More Awesome Than You!

Here's the deal. I have a Dell Optiplex GX400. I need to upgrade my RAM, at least up to 1G (These loading times have finally cracked me). I've been told that the RAM I require is PC800 RDRAM RIMM, possibly ECC. I can do without the ECC, I don't care about it. What this comes down to is that this kind of RAM is dreadfully costly. The best deal I've found for 1g is around $200! Isn't RAM supposed to be cheap?

So here's my questions. What do you think is my best course of action? Where do you go for your RAM? Should it be this expensive? If no one can answer them, at least I feel better now that I've vented a little.

Is that for one 1GB stick?

How many RAM slots do you have?  It might be cheaper to buy a bunch of 512MB sticks.

Being Norwegian I'm not going to make any judgement on the price.

That price is for two sticks of 512, adding up to 1G. They call it a kit.

I have 4 slots. If I remember correctly, two are open, but I'm not going to open it up just yet. Right now I have 256 total.

Oh yeah, they have to be installed in pairs if I remember correctly, so I assume that means you currently have two 128MB sticks...

I think you'll just have to go with that price.  RAM is cheap; RDRAM is crazy expansive.

What's the specs on the rest of your computer?  I'm curious as to why it uses RDram.

Ack, I just looked it up and it appears that RDRAM is really fast but a pain in the neck in just about every other possible way.  And looking at the specs on the Optiplex GX400, I see it's what, about a 2001 vintage machine?

You might do better to save your money, deal with the load times a while longer and upgrade to a whole new system.  For $500 (or less) you could get a significantly better machine all around, and without the exotic, expensive upgrade requirements.

I still use RDRAMs as well, and they are crazy expensive because they are no longer produced. If you want to go for the cheaper RAMs, it might require to change your motherboard, and with that the CPU, because the slots for DDR are different than RDRAMs and they won't fit.

RDRAM was introduced back in 2000-2001, these are the RAMs used in various consoles, but eventually DDR took over the market and Rambus for the PC was discontinued. I still use the best motherboard for RDRAM and have 1gb of it, with a 3ghz P4 processor, but this is the limit. The old motherboards that still use RDRAM limit your videocards (mine allows for 4x AGP, it currently holds a 8x card, but most are PCI-E anyway and the newer ones doesn't even have an AGP version) and CPU (3ghz is max), so for now it might be enough, but later you'll have to update anyway. I'm sticking with it, because I like it how this old 5 year old junk is faster than most modern PCs, but if you can't and won't tinker / sacrifice time to find parts for it, I'd advise to save up money and buy an up-to-date system with DDR rams. Those are cheap :D

*geek out*

RDRAM was basically a boondoggle foisted on the buying public when Intel stupidly signed an exclusive-use agreement with Rambus Inc. by which all new Intel platforms (through 2002) would use RDRAM exclusively—the i820 and i850 chipsets for the Pentium 4, for example. For a variety of reasons, RDRAM was absurdly expensive and underperforming.

If your motherboard requires RDRAM, that's what you're stuck with. As others have mentioned, it would be far better to spend a bit more on a new, current machine in the $500-600 range than to waste your money on RDRAM, especially since RDRAM modules need to be installed in pairs, or you need to install a blank "C-RIMM" in place of the second module.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rambus
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RDRAM
FTC Finds Rambus Unlawfully Obtained Monopoly Power (http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2006/08/rambus.htm)

If the computer is that old, the only way it's going to be worth upgrading is if you buy cheap used parts.

Sigh. Somewhat afraid of that. Changing computers for me is a lot like moving houses. Would it be possible to get a new motherboard (and therefore, new RAM) without getting a new hard drive? I've never actually thought about that before, so I don't know if it's possible. If not, how new of a computer would you reccomend? Money always seems to tight for me (then again, I'm quite frugal), and I don't wish to completely splurge on something like this.

Before I go on any further, I'd like to say thanks for all your advice so far. I greatly appreciate anyone who helps me with technical issues.

Yes. It is generally not necessary to buy new drives of any type when switching motherboards, although you may need to repair your Windoze install since Windoze is stupid and freaks out when you replace the motherboard.

Freaks out? Are we talking BFBVFS level of freaking out? Or maybe a few hours of clicking and waiting?

