly need that much firepower for a gaming rig, but notebooks are generally less powerful than desktops (or machines built up from desktop components).
20 January 2017: the End of an Error.
It'll be Doom 3.
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Genius dies of the same blow that destroys liberty.
these guys inside-USA
--
Don't lead me into temptation... I can find it myself.
PIII 800MHZ, Geforce 2 go card 128MB ram , subwoofer (i'll believe it when i hear it) DVD/CDR firewire port, 2 usb
2799
I know this isn't that fast by todays standards, but for building that tiny LAN box, the A-Trend ATC-6254M BX motherboard has integrated Voodoo3/2000 w/ 16 MB vram on a 2x onboard AGP, and onboard Yamaha 740 sound controller. That'd eliminate at least the perpendicular AGP card jutting out. Coupled with the fastest PIII it'll take and some other desktop components, and you've got a modest gaming rig without the cost of going laptop.
This is where I get my recommended daily allowance of "Foot in Mouth."
Doing work on my carmp3 player, which was also to serve as a small desktop capable of gaming, I have had some experience in this area. Book PCs are VERY nice and are by far the smallest (I have one 3x10x12 inches), while small PC cases (Micro/FlexATX) are a bit bigger (about 6x13x14, basically twice as big). The main difference? Book PCs are NOT expandable, while small cases are. You COULD always go the rackmount (1U or 1/2U) way and get a PCI slot, but still no AGP.
My best bet (and the system that has worked the best for me): Find a case with 1 5.25 (CDROM), 1 3.5 (FLOPPY) and 1 internal 3.5 (HARD DRIVE), that has 3 or 4 bay slots in the back. Then get a good motherboard (I have an Amptron 805LMR, integrated sound and network, 1 AGP, 1 CMR, 2 PCI) with as much integrated as possible. Avoid integrated video, that can be messy at times. Also, on power supply: I have run this computer with a TNT2U, Duron 650, 2 7200RPM hard drives, 1 CD-R, and 192MB of ram, PLUS my power hungry video capture card (takes a LOT of juice), all on a 150W power supply. I was warned time and time again that this would not work, but I have had NO problems with power. The only issue is heat, and that is because I do not have a fan in the front of the case.
As for fast equipment for gaming, AMD CPUs ROCK (my duron 650 blows away my Celeron 800, even though the 800 is MUCH faster than its predicessors) and are cheap. Duron / TBird 900 should work great. 7200RPM hard drives are by far the best choice for gamers. I have tried Maxtor 20GB 7200 (dont recall model) drives and IBM 75GXP 45GB drives, and both work very well. The IBM is faster, IMPO. Video brings up the usual debate: Top of line (Geforce 3 /2) or budget (GF2MX or ATI Radeon). Go with what works for you. Sound is not an issue. My integrated sound card sounds just as good as my SBLive, minus the environmental audio.
The rest is up to you. Good luck!
You want a Happy Hacker Keyboard ... this thing is portable ! Two people at the month lan party I go to, use it, and do very well with it.
And you can't go wrong with a flat panel LCD if you can afford it. You may want to check your local computer fair and see if you can buy a refurbished one.
A large group of friends of mine have an informal gaming club. It's basically where one person's house is designated the "clubhouse", and everybody that plays regularly purchases an extra monitor, keyboard, and mouse to store permanently in that house. Then they bring a mini tower (which is pretty easy to lug around) on game days. Since a used monitor only costs like $80, you're talking $100 over-head.. That's NOTHING compared to the overhead of a laptop.
-Michael
-Michael
Essentially this 'Ask Slashdot' is looking for a beefed up x86 IMac.
This is freaking me out. I never thought anyone would come up with a PRACTICAL use for such a machine.
:)
How hard would it be to use one of those metal suitcases and fit it out to have a real desktop motherboard, a couple AGP/PCI cards, a flat screen monitor in the lid (with hopefully enough room for air-circulation), a power supply, a couple drives, etc? I mean, you could have a couple holes in the side for external ports/power cord/etc, and to leave, just unplug and close, and go.
The strength here is that you have all of the functionality (not to mention upgradeability) of a real computer with all of the mobility of an old 80s luggable PC.
This just a thought that I have been kicking around.
"Don't mind me cutting myself on Occam's Razor"
I do rather well with my Laptop, thank you very much. Maybe the one you've been playing on just isn't powerful enough.
Yes, the hard drives tend to be slow. A big enough laptop hard drive helps defeat some of this, and lots of memory always helps.
I'd rather SPEND more than CARRY more. Call me spoiled.
I can't wait to get ahold of a GeForce2Go based laptop.
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
Moderation Totals: Wrong=2, Stupid=3, Total=5.
That's my only concern with the GeForce2Go. If it supports RatioMetric, I'm sooooooooo there with my next laptop. If it does not, forget it.
BTW - The ATI doesn't seem to take a performance hit as the scaling appears to be done in hardware somewhere between the Video Chipset and the LCD, or perhaps in the LCD display it's self. If that's the case, I think there is probably no reason that NVidia based Laptops can't have this feature.
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
Moderation Totals: Wrong=2, Stupid=3, Total=5.
I paid $5000 several months ago. It doesn't bother me, but it might bother some people.
Dell now offers the 8000, which is some degree cheaper. It's not nearly as light as the 5000e, but in most respects it is a superior system minus the extreme compact nature of the 5000e.
It's easy to say that if I were buying the system today I would rather have the 8000, for $2000 less.
Incidently, you are very wrong. I have a Pentium III based desktop system graced with 256 megabytes of ram and a GeForce 2 GTS and I can honestly say from personal experience that my desktop doesn't game THAT MUCH better than my laptop.
Yes, there is a performance difference. And in some things you can REALLY tell. But no, it's not "half as fast" as you put it. I can EASILY say without a doubt that my Laptop was outperforming many desktops I saw present at Lanwar.
I speak as an owner of both. If my 5000e gets to the point where the latest, greatest game isn't going to play well, I'll buy a new laptop.
As for the question of my Laptop getting stolen, I've known of few items* turn up missing at Lanwars in general. Maybe it's the mentality of gamers that the only thing it's okay to steal is copyrighted material. Besides, at Lanwar 9, I think I was the only person out of 380+ that showed up with a Laptop. I looked for others, but didn't see any.
