PC Buying help wanted....

[Jimi Hughes]

Hi all,

I recently moved to PC sim racing from xbox due to lack of out and out sim racers, which i play on my laptop. It is sufficient to run the GTR Evo Series (RAce 07/Race On) but not perfectly, and in order to get the maximum performance on track I could do with something abit quicker.

I am considering buying a PC which will only be used for gaming (or at least 95% for gaming), and should I get one I will probably get myself R Factor, RBR and possibly a few other titles that take my fancy. It would only be used for Racing Simulators, as no other genres of gaming interest me, which may end up very expensive just to try and find a tenth or two per lap on a game!

So I am wondering, what is the best value for money on a PC at the moment, which would very smoothly run the GTR series and possibly RBR and R Factor aswell. I already own a sufficient monitor (Samsung 22" Fully HD Moniter) and i need to find really the cheapest PC just for running the game with pretty good graphics, and no lag or juddering.

Can anyone help me?

Cheers,

Jimi

 

[Craig Stevenson]

You don't say what your budget is but check out the Gamer - Titan or Pro Gamer base units at OCUK, I would also take a shufty at Mesh

 

[Jimi Hughes]

yeah, minor detail to miss out when im buying on a budget! I'd say it'll be in the £500 bracket if there is such thing as a gaming PC for that sort of price!
Ill have a look at these, thanks bud

 

[Wietse Visser]

for most racegames you dont actually need a big PC
atm i run a amd x2 6400 with 4gb ram and a gts8800, think a similair setup wil cost you around 400 euro.

but if you look to the future i would get something more build for expansion like a intel i5 or amd X3 and you would need to spend most money for the vidcard new around 100-more euro then you would be in a save place i think. Do you have a case with a PSU aswell? because that will set you back for 100 euro aswell (PSU is one of the most importand things for the PC, but dont go overboard 600W is more then enough)

if you need more info just PM me

 

[Nick Deeley]

The computer I use for gaming cost me £500

4GB of ram, 64bit windoze 7, 500GB hard drive. And a fairly decent graphics card in the Nvidia GeForce GTS 250. Can run GTR Evo on full graphics settings with very little side effects. Bought from overclockers. Not sure if they have this PC in stock anymore, but that should give you a rough idea.

If you have more than 2GB of ram - get 64bit version of your operating system to utilise the ram.

 

[Tom Watts]

yh i built a computer to run a couple years ago just for gaming and it cost me a little over 250 pounds and can run a the highest settings on the race series

 

[Wietse Visser]

Jimi are you handy with putting the PC together yourself?

buying it in parts is cheaper then buying e premade one and you can offcourse pay the amount you want and can....

 

[Willie Watt]

yeah, minor detail to miss out when im buying on a budget! I'd say it'll be in the £500 bracket if there is such thing as a gaming PC for that sort of price!
Ill have a look at these, thanks bud

If you have some decent stuff in your PC at the moment, you could always spend 500 on the key bits. new MB, processor, Graphics card, then scavenge the rest from your existing PC and ugrade each of those as approriate.

 

[Jimi Hughes]

Im running off a laptop at the minute, and updating graphics card etc is quite difficult for the returns so i've heard, so im probably better off getting a PC, especially to be able to run other titles as well.

Thanks for all the replys so far, all will be of great help when the time comes. Any more suggestions keep 'em coming!

 

[Damian Henderson]

I would take into consideration that rFactor2 & GTR3 will be coming, which I guess you would be interested in playing. If so I would consider what video card to get, and possibly get something that is more future proof then something that can handle current racing games fine, as if you get something that just does the job now, it may well struggle with future racing games, thus you possibly considering another upgrade further down the line.

Personally I would invest in a 5770 1gb, or if possible GTX460, to be ready for the future, if this is possible.

www.dhrgp.com

 

[Tony Crabb]

Have a look here:

http://www.cclonline.com/systems/?gamer

Maybe of some help.

 

[Ant Collett]

I build PC's as a hobby & recently put one together for a friend who was getting into iRacing. He was ever so pleased with his quad core, Win 7, 250gts combo.(£375) I would be happy to build one for you. Used or new parts entirely up to you.

 

[Matt Cox]

I don't want to start a similar thread for essentially the same thing so I'll just tack on to this one.

I'm looking to upgrade since my machine is getting a bit old. I'm currently running a 2.0Ghz Athlon AM2 X2 with crossfired X1950s. The whole lot is nearly 4 years old now and it's now struggling a bit with higher resolutions since I moved to a full HD capable monitor. I've been AMD ever since I replaced my original Pentium many moons ago, and I'm wondering which direction to go. Of course keeping the costs down is part of it, I don't play anything like Crysis, but it just needs to be ready for Rfactor 2. I've only just started researching the current processor situation, but as far as I understand it the Intel Core i<insert number here> have the wow factor, but AMD have a better price point. I'm aiming for a quad-core solution. The graphics card has already been decided - a GeForce 460 GTX.

I always build my own machines so no problems there, but any advice would be appreciated.

 

[Jimi Hughes]

Good man, I was thinking of going for the same G card in my system, and i was tryin to decide wether its worth using Intel i5 in the system or not.

Im pretty much going for the same type of system you will be after i think so its a very relavent post. Any more help, please keep it coming.

And, Ant, if you are still reading the this thread I am very interested in your offer about building a PC, I sent you a PM on here, it would be great to hear back from you. Thanks alot for the useful posts guys!

 

[Travis]

Hi all,

I'm also looking at building a new PC, primarily to step-up from console racers such as Race Pro and Forza 3 to SimBin's PC line of racing games. I've read that Nvidia videocards can cause issues with SimBin's games - reports of stuttering, glitches & crashes that the ATI range of videocards do not appear to suffer from. Can anyone confirm that this true.

As much as i'd like to SLI two GTX 460's, if the Nvidia cards have issues, I'll stick with a single ATI 5870 and crossfire that at a later date.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Martin Vrba]

I've read that Nvidia videocards can cause issues with SimBin's games - reports of stuttering, glitches & crashes that the ATI range of videocards do not appear to suffer from. Can anyone confirm that this true.

I've got a GTX 460 and I don't have a single problem with it... go for it, it's a great graphics card

 

[Jimi Hughes]

I've got a GTX 460 and I don't have a single problem with it... go for it, it's a great graphics card

What Motherboard and Processer are you using with this Martin? Also, do you think that the GTX 460 will be able to run rFactor 2 when its released?

 

[Travis]

I think if you SLI two GTX 460's, you'll end up with stunning performance for the money. Refer to crossfired 5870 vs SLI'd GTX 460 benchmarks here

 

[Martin Vrba]

What Motherboard and Processer are you using with this Martin? Also, do you think that the GTX 460 will be able to run rFactor 2 when its released?

MSI AM2+ motherboard and AMD Phenom X4 9550 (OC'd to 2,6GHz)... yes, it will run rFactor 2

I think if you SLI two GTX 460's, you'll end up with stunning performance for the money.

yup, it's the best "performance for the money" combo you can get now...

 

[Rob Simms]

I would stay away from 2 video cards, you will not get 2x peformance. The next series is only a few months away. Try to budget around $120-150. I would try to max price for all parts with OS to $1000. I built a nice AMD for a guy for $723 minus OS and case.