I have replaced one or possibly two motherboards without reinstalling Windows. The important thing is to install the chipset drivers for the new motherboard. With most boards, updated drivers can be found on the manufacturer's Web site. If you have an Intel chipset, you can get a unified driver package from the Intel Web site.

This is probably moot, however, since Dell uses proprietary motherboards that fit into their proprietary cases. Sometimes an after-market motherboard will fit, but often it will not. Furthermore, Dell has been known to use proprietary power supplies with non-standard wiring, so that plugging a Dell PSU into an after-market motherboard can fry the motherboard.

Here's the thing. If you buy a new motherboard, you're also going to need to buy new RAM, and possibly a new CPU as well, as at this point it could be difficult to find a motherboard that will accept your old CPU, which is probably the discontinued Socket 423 (current P4s are Socket 478 or LGA 775); for example, Newegg doesn't stock any Socket 423 motherboards. Then you might need a new case and power supply; the GX400 motherboard looks like the I/O shield is attached rather than snapping into the case like a standard I/O shield, and it looks to be larger than standard as well.

Now you have a new PC, but with lower performance and possibly for greater cost than a new entry-level PC from Dell, Gateway, HP, or Acer. You can get a pretty nice PC for about $550 shipped that will probably outperform by a significant margin anything you could upgrade to using the parts you have. Such a PC will have integrated graphics, but the graphics performance probably won't be worse—and may even be better if you're using the original graphics board—than what you have now, certainly good enough until you can afford to get a PCI-E graphics board.

There comes a time in every PC's life when it just isn't cost effective (or even possible) to upgrade it further. I believe your Optiplex has reached that stage. It was introduced in March 2001, and sold for $1299 in its base configuration:

Dell OptiPlexGX400

"Dell has recently announced the OptiPlex GX400, its first Pentium 4-powered desktop computer tailored specifically for corporate and institutional users. Priced in line with Dell's Pentium III-based OptiPlex systems, the midnight-gray OptiPlex GX400 is the fastest and most powerful OptiPlex desktop system and is available immediately in the U.S. and Canada. At the heart of the GX400 is the Intel Pentium 4 processor, the most powerful microprocessor ever featured in a Dell OptiPlex system. Featuring the Intel 850 chipset and Rambus memory, the GX 400 will initially be available with the Pentium 4 processor at 1.3 and 1.4 GHz with 256KB Advanced Transfer Cache memory, up to 2 GB RDRAM and hard drives and up to 40 GB in capacity to meet the needs of the high-performance desktop computer users. The OptiPlex GX400 features an award-winning, midnight gray OptiFrame mini-tower chassis designed for maximum expansion capacity and easy accessibility. The GX400 features integrated audio and supports a wide variety of AGP video and PCI audio options. Designed for maximum manageability, the OptiPlex GX400 also features Dell's LegacySelect Technology Control, which allows IT managers to enable or disable any combination of parallel, serial ports, and floppy drives to provide the right balance of functionality and IT control for each workgroup.

"Immediately available in the U.S. and Canada, prices start at $1,299 for an OptiPlex GX400 that includes an Intel Pentium 4 processor at 1.3 GHz, 128 MB PC600 RDRAM, 10 GB hard disk drive, integrated 10/100 networking and audio, NVIDIA TNT2 Pro 16MB AGP card, 1.44 MB floppy disk and CDROM drives."
http://www.sharkyextreme.com/archives/march01_06.shtml

In case you're curious, there are a bunch of Optiplex GX400s on eBay right now for less than $100.

I have never found that to be the case, and no information I've found suggests this is possible if you replace the motherboard with a different one. You can't "install" any drivers because the Windoze will not boot and crashes immediately if you attempt to start up after changing to a different motherboard, until you reinstall Windoze off the CD.

That thing could run TS2?  I had a computer that had similar specs to that but it hung during the last part of the setup.  Then again, it also had Windows ME on it.

Yeah, about that. That's how I came about my computer in the first place.  :-[


This "thing" runs fine. Between loading times, even the Sims runs smoothly. Plus, I'm running 2000, not ME.


