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The Best Gaming PC Money Can Buy

SlappingOysters writes "Gameplayer has gone live with their best PC hardware configurations for Q1 2009. They've broken it into three tiers depending on the investor's budget. And while the prices are regional, it is comparative across the globe. The site has also detailed the 10 Hottest PC Games of 2009 to unveil the software on the horizon which may seduce gamers into an upgrade."

6 of 360 comments (clear)

  1. Re:The thing about these machines is by rodrigoandrade · · Score: 3, Interesting

    You mean the original Crysis, not Warhead, as the newer game was optimized to run on lesser hardware.

    I know because I have both running on a Core 2 Quad Q9550 with 2 GB of 1333 MHz DDR3 and a Geforce 9800GT. Warhead runs smoother on higher settings.

  2. Re:The thing about these machines is by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Your eyes can only pickup 80fps anyway; you wouldn't know if it was 100 or 10,000 fps unless the fps counter didn't say.

    It doesn't matter what your eyes can see. It's about responsiveness. Faster rendering makes the game more responsive. See, we live in an analog world which has essentially infinite FPS. The closer a game gets to that then the better it feels because it will respond at the exact microsecond you do something. It does make a very real difference.

    Now granted many people don't care otherwise there wouldn't be people like you that think "80 FPS is enough for anyone." Gunny how that number keeps creeping upwards. First it was 24 FPS (because that was all the eye could see), then 30, then 60, now you're saying 80. LOL

  3. What games don't run in 64-bit Windows? by Sycraft-fu · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Seriously, I'm honestly curious. I'm a huge PC gamer and I run Vista 64-bit. All 32-bit Windows apps, which accounts for most games made in the last 10 years or so, seem to run great natively. For older DOS games, well those don't run well in 32-bit Windows. You get no sound, video problems, etc. The NTVDM isn't really good fro games. So what you do is fire up DOSBox, which runs them great. However that runs just as well in 64-bit as it does in 32-bit.

    Thus far, I don't see any gaming problems with a 64-bit OS. So if you know of some, I'd be interested in what they are.

  4. Re:Why best gaming machine? by Xest · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Anyone who spends that kind of money on hardware to play last gen games is a fool.

    Plenty of current and next gen games when they arrive utilise 4 cores, it seems to make sense if you're spending money on a PC like that for it to be able to still play the games of tommorrow than to play the games of yesterday that can be run perfectly well even if using only 1 of 4 cores anyway.

    To create an example to make this point clear:

    Game A is out now
    - it can be run on a single core higher clock speed CPU at 150fps
    - or a lower clock speed quad core CPU utilising only one of them at 140fps

    The difference will be narrow (or may not even exist in fact) because the OS still utilises multiple cores to ensure the game has a core to itself whilst single core has to share the core with the OS and background processes so even if the game doesn't use 4 cores, the OS does. Then onto the next scenario, a new game:

    Game B comes out in a month
    - it can be run on a single core higher clock speed CPU at 20fps due to not supporting the latest SIMD extensions etc.
    - or it can be run on a quad core CPU utilising all cores, with the latest SIMD extensions and such at 200fps

    So tell me, if you're laying down this kind of cash for a PC that you'll probably want to last for a while, what makes the most sense to go for?

    Only a fool uses the "quad core is pointless, existing games don't use them all" argument when spending the amount of cash required for a high end gaming PC.

  5. Re:The thing about these machines is by wgaryhas · · Score: 4, Interesting

    depending on the monitor's refresh rate, 80 fps may be the best a monitor can do: 8 ms response time = 125 fps 12 ms = 83 fps 16 ms = 63 fps And many monitors have response times of 12 ms or more. So if you aren't paying attention, you could build a system that updates faster than the monitor can display.

    --
    "For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong." - H.L. Mencken
  6. Re:What a crock... by Shadow+of+Eternity · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Alan Wake
    Bioshock
    Company of Heroes
    Crysis
    Far Cry 2
    Hellgate: London
    Lost Planet
    Microsft Flight Sim X
    Rainbow Six Vegas
    Source Engine
    Splinter Cell Double Agent
    STALKER
    Stranglehold
    Supreme Commander
    Unreal Engine 3
    Half-life2: Orange box engine games/mods

    Nowadays you've basically got a choice between a 3.4ghz quadcore and a 3.4-3.8ghz dualcore (4ghz is still a little out of range for the average overclocker). I'd rather have another 2 cores and a slower clockspeed than a slight boost in clockspeed. Then again maybe that's because I'm not an idiot that relies on the false logic that just because it's not immediately the absolute best thing out there that it won't be very useful to have for the next few years.

    --
    A bullet may have your name on it but splash damage is addressed "To whom it may concern."