[Dangerzone]

i just fininshed working on my new gaming computer, and i was wondering what everyone else here is running

model and company: i started with a gateway FX510XT ( webpage here )

upgrades and modifications: i water cooled the system, installed cold cathode lighting in the case, and went full wireless

setup and location: i have the computer in my living room and i am using my 46" HDTV as a monitor, and the sound is plugged into a 7.1 home theater system ..............i also have all my other electronics (x360, ps2, etc...) hooked up to the same tv and home theater system

comments: personally i prefer nvidia to ati, but the ati dual card setup in my computer is one of the best gpu setups that you can buy right now..........i also love to be able to play games on the big screen while leaning back in my recliner...........and it feels good to have a completely new computer after almost 2 years of constantly upgrading my old one

[Sage]

model and company: 1998 Apple iMac 233 (Bondi).

upgrades and modifications: 320 Mb of RAM. Also, a bunny sticker installed by the previous owner that I haven't taken the time to remove.

setup and location: The table in my kitchen that marks the difference between "living room" and "kitchen". I can watch my 20" flat-screen CRT television from here and surf the web at the same time. I have a set of headphones plugged in that came from American Airlines.

comments: I gave $100 several years ago for this computer. It was second-hand, but it came with a bag filled with both the original install disks and a boatload of other software, as well as a matching keyboard and mouse. I have since bought faster iMacs, but this one does all I need it to do, and I absolutely loathe the optical mouses that are standard on later models.

[Huz]

model and company: Gateway GP6-400

upgrades and modifications: 320 Mb of RAM. A bigger HD. An ATI Radeon of some description. Also, I removed the fan because it stopped working.

setup and location: Under my desk, connected to a pair of Logitech speakers and a CRT monitor.

comments: I got this for free three years ago. It has proven excellent value for money.

[tabacco]

model & company: n/a, built from scratch.

specs: Athlon XP 3200+, 2GB DDR400, GeForce 6800GT/256MB, 2 WD SE hard drives: 250GB and 160GB.

setup and location: it's under my desk. I often put my feet up on it. I'm using 2 19" digital flat panels, and the front half of a Creative 4.1 speaker system (I have nowhere behind me to hang the rear channel the way my desk is set up )

comments: been pretty darn reliable for the last couple of years. I hae no idea how much it cost, because it's been built and upgraded incrementally over the years. Sooner or later it's going to need a new CPU, which is going to mean a new MB, RAM, and video card (to go PCIe), and that won't come cheaply, so it's a ways off.

[Karmillo]

Model: Karmillos Alienware!

Specs:
Intel Pentium 4 CPU 3.60GHz
4Gb memory
Nvidia Gforce 6800 Ultra
Creative Soundblaster Audigy 2Zx
2 hardrives which equal to 450Gb
21" Mitsibushi Diamond Pro 930sb CRT monitor

Setup:
at My desk, on a little table next to it. I dont trust it on the floor since my Dog has a habbit of 'marking' oblong objects in the house
My speakers are 'Creative 7.1 gigabit' but ive only got the front left, right and center ones set up along with the sub woofer due to space reasons

Comments: Its loud as hell and the glow in the dark can get annoying if Im leaving it on to download something over night but it does what I need it to do
Theres a lot of crap clogging it up at the moment but since Alienware never made Recovery disks for their PC's in the UK untill after I got mine means that I cant really do a complete restore....
I really need to go through it sometime and get rid of all the junk

[AGA]

Model:
AGATech Ninja 5000 (...I built it myself ¬¬)

Specs:
3.4GHz P4 processor, with 512kB L2 cache
1GB 3200 RAM
GeForce 5700LE GPU
2 HDs, one 120GB, one 70GB
Windows XP Pro

Comments:
A lot of memory and a fast processor go a long way - this PC trounces almost all games, even ones that typically require a better gfx card to run well. Apart from Oblivion, the bastard. I use a Creative 5.1 setup, with one of the satellite speakers missing (the front-middle), and a 19" CRT monitor. Oh, and I have a comfy swivelly "executive" chair, which rocks (...spins).

[Intrepid Homoludens]

model and company: HP Compaq R4000 laptop - AMD Athlon 64 3500+ processor, 512MB RAM, ATI Radeon Mobility Xpress200.

upgrades and modifications: None. I'm not interested in whoring out on getting this thing tricked out. However I'll be ramping up the RAM to at least 1 gig.

setup and location: Because it's wi-fi, anywhere I want, including the cafe across the street from my building. But mostly I plant myself on the living room couch with it.

comments: F*** PC gaming for a while, I'm investing in an Xbox360 and will mostly game on that. I'll eventually get another desktop in a few years pending on affordability. But for the time being I'm perfectly happy with my laptop for a variety of purposes, especially for writing, research, and entertainment.