Okay, now back to pinching pennies, and time. Tell me if this will work. I buy a new compy (reccomendations still welcome), take my hard drive out of my old one, and put it into my new one and set it as my primary drive, with the HD that came with it (hopefully) as a slave. If I can't just plop it in there, I have a friend who owns a computer repair place who can transfer my files, as he did with this one. Once all is complete, sell my old compy for a quick $100 (again, hopefully).

I suppose I could be mis-remembering. It has been a few years since the last time I replaced a motherboard on an XP machine, and I may have taken the opportunity to re-install the OS at the same time. OTOH it might be possible to do a "refresh" or repair install of Windows XP from the CD without having to do a clean install (although if you've got the time a clean install is always better).

Same principle, but easier on a new PC:
Install the old HDD as the slave. Keep the new HDD as the boot drive. XP, which should be on your new PC, should add the old hdd as a drive named a subsequent letter from your boot drive. On new PC's that can be something crazy down the line like drive 'K'

Anyway, at this point, the files can be transferred like you were saying above.

Doing a repair/refresh install works, but does not eliminate the underlying problem of having to reinstall, thus breaking a bunch of stuff you now have to fix.

What I've done every time I've got a new computer, is to mouunt my old harddrive as a slave, and slowly re-introduce parts of it to the new shiny disk.
It used to take me forever to make a fresh computer feel like home, but now I can do it in a few days.

I don't ever buy "new computers". I buy parts of a new computer that my old computer doesn't have, and assemble a computer out of those parts. I already have a CD drive, and a hard drive, so I do not buy another one. At some point I will replace some of those components, and if they still function, those parts go into the old parts bin. At some point the used parts become capable of forming a new computer, so I do so and install Linux on it.

My current computer is only likely to be expanded and upgraded, not replaced.
My old one was a toaster, and the cabinet just wasn't made for serious modifying.

As others have pointed out, the most cost effective solution for you is to upgrade to a new system.  However, there are many different scenarios for transferring your data.

If you absolutely wish to keep your current setup, you can make a ghost image of your current drive and then restore it to your new computer.   If you have (or can borrow) a large external disk drive, that might be the easiest solution.  This is assuming you can access the USB drive in DOS, as you can only ghost a drive in DOS.

If you don't have a USB drive, you can install the old drive into your new machine and do a disk to disk transfer using ghost.  The thing is, your new computer is likely to be a sata drive, while your old drive is likely to be an IDE drive.  So the whole concept of "slaving" a drive doesn't apply here. (Actually that's a pretty outdated concept.  It refers to installing a second drive on an existing IDE port, something that you rarely do nowadays.).  The easiest way to do it is to unplug your IDE DVD drive, from your new system (just the cables, don't remove the drive), and plug in your old drive in its place.  Then you can ghost the old drive over the new drive, being very very very very careful not to overwrite the old drive with the new drive (wiping out EVERYTHING).

That might or might not work.  After cloning a drive with an image from a totally different system, you sometimes get a blue screen and are unable to boot properly, as the drivers are too incompatible.  In that case you can do a sysprep on the old system, prior to ghosting it.  That will force the system to redetect and reinstall all drivers when you boot up the freshly installed drive in the new system.

As you can see, transferring your operating system from one system to the other can get pretty complicated.

Personally I would recommend you don't do it.  I know starting from scratch can be painful, but just like spring cleaning; it's something that needs to be done once in a while.

Starting from scratch certainly doesn't mean loosing everything however.

The easiest (and cleanest) scenario is for you to purchase a new computer. Install all your software on it.  Hook it up to your router (or a cross-link cable, if you don't have a router) and transfer the data from one to the other.  To minimize the pain of starting over, and make things easy, there is one easy way to transfer data.  You should only do this if you were running windows XP on your old GX400. Log in your new computer using a different account that the one you plan to use.  Connect to your old machine (over the network, using a cable or the router).  Locate your profile folder.  It should be in c:\documents and settings\profilename.  Delete the profile on your new computer (there's nothing in it yet right?) and copy your old profile over.  The profile names must be the same.  When you log back in, everything will be like it was on your old computer; data, favorites, desktop, etc.

You will still need to reinstall all your software however.  But once you do all your settings will have been retained.

