October Extreme Gaming PC Buyer's Guide - Page 8

Price Round Up

The Intel System

Case: CoolerMaster ATC-201B-BXT Black - $159
PSU: Antec 480W TruePower - $86
CPU: Pentium 4-3.2 GHz Processor Retail Box - $394
Cooling: Included - N/A
Motherboard: ABIT IC7-MAX3 - $207
Memory: Corsair XMS 1GB PC-3200 LLPRO (2X512) - $328
Hard Drive: Two Western Digital 200GB SATA, 7200 RPM w/ 8-MB Cache - $376
Video Card: ATI Radeon 9800XT 256-MB - $485
Monitor: Mitsubishi 2070SB-BK 22" Diamondtron Monitor - $609
Sound Card: Creative Soundblaster Audigy2 ZS Platinum Pro - $204
Speakers: Klipsch ProMedia Ultra 5.1 - $360
CD/DVD-RW: Plextor PX-708A DVD-RW/+RW - $234
CDRW: Lite On LTR-52327S - 52x32x52 CD-RW Drive - $36
NIC: Included - $0
Modem: US Robotics External v.92 Faxmodem - $62
Mouse: Logitech MX700 Optical Mouse - $49
Keyboard: Microsoft Multimedia Natural Keyboard OEM - $20
Gamepad: Saitek P3000 Wireless Pad - $39
Operating System: Windows XP Pro w/s SP1 - $135
UPS: APC Back-UPS Pro 650VA- $235
Floppy: Generic Black Floppy Disk Drive - $8

Total: $4,026

The AMD System

Case: CoolerMaster ATC-201B-BXT Black - $159
PSU: Antec 480W TruePower - $86
CPU: AMD Athlon 64 3200+ Retail - $425
Cooling: Included - $0
Motherboard: Asus K8V Deluxe - $138
Memory: Corsair XMS 1GB PC-3200 LLPRO (2X512) - $328
Hard Drive: Two Western Digital 200GB SATA, 7200 RPM w/ 8-MB Cache - $376
Video Card: ATI Radeon 9800XT 256-MB - $485
Monitor: Mitsubishi 2070SB-BK 22" Diamondtron Monitor - $609
Sound Card: Creative Soundblaster Audigy2 ZS Platinum Pro - $204
Speakers: Klipsch ProMedia Ultra 5.1 - $360
CD/DVD-RW: Plextor PX-708A DVD-RW/+RW - $234
CDRW: Lite On LTR-52327S - 52x32x52 CD-RW Drive - $36
NIC: Included - $0
Modem: US Robotics External v.92 Faxmodem - $62
Mouse: Logitech MX700 Optical Mouse - $49
Keyboard: Microsoft Multimedia Natural Keyboard OEM - $20
Gamepad: Saitek P3000 Wireless Pad - $39
Operating System: Windows XP Pro w/s SP1 - $135
UPS: APC Back-UPS Pro 650VA- $235
Floppy: Generic Black Floppy Disk Drive - $8

Total: $3,988

Closing Remarks

This month we completely overhauled the entire guide, which was a natural byproduct of it being stagnant for the past few months. Both AMD and Intel systems were given new processors and motherboards to bring them up to speed, including the move to the impressive and highly-anticipated Athlon 64 3200+. We also upgraded to ATI's flagship Radeon 9800 XT video card, and while it's not a quantum leap past previous 3D cards, the extra power and OverDrive feature will translate into higher framerates. The Serial ATA RAID 0 array enhances the system's storage capacity and speed, while the 8X DVD+-/R/RW drive gives added multimedia options and serious system backup power to boot.

Over next couple of months we should see a lot of movement as companies continue to release new hardware and retool their pricing structure in anticipation for the holiday season. Hopefully we'll be able to find a Pentium 4 Extreme Edition at a reasonable price, as we'd really like to include one in our next guide. In addition, AMD's Athlon 64 FX-51 was a little too expensive to include in this month's guide, and would have upset the balance between our Intel and AMD systems too much. With any luck the potential release of the Pentium 4 EE would hopefully be able to fix that for next month. We're also looking forward to a slew of new AMD Athlon 64 motherboards to hit the shelves in the near future, giving us a wider range of choices for AMD's new platform.

* Please note that the prices in our guide do not include shipping costs or taxes. The final system price also reflects a "best case" scenario of finding an online vendor that stocks the majority of internal components, or having access to a number of local computer retailers for system quotes and comparison shopping.