*(As I recall, someone's stuffed animal turned up missing at Lanwar 9. It was announced over the PA, but this doesn't mean it was stolen, it could have just been misplaced.)
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
Moderation Totals: Wrong=2, Stupid=3, Total=5.
Yup. A Notbook. A fully loaded Dell 5000e.
128 megabytes of ram (ready for the other 128 megs any day now...) 30 gig HD, 850mhz Pentium III, Rage Mobility 128, 1600x1200 15+ inch display with RatioMetric Scaling, a DVD, and a 3Com CardBus 10/100+56k double height dongle-free Nic/Modem.
I've found that for almost any game I want to play, this groovy little gig is light, powerful, and a whole lot less trouble than "dragging along my big leather suitcase and my garment bag and my tenor saxophone and my twelve-pound bowling ball and my lucky, lucky autographed glow-in-the-dark snorkel" (well, hey, at least THAT'S what it feels like to drag your whole computer to LANWAR.
Anyway, I normally get a lot of ooohs and aaahs from the people sitting next to me. Their first reactions are "You aren't seriously going to play on a Laptop are you?"
But by the time they see me pulling off acceptable frame-rates in Quake 3 they soon realize maybe it's not so bad for games after all. (Just bring along a good mouse, touch-pads blow for games.)
Incidently, it even plays Black And White fairly well, and of course it plays Diablo II like a dream.
One thing to note about portables that anybody looking to buy one should keep in mine is the RatioMetric Displays.
Some LCDs only look good in their native resolution, requiring lower screen sizes to be scaled up into a blocky mess or to be reduced down and not viewed fullscreen.
ATI's later offerings have used a method where somewhere between the video output and the LCD, any display that isn't full screen is blown up to fill the full LCD with a natural Anti-Aliasing effect. This form of "Mode Promotion" works really well for almost any display mode, though anything less than 640x480 does seem to suffer from a slight blurr, but who uses anything lower than that for games?
Anyway, the point of this message is that you shouldn't discount very high end Laptops as Lanparty material. Just get over the $5000 price tag of one with good performance and you'll be fine.
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
Moderation Totals: Wrong=2, Stupid=3, Total=5.
I've found that I don't really mind taking my tower case to lan parties, I have a small hand cart for that, it's the monitor that's the problem.
Even though I only have a 17" it's big, heavy and doesn't fit on the hand card. I should also say that I carry two shoulder bags, one with my keyboard/mouse/force commander/joystick and cables, the other one has my surround speakers and network cables/crimping tools/screw drivers. I can typically carry this in just one load but the monitor takes a second trip, it would be nice to have a flat screen monitor but there just out of a college student's price range.
A powerful laptop would be nice, but with limited upgrade and poor video peformance I'll stick with a full computer with lots of upgrade potential.
Because some people are either too lazy to do that, or others are putting in _'s after a url and then doing the usual login style obfuscation of the goatse.cx url, like below:
_ __ ____________________@goatse.cx
http://www.cnn.com_____________________:_______
Nicely hidden, while looking at mouseover like a legit url.
If I could only live my life with my threshold at 4...
Here may be just what you're looking for. It's a step by step guide to building a compact Athlon system, small enough that the entire system can be carried in a backpack. For the goatse.cx weary, the link is at http://myhome.netsgo.com/wesleycrushr/Hardware/gui 010405a-1.htm
Hope this helps.
-Jason
If I could only live my life with my threshold at 4...
They're hard to find, and it's nearly impossible to find a power supply that will run the bigger iron, but I would think that an mATX motherboard in a mATX case would do it for you.
Alternatively, just find the mATX motherboard, and hook it up open-air. Fun! This has the added benefit of keeping the machine running the latest hardware, as you replace components every 6 months due to failure anyway.
-=Best Viewed Using [INLINE]=-
I made something similar to what you want for an automation project. I got ahold of a half size SBC (Single Board Computer): http://www.aristaipc.com/image/h7200vl_h7200p-vl.h tml and fabricated a small plexi-glass enclosure around it. There are U-shaped PCI riser cards available that allowed me to stack a PCI Voodoo3 on top of it too. Complete with a an 20GB Laptop IDE HD and micro 180 watt PS, and a 1GHz Coppermine, the whole thing measures about 6x8x8".
--
Suddenly, I realized, everything had gone terribly wrong. - Hunter S. Thompson, Fear and Loathing in LV
With a Apple G4 Cube you'll get a agp slot, built in ethernet, dvd or cdrw all in eight inch cube. I doubt you will hack you self a smaller case than that.
I've been on the same quest for the last couple of months -- ever since I decided to fly to my clan's next big LAN party in Salt Lake City. I'm not taking a monitor, but I'm definitely taking my own computer. If I didn't, I'd end up spending hours reconfiguring somebody elses computer to match my normal setup.
I recently acquired the carcass to my Mom's old HP Pavilion 4455. It's bigger than I had hoped for, but it's smaller than my mini-tower game systems. The case has just enough room for a microATX board with 1 AGP, 2 PCI and 1 ISA slots. It has one 5.25" bay for the CDROM, a 3.5" bay for the floppy, and the hard drive bolts vertically to the front of the case. It also has a pathetic sound/modem board that I promptly discarded. I'm going to give it a test run with the original motherboard, a Celeron 500 and a GeForce2 GTS video card. If that's not good enough for Tribes 2, I'll dump that motherboard and buy a newer P3 capable MATX motherboard -- I'm pretty sure a standard MATX board will fit in the case. I'd rather do Athlon but I can't find an MATX Athlon board
I'd prefer to build my own LAN party system from scratch but I haven't been able to find empty cases this small anywhere. It seems like there's a niche market here that somebody could fill -- I've got a lot of friends that would also like to build or buy a small LAN party system without paying the premium for a laptop. I'm looking forward to the time when prices on LCD monitors come down -- those are perfect for LAN party systems, but they're still too expensive for most gamers.
It may not be perfect, but I think it could be helpful.
And the performance is awful. For a LAN party, you want a box with power, and it needs a 3d accelerator. You won't get that in a Compaq box (especially not in the SFF).