I have gone one step further than this.  I have divided my drive in two partitions.  One partition contains the operating system and programs, the other my profile.  Whenever I feel the urge to reinstall, I just overwrite the C: partition with my previously saved clean ghost image. I change the registery to point to my profile on the D: drive and voila.  A clean system with minimum fuss.

Okay, you've all been so helpful, and I only need one last thing. Which brand of computer should I buy? What kind are you using, and do you like it? I'm only looking for about 1 gig of RAM, and I'll use my old HDD, even if I must reformat it. I'm looking for cost-effectiveness at the moment. I don't need top of the line, I just need a little over minimum. Once I get this answer, I'll be done (I hope).

Personally, I can't stand "brand systems".  The ones that use quality parts cost far more than they should, and the ones that offer you an "affordable and easy out-of-the-box" solution use sub-standard components.

Ideally, you should pair up with someone who knows at least a fair amount about hardware, then spend a couple days going through some independant product reviews for various components.  Weigh the pro's and con's and make informed decisions which match your performance tolerances with your budget, and then (again with the help of your hardware savvy friend), you simply build it yourself.

The result is a computer that out-performs anything you can pre-buy for the same price, and is far more upgrade-friendly as well as just made of far superior stuff to 90% or more of the pre-done systems offered by the "big boys".

However, this solution isn't suitable to everyone, and if you simply can't be arsed to invest that kind of time, nor do you have access to any friends/family who know their stuff well enough to attempt this approach, then I suppose the next best thing would be to browse several maker's systems that meet your combined performance/budget limitations and read independant (and hopefully unbiased) reviews of those.

It won't tell you exactly what's going to be perfect for you, but if 75% of people who bought "system X" utterly hated it and it blew up in a couple months, you'll be one step closer to at least knowing what might not be a particularly grand choice.

Sorry if it's not terribly helpful, but as someone who's built my own systems since back in the days of the 8088, it's about the best advice I can really offer without spending about a week trying to explain far more techno-geek babble than I'm sure you'd care to hear in the first place.  ;)

-Kitt

I'd like to build my own system, and I have knowledgable friends, but I always figured that would be the most expensive route. Am I wrong to think this?

Erm, yes and no.  In terms of strict dollars, probably.  But as with all things, a direct cost comparison isn't a very good measure, as the true indicator of overall value is more a comparison of "bang for your buck".

You can probably buy a pre-built system with "equal" specs to what you could build on your own for slightly less dollars (in most cases), though by really shopping around I've always been able to vastly minimize this down to where it's negligible at best.

The thing is though, to get the prices as low as the 'giants' do, they use often sub-standard, usually proprietary (hard-soldered) components.

For example, a friend of mine bought a shiny new Dell Dimension (something-something) a while back, and the spec sheet sounded pretty good.  It even included a Geforce 6x00 (I can't quite recall) and 1 gig of RAM, and it was a few hundred cheaper than the one I built around the same time with relatively "comparable" specifications.

Here's the deal though..  Not only was the memory 4 chips of 256 (meaning no empty slots to just add more, you had to yank some to add any -which blows) and about the most craptastic stuff they could find... The Geforce was actually hard-wired right in the MOBO, and what's more, Dell decided since they went that way, there wasn't any point in putting an AGP or PCIe slot in there whatsoever!  The space is on the board for one, but they never even soldered in a socket, so in order to upgrade the video card, she has to buy an entirely new motherboard at a minimum, and with a Dell, that pretty much means you're best off just waiting and buying a whole new system.

They love to do that with all sorts of things, even the power supply (which is junk compared to the Antec models I always use to begin with), and even though you can get converters to use standard PSUs in a Dell, it's more aggravation and crap that no one needs.

Now granted, I'm pretty biased.  The last good complete systems I saw that weren't either built out of proprietary and crappy components OR ridiculously priced (say like Alienware) was back with this company called Zeos, and they've been dead and gone for at least a couple decades -mainly because you can't afford to build quality machines at a competitive price en masse and expect to compete with companies like Dell or Gateway who sell 'mostly functional not-quite junk' to the masses at an attractive price in a nice wrapper.