[Gordon Bennett]

Model and company: Micron PC something or other from about three and a half years ago. One of the first 3GHz P4 machines to roll off the lines. Nice size hard drive, somewhat dated GeForce4 Ti video card.

Upgrades and modifications: External DVD burner that has since replaced the dead DVD-ROM that is built in. ATI video in card that I use from time to time to capture things I have on videotape. IBM Model M PS/2 keyboard made in 1988, which has been attached to every PC I have ever owned.

Comments: Unfortunately it will not travel, being a desktop. I need to invest in a nice, powerful laptop that can cross the Atlantic with me, consequently I am not going to bother upgrading this machine at all. Sadly I may have to leave my beloved Model M behind when I travel.

[RLacey]

Model
MV Ixius 17 (Notebook)

Specs
Intel Pentium 4 3.4Ghz
1024 MB RAM
nVidia Geforce Go 6800 256MB
60Gb HD (@ 7200rpm)
Windows XP Home

Upgrades and Modifications
None.

Comments
It runs what I want it to, and can manage Oblivion pretty well. The fairly large (for a laptop) screen is nice, though it has a single dead pixel just off centre, just to be annoying.

[samIamsad]

model and company: Selfmade(TM)!

Board: Asus A7A266
CPU: AMD Athlon XP2200+
GFX: Nvidia Geforce 4ti 4200 64 MB
RAM: 768 MB cheapass SD-RAM
HD: IBM 40 gig
Power supply: Enermax 350W
Misc: Gravis GamePad Pro, ISDN card, Relisys 17" screen


upgrades and modifications: Time to hold yer breath, suckers: An shiny, sexy Intel Celeron sticker! Remnants from the time there actually was an Intel Celeron 400A inside.


setup and location: On a nice computer desk. In my room. Heh. It's also connected to my stereo system.


comments: It's a loud beast. No game has convinced me to upgrade so far, and on top of that, there's still a hell of a lot of older games I'd like to play anyway. And really, gaming is pretty much the only thing I'd need that much power for. Silly, isn't it? It's not as if this system is being used as a home-built rendering studio. Or something.

[colpet]

Model and Specs:
Custom made for gaming in Fall 2004
Intel 4 3 Ghz 1024 KB RAM
NVIDIA GeForce FX 5700LE 256MB card
2 X 40GB hardrive + 80 GB hard drive for games
2 CD/DVD drives, one of which is a CD burner
WinXP home Edition
21" trinitron CRT monitor

Modifications:
I have 2 additional computers (Win95 and Win98) hooked up via a KVM switch.

I have a huge corner desk set up in a designated room. I'm lucky to have the computer all to myself. It's easy to play either new or older games with this set up (minimal tweaking required ).

[copycat]

Model and company: Apple MacBook Pro 15" (Early 2006)

Specs: Intel CoreDuo 2 GHz, 1 GB RAM, ATI Radeon X1600 256 MB, 100 GB HD

OSes: Mac OS X Tiger 10.4.6, and, sometimes when I can be bothered to install it: Games XP SP2

Upgrades and modifications: So far none, will upgrade to 2 GB RAM and a faster hard-drive

Comments: "Everyone wants a MacBook Pro because they are so bitchin' ", Steve Jobs, Apple shareholder meeting, April 2006

[KanyeWest]

Amd Athlon XP 2800+
Geforce 6600GT
1,5GB ram
40+200+200GB harddisks
Aopen DVD/CD burner 8x/40x
Hercules 17" TFT monitor
Philips 5.1 soundsystem
MS Multimedia Natural keyboard
Nvidia TV card "MCE"
Windows XP Media Centre Edition 2005
Logitech G5 Laser Mouse

[Bastich]

Athlon FX-55
2GB RAM
Nvidia 7900GTX x 2 (SLI)
WD Raptor 150GB HD x 1
WD Raptor 74GB HD x 4 (RAID)
Soundblaster X-fi Platinum
Samsung Syncmaster 204B 20" LCDs
Viewsonic 22" P225f CRT Monitor

The case is an I-Star Storm D400L 4U rackmount chassis with 5 SATA II Hotswap bays and a PC Power and Cooling 510-SLI power supply. Everything is run through a Tripp Lite 2400W rackmount line conditioner.

I output my sound to an Onkyo Receiver and then to Definitive Technology speakers and subs. It's really just my old home theater setup that I use solely for PC gaming now.