---GEEK CODE---
Ver: 3.12
GCS/S d- s++: a-- C++++ UBCL+++ P+ L++
W+++ PS+ Y+ R+ b+++ h+(++) r++ y+
Sounds like they've improved since I last saw them :) For most RTS games, they sound like they'd work fine. 3d games you'd probably need to run at 800x600, which is a tad low. I can definitely seeing having one as a dedicated server sitting in the corner of the room. Especailly with games like UT offering full web management of the server.
:)
The price though is where it turns me away from them. Besides, I like building my own boxes, seeing as how I've been doing it for 11 years
---GEEK CODE---
Ver: 3.12
GCS/S d- s++: a-- C++++ UBCL+++ P+ L++
W+++ PS+ Y+ R+ b+++ h+(++) r++ y+
I've had a Dell Inspiron 7500 with the 15.4" screen for nearly a year now. It works well for games too. Certainly, 2D style games in the native resolution (in this case 1280x1024) are crystal clear.
3D is a bit lacking though. The ATI 8Mb chipset (Rage mobility) isn't bad, but my much slower tower with a P-II 350 and original TNT is miles better in both frame rate and image quality.
Not to say it's not usable though - you'll probably have to use 640x480 to get a decent frame rate, and you'll need at least DirectX 7.
Also, the contrast of 3D images is not so good. It might be the TFT screen, as that affects such things anyhow, but I think the chipset doesn't do an amazing job (I tried it with a monitor too).
Other things to note about the laptop: the VGA out can be used as a second screen (Win98/Win2K) as well as just a replica of the primary display. That's nice. The laptop also works very well with Linux (sound and all).
-- Steve
---
/bin/fortune | slashdotsig.sh
A while ago my step Father built a system using an old brief case as the case to his Dual PII machine. Some glue and a drill were the main tools needed.. He had to be real careful about the size of the Cards he put in the machine, some of them were just too big... he even sawed part of one of the cards down to get it to fit. But in the end its a pretty nice setup... real convienent for carring around (like to LAN parties (: )
Mostly first-person shooters (which I don't like). But when we did a 1 weeks party for Baldur's Gate, that was cool. (I was home on Winter Break, and we set up a room in my house for the LAN party. We had four computers going round the clock, and people would come and go, create a character, and join the mayhem. People would even NPC their chars to take a nap.
I also like wargame LAN parties, but those are harder to come by.
I have seen girls at them... but it's rare.
Alex
From [H]: http://myhome.netsgo.com/wesleycrushr/Hardware/gui 010405a-1.htm
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It's OK to be social, just don't tell anyone about it.
http://myhome.netsgo.com/wesleycrushr/Hardware/gui 010405a-1.htm
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It's OK to be social, just don't tell anyone about it.
Not to mention that he said he did not wnat to carry his notebook around.
I'm the big fish in the big pond bitch.
I don't really have an answer for your question, but I would warn you about one thing. Trying to custom build a powerful system as small as possible, you will likely have trouble with the heat generated. I would suggest that you at least base your system on a pre-built model, so that you can be reasonably sure there are adequate heatsinks and cooling fans, and reasonable airflow through the case.
Except that PC/104 only has an ISA bus and PC/104+ has ISA and PCI busses - No AGP. And I've never seen a PC/104+ 3d video card either.
"Prefiero morir de pie que vivir siempre arrodillado!"
It appears that the Dell Optiplex GX150 SF does indeed have a 4XAGP slot, but it is 'low profile', and a single PCI slot, also low profile...
Excerpt from the Dell site:
Expansion Slots
One low-profile 4XAGP slot (2.5" h x 6.6" l)
One low-profile PCI slot (2.5" h x 6.6" l)
I guess that should fit the LEOTEC Geforce2 MX card mentioned in Wesley Woo-Duk Chung's article (for the compact Athlon system).
The visible screen was reduced to about 1/5 normal. Mind you I got all 80x25 characters, but they were TINY! In awe of this, I popped out the CD and booted back into Windows, opened a command prompt, hit CTRL-ENTER (turns it fullscreen) and got the exact same display. You can set this in the bios on the compaq laptops. If that doesn't work (but it does), you can allways run in svga textmode (which is cool anyway, because you can put much more characters on your display).
I used to have compaq laptops, but not anymore, because the components are very weak and break easily! My dvdplayer, internal nic and modem were broken within 2 months, shortly after that my harddrive started to make an annoying click sound (ibm travelstar 20gig harddrive btw) which compaq claimed was not broken. I sold the crappy machine shortly after this.
My next one will be a Dell as well btw.
Yes, the video card is lacking for most 3d games these days.. It would probably suffice for HL engine games, but for Q3, UT, Tribes, et cetra, you want something with more gusto.
It's a shame that it there is not a BookPC sized unit with at least a PCI slot.
However;
These make real Nice home-entertainment centers. I got one, slapped a DVD in it, 30GB HDD (fits my MP3 collection), painted the case Black, setup gIRder for IR remote control, and hooked it up to our exsisting Stereo unit..
Issa wery Nice!
----- The internet has given everyone the ability to have their voice heard equally as loud.. even if they shouldn't be
It needs to be an imac style PC, with PCI and AGP slots mounted in back, below the monitor tube, it could probably be hacked together, but sheilding the disks would be my question.
Read my plan to save the Bengals
If you want pre-built, check out Compaq's small form factor and slim desktop PC's. They aren't much larger than a laptop, weigh just a little more, but have a few slots for upgraded components (like video card) and are affordable.
m l
http://www.compaq.com/products/desktops/index.sht
sononomo@hotmail.com - Has seen the Factory Ass at Comdex
Get one of these
Same to you too.
Try playing Quake III on a PowerBook and then come back and see me...
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.
"I also wanted to know if these LAN thingies are mostly "sausage fests" or if women actually pretended to be impressed by virtual feats of destruction."
No way dude.. total babe fests. Hot chicks too.. all wearing "All your base belong to us" shirts. Those shirts turn me on.
-gerbik
You can go the expensive route and buy what is known as a "Luggable". It's just a compacted case, usually with built-in LCD, CRT, or Plasma. They are insanely expensive but it's pretty much exactly what you are looking for. Here is an example of what one looks like PC-ATX R9. Yes my friends this one does support dual processor motherboards. And a water-resistant keyboard. Expect this sort of deal to be used by field engineers and law enforcement.
