July 2005 High-end Gaming PC Buyer's Guide - Page 8

Price Roundup

Intel Pentium 4 System

Case: Cooler Master WaveMaster TAC-T01-E1C w/Antec 480W PSU - $229
Processor: Intel Pentium 4 660 3.6GHz LGA775 - $615
Cooling: Retail HSF - $0
Motherboard: ASUS P5ND2-SLI Deluxe - $210
Memory: 2x512-MB Corsair TWIN2X1024-4300C3 - $194
Hard Drive: Maxtor DiamondMax 10 250GB 7200RPM SATA 6B250S0 - $126
Video Card: GeForce 6800GT 256-MB PCI Express - $353
Monitor: ViewSonic VP171B-2 17" LCD - $320
Sound Card: SoundBlaster Audigy 2 ZS Retail - $71
Speakers: Logitech THX Z-5300e 5.1 Speakers - $128
DVD-/+RW: Pioneer 16x DVD+RW/-RW DVR-109 OEM - $47
Communications: None or (optional Intel Pro/1000 T or USR External v.92) - $0
Mouse: Logitech MX518 Mouse - $39
Keyboard: Microsoft Natural Multimedia Keyboard - $17
Operating System: Windows XP Pro - $145
Floppy: Generic - $8

Total: $2,502

AMD Athlon 64 System

Case: Cooler Master WaveMaster TAC-T01-E1C w/Antec 480W PSU - $229
Processor: Athlon 64 X2 4400+ Retail - $599
Cooling: Thermalright XP-120 w/Vantec Stealth 120mm - $57
Motherboard: DFI LANPARTY UT nF4 SLI-DR - $175
Memory: 2 X 512-MB OCZ PC3200 EL Platinum Rev 2 - $179
Hard Drive: Maxtor DiamondMax 10 250GB 7200RPM SATA 6B250S0 - $126
Video Card: XFX GeForce 6800GT 256-MB PCI Express - $353
Monitor: ViewSonic VP171B-2 17" LCD - $320
Sound Card: SoundBlaster Audigy 2 ZS Retail - $71
Speakers: Logitech THX Z-5300e 5.1 Speakers - $128
DVD-/+RW: Pioneer 16x DVD+RW/-RW DVR-109 OEM - $47
Communications: None or (optional Intel Pro/1000 T or USR External v.92) - $0
Mouse: Logitech MX518 Mouse - $39
Keyboard: Microsoft Natural Multimedia Keyboard - $17
Operating System: Windows XP Pro - $145
Floppy: Generic - $8

Total: $2,493

Closing Remarks

This month we shuffled around the processor and motherboard choices for both our AMD and Intel systems. Performance considerations negated moving to a dual core processor on the Intel side, but we did go ahead with a dual core upgrade for our AMD platform, in the form of the Athlon 64 X2 4400+. Both the Intel and AMD systems now enjoy nForce4 SLI chipset-based motherboards and the performance and upgrade potential of dual PCI Express video card support. Unfortunately, we could not move to NVIDIA's latest GeForce 7800 GTX, as its high retail price wasn't feasible for our budget. Overall, July proved to be a balancing period in which we focused most of our efforts in minor improvements and getting the two systems up to spec in terms of platform performance and SLI support.

AMD and Intel have finally shown their hands and released a host of dual core processors, and it will be interesting to see where this all heads. If multithreaded applications and games become more prevalent over the next year or two, the full power of dual core will quickly become apparent. For now, dual core chips are strongest in traditional multithreaded applications such as multimedia encoding, and show little improvement in single threaded applications such as games. On the graphics front, NVIDIA has beaten ATI to the punch with the GeForce 7800 GTX series, but ATI may still have an ace up its sleeve. Hopefully, we will soon be able to take a look at production samples of ATI's R520 chip, a variant of which is also featured in the upcoming XBOX360 console.

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. Also, throughout the compilation of this guide, we have made every attempt to ensure availability and realistic street pricing of the included components.