About the only reason I ever suggest someone go with a pre-built system is for the warranty and support if that's something they really need OR if they either really just have loads of money and not a load of time to burn, in which case I'd go with one of the shiny Alienware-like deals where you're getting ultra cutting edge, but you're paying for it too, or if bottom line cost really is their main factor, in which case sadly the pre-built is about your best choice in most cases but again, overall performance and system satisfaction generally end up taking some hits along the way.

Sorry it's getting so wordy.  I'm pretty verbose to begin with, and certain subjects (like this one) really get me going and I forget how to STFU for a while.  :P

-Kitt

building your own system need not be the most expensive route.  You are in control of what you put in it.  That's what I did, I picked all the components I wanted, went to a local shop and had them build it according to my specs.  They did charge me for putting it together, but it wasn't a lot. (50$).  I could have done it myself, but I did that out of sheer lazyness.

Be careful however, to fall in the trap of hobbling your new system because you are trying to keep old components like your hard drive.  Most hardware has evolved since your GX400.  Hard drives are generally SATA.  They also run at 7200 RPM or better.  They willl perform better than your current drive (which I assume is a 5400 RPM IDE drive).  TS2 peformance depends on more than just memory.  Hard drive speed is another factor.  How big is it?  If I remember correctly, that generation of desktop came with  20-40 GB drives.  Compared with the size of modern drives, that's like a drop in the bucket.  Not even worth installing in a new system.  You are better off trying to sell your old system and make a few bucks off it, which you can't really do if you take it apart.

You might read the thread that is stickied in this forum.  It should tell you everything you want to know about picking a computer for TS2


Edit:  I agree with you Kittkitt.  Dells do have their uses though.  I am buying one for my mother.  All she does is surf the web (a little), so a low-end one is good enough for her.  Also the warranty means that if something goes wrong, I am not stuck trying to troubleshoot a computer, over the phone, with an almost complety computer illiterate 84 year old woman. (I live out of town).

Due to me being a perfectionist, I'm going to go over a checklist, so fill in my holes, or correct me where I'm wrong.

Hard Drive: I am currently using a master-slave system with two hard drives: a 40G and a 20G. The 40 I bought myself, and I assume that it is new enough. The 20 came with the computer, and I planned to use it for overflow off my 40. Currently, it is still empty. It was the master, but I made it the slave once I found out that it was a Maxtor. Not a big fan of Maxtor. In short, I should have this covered.

RAM and Motherboard: What kind of motherboard am I looking for? And what specs are important when looking for one? What kind of RAM should I look into? How much would a gig of that set me back?

Other stuff: Well, I know to get the obvious. CD-ROM, maybe a DVD-ROM. Do you think a floppy disk reader is still essential? What am I looking for in a case? Anything I forgot?

I know this is a lot of questions, and you're likely fed up with me by now. If you are, I understand completely. I just really want to get this right. I use my computer a lot and don't want to screw this up. Thanks again, and thanks a lot.

First, quickly to angelyne:  Agreed completely.  I'm not saying "Dell is crap!  Burn Dell!", but it's one of the very last recommendations I'd tend to make to someone trying to build any sort of gaming rig, or one they'll probably want to update in the next year or two.

They're awesome for uses like you've described above, as also are E-machines I've found.  Take it out of the box, plug it into the cable (or whatever) and zing.  Off you go.  It'll do what they need, and if it breaks, it's some tech support person's problem, which is a very good thing under the circumstances.  ;)

Now, back to you, kutto.

Honestly, not trying to be mean but...  your HD solution is, as angelyne more or less tried to indicate nicely, crap. :D

Your M/S configuration is not teeny by today's standards (you total 60 GB on both drives, whereas even only my primary drive is 130 GB, and the other is larger yet), but also almost certainly some generation or another of IDE.

This is bad.  Today's drives are faster, more reliable, but they run on the SATA interface, which won't use an IDE drive no matter how much you beat on it.  Now, you could buy a MOBO that still carries an IDE port or two (Giving you 2 or 4 available IDE devices respectively) and toss the old drive on there just to pull stuff from or bulk store junk that access time really isn't even a factor in.