If you want to go cheap then you get yourself a tiny ATX case. 1 or 2 5.25" bays is all. I can tuck one of these under my arms and my 15" monitor under the other and walk to a lan party in one trip. (up 3 flights of stairs too if I'm ambitious). Something like CaseAce GearGrip Pro. It lets you have a handle and shoulder strap for a standard case, plus pockets for keyboard and mouse. (I found this on Chick's Hardware)
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
What a waste of time!
--
Je t'aime Stéphanie
There are lunchbox sized computers, with an ATX style motherboard, and slots to add cards. There is a drop down keyboard on the front, with an LCD screen mounted behind of it. Something like that would have the power of a desktop, and still be somewhat portable. This site is one possible vendor. Check it out. BSI Computers
You could do something similar building your own. I would use an AGP riser card from out a 2U rackmount so I could have any video card I want.
Buy a laptop.
I have to agree here, this is what portable computers were made for. I am not sure why you object to carrying around a laptop as opposed to micro desktop PC. In the configuration you are looking at, the bulkiest part is going to be the monitor anyway. Buying a small integrated system like the BookPC is going to have all the same problems as a portable and weigh 3 times as much. The ATI Mobile Rage isn't a great chipset, but it kicks butt on the 810 chipset and the new Nvidia chipset promises to be better. The portable can also be used in many places a BookPC type system can not, like an airplane. Buy a laptop and get a decent external monitor, keyboard, mouse, joystick and some speakers (all of which you will need anyway), all your problems will be solved. The only set back is price, even a low end laptop costs a lot more than a BookPC.
Jesus died for sombodies sins, but not mine.
"Our products just aren't engineered for security,"
-Brian Valentine,VP in charge of MS Windows Development
Secondly, Why do you advocate buying all that extra stuff to supplement the laptop?!
I only advocate the extra stuff for the purpose his is intending to use it for, which is LAN parties. Where all this stuff matters, if all he was going to do was play solitaire, I'd say it was a waste.
go with a full tower case w/ better equipment
I am running on the assumption that he wants something easy to transport, he stated as much, I don't think a full tower case is what he had in mind. I suggested a laptop, not because it can replace a loaded desktop PC, but because it is portable. Most of the extremely small desktop PC systems use integrated sound and video, which are also crappy when compared to a Soundblaster Live and a GeForce II. So why shouldn't he buy himself some flexibilty. You can't play solitaire on an airplane with a full tower system.
Given a choice between a micro desktop integrated everything desktop and a laptop system, I take the laptop everytime.
Jesus died for sombodies sins, but not mine.
"Our products just aren't engineered for security,"
-Brian Valentine,VP in charge of MS Windows Development
BookPCs have a small form factor and everything is onboard. Most of them support Intel 300-800MHz Socket 370 CPUs, Using the integrated Intel 810 chipset with 3D AGP VGA embedded. Two SDRAM DIMM slots, but no expansion slots. Built in modem, LAN, joystick, and sound. Depending on which you get, you can grab one for less than $300.
Check out the article at the National Post. A Toronto based company called Mynix has a PC the size of a haldheld. Very cool, very portable! It's about 1" x 5" x 5 3/4", which is much smaller than a laptop and looks to have all the perks of a PC.
a small hovercraft...
DanH
Cav Pilot's Reference Page
Cav Pilot's Reference Page
UNIX - Not just for Vestal Virgins anymore
We just got a whole bunch (ie more than 100) of Compaq DeskPro ENs. AGP, Built in everything (sound is actually pretty good, intel everything, PC133, 10GB hd, yadda yadda) chuck a bungee cord on it and a flat screen you're goos to go... In fact I think I need one too.
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This
A word of warning about duct tape: The silver stuff is semi-metallic, so it probably wouldn't be the best bet for a custom-built computer. I know they say duct tape can fix anything, but that's just not entirely true. Hop down to your local Radio Shack or Fry's and buy an electronics case. Keep the power supply on the outside.
Nice and small, but plenty powerful, and extremely well-built -- of course you'd have to add a monitor...
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Politics is about making compromises. Religion isn't. --Michael Horton
Is it gaming day here at Slashdot or something? What is that, the 4th gaming related article, and it's barely midday?
It seems a lot of people are saying "Use a high-powered laptop", but the thing is, for what you'd pay for a tricked out Dell that would be capable of keeping up with a decent desktop, you could probably hire sherpa's to tote your desktop around for you.
My advice would be to stick with a desktop for gaming. Not only do they generally offer better performance overall (HD speed anyone?), but they're much easier to upgrade. A GeForce2 in a laptop might sound good now, but what about in a couple years, when Quake 4 or whatever wants a GeForce3, or you want to throw in a SBLive Titanium-Platnium-Gold-Silver-Bronze?
There's a lot of companies making specialized carrying straps for gaming rigs. Usually something like velcro straps with a handle on the top, perhaps some pockets for keyboard, mice, power cords, etc. Check out ThinkGeek, there's a couple listed there.
check out the case on page 70 built into an army ammo case:
t ml
http://www.virtualhideout.net/cool_case/page70.sh
Ooops. Sorry for the formatting error...
You'll also want to spring for a 15" LCD screen, I think.
Dell's GX150 SF can be seen here .
Compaq's EN SFF can be seen here.
Get a high-end multimedia laptop. A refurbished Dell Inspiron 7500 does me wonders. It's better than anything else I owned until two days ago... If you insist on "desktop components" (3.5" ATA100 drives at 7200 rpm, for example), then your box size is not limited by the motherboard -- instead, it'll be the power supply, hard-drive, and the cd-rom drive that'll dominate the form factor. You can try buying a small-form-factor computer like the Dell Optiplex GX150 SF, or a Compaq EN SFF. They pack the components about as tight as you can possibly get. The only drawback is the lack of an AGP slot (at least in the Compaq EN SFF that I just bought two days ago). But there's 3 (count 'em) PCI slots, and networking and sound's already built in! BTW, these SFF machines are QUIET! Much better than any low-cost homebrew's. (I could get just as quiet machines if I paid for quiet fans, and power supplies, but the end result costs just about the same as the branded machines... Oh well.)
