dpal on January 19th, 2007

It’s about the time for me to upgrade my computer… Actually, it will be a full build. My current PC has lasted me since around Nov/Dec of 2002, and it is getting a little long in the tooth. If I were average user, the pc could probably last me another year or two, but I’m a gamer… and today’s games demand graphic horsepower. With that in mind, I have spent the past few months on newegg trying to come up with a configuration that will do all of the things I demand from my PC. It must:

  • have enough graphics power for me to run recent games at decent settings without choking
  • have enough memory to run a separate virtual machine or two
  • have enough storage to hold my media(pix and videos)
  • cost under $1,500
  • last me another 4 years
  • Those last 2 are tough.
    So, after much consternation, I came up with this setup. I actually feel like I will need more storage, but I do have a 250 GB IDE hard drive that I can transfer over to the new box. As long as I still have my little linux box running, it will handle all of the web testing that I do for both work and for fun. It can also handle some networked storage as I have had samba set up on it for a few years.

    My plan for the new box is to be my gaming machine and then use the free vmware server to run another instance of linux. The Virtual machine will be up most of the time and I will use that as the primary computing machine. Since my pc has become a communal entity, I thought it would be much easier(and safer) for me to run a virtual instance of linux(or guest), and have everyone just use that. When I want to game, I can just close down the virtual machine and I will be in my Windows(host). Heck, if it weren’t for my gaming habit, this whole house would have been running linux a long time ago.

    So anyway, take a look at my wish list and come back and tell me what you think. I’m actually trying to get the cost down to $1,200, but I’m not sure I can do that and still reach all of my goals. I highly encourage any suggestions you guys out there might have.

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    One Response to “PC Planning”

    1. $1500 and 4 years… good luck, I concurr that it will be difficult

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