April 2004 Value Gaming PC Buyer's Guide - Page 8

Price Roundup

AMD Athlon XP System

Case: Aspire X-Dreamer II (with 350W PSU) - $50
CPU: AMD Athlon XP 2800+ Barton Retail - $121
Cooling: included Retail HSF - $0
Motherboard: MSI K7N2 Delta-L - $72
Memory: 512-MB (2x256-MB) Corsair PC3200 DDR - $112
Hard Drive: 80GB Western Digital SE (8-MB) - $67
Video Card: ATI Radeon 9700 Pro 128-MB OEM - $169
Monitor: Samsung 955DF - $185
Sound Card: 6-Channel Integrated - $0
Speakers: Logitech Z640 6-Piece Speaker System - $60
CD/DVD-ROM: AOpen 48x24x48x16 Combo Drive - $50
Communications: Onboard LAN - $0
Mouse: Microsoft Intellimouse Optical - $15
Keyboard: Microsoft Multimedia Keyboard - $15
Operating System: Windows XP Home - $81
Floppy: - $0

Total: $997

Intel Pentium 4 System

Case: Aspire X-Dreamer II (with 350W PSU) - $50
CPU: Pentium 4-2.8 GHz (533) Retail - $163
Cooling: included Retail HSF - $0
Motherboard: MSI 865PE NEO2-PLS - $77
Memory: 2 x 256-MB PC3200 DDR - $84
Hard Drive: 80GB Western Digital - $55
Video Card: ATI Radeon 9700 Pro 128-MB OEM - $169
Monitor: Samsung 955DF - $185
Sound Card: 6-Channel Integrated - $0
Speakers: Logitech Z640 6-Piece Speaker System - $60
CD/DVD-ROM: AOpen 48x24x48x16 Combo Drive - $50
Communications: Onboard LAN - $0
Mouse: Microsoft Intellimouse Optical - $15
Keyboard: Microsoft Multimedia Keyboard - $15
Operating System: Windows XP Home - $81
Floppy: - $0

Total: $1,004

Conclusion

This month we get back to the regular grind, where we offer a selection of incremental improvements and standard choices, all with the goal of maximizing our $1,000 budget. The recent DDR price spikes put the pressure on, but we managed to come within budget for the AMD system, while going over by a few dollars with the Intel system. Best of all, there were no real concessions needed, and the video card, processor speeds, memory speeds and hard disk capacities remained consistent. We switched back to MSI motherboards, made use of some timely price cuts on other areas, and most important of all, kept out prized ATI Radeon 9700 Pro 128-MB powerhouse intact.

The performance race is once again a pretty even race between AMD and Intel, with maybe a slight nod to the i865PE-powered Pentium 4-2.8 GHz. The Athlon XP 2800+ and Pentium 4-2.8 GHz again represent the best overall price-performance options at the mid-range, we're still looking at a noticeable premium for going any higher. At stock clock speeds, these two CPUs still give some high-end configurations a good run for the money, but both also offer significant headroom for overclocking.

This month's component list once again looks like a mix of the mid-range and high-end, and it is still amazing what you can get for a cool $1K. These include high-performance CPUs, 512-MB of dual-channel PC3200 DDR, 7200 RPM hard drives, CDR/RW and DVD-ROM capabilities, and a powerful Radeon 9700 Pro 128-MB video card as the finishing touch. If overall value is your main goal, these value gaming systems certainly deliver, and offer a noticeable price-performance advantage over our higher-priced guide configurations.

* 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.