I don't know where, but I saw a briefcase computer someone made by using a motherboard with built in network, and then using a pci riser card modified so the video card would lay flat, and power supply and all was on one side of the case (under plexiglass), then monitor was on the other side, made from a flat panel display, gloriously taken out of its packaging and carefully mounted in the suitcase.. then he just put ports for keyboard/mouse/gameport and everything else was builtin (speakers included).. makes for a nice setup I think ;)
Jay
"What's this script do? unzip ; touch ; finger ; mount ; gasp ; yes ; umount ; sleep Hint for the answer: not everyth
Goddamn, are they ever. I've seen custom systems like this before, but they were 2-3 times as large. It's a little on the expensive side, but, oh... the uses.
Weird. I actually agreed with someone. Guess I'm glad it's Friday.
http://www.advantech.com/products/PCM-9574.asp It has a socket370 PIII and a PCI slot, in a 5 1/4" Drive form factor. Enjoy
"Out the 100Base-T port, through the router, off the bridge, past the firewall..... Nothing but Net."
I'm not just blowing smoke, either. I have some fond memories of impromptu LAN parties playing Starcraft, Diablo2 and Counterstrike. Most of the people were playing on laptops (with a mouse attached, of course).
The keyboards are very cramped, though, and I really can't handle staring at a laptop screen for more then a couple hours at a time. But it is a much faster set up time (with the exception of the inevitable nimrod who doesn't know what his network settings should be).
psmylie's dictionary: Godzillion (noun) Any number large enough to destroy Tokyo
Cool idea, but only /.ers would use it.
You say things that offend me and I can deal with it. Can you?
LOL good signature..
Consider yourself blessed if you are sneezed on by a dragon and only get wet, it could have been a fireball.
...like an X-Box.
- I don't care if they globalize against free speech. All my best free thoughts are done in my head.
This thing is pretty nifty, and it has all the features that you listed... i think.
Looks pretty light-weight, and even has a built-in speaker...
http://www.eurocomla.com/lcd_sys.htm
Have you looked at this option? I know it is an i810E chipset, but if you can live with 640x480, it is the ultimate in portability. iBuyPower.com has them for sale, and a search on Google can find reviews for you. Might just be what you are after. LAN, sound, and everything is already included in a SMALL for factor.
--------- Never ask a geek why, unles you REALLY want to know.
The sub desktop standard put forth called Flex ATX is ideal for making a small fully powered desktop in a real small form factor. Englight (http://www.enlight.com.tw) has a flex atx offering as do numerous other manufacturers.
This would be an ideal roll your own type soultion.
How about a Apple G4 Cube, that could be exactly what you are looking for. You can get them with a NVIDIA Geforce2 MX.
Also get an Apple 15" Flat Panel display. That would be a lot easier to carry then a CRT Monitor.
You should check out Cell Computing's products. I am planning on doing a wearable project with their Plug N Run series when I have the money to spare. You will probably be more interested in their PnR Developement boards. Call for some price quotes and for their size I'll think you'll be surprised. Also Look around for the M1 and M2 viewers if you want to totally geek out.
I recently piced up a new toshiba laptop, and the suwoofer make a MASSIVE difference to the sound quality. The normal speakers a quite good, but the tiny little subwoofer really completes the sound. Mine's on got the 8 meg S3 card in it, but even with that it's very nice gaming rig for lan parties..
I'd have to agree with that. I have a Dell Inspiron 3800 with an ATI chipset and it's horrible. Wait until the nvidia laptop chips come out if you want to game on a laptop. ATI has serious problem with never fixing long standing problems with their drivers.
I'm sure you could get your hands on an old eMachines eOne. It's the one that caught the attention of Apple legal a few years ago. I'm not sure how propriatary the board is, but you might be able to get something in there.
There are plenty of Linux-compatible hardware to choose from. If you are going to be overclocking, I highly recommend Abit's KT7 and KT7A line of motherboards. They offer jumper- free multiplier and voltage adjustments and the board plays nice with Linux. Get any old soundcard that works and the best AGP card you can afford. A good list of Linux-compatible hardware can be found at the Linux Hardware Database:
http://www.linhardware.com
NVIDIA and Matrox have good Linux drivers. AMD Athlons and Durons are pretty affordabe. Agilent Articooler, Lian Li case. Go crazy and I'm sure you'll have an awesome gaming rig. Hope this helps.
-Leperflesh.
I am allowed to criticize you: you are not allowed to criticize me. Sorry, that's just how things are.
...for $499 (15"). That's what I paid for my 17" CRT 4 years ago. This may be the summer for flatscreens.
Get a "Moniputer" from Tiger Direct ($99), and find a LPX or NLX motherboard somewhere (pref. w/AGP) get the rest of your stuff (sound, NIC, etc...) and there you go. A self contained computer just a little bit bigger thn a 17" monitor. Here is the link to the Moniputer:
o ol s/item-details.asp?sku=u450-1000
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchT
Jaysyn
There is a war going on for your mind.
Do a Google search on "lunchbox PC". This will get you a carryable case designed to fit full-blown desktop internal components that has a built-in LCD screen and keyboard. You populate it with ordinary desktop motherboard, drives, cards, etc., pick it up and go. The card interfaces are on the side, so hook-up at the site is easy, and they usually come with a video driver setup that will work with the built-in screen or out to the monitor of your choice.
Okay. So you're going to spend $5000 for a nice laptop that will run half as fast as a real gaming machine, cost 4 times as much, and be 3 times as easy to STEAL?
i think this is worth a look http://www.arstechnica.com/reviews/2q00/espresso/e spresso-1.html
so is
http://www.wescomcomputer.com/portable/index.htm
they have some very applicable stuff
http://www.portable-computer.com/portable/portable .htm
this one is really cool
http://www.cesgroup.com/prism/n8/n8view.htm
it's possible and easier to build then people imagine..just noone has done it... i like the espresso though personally :)
Simple.
Take a "low profile" case. (Aopen.)
Put in the MS-6340M from Microstar (Its microATX, Integrated audio/video)
Add an Athlon
Add your memory
Add a 1/2 size NIC
Go with the PC104 or Single board PC idea - the embedded functionality is incredible. There are US vendors, but one of the best I know is "Inside Technology" You're looking at more than treble the price of a normal motherboard though. You could even make a Beowulf cluster that fitted in a shoe box though! Steve
C'mon! If the whole community bands together we co---
Oh wait, sorry. I thought that was today's theme on Slashdot.
