Marius Fett Posted November 9, 2008 Share Posted November 9, 2008 Eich.. As some of you may or may not know, i've been saving to buy an iMac for quite a while. But id also like a new PC that I can play some games on. I've just found out I can get a pretty nice spec gaming rig for half the price of the iMac and with slightly better specs too. I'm looking for an opinion as to which I should go for. Please don't just automatically say PC just because you don't like Mac and vice-versa. Please give an honest opinion based on this info: Case: X-Blade Black CPU: AMD Phenom Quad Core 9550 (4 x 2.2GHz) 2MB Motherboard: ASUS M3A-H/HDMI 5200MT/s (AMD 780G) Memory: Corsair XMS2 4GB PC2-8500 1066 MHZ (2 x 2 GB) - Lifetime Warranty (DDR2) Graphics Card: NVIDIA GeForce 9800GT - 1 GB - 2xDVI/VGA (Palit) - OverClocked Power Supply: 600W PSU HDD: 500 GB SATA-II HDD UDMA 300 7200 16MB Optical Drive: Samsung (S222A) DVD PLUS/-RW 22x Dual Layer - Black (IDE) Sound Card: Creative Audigy SE 7.1 (PCI) CPU Heatsink: ThermalTake Blue ORB II - Low Noise Other: 4 Port Firewire IEEE 1394 & Free Cable (PCI) 10 X USB 2.0 Ports ASUS Wireless LAN 125Mbps (PCI) Internal Card Reader 50-in-1 Belkin 4 UK Outlet Surge Protector 1.7M Cable Vista Ultimate 64-bit Logitech 2.0 X-140 Black Multimedia Speakers Price: £783.37 Those are the specs for the PC. (This is a custom configured rig so if you think I should change anything let me know) For the iMac specs, just go to the Apple online store, select the UK option, go to iMac, go to the second 20 inch model and select the 750 GB HD. The site I used for the PC parts was http://www.computerplanet.co.uk/ Suggestions and opinions as to which I should go for are appreciated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jrrtoken Posted November 9, 2008 Share Posted November 9, 2008 Have you ever thought about dual booting XP off of your iMac? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Fett Posted November 9, 2008 Author Share Posted November 9, 2008 ^The original plan was to use bootcamp to run XP yeah, but the iMac wouldn't be able to run games to well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stingerhs Posted November 9, 2008 Share Posted November 9, 2008 the only concerns i would have with that build is ye ol' Athlon 6000 (why they don't stick a Phenom X3 in there is beyond me). its not a bad CPU, but there are better options from AMD that aren't that much more money-wise. the other point is the graphics card. the Radeon 4750 and the GeForce 9800-series are too cheap for them not to put one or the other in there. that 9500GT isn't a bad card, but like the CPU, it wouldn't cost much to upgrade to a card that will give you much better performance. the other thing is the power supply. that one might be adequate for that system, but if you plan on upgrading on down the road, that measly 350W isn't going to be able to handle it which means that you'd need to get a new power supply in addition to the new part. and don't think that you'll get a better deal by getting an Apple and duel-booting. a Mac with solid hardware will cost a premium over a comparably equipped PC. the upside, though, is that you wouldn't need two systems (ie, one for gaming and another for everything else), and getting two systems will cost more money than by just getting one high-end Mac and duel-booting. hope that helps. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Fett Posted November 9, 2008 Author Share Posted November 9, 2008 ^I went back and configured the same system again, but with the new Graphics card you suggested, though I went for the AMD Phenom X4 rather than the X3. "Might aswell go all the way" I thought. It went from £631.21 up to just £738.95 . So I think i'll add that to the original post. These are the components I swapped in: NVIDIA GeForce 9800GT - 1 GB - 2xDVI/VGA (Palit) - OverClocked and AMD Phenom Quad Core 9950 (4 x 2.6GHz) 2MB Black Edition ^Quad Core Whore baby yeeeeah! (I also had to change the RAM to this: GEIL 2GB PC-6400 800 MHZ (1 x 2 GB) DDR2. The RAM I originally listed was 1066 MHZ DDR3, but meh, the extra processing power is worth it. Now that i've selected these components rather than the other ones, do you think there's a need to get a bigger power supply? Also, for another 30 quid, I could swap XP for Vista Ultimate. (Either 64bit or 32bit as they both cost the same). Would that be a good idea? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
stingerhs Posted November 10, 2008 Share Posted November 10, 2008 you'll definitely need a bigger PSU. 600-700W range is definitely needed given the Phenom and GeForce's power consumption. as for the OS, its going to depend on what you're most comfortable with in addition to planning ahead. if you're not to keen on leaving XP behind, then stick with XP. Vista is by no means a bad OS, but there's not really very many reasons for choosing it over XP except for one very compelling reason: RAM upgrades. if you're going to upgrade your RAM in the future, you'll need 64-bit Vista. 32-bit Vista and XP can support a max of about 3GB of RAM due to memory addressing limitations. 64-bit Vista, however, can support much more RAM than even your motherboard can support which makes it ideal if you're planning on upgrading the RAM later. if you do get Vista, btw, just get Home Premium. all the features included with Ultimate are likely to go unused (its just Vista Business and Home Premium slapped together). and one last thing: just get the regular Phenom X4 9950. the Black Edition is for overclockers, and even then, it doesn't overclock much higher than stock speeds (the limit is somewhere around 2.8-3.0GHz compared to 2.6 GHz). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Q Posted November 10, 2008 Share Posted November 10, 2008 Hey Marius: Where are you getting your parts? Could you provide a link(s)? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marius Fett Posted November 10, 2008 Author Share Posted November 10, 2008 @stinger: I've got no problem with using Vista. I have it on the craptop laptop i'm using now. I used to hate it, but i've gotten used to it now, and it's grown on me. So I most likely will get a version of Vista. When I order the machine, i'll get 64-bit Vista and 4 gigs of RAM (for the price these guys give i'm tempted to just go with 8 though. ) and maybe upgrade in future. As for the PSU, would a 600 be ok? @Q: This is the site i'm using: http://www.computerplanet.co.uk/ @Topic With the processor stingerhs suggested, 4 gigs of RAM, 64-bit Vista and the 600W PSU, it comes to £783.37 (I dropped the 80 gig Meda Storage HD as I can salvage one from my other PC) I'll add the new parts to the first post. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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