rec.autos.simulators

Whats 'hot' and what's not these days?
I'm looking at putting together a whole new rig so any advices would be
welcomed....

It's been so long time since i "keept track of" hardware developements so
I'm a bit unsure what to get.....  Is AMD still the CPU get or have the
Intels fallen in price?
And what about mo/bo's?  I just checked a few cards but I have no real idea
if what to get....

Does N2002 have any issues with any soundcards? Whats good to get there?

When it comes to video-card I think I've pretty much made up my mind...
I'll be gunning for a 128mb MSI GF4 Ti4400 card...  The Radeon 9700 kick it
ass for sure - but sadly it's to expensive at the moment. :-(

Guess I'll go for XP this time tho...   unless it's a huge nightmare to use
it for *** etc...

Any help is much appreciated (sp?)

--
ed_

I am also using a Hercules Game Theater XP 6.1 sound card, and have had
nothing but great results.  The Turtle Beach Santa Cruz uses the same basic
audio chip, and can be found very reasonable now.  Both cards offer the
ability to leave your headphones connected along with your speaker system,
and choose which to use via software.  I have heard that the Santa Cruz will
also simulate 5.1 even if the game doesn't support it, but I can't say how
that works, or if the others also do it.

I believe you are getting a great video card.  Lots will tell you that the
Ti4200 is just as good, only underclocked, but there are reports that some
companies are using lesser quality memory on the Ti4200 to keep people from
buying the cheap one and getting the same results as the more expensive
units.

Intel deserves a look though, as you can get certain 2.26Ghz chips and
easily run them at 2.66 Ghz without increasing the VCore voltage any,
according to most reviews.

You didn't ask about the memory, but I would recommend the Samsung PC2700.
It has proven to be stable near 200mhz FSB, where the default for an XP chip
is 133mhz.

Hope this gives you a starting point, I'm sure it will give everyone else
something to discuss<g>.

Glen Pittman

   Last I heard the latest P4's were stomping on the 2.2+ athlons.  When the
Clawhammer AMD chip comes out (I think this fall) you will probably see AMD
back on top.
   Vidcards...another time to wait jussssst a little bit longer.  The ATI
Radeon 9700 is supposed to kick the livin' daylights outta the GF 4 's that
are out there.
   The lowcost plan might be to wait for the release of the Clawhammer chips
and the next gen vidcards, then pick up the current top stuff after it gets
it's price reduced.
dave henrie

They should be shipping now. www.anandtech.com (and probably others) have a good
comparison of the released 9700 Pro and GF4 4600.  There is supposed to be a
detuned 9700 (non-Pro) version made by OEMs, as well as a 9500 version coming
according to the anandtech article.

Isn't this always true with 6 month product cycles?  You'll always be waiting
just a little bit longer. ;-) AMD XP2400+ and 2600+ are supposedly just around
the corner (big price drops on the 2200+'s this week) and Intel's talking 3G in
the next little while.

Bottom line though is that with the vid card he mentioned and any "mid range"
cpu (ie anything around 2G) the system should run any of today's games quite
well, IMHO.

Ken

Achim

Yes it does, as well as the Philips AE/706 card. The TB is a god card, but I
preferred the sound of the AE better. However the AE card, WinXP, and my
motherboard (ASUS A7M266) would not play nice together. If you gonna run
WinXP go with the Santa Cruz card, but if your gonna stick with the older
O/S like Win9x then their is issues with the Santa Cruz.

As far as OS goes I do like WinXP for its stability. All my titles seem to
run fine some run better in WinXP than the older OS. Ratbag's DTR for
example. I have not seen any real performance hits from it. If you have a
home network you may want to consider getting XP pro. I have heard that XP
Home can be a pain to get a network setup. One magazine even called it a set
backwards. No real experience on my end to know for sure since I'm running
XP pro

MadDAWG

So I might aswell stick to Win98SE or ME then?

--
ed_

No real need for XP pro in relation to home networking.  Unless of course
you are in a domain that requires authentication (which most home users
don't).  Home version does Peer to Peer just fine, in fact quite well.

Mitch

    AMD has just announced the 2600+ chips, which run cool and overclock
well.  See the review on www.anandtech.com and elsewhere.

rms

If running N2002 is your main concern and you already own SE or ME, I'd stay
with SE or ME, there is no actual _need_ to get XP IMO. But if you have to
buy a new OS anyway, XP is perhaps the more logical alternative. Your new
machine should be powerful enough to run N2002 well under XP.

Achim

I have since swapped to a WinXP only environment, and get 100fps at
1600x1200x32.

That is with a Ti4600 and a XP2000+.

Definetly get XP though. It's a no brainer.

A dvd burned is nice to back up 9 gigs of stuff at once too, but most are
still around $400 beans.

I upgraded from an el-cheapo 700Mhz Celeron rig that
Bertelsmann gave to all its employees a year ago.

Cheers,

uwe

--
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Uwe

--
mail replies to Uwe at schuerkamp dot de ( yahoo address is spambox)
Uwe Schuerkamp //////////////////////////// http://www.schuerkamp.de/
Herford, Germany \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\ (52.0N/8.5E)
GPG Fingerprint:  2E 13 20 22 9A 3F 63 7F  67 6F E9 B1 A8 36 A4 61

Best AMD Motherboard Available.  This means it will NOT have a VIA Chipset.
The upcomming SIS 648 stuff sounds very compelling...

Fastest AMD Athlon available (2600+ was just released).

Turtle Beach Santa Cruz Sound Card (I left Creative 2 years ago and have
never looked back, nor wanted to look back).

1 GB DDR 2700 RAM (or 333 if that's the STANDARD highest speed at the time).

ATI Radeon 9700 Pro (this one was obvious).

Mitsubishi 22" 2060U Monitor.

Klipsch ProMedia 5.1 Speaker System.

Yamaha CDRW (The new one that writes letters and graphics on the back of the
disc).

Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 7200 RPM Drive.

Keyboard/Mouse to taste.

500+ Watt Antec TruePower Power Supply (I think it's a 533).

Lian Li PC70 (or it's current replacement) case.

Intel Pro/100 LAN Card (or it's current replacement).

I can personally vouch for the TBSC, Mitsu 2060U, Klipsch Speakers and
LianLi case because that's what I currently have.

I just LOVE spending other people's money :)

-Larry