The time has come to buy a new PC. Forum help needed.

[Concept]

Hi all,

I've had my PC now for a good nine years and I've decided with the upcoming release of Half-Life 2 that now is the time to completely upgrade and buy a new one. Preferably I'm looking to pick one up in the next week or so, and I'm interested in gauging opinions and help from some tech heads around here. I also intend to immediately get broadband as soon as I've done this, so I can hopefully obtain a stable net connection and sign on to Xbox live. The problem is I'm very much a novice when it comes to computing, so I'm going to need some assistance in what would otherwise be straightforward things to many of you.

Basically, I'm willing to spend between ?1,000-1500 on a decent PC that will stand a chance of running Half-Life 2 later in the year. I'd very much appreciate it if you could provide me a decent specification list within the price range I've just mentioned, and whether it's realistic of me to except to get a PC that already isn't out of date.

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1) I need to know which is better overall processor: AMD Athlon or Pentium 4, and what sort of speed I should be looking for over the 3GHz range.
2) What kind of graphics card, RAM, make etc. I should be looking for when it comes to running Half-Life 2 and the latest games?
3) What broadband service would you recommend for a good upload rate? (I'm willing to spend ?30-40 a month). I'm basically looking for a service that'll let me surf the net without my connection coming to a crawl every so often.
4) What kind of router should I be looking for in terms of a relatively simple and efficient set-up between my Xbox and PC?
5) Ideally, so I don't have to upgrade three or four months down the line, what type and size of HD should I be looking for? I'll obviously be looking to use the net for more than just forum/emailing/instant messaging than I do now when I get a new PC, so any advice on storage would be most appreciated.

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Although I know there's a thread on PC suppliers, I'd rather keep my questions centred in one single topic so there's a minimum of fuss for everyone. Can you please tell me a decent online and offline store for buying whole PCs? I don't know want to particularly build a PC myself, and I'm hopefully looking for one with all the essential programs I'll need at first to be already installed. I'm not the most technical person out there when it comes to PC technology, so what I'm looking for is advice on getting a powerful PC and a fast stable net connection with as little fuss as possible. If that can be done.

I'd like to thank you in advance for those who choose to help. Cheers.

[Ish]

Firstly: build or buy. If you know what your doing you can build an absolutely top of the range ninja rig for around a thousand pounds. Building PCs really isn't very hard.... and there's tonne's you can read in advance on the web.

In answer to your questions:

1) I don't think you'll get a clear answer. Some people will say Intel others Athlon. I recently built a new PC and my research led me towards a P4 3GHz with 800MHz FSB (since overclocked). It flies. Even on the Far Cry demo with everything ('cept anti-aliasing) cranked to max.

2) Again its not clear cut at the moment. I think up until a few months ago you could have said ATI. But now they and NVidia appear to be back at neck and neck again. I'd pick a price limit and just get the best value you can for that.

3) Check www.adslguide.org.

4) Can't really help you there - my XBox isn't on Live.

5) Once you get broadband you'd be amazed how quickly you start filling things up. Game demos, videos, music files. I'd go for 120Gb right now. You can get a 120Gb SATA drive (also recommended as opposed to IDE) for around 60 quid. But it really depends on what you want. Hard drives are a doddle to upgrade later if you run out of room.

In terms of running the latest games they're becoming real RAM hogs. I'd get as much of the fastest RAM you can afford.

This is what I recently built:

3.0GHz Intel P4 with 800 MHz FSB
1Gb Dual Channel DDR Kingston HyperX PC4100 RAM
Abit IC7-Max3 Motherboard
120GB SATA Maxtor Hard Drive
128Mb 9800 Pro videocard (which with stock cooling I've managed to overclock by 50MHz on both the GPU and memory side with no 'artifacts')
Antec 480W TrueBlue PSU (sounds dull but a decent PSU is key to a reliable PC)

It cost around 800 quid to build. Excluding the graphics card - that I already had.

Of course you don't have the same kind of warranty (instead the warranty is on the components). And (you say your a novice) if you were to try and build it and fry something you'd be somewhere between peeved and apocalyptic - depending on your disposition

But still - that PC flies on every game and game demo I've tried so as far as specs it should give you an idea of what to look for.

[Ian(not Ian)]

Ish is right on the build it yourself issue Concept.
I too