What's most important?

[Legion Kreinak]

Very nice reply man, thanks a bunch!

What's the difference between GT/GTX/GS? What's the big difference between the 6800 and 7800?

I wish DeLLs let me choose an nVidia. Why would they stick me with an SE? Uch, it's so frustrating.

If I build my own computer, I wouldn't have any kind've warranty like DeLL would give me. Plus, I don't know how to figure out if stuff is compatible. I have no idea how to pick a motherboard - nothing.

 

[Legion Kreinak]

This really confuses me, guys:

$401 - geforce 6800 ultra 256mb pci express
$199 - geforce 6800 le 128mb
$253 - geforce 6800 gt pci express 256mb
$282 - geforce 6800 gt oc 256mb
$203 - geforce 6800 gt oc
$170 - geforce 6800 ge 256mb
$347 - geforce 6800 agp 256mb
$199 - geforce 6800 agp 128mb
$170 - geforce 6800 256mb pci express

Those are all the 6800's from www.pricewatch.com

OC means overclocked, right? There's no reason to buy a card OCed, is there?

AGP? What's that?

Ulta, le and gt?

Sorry for all the questions - this is just making my head hurt, but I wanna learn.

 

[Jamxx]

Hah, it's okay, we're here to help. And learn ourselves!

AGP is basically another input like PCI-Express. It runs at 8x, while PCI-Express runs at 16x. It is just a downgraded version of PCI-Express (and older). Cards using AGP will only use AGP inputs and cards using PCI-Express will only use PCI-Express inputs (there are exceptions such as AGP-Express but don't worry about that right now).

I'm guessing "OC" means overclocked but I can't be sure unless I see the specifications for the thing. And there is a point to buying overclocked cards, because they're still under warranty when they're overclocked! That means that you could send it back if it heats up too much and shuts down (when overclocked) as opposed to if you did that with a non-overclocked version of the card they wouldn't help you with it since overclocking usually voids warranties.

LE is basically Nvidia's SE, don't get that.

GT is their midrange, whilst Ultra is their top of the line of the same card. Ultra has higher clock speeds and more memory, usually. Sometimes the memory between the GT and Ultra is the same, though. Just check the specifications.

Keep this in mind: Don't get an AGP card now. Stick to 256 megabytes of memory on the card, it'll help a bunch (memory on video cards is not upgradeable to the best of my knowledge). Don't get "LE" or "SE" versions of cards. They are much worse than their non-LE or non-SE counterparts.

One more thing I should mention is that sometimes "OC"'d cards and standard cards have the same clock speeds; the companies can choose to put OC on their cards even though they run at the same speeds as the other companies' cards because they can just say that their version of the regular card runs at a slower clock speed.

Hope all of that's understandable and hope it helps.

 

[Legion Kreinak]

I'm very pleased with these forums. Since joining them, I feel I've learned a lot. I plan to keep asking questions, so thanks for all the help.

I hear ya' on companies claiming their stuff is OCed, even when it's not.

You know what's frustrating about computer stuff? You wait for prices to drop and then, all of a sudden, the newest thing sounds awesome! There's gotta be a point where upgrading isn't going to do much good - I mean, how much better can it get each time they make a jump?

What does memory do? What about clock speed? I wanna try to understand all the details of this stuff. Right now I feel unable to stand on my own two feet.

 

[Legion Kreinak]

What annoys me is, I like most of what DeLL offers, aside from the video card. From what I grasp, the SE's suck, and I should try and get something better. They only offer higher end stuff on their XPS systems. I'm going for an E510.

Compared to what I have now, the new DeLL I had discussed getting in another thread would have: 3x processing speed, 4x HDD capacity, 8x video card memory, 8x RAM.

CPU: 933 MHz vs. 3.0 GHz
HDD: 40 GB vs. 160 GB
Vid C.: 32 mb nvidia geforce 2 vs. ATI Radeon 256 mb X600 SE
RAM: 128 MB DDR SDRAM vs. 1 GB DDR2 SDRAM

Looking at it like that makes me think I'm complicating things too much - clearly the system DeLL is offering (despite the drawback of the video card) is well worth it, no?

 

[Jamxx]

Yes, it is worth it. I didn't mean for you to get the idea that it wasn't.

The more video memory in a video card, the faster it'll run games. Well, the more information it can hold in a given moment so it can process things faster by storing more information in a given moment... if that makes sense.

The higher the clock speeds are, the faster the card'll run. Clock speeds are like speeds for a car; the higher the top speed is, the faster it'll go!

I'm not really an expert on video cards and how they work (well... come to think of it I'm not really an expert on anything computer related...) but I'm trying my best to explain what I know...