Personally though, I'd just move everything off the thing to a newer, superior, larger and faster drive and use the old one for a paperweight.  Or if you take them apart, you can make some really cool looking wind chimes out of 'em, but obviously you want to be absolutely sure you never need anything from that drive ever again.  I've got some old 20 meg 'chimes around here someplace from further back than I care to remember offhand.  ;)

Anyways, you can keep the drives you're using, but I don't recommend it.  Today's applications LOVE to munch on your HD for data swapping.  Windows itself does it, your video card does it, and the Sims2 LOVES to do it.  Having an old and slow drive in there is non-awesome.

Now, as to the mobo... well, personally I always go with either Abit or Asus, but really that's a matter of personal preference.  In my experience, I find them to make solid, reliable boards and it's never been worth it to me to save the few bucks with a lesser known compared to the problems it's caused in me in the past.

That out of the way, the features you want depend largely on your overall plan.  Usually, when I go to build a system, the first thing I decide on is the processor I'm going to be using, since that dictates a range of boards right there that you'll have to go with to have the right socket.  For me, that means looking at the top of the heap for the two big chip makers and then dropping down the price sheets a few notches.  You can lose a few hundred MHZ in processor speed and not suffer any significant performance hit, but dropping down a few spots from "top of the line" means huge dollar savings.

Next thing I look at is what sorts of ram speeds, types, and configurations are available on boards with that slot, and doing a little research to catch up on all the new advancements, I pick the one that's at the right balance of cost vs performance depending on the sort of system I'm aiming at -again, for me this tends to be aimed mostly toward performance, because in my case, being an avid gamer as well as using a lot of graphic intensive apps, I don't see a point in building a new system that's just 'eh, so-so'.  These days, most of your better RAM runs best if you can run it in dual channel mode, so whatever I buy it come in pairs.  To use dual channel mode, you have to be using an even number (and they really really should be identical) of chips, so if you want 1 gig, grab 2 512 meg modules.  Which slots you'll need to use will be listed in the spec sheets for your mobo.

The next big factor in a gaming rig tends to be your video.  Personally, I'm an Nvidia gal, but again, that's a matter of preference.  What's truly of consequence here is again, you can save a LOT of money if you drop just a couple spots down the 'totem pole', and you really won't miss very much performance doing so in the long run.

I would advise against any sort of SLI or Crossfire (dual video) solution, as from what you've said so far, the gains you can get in performance in certain situations would be far outweighed by the massive cost of two cutting edge video cards.

Typically, the main factor right now for video cards is interface.  I highly suggest going with PCIe, as AGP is a slowly dying breed and you immediately breed in lack of upgrade option plus usually having to select a sub-standard card even in today's market with AGP.

Then there's the "generation vs memory" issue..  Personally, I have excellent results with dropping my core down a bit (say for example instead of grabbing a shiny new 7950 series, I might drop back to the 6800's) but I keep to the 'upper end' of the 'last generation' down so as to maximize the core and memory clock in those models, as well as providing more video memory.

The geforce 6800 ultra 512mb PCIe for example can be had for about $225 US, whereas you won't even touch a 7900 with 512 meg for less than around $400 -and those aren't even quite the top of the pile anymore.  The cost drops really fast, so it just depends on how awesome and shiny you really need to be.  Sure, the newer one will definitely be more awesome and faster, but enough so to justify double the price (or more?) Not IMHO.

Now... with those core components chosen, in my example we'd have narrowed our field of mobo choices down to something with SATA and good bus speeds that supports whichever processor I initially decided I wanted to go with, and has the right type of RAM banks to support my spiffy 1 gig of dual channel memory (and in my case, it'd have to have at least 4 slots so I could add more later.  RAM can make a massive difference to boost a slightly tired, but not entirely defunct system a year or so down the line).

So with that in mind, I'd start looking over the choices that leaves me with and find one that has a good combination of spiffy features (built in good network, extra IDE controllers just 'cuz..and either a neutral BIOS, or one that matches my choice in video card (Nvidia and ATI are both making 'em these days, and if you decide to use a board with one of their chips, it's generally a wise choice to use the same one as what you prefer in video card).

Whew... Past that, you drop in some sort of sound card -I'm using the Audigy 2 line which still works splendid with my 5.1 speaker setup and sounds better than many people's home stereo I've heard, one or two optical drives (DVD/CD-R/W, possibly a really fast plain reader, or whatever combination you prefer), a bunch of cooling fans and a good (I use aluminum for the better heat dissipation) case with lots of bays for drives and room for moving air around and places to put fans that not only cool your RAM and CPU, but also your drive and expansion bays for todays faster, hotter running hardware...