How about getting a good quality lap top from Dell or another brand name with the new Nvidia or ATI mobile graphics chips and a good compatible sound card?
If you're interested in playing 3D games, laptops still might not be the way to go. I've got an ATI 3D accelerator in my laptop (Compaq Presario 17XL362), and the 3D performance is pretty poor (especially with some of the newer titles). I'm not sure how the nVidia GeForce2Go stacks up (I'd hope it's better), but it's certainly something where you want to try before you buy.
All that said, my laptop is great for 2D games(AoE, Fallout Tactics, etc), and it is a whole lot easier to haul around than my gaming machine.
-j
small mother boards: http://www.advantech.com/epc/products/index.asp?ca tegory_name=Single%20Board%20C
omputers
Be a big man. Bring all your stuff - my roomate and I used to go to LAN's all the time. We had 2 19" towers, a 21" and a 19" monitor, spare hubs/switches miles of cables, keyboards, mice, etc. etc. etc. Just make it worth your time - one year, we stretched our stretched our spring break by another week just staying at this guys house drinking and gaming. Make the LAN's last more than 48hrs and you'll not regret having toted all your stuff.
Having never been to one, I wonder what games are played. Half-Life, Quake, Unreal, I assume. Not Dr. Mario or Dig-Dug. I'm just curious.
I also wanted to know if these LAN thingies are mostly "sausage fests" or if women actually pretended to be impressed by virtual feats of destruction.
Check me out, ladies. I just rolled over this PacPan machine!
Ever hear of reading comprehension?
"I bring my lower powered notebook"
Please call 1-800-ABCDEFG right now.
If you want to know what is the best value for the money, look around at Hard|OCP and Anandtech. Every few months Anand's site does system price guides, putting together various systems on a budget. The latest price for a lower-budget gaming system was $1,045. This was in November, so you can get an even better system for that amount, or that same system even cheaper. (Price includes montitor, but not software).
There are some very interesting designs in there. I wonder if anything could be done with a Tiquit? I'm currently building a Tiquit into a Motorola pager enclosure. These little computers are very cool.
Obviously a little light on the horsepower, but you could build a Beowolf cluster that could fit in a briefcase... ;)
-WSAn operating system should be like a light switch... simple, effective, easy to use, and designed for everyone.
Not for nothin but if you could use an Imac case, they are fairly portable and have a monitor built in... You could probably find replacement pc parts or install ppc linux on it...
RRDEJAY
Why do birds suddenly appear, everynight when my cars clear...
Gone but not... ummm
If size is more of a concern than cost then a single board computer (SBC) is your best bet. PC/104 is ISA only so you don't find any lightning fast cpu's or graphics processors on them. PC/104-Plus will get you PCI at least. There are a few very small 3" x 5" SBC's that feature 1GHz Athalons along with AGP 3-D graphics accelerators, high performance chipsets like the SiS 630 and all the usual I/O's and drive controllers. Some vendors offer very compact enclosures for them as well.
Quidquid latine dictum sit altum viditur
My Dell Inspiron 8000 has...
15" UXGA 1600 x 1200
850 PIII ( now they offer 1 gightz)
256 mb ram (to 512)
32 mb ati
dvd (fixed drive)
zip (modular)
dolby digital sound
s-video
firewire
integrated 10/100 and 56k (pcmcia suk)
20 gig hd
monitor connector, port replicator, serial, usb...
Mine cost under $3000 US with SF/CA tax (way too much for tax---especially if they cant keep the electricity going).
So, if you need the high power laptop, this is a good one for under three grand. If you dont like the specs, or you want more, wait a few weeks---they'll get better. It's a bit on the heavy/ugly side, but it gets the job done.
Dolch have been doing "mil-spec" lunchbox PCs for well over a decade, and are still going strong. Just hand over your credit card, and don't look at the bill without a few shots of Jameson down yer...
(this is not a
Here's something I've been eyeing for a while that just may be the perfect solution to your problem- The Lunchbox PC.
Anyone remember how back in the old days (haha) a lot of consumer-level systems were single-piece units with detachable keyboards? Good old luggables, like the Kaypro II and the slightly more recent Compaq Portable 386 are still around, albeit substantially updated and, if you're willing to pay for them, loaded to the hilt.
BSI Computer makes an entire line of fairly impressive luggables, ranging from older, AT-based systems to dual processor P3-933 or single P4-1.5GHz machines. And for those AMD nuts (such as myself), they also offer Athlon machines.
Probably the best-suited LAN party machine I've seen is the N9 ATX, which allows for standard PCI and/or ISA expansion cards (depending on the motherboard you choose), 3.5" IDE or SCSI hard disks (they currently offer drives ranging up to 75GB). My only concern would be the LCD screen, though the 1024x768 max resolution should be good enough for all but the most demanding gamers, and 15.1" isn't more than an inch smaller than virtually every 17" monitor. Besides, the whole machine's still going to substantially outperform any laptop you can come up with, and it's fully upgradeable.
Could everyone bring a Playstation 2 instead?
you can make a very compact system using parts designed for rackmount servers. getting some of the connectors that allow pci/isa cards to be mounted sideways will make youre system thinner. if youve got the cash, or some sticky fingers get a case from a rackmount computer. hell buy a rackmount computer if you got the cash.
using a baby AT mainboard will reduce your space.
dont forget when you cram more heat generating components into a smaller space youre going to need more cooling power. dont skimp on fans.
if you have opposable thumbs you can also build yourself a custom case using sheet metal and a pop-riveter (ask at the hardware store, they are lovely tools)
if i were doing this id look into some small speakers. either some very small ones to tape into the case, or some of the ones that fit into a 5 1/2 drivebay.
when it somes down to it you end up with the big 3 of computers. you can have it fast/powerful, cheap, or small. pick 2 of those.
The PC/104 is built to be easily assembled. For your needs, I seriosly think this is the best way to go. You can then just bolt on a decent video card, bolt on a decent sound card.... well you get the idea. Don't be afraid of the PC/104 it is your friend ;)
The only other this is that it is damned expensive (at least a few hundred bucks for the base module). You may be better off getting a baby mobo and building it from there. To make it ultra small, use a mobo with integrated multimedia, otherwise it will be the size of a normal dektop case, except with a load of tape on it.
