Any computer gaming geeks in here?

[OmniGLH]

Looking for some advice on upgrading my PC to play some new games, could use some advice.  

Since I'm not going to be doing any REAL racing this year (or for the next 2-3 years), I'll have to settle for racing of the online variety (I'm way too competitive to not do ANY kind of racing at all.)

Since there really aren't any good cycle games (aside from MotoGP2), I'll mostly be playing driving games.  GT4 on the PS2 is great and all, but it's not the most realistic game out there and the AI sucks.

Mainly - I want to be able to play Live for Speed, rFactor, and GTR at full detail with a good frame rate (~40+fps), good resolution, and a good amount of cars on the track.

Right now, my 800MHz P3 box with 768mb ram and GF3 Ti200 card can't play these games at more than 8-9fps with NO cars on the track at 800x600 with all the detail shut off.  My 1.5GHz laptop is better, running at ~40fps if I've got it on 800x600, low detail, with 8-10 AI cars running around.

I've had 2-3 people suggest to me that all I need on my 800MHz P3 is a new video card.  If somebody else here agrees with that, then I'll try it... but I'm having a hard time accepting the idea that a $200 video card in my 4-year-old PC will make the difference between 8fps at no detail, and 40fps at full.

I'm willing to swap out the motherboard, processor, ram, and video card... hopefully for not too much $.  Got any suggestions?

[spyderchick]

I'd build a new box if i were you. Research what kind of configuration will work best for your games. The more RAM the better, and watch the front side bus on the processor. Get a decent video card, but you don't need a $600 card. Probably $200-250 should do it. Good Luck.

[ew422]

ATI Radeon 9800 Pro.  Under $200 anywhere.  Performs great on NR2003, GPL,  F1C etc. for me.  But a good processor and lots of RAM are just as important.

[Gixxerblade]

Upgrade! You may spend around $6-$700 for a homebuilt computer. I suggest that because you don't have to deal with customer support from India.  :-[ Goto www.pricewatch.com for your computer needs. I personally am a gaming geek BIG TIME!!! I play almost every night for about 3 hours. What I have is an AMD2800, MSI Motherboard, 1 gig DDR 2100 RAM, ATI 9700 PRO, Sound Blaster Audigy 2, 200 GB HD and I spent around $600 including the case and 400 WATT power supply. I kept the floppy, CD Burner and CD-Rom from my old computer. Think about it. $600. You will spend that in a weekend racing. Not to shabby!  :P

[spyderchick]

AMD baby...all the way!

Or...you could just spend a gazillion dollars for an Alienware system. Nah...building your own box is really a lot of fun.

[OmniGLH]

Based on what I've read today (I'm such a slacker sometimes..) it seems the AMD chipset is the way to go.  I'm planning to reuse my old case (generic ATX tower), power supply (it's only a month old, Antec 350W), HD (7200rpm 250mb), and DVD burner.  So I'm really only going to upgrade the mobo, proc, ram, and video card.  Hopefully just upgrading those parts will keep me WELL under the $600 you spent.

A few folks now from another board I'm on have sworn a new video card will make a noticeable improvement (I currently have a GeForce3 Ti200 with 64mb).  So I figure I'll try that first and see what happens.  Worst case I carry the card over to my new system.

$600 one race weekend?  I haven't had a weekend that cheap in a good 2 years.  I miss the old days when I was slow enough to make a set of tires last 2 weekends  :(  

[GSXR RACER MIKE]

     Though I'm certainly not a guru on the subject I too was in a similar situation last year. I was playing some games like Mech Warrior 4 Mercenaries and the video would lock up on me during scenes with moderate amounts of A/I being generated (numerous active characters battling on screen at once).

     My system isn't anything crazy, it's an AMD 2600 (1200mhz) with 512 RAM, 60GB 5k rpm HD, and an ATI Radeon 9800 PRO video card. I originally only had 256 RAM with my old video card and was told that it would help alot to double it, it did help, but only a little. I then thought it had to be the video card so I jumped up to the 9800 PRO and that made a big difference. It still will occasionally lock up during heavy A/I scenes but in general it runs much more flawlessly.

     Since then I have considered a faster hard drive and doubling the RAM again, but I was advised against this individually by several computer techs at different places. They seemed to agree that the major problem is most likely my 'front side bus speed' which is slow by comparison to what is out there now. That would require a M/B change and I am on the fence if I should jump up to the AMD 64 bit processor (since 64 bit is what most new systems will be based on very soon). The upper 32 bit systems with a faster front side bus will run the current stuff, but I have read that some of the games out on the ever approaching horizon will be even more demanding than the 32 bit based systems are capable of. The 32 bit systems are pretty much maxed out now and won't see any real improvement in speed from where the best ones are at now. Also to consider is that as the 64 bit systems gain main stream popularity the options for what you can get for the 32 bit systems will decrease. This is all based on what I have read in magazines and from what several tech's have told me. :)

[spyderchick]

Exactly Mike, that's what I had in my post. FSB on the processor is key in getting games to run smoothly. A video card can only do so much. When programs are graphics intensive, the entire package works as a team. This isn't a big deal when running office programs, but gaming takes a toll on the system. It's also good to make sure you put adequate cooling in the box as well. Fans are cheap insurance.

[speedster_1]

This aint a racing game but I just saw some clips from Battlefield 2 coming out in June I think...It looke really sweet.  Like battlefied 1942 but Modern day warfare.

[SliderPhoto]

Jim, think of the video card as a separate computer, it has its own processor and memory. More memory is good if the program takes use of it.  Basicaly if you think of it as caching frames in memory on the card, so when it swaps frames and other graphic algorithms the data is there on the card, it doesn't have to go through the main bus and request/transfer, swap out, etc. So a good video card can make a big difference. Now if your main board, it still slow, CPU, bus speed, memory speed, the data is bottlenecked there.

If you build your own, buy a good card and give that a try--as long as you have the latest and greatest bus type. If that doesn't do it for you, you can move the card to a new main board.

My $.02

[OmniGLH]

OK.  There seems to be a general consensus that a video card might make a pretty good difference, so I picked up a nVidia 6600GT card on lunch today.  I would've gone ATI but from what I've read, the 6600 is the better way to go in the $200 bracket (the ATI X800 is better but it's $100 more.)  I'll give it a whirl when I get home.

Things sure have come a long way since the day of CGA, EGA and VGA  ;)  The last time I really knew what was "hot" in computer graphics was when I got a new 486 with a "hi-color" graphics card (which was shortly outdated by the "true-color" cards...)

[spyderchick]

Yeah, and while 64bit processors are here, just wait until 64bit programs and OSs hit the market with regularity. I'm sure we'll all a little upgrading to do. Good luck!