rec.autos.simulators

I'd appreciate answers copied to me (as well as the forum) at:

Peace out

Bart Brown

    Get as much cpu as you can afford.  Don't worry about overclocking.  
That was needed back in the days of 100mhz systems, but we are running
3000+ mhz so its not as critical.  The closer to the 3.0 or higher rating
for Pentium 4's or 3000+ for Amd XP+ the better.
  Video cards are mostly pretty fast now, Real benefit of one type over
another usually only shows up as you start using really big screen sizes.  
So if you can live with 1024x740 then just about any modern ATI or Nvidia
card will do.  I guess as a filter, I'd shoot for around $200 as a price
point for a video card...anything below is gonna have some issues..and as
you get above that, you are getting top end stuff.  For GPL, you might
have better sucess with Nvidia products...ATI works fine, but some folks
like to use Full Screen Anti Aliasing, and some versions of ATI drivers
do not support 16bit FSAA.  
   I use ATI and I have GPL so it will work, just may be a minor issue.

I've worked on alot of systems for friends of my wife.(I don't have
friends, they take away from my simming)  :)  But I've seen several newer
systems with really fast components that are a dog compared to mine.  So
don't be fooled by just numbers...Companies like HP, DELL, GATEWAY, any
of the complete box sellers really, often will scrimp in some areas to
impress you(the buyer) in others.  Make sure you have a fairly big hard
drive (and I do mean big...if you have been away for awhile, then you'll
be shocked at the size and low cost of Harddrives. 80 meg or more if you
plan to add mods{sportscars, trucks etc} to your sims)that is AT MINIMUM
a 7200rpm variety.(a nice cache for the HD helps too 8mb is a number I've
seen on boxes, although I don't have any info why that is a good or bad
number.)  <lol>  

   a bare bones GPL only system could be a P4 2.4 or close to that with
an older Nvidia 4200 video.  If you get a box with Windows XP then pile
on the RAM, minimum should be 512mb for XP.  

   IF you plan on MORE than GPL then you need to get near that > 3.0
level for CPU's and then get a video card that prices out closer to $300.
One of the latest demos out is for GTR.  The demo has just one car on the
track and that has been placing a load on some systems.  Just about any
slow system can be made to run a sim, but you loose graphics, car counts
and more the farther down the performance ladder you go.

In closing, I'd like to thankyou for your question, since it allowed me
to use almost all of the [bracket] symbols...!  :>

dave henrie

That's tiny!!! , obviously you meant gig :D

WHOOPs!  *#&#&(   yes indeed...GIGS  thanks..

80gigabyte(or GREATER) not megabyte..doh...dave is sorry.

http://www1.us.dell.com/content/products/productdetails.aspx/dimen_xp...

Andi.

--
Remove only one zero to reply.

The GPL with the 65 season is good too,

Dave -- just as I remember, you ARE the person to ask! Glad to see
that some good things remain in the world. Armed with your
information, I hope I can build a box that gets it all done.

Many thanks!

Bart Brown

  For GPL, you might
Just a minor nitpick in otherwise solid advice... ATI cards actually work well
with GPL now with the last few driver releases (IIRC they fixed the 16bit FSAA
with 4.0 and they are now up to 4.6 last I checked).  Unlike the GF4 4200 it
replaced, my radeon 9700 works wonders in GPL, no menu corruption with D3D and
FSAA on, online or off.  And it is fast enough that you don't have to resort to
using opengl (opengl ran faster by was not as bright or sharp as D3D).

My 2cents.

Ken

Andi.

--
Remove only one zero to reply.

-Larry

The Athlon64 3500-939 is looking real good to me right now.

The other thing that bugs me about Dell is the proprietary nature of their
components.  Upgrading their systems (Power supplies, system boards, etc...)
can be a pain in the hoot.

-Larry

http://www1.us.dell.com/content/products/productdetails.aspx/dimen_xp...

Soyo - K7VME - VIA Socket A Barebones Kit with 52x CD-ROM,350-watt PS,
Keyboard, Mouse and Speakers

Price:          
$109.99
Less Rebate:    
- $90.00
Final Price:    
$19.99*

Kinda hard to beat for 20 bucks. There are three rebates, two of which
expire 7-18-04.

I'm going to combine this with an AMD XP processor -- what I'm not sure
of: is it worth the $40-$50 difference between an Athlon XP2800+ (512K
Cache / 333MHz FSB) and an Athlon XP 3200+ (512KB Cache / 400MHz FSB),
when the K7VME only supports up to 333MHz FSB? I guess what I'm asking
is will I take a performance hit on the 3200+ at 333MHz (rather than its
full-rated 400) to such an extent (or at all?) that I'd be just as well
off with the 2800+? Sorry for the convoluted sentence structure...

Also, I've had great success on the Mac with two 7200rpm drives in RAID
0 configuration -- is it worth the trouble on the PC?

Anyway, thanks again for your help!

Bart Brown

Yea it will take a hit, I think the overall clock speed will decrease, so
get the 333 processor

    Well, this is a lousy choice of motherboard, especially given that you
are thinking of a XP3200+, which is designed to run at 400FSB.  I would
choose the Abit NF7-S, hands down, especially since it includes a decent
builtin soundsystem.

    A MUCH smarter move is purchasing the Mobile Barton 2400+ for $70 at
newegg & elsewhere.  This cpu is completely unlocked and will overclock to
3500+ rating pretty easily (with a good heatsink).  BTW, a low-end Athlon64
2800+ and a Socket754 Nforce3 250gb or KT800pro motherboard (which has a
decent soundchip) looks really tempting when you compare it to a highend
AthlonXP system.  Think about it.

    Both Anandtech and Storagereview say raid on a desktop is pointless.
Put the money saved into more ram (2x512meg PC3200 or PC3500) and a better
videocard (X800pro or 6800).

rms