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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?"
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.
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.
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!
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.
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.
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?)
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 find this hard to believe. The only explanation could be tweakability. I've used OEM systems (and Dells) and never found them to be lacking from the ones I build myself. I also only use the highest quality parts in my own systems.
:)
And actually, I have a GeForce 400mhz system at home and I work with Dell 700mhz Celerons with Ati 4meg graphics cards. The Dell actually beats my system in a few cases. Of course not in all, but it does in some.
My guess is he got a bad system or you tweaked the hell out of yours. Plus you DO have an ultra version of the card. That is a huge plus when it comes to 3d benchmarks.
And aside from *all* of that, the original poster wanted a machine he could carry with him. The Inspiron 8000 series is, flat out, a powerhouse. Up to 1ghz processor, up to 512megs ram, up to 32meg graphics card (Ati Rage == good, GeForce == better and coming soon), with DVD and CDRW. I was pricing them just last night and came up with a slightly reduced version of what I just said for around $2400. Not bad, and my current dell laptop rules my world except for the graphics card
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 :(.
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?
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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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
-This sig intentionally left blank
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
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.
PIII 800MHZ, Geforce 2 go card 128MB ram , subwoofer (i'll believe it when i hear it) DVD/CDR firewire port, 2 usb
2799
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
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.
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...
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".
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Suddenly, I realized, everything had gone terribly wrong. - Hunter S. Thompson, Fear and Loathing in LV
BTW: this laptop was reviewed in the last Computer Gaming World, and the staff there had a very high opinion of it as a gaming machine. The first gaming laptop worthy of a gamers notice was how I think they put it.
So grab a copy of last months CGW if you can still find it.
LibBT: BitTorrent for C - small - fast - clean (Now Versio
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/bin/fortune | slashdotsig.sh
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
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.
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!"
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
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
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
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.
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.)
...like an X-Box.
- I don't care if they globalize against free speech. All my best free thoughts are done in my head.
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.
That, of course, will be the topic of next week's Ask Slashdot: "How can I build a smaller monitor? I've heard I can get a nasty shock even when it's unplugged. What parts should I avoid touching?"
Seriously, it's easier to carry one bulky monitor and one small case (even if it's still separate trips) than it is to carry one bulky monitor and one large case, especially if you're dragging them somewhere like a 3rd floor apartment.
Hell, maybe his friend even has some extra monitors lying around. A cheap monitor is still significantly cheaper than a "cheap" PC with enough oomph to keep up with contemporary FPSes.
-Leperflesh.
I am allowed to criticize you: you are not allowed to criticize me. Sorry, that's just how things are.
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!
I love the smell of Karma in the morning
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.
...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.
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.