Oh, and as I mentioned before, I use Antec PSUs..  any of their "whatever"Power lines are good.  They provide solid, constant, reliable voltages and true rated wattages and thus don't tend to fry things like your $300 video card because they decided to fluctuate .3v just for giggles.  That happens sometimes with crap PSUs, and it can be really catastrophic.

Since I'm now getting to the point of practically writing a book here, and much of this is probably already covered in that post about system recommendations for a Sims capable machine, I'll leave it there for now and let you digest a bit before I assault you any further.  Trying to get too terribly specific usually leads to problems here anyways, as again, much of the process of choosing components is based on what exactly you're trying to accomplish coupled with your own experiences and opinions.

-Kitt

First off, one thing we have neglected to mention as part of the cost of upgrading is the price of an OEM version of Windows XP, since the Optiplex probably has Win2K pre-installed.

As far as the cost of building your own goes, it's neither necessarily more nor less expensive than buying a prebuilt PC. At the low end (~$550), you will be hard-pressed to build a machine that will outperform what you can get for the same price from one of the online vendors unless you have access to wholesale prices. You do need to shop carefully though when buying a pre-buit or built-to-order PC, to avoid the common pitfalls of cheap/ínadequate/custom parts like the four 256 MB RAM modules described above.

Once you approach US$1500, the chances of building a better machine for less are much greater, if you get your parts from online discounters like Newegg, Zipzoomfly, MWave, or Buy.com.

The big advantages of building your own are getting exactly what you want and only what you want (this includes having a quality case and power supply), and knowing exactly how it all works together, because you configured it. The disadvantage is that you are your own tech support, and if you break something there aren't more on a shelf in the back room.

That said, a prebuilt machine in the US$550 range from one of the big vendors that has 1 GB RAM will give you pretty much all you need to have a good gaming experience with TS2. The integrated graphics won't be on a par with a current add-in graphics board, but it will certainly be far superior than the nVidia TNT board that's probably in the Optiplex, and will be good enough until you can afford a proper graphics board. As KittKitt mentioned, the best value in graphics boards tends to be the top-of-the-previous-model-line-now-at-discount-prices. In the nVidia line, that would be the 6800 series, and in the ATI line it would be the X850 XT (which, at around US$115, is easily the best value out there), which is generally a better performer than the 6800 boards and some 7000-series boards as well (and it seems most reviewers feel ATI's image quality is better).

Intel's new Core 2 CPUs are at the top of the performance heap for now, by a significant margin. However, you aren't going to get one in a budget PC, so you're best bang for the dollar is still the Athlon 64. If possible, try to get one in the new AM2 socket format, to maximize your future upgrade options. TS2 is CPU-limited, so get the fastest CPU you can budget.

If you aren't archiving MP3 files, hi-rez images, or video, you don't need a giant hard drive. My three drives total 102 GB (formatted), and I have 43.5 GB free, even with a lot of applications installed. If you can only budget an 80- or 120 GB hard drive, don't worry about it. But do be sure it is SATA and spins at 7200 RPM (the hard drive is one place the big builders sometimes cut corners on budget PCs, using cheap 5400 RPM drives).

Since someone mentioned partitioning the hard drive, let me point out that while this was a useful practice when using FAT32 (because of issues with cluster size, slack space, and the maximum size of a partition under Windows), from everything I've read it appears NTFS functions best on an unpartitioned drive. If you want the "housekeeping" and paging file advantages of multiple partitions, it is best to install a second hard drive.

First, I just wanted to pop in and echo the endorsement for Newegg.com.

I've ordered oodles of stuff from them, and while you must read very carefully (some items are specifically designated as "OEM" -which means they lack manuals, warranty, and sometimes even installation software where applicable), I've never yet been dissatisfied with any purchase there.  Their prices are competitive (though not always the lowest) and they ship what you order when they say they will in well-protected shipping containers.

So yeah, you could most definitely do worse for where you shop.