I also have 2 legacy x86 computers for old games as well as an Amiga 1200 and a Commodore 64, so technically my gaming rig is actually 5 rigs.

I'm currently rackmounting everything I own as this crap just takes up too much space. I have over 20 feet worth of desk to hold all my computer stuff right now and it's just ridiculous. I want to reduce it to a single 6-7 foot desk and a single 6-7 foot tall rack. That will take up less than half as much space and make wiring everything together much simpler as well.

[kuze]

XP2800+
Radeon9800PRO@SE
1.5GB RAM
19" Philips CRT
NEC 12x DVD burner
Win2k+Ubuntu

Comments: Hooked up to my iBook G3 900MHz (primary machine) via KVM, ethernet (synergy) and WiFi. The iBook is also hooked up to the CRT. The CRT is also hooked up to my PS2 via the Radeon. Oh, and there is a Linux PC (700MHz) in the other room if I want a real Linux shell without rebooting my main gaming PC.

[jjacob]

Built from scratch;
P4 3.2 Ghz with HT
Asus P5GD2 Platinum with RAID, S-ATA and wifi and.. stuff
nVidia 6800GT "Extreme" 256MB
1/2GB RAM (usually two but I lent one to a friend temporarily )
2x Western Digital Caviar 250GB 7500rpm (or 10K RPM, I forgot)
Creative SB Audigy!+&$-something
Plextor PX-750 16x DL DVD-R/CD-R writer
Draytek Vigor 2800G wireless ADSL2 routermodem (<--- best buy ever)
22" Iiyama VM Pro 513, 1600x1200@85Hz + Sony SDM-HS94P TFT, 1280x1024@8ms (and tv-out to a 40" Sony 'flat' CRT TV, which literally weighs more than me)
Razer Diamondback mouse
Wireless MS keyboard
WinXP Pro SP2
Hooked up to a Harmon/Kardon amp + 4 Mission speakers (4x200W)

Pretty decent setup, enough to last me for another year at least

[Kolzig]

model & company: built from scratch.

specs: Athlon XP 64 3500+, 1GB DDR400, GeForce 6600GT/128MB PCI-E, 1 SATA 150GB Samsung harddrive, 19" Samsung SyncMaster 959NF

setup and location: it's under my desk. My desk is crap and I really need a new one if I might move to my first real own appartment during the Autumn.

comments: I bought it a year ago, it has been really reliable. I'm kind of disappointed that the graphics card doesn't have 256MB, because that's what I originally wanted, but didn't get.

[SoccerDude28]

Model and company: Custom built
Specs: Intel P4 3.2 GHz, 1 GB DDR3200 RAM, GeForce 6800 GT, 200 GB Hard Drive, 25 inch NES monitor

I've had it almost a year and a half ago, and it still runs everything I throw at it at a reasonable framerate. Chokes sometimes when I enable 4x AA but I can live with that.

[bysmitty]

Hand built with the greatest loving care. I originally put it together in October of 05 but she has changed much since then.
-AMD 4400+ x2 overclocked to 2.66 with custom watercooling
-2 gigs OCZ platinum dual channel
-2 EVGA 7800GTXs overclocked to 470/1.3 running in SLI w/ NV5rev3 silencers
-Asus A8N-SLI Premium
-Seasonic S12 600w
-250gig Seagate Barracuda 7800.8
-Soundblaster X-Fi Platinum
-CoolerMaster 830
-Dell 2405 LCD

Fresh pix of the water cooling I added over the weekend
pic1 / pic2 / pic3 / pic4 / pic5

[bysmitty]

Originally Posted by Kolzig

model & company: built from scratch.

specs: Athlon XP 64 3500+, 1GB DDR400, GeForce 6600GT/128MB PCI-E, 1 SATA 150GB Samsung harddrive, 19" Samsung SyncMaster 959NF

setup and location: it's under my desk. My desk is crap and I really need a new one if I might move to my first real own appartment during the Autumn.

comments: I bought it a year ago, it has been really reliable. I'm kind of disappointed that the graphics card doesn't have 256MB, because that's what I originally wanted, but didn't get.

Don't worry about only having 128mb vid memory. It will limit your ability to hit higher resolutions a bit but overall the amount of vid memory means very little for performance. Judging a vid card by how much memory it has is kinda' like judging a car by how big the wheels are; sure it will help you get to certain places but there are much more important factors like GPU speed. The most important thing is that you have a PCIe slot which lets you easily upgrade that GPU when it becomes to old and rusty. CPU wise, that 3500+ will last you for plenty of time to come which is good since AMD isn’t supporting socket 939 anymore.

...bysmitty