I would highly recommend it to almost anyone. Quake 3 RUNS on this!! I mostly play Diablo 2 myself, but I have had no problems with it. The only downside that I have seen with it is the fact that there is no current way to run a game full screen with a resolution less then 1024x768 as this is the native pixil size for the screen. Anything smaller only uses the number of pixils specified (centered of course). So it sucks in the sense that it does not scale the pixil size up yet. Hopefully someone ...hint...hint... NVIDIA ...wink...wink... will work on a driver fix for this.
I have a bookpc, they're absolutely great for travelling, but I'm want to know where the boards with 32mb integrated tnt2 chips are / do they exist?
PCWare [www.pcware.com] makes small-sized ATX motherboards. Their 805LMR motherboards feature onboard NIC, sound, and modem. They're relatively cheap, and pretty reliable. The 805 will take an AMD Duron or Thunderbird processor, and has an AGP slot. You could grab a small desktop case and slap one of these in it.
"I am a man, and men are
animals who tell stories."
"The meek shall inherit the earth, the rest of us shall go to the stars." Isaac Asimov
For the unenlightend,
"dragging along my big leather suitcase and my garment bag and my tenor saxophone and my twelve-pound bowling ball and my lucky, lucky autographed glow-in-the-dark snorkel"
is a line from Weird Al Yankovic's 12 minute epic, "Albequerque".
Other amusing lines:
"My mother stared at me as a cow stares at an oncoming train."
"Whe said to me, "hey, you have weasels on your face."
"Hey! You ca't have that, that snorkel's been just like a snorkel to me."
Homer, that's not God, it's just a waffle Bart stuck to the ceiling
I know I shouldn't eat thee
Comments should be like skirts. Short enough to keep your attention, but long enough to cover the subject
The called it Workbook and the Name is Programm!
750 P3, 512 MB RAM, 32gig HD, Celsius GM3 GFX Module (Card) (ATI GFX-CPU)- 16 MB of additional frame buffer and Texture ram and JUST PLAIN ROX with OpenGL.
Detachable Keyboard, DVD, 15" High End TFT Screen, etc, etc...
They built this thing for 3D Designers on a Trainride. Fastest Notebook out there.
It's yours for, you sitting?, 7500$. You won't get smaller and faster than that.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
Not to mention that wearing a computer is not the best way to get laid, anyway.
"Dear, it's not toy, it's a very expensuve and high tech digital assistant...now go away, i'm playing Ms Pacman on MAME."
Hey freaks: now you're ju
Well there are smaller m-atx cases.
One that is reviewed by anand is.
7.5"x14"x12.6
Enlight EN-7308 microATX Mini Tower
It has AMD aproved power supply for upto 1Ghz or similar...
If I was consider a movable computer for lan partyes. This could be the case, unless there is real desire to make one by my self.
NLX and desktop mATX cases could do well too depending on what form of case you could move best. My recommendation is to surf couple of manufacturers pages and pick the best for your needs.
You can find both MB:s for both duron and Celeron in mATX form factor.
The reason not to ATX is that those last inches actually determine if it can be fit inside the back-back. The two smallest values are critical for getting it fit inside the back-back. I measured that this case would just nicely fit in mine while it couldn't be inch larger in two smallest directions. The largest dimension... Well There is extra space in top of back, I think that could be used well too. Now the back could be considered large but not huge.It would still lack space of putting normal keyboard there.
(But there are smaller ones that could fit.) Extra space could be used by mouse and (speakers or headphones) and game CD:s.
Now with mATX I could fit EVERYTHING except monitor to my back. Now I have hands free just for the monitor.
---disclaimer---
This is purely hypothetical, it assumes that the place I live would not be a large LAN party itself....
Emacs is good operating system, but it has one flaw: Its text editor could be better.
Page 103
Above are two more links to pages with similar 'suitcase' mods, as VH refers to them. Hope this gives you some ideas on what's possible using a suitcase/briefcase!
I fail to understand your logic. First of all, laptops were created for frequent flier business users who can't cart a ton of computer stuff around, not for the gaming crowd. Secondly, Why do you advocate buying all that extra stuff to supplement the laptop?! It would cost about $1000 less to just buy all that stuff, skip the laptop, and go with a full tower case w/ better equipment!
Check out the Virtual Hideout Cool Case gallery. I've linked to a page that has some pretty good internal pics of a case that someone built as a 'LAN party case' out of one of those metallic briefcases (look at the bottom of the page). There's quite a few more pics of similar mods people have done to accomadate LAN gaming, if you have time to look through the 1000+ pics they have in the gallery.
http://www.compaqfactoryoutlet.com has some pretty decent machines for under $1,500. And you even get a 15" LCD monitor thown in to boot (i.e. the screen, for the sarcasm impaired).
Not necessarily.
With a high-speed wireless link to the Internet, he live-cam's his video back to his server, and anyone who attacks him can be sent to jail leisurely.
I am for the complete Trantorization of Earth.
...you're better off buying a good second monitor and boxing and shipping it days ahead to your friend's house.
You can eat up a lot of shipments of a brighter, clearer picture for the price of one $2800 flatscreen.
As long as the lan parties aren't last-minute, you have plenty of lead time. You don't even have to unpack the monitor at home. Just call for an evening pickup and do ground, 2nd day, or overnight as the case is required.
I am for the complete Trantorization of Earth.
I've searched the web for NLX, NPX, micorATX. They all have crappy intergrated Video and Sound.
One thing I did learn is that there is such a thing as Low Profile PCI and supposedly AGP cards. These are simply shorter cards.
- Wish List
- FlexATX / Micro ATX with integrated 10/100 Ethernet. 1 AGP, 2PCI.
- Case that looks like a DVD player / VCR including an LCD panel that I can put dumb little messages on and display the time if I ever write a Linux driver for it. Case will have a 5.25 slot for a CD/DVD of some kind (I wish DVD RAM was up to snuff although I've heard of DVD/CDRW combos). AND a shallow 5.25 faceplate slot (where I can put the SBLive Platinum Faceplate with the IR PORT!)