Also, I agree with pretty much everything Hegelian with the sole exception that as I already stated, I prefer the Nvidias to the ATIs.  Honestly, it's mostly because I had a string of really bad experiences with some (older) ATI boards and never quite let go of the ire it caused.  Couple that with the fact that regardless of what anyone says, the simple fact is that both companies continually play leap frog as far as who's board is faster, better quality, better value, etc etc , and that leaves me in the Geforce arena for the foreseeable future.

I will however strongly remind that I am in no way saying ATI is a bad choice.  Go read several 3rd party reviews of the boards on both sides of the fence that sit well within your price/performance ranges and make your own better-informed choice based on as much hard fact as you can scrape together.

Sorry to babble, but I can't help but giggle at how we're already so clearly illustrating just how huge a role  opinion and past experience can play in the recommendations for system building game.  Easily amused I suppose.  :D

-Kitt

I think nothing gets us going more than a "which computer should I upgrade to" thread.  Except maybe for a "where can I download the best hair" thread :)

I got my video and sound needs covered. I myself am partial to nvidia, and a Soundblaster card tags along.

As for the rest of the parts, I will make contact with my friend to start plans for building my computer, as well as ask him about wholesale prices he may have access to.

I'll keep reading this over, and if I run into problems, you'll be the first to know. :) Thanks again. Wish me luck.

Well, most bios...es(biosi ?) still use the terminology slave/master; even with SATA drives. And most motherboards still have primary and secondary IDE ports. Secondary for DVD drives and such and the good ol' primary for boot drives; why? I dunno. Most of these primary and secondary IDE ports can also slave/master so you can install 4 drives of various types at once. You'll see them described on mobo specs as 4 x PATA.

Anyway, a word of warning that I didn't mention earlier about installing an old IDE HDD on a new computer with a SATA boot HDD: Go straight to the bios setup when you reboot and make sure it isn't installing the IDE HDD as your boot drive. Most do; old programming habits die hard I suppose. You'll probably have to manually configure the SATA HDD back to being your boot device.

Biosen.

Why would you even *HAVE* a SATA HDD if you were buying an upgrade replacement to your old computer? Since you'd already have a hard drive, there'd be no reason to buy one. I have yet to see a commonly available motherboard that comes with no IDE capability.

For what its worth, my list of components for what I like to call my 'Cheap Ass Intel PC':

APEVIA (ASPIRE) X-DISCOVERY-BK Black Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case - Retail
Model #: X-DISCOVERY-BK
$75 US

ASUS P5LD2 Socket T (LGA 775) Intel 945P ATX Intel Motherboard - Retail
Model #: P5LD2
$125

ASUS EN7600GT/2DHT/256M Geforce 7600GT 256MB GDDR3 PCI Express x16 Video Card - Retail
Model #: EN7600GT/2DHT/256M
$200

ENERMAX Noisetaker II EG701AX VE(W) SFMA ATX12V Ver 2.2 600W Power Supply - Retail
Model #: EG701AX VE(W) SFMA
$175

Intel Pentium 4 531 Prescott 3.0GHz LGA 775 Processor Model BX80547PG3000EK - Retail
Model #: BX80547PG3000EK
$100

Kingston ValueRAM 1GB (2 x 512MB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 667 (PC2 5300) Dual Channel Kit System Memory Model KVR667D2N5K2/1G - Retail
Model #: KVR667D2N5K2/1G
$100

SONY Black 1.44MB 3.5" Internal Floppy Drive Windows 98SE/ ME/ 2000/ XP - OEM
Model #: MPF920 Black

Western Digital Caviar SE WD1200JS 120GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM
Model #: WD1200JS

SONY Combo Drive Black IDE Model CRX320EE/B2S W/O SW - OEM
Model #: CRX320EE/B2S W/O SW

Prices on the retail parts are pretty general. I gave no prices on the OEM parts; that would depend on the store you bought them from.

This assumes one reuses (as I would) the keyboard, mouse, speakers, monitor, and modem from an old PC.

I don't personally endorse any OS.

In the beginning, Kutto's first thought was: Buy new prefab PC; put old IDE HDD into new PC; transfer data to the new HDD. Most new prefab PC's should have a SATA drive.

Yes, but that would be a stupid, overpriced, Kutto thing to do. And prefab PCs are crap and they cheat you by using substandard and proprietary parts.