Here's the choice it really all boils down to. If you want to be able to play games, you're not going to want that X600 SE in your system very long. You could buy the Dell, then upgrade the video card right off the bat to something that suits you better. That's option one.

And I still keep coming back to this thought: build your own system! You can get exactly what you want and then learn how everything is constructed and know how to troubleshoot your own computer. Trust me, it really isn't as hard as it looks! When I first got my Asus motherboard, I dreaded opening the instruction manual figuring they'd surely forgotten to throw English into the languages it had. Actually, the manual was very helpful and well-written, which I was pleasantly surprised with. It had quite a good amount of information as well as troubleshooting options.

Here's another quick thought. If you buy the Dell, you'll still be able to use your other system. If you build your own computer, you can use the old drives you had in your other computer instead of buying new ones (unless you want to upgrade that too). If you wanted, you could just keep your 40 GB hard drive instead of getting a new one to save money. Now, keep in mind, though, when you undergo a change in motherboards, Windows will not start. You need to get all of your important files on CD's, DVD's, or on a FlashDrive or external hard drive before you put the hard drive into the new computer. Also, you should download a program off the Internet that will completely reformat your hard drive (such as KillDisk) before installing Windows again in the new system (though Windows can reformat the drive for you as well, I prefer using KillDisk because it is more thorough and I've had problems with Windows reformatting my drives before).

Well, that should give you something else to think about for a few . Hope it helps.

 

[TRDCorolla1]

From what you have now ^^, anything would be better and that is including the E510 from Dell. I've seen that config and it looks very nice for the price.

E510:

http://www1.us.dell.com/content/pro...10?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&~tab=specstab#tabtop

 

[Legion Kreinak]

If I got that DeLL, could I sub in any nvidia card (a 6800 or 7800) without compatability issues? My big fear now is that, if I do go DeLL and I wanna replace the video card, I'll have issues with that.

I figure anything would be better than what I have now. It's about time I upgrade. I just think I'm getting too obsessed in that I don't need anything dual core or with a RAID HDD. Chances are, for the stuff I want it for, what I outlined will do just fine.

I need a new HD anyway, so no need to go through KillDisk and storing my files when I change motherboards, etc.

I still find the idea of building my own intriguing. DeLL would offer a warranty in case anything went wrong though. Not to mention, I don't know how to figure out if stuff is compatible or not. Like motherboards with processors and video cards, if stuff will run together, etc. DeLL would also have it put together for me. Unless someone wants to try and teach me how to learn what stuff can clash and how to make sure it's compatible, I don't know if building my own is right for me.

 

[mammikoura]

If I got that DeLL, could I sub in any nvidia card (a 6800 or 7800) without compatability issues? My big fear now is that, if I do go DeLL and I wanna replace the video card, I'll have issues with that.

no. There is a pci-e slot so u could put in any pci-e card, but the psu is onlu 305W so it won't be enough to run any good vid cards. And I've heard that dell uses some kind of special connector so u can't change the psu.

I still find the idea of building my own intriguing. DeLL would offer a warranty in case anything went wrong though. Not to mention, I don't know how to figure out if stuff is compatible or not. Like motherboards with processors and video cards, if stuff will run together, etc. DeLL would also have it put together for me. Unless someone wants to try and teach me how to learn what stuff can clash and how to make sure it's compatible, I don't know if building my own is right for me.

U will have warranty on every single part u buy, sometimes it might be onluylike 1 month, but usually it's alot longer (my vid card, mobo & cpu have 3 years and my ram has lifetime)
And with mobos u only need to check that it's the same socket as the cpu, has the same kind of video thingy (pci, agp, pci-e) as the vid card and that the number of pins in the ram and the mobo dimm match.
And if u have some questions just ask.

And putting it together is easy, and the mobo manual has very good instructions.

 

[Legion Kreinak]

Wow, so I couldn't swap in a better card for my DeLL? That's not cool.

I had figured I'd have warranty on individual parts, but didn't know if it'd be as good as something from DeLL. Who warranties 'em? The company or Newegg?

What is a PSU? What does it do? Do you need one?

If I build my own I'm afraid of breaking one of the little pins or something. If I did, could I just tell Newegg it came broken and get a replacement? I don't like to do anything sneaky like that, but I also don't wanna get screwed in a matter of five seconds because I'm careless (no matter how careful I'd try to be) with the components.

Can someone list me all the individual stuff I'd need? So far, I know I'd need: Motherboard, CPU, HDD, RAM, PSU, Case (fans come in this, right?), Video Card, Sound Card, Speakers (need good ones, with a sub - but cheap - any suggestions?), Dual Optical Drives (16x DVD & DVD-RW Preferred so I can directly copy CDs & DVDs - any input here?), and I believe I need an eternet card to get on the net.

What about USB ports? What determines how many of those I have? MOBO?