- Low profile AGP GeForce2 with DVI and HDTV out. (VGA & NTSC would be nice but this is a low profile card and I want a portable LCD and HDTV hookups.)
- Low profile SBLive 5.1 Platinum.
- Low Profile MPEG2 decoder/encoder.
- 4 USB ports ON THE FRONT!
- USB gamepads comparable to PS2 DualShock (Xbox gamepads?)
This puppy would look like a DVD player with Sound outputs on the front and gameports. It might even look like the PS2. Although I think having a super slim version of Linux running 24/7 and breifly waking the CPU from hibernation to display the time on the LCD would be cool.Of course I'd have to figure out how to do "Instant On Linux". Might even mirror the Indrema software into this badboy, especially if we found a low-profile GeForce3 instead.
CRUD! Need 3 PCI slots for the TV input so this can double as a TiVo. Oh well, that's the way pie in the sky dreams go. I guess I'll just have to buy an Xbox and figure out how to dual boot with the Indrema Linux.
---- Smokin' another sig.
this way you can easily seperate the psu (the one at the bottom) from the rest of the comp (plus some seperate boxes for ide stuff too)
maybe this is a solution for the future... :]
There is another compact standard called EBX that has higher computing power, such as those at Versalogic.
We use some of these at work as terminals. Nice and compact. I doubt that any of the models available would work for a serious gaming machine, but they may be a good to contact for a case and parts. They use a floppy that is shorter than normal size to help keep the case so small. Liberty Computers
My objection to Laptops that I would hope to solve with a "medium-small desktop" is quality and price. I consider laptops to generally contain inferior quality components yet cost more. Before someone jumps in about "inferior quality", let me explain: the keyboard on a laptop is crap to use compared to US$ 15 101-key, and you can't replace it after its done its 6 months of hard use and become a little tetchy. And have you ever seen a pointing device on a laptop you could actually play Starcraft* or Diablo II with and not get 1) toasted or 2) massive hand-strain? If so, do you have the choice to include that exact pointing device on any new laptop you want? Most vexxing is that for all the inferiority-of-use and non-replaceability and lack of choice in components like this, laptops cost a mint! And it doesn't get any better to say "well, it comes with USB ports, so you can use any peripherals you want", because that would basically be a (incredibly overpriced) mid-sized desktop. I'm seriously thinking about the Nano-II: http://www.linux-works.com/html/nano_ii.html. The only thing it lacks is a real video card (which sucks for gaming, I know. :(
is called NLX. Dell (and probably others) use them a lot (Dell uses them namely in their OptiPlex line).
NLX rocks. You'll have to get a riser card, but you'll never go back to ATX. =)
I have an NLX machine with integrated video sitting under my couch, which is about 8 feet in front of my tv. I have a video card in the machine that can use a TV for output. I put the TV in front of the couch, run all the cabling underneath the carpet, and my 'cable box' stays under the couch. Footstamp is about 14"d x 12"w 3.5"h (i'm guessing. i'm at work, the machine is at home, and it has been under the couch for a few months).
Thanks to a good internet connection, I can stream stuff and watch it on the TV, through the boxen.
A few weeks ago, there was a discussion on that douche-bag giving out free-ads for his own company...I mean, about using ethernet to hook up fibre channel drives. I have a few of those drives and the QLA2100 hooked up to the same machine (the NLX slot riser gives me 2 PCI slots in this case) and I keep all my MP3s on there, except I don't use that pussy ethernet to do it...I use HSSDC as it's intended [thanks Sandin!] (sorry, but 100Mbit is too slow for me ). Since those drives are so damn cheap though, I may get some more and figure out a way to rip DVDs onto a drive and watch them from there. =)
I use W2k Pro on it, just because I didn't want to spend much time mucking with the DVD business with nixen and the video card. I'm sure that someone could get it to work though.
Laptops are MUCH slower than their desktop counterparts and unacceptable for any modern LAN gaming. The new Geforce MX at least makes it POSSIBLE to use a laptop for hardcore gaming, but the major limiting factor is going to be the screen. Laptop screens are small, and LCD screens have a tendency to blur at high framerates/fast motion usage, making them totally unacceptable for any kind of serious gaming. In addition, laptop keyboards tend to be a bit cramped, so you would need to bring an external keyboard and mouse to maintain accurate control.
Laptop hard drives are notoriously slow, and the poster specifically asked for a fast IDE drive.
Slashdot: Open Source, Closed Minds.
I have a nice TuxTop that is PIII 850 16meg video 256meg RAM that I use for gaming. I think lugging a monitor around is what is going to weigh you down.
Modest doubt is called the beacon of the wise - William Shakespeare
... a shitty waste of time as opposed to sitting around slashdot spouting off your fat head?
It is pitch dark. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
A mate of mine has created what you are looking for. Check out his website on it at http://www.awoot.com/portapc/portapc3.html
Take a look at this!!
I paid 950$ for one of those with a 800Mhz PIII with 256Mo of ram!
I used it for a server appliance but it would d a nice gaming box.
Through the mud and the blood into the green field beyond...
--
Aughaaaaaaa Hamburger.
Good, Bad. I'm the guy with the gun. -Ash
Oh, just get hit by a truck, break your spine, get a neat wheelchair with a powerful motor and a large carrying capacity, and load yourself up with a regular PC. You don't have to carry it. Just make sure you outfit it with that straw controlled mouse!
------ 1001001
I've been trying to make a similar rig, but for the purpose of recording a dv stream though firewire in realtime. Laptops aren't really up to the task yet, and since I've got to take it on location to record the video it's got to be as portable as possible. This is what I've found so far as being the smallest full powered system: ASUS P4T-M MicroATX motherboard: http://www.asus.com/products/motherboard/pentium4/ p4t-m/spec.html
As an option, you can get built in Ethernet, 1394, and audio.
Combine this with this 1U powersupply from PCPowerCooling:
http://www.pcpowercooling.com/products/power_suppl ies/highperformance/turbocools/index_hp_1u.htm
Add a right angle AGP adapter for your GForce3 or other card:
http://www.catalyst-ent.com/Products/Adapters/agpr t/agprt.htm
Build your own clear acrylic case and your set.
This system would measure not much bigger than 9x9x4 or so inches, with no performance sacrifices!
What do you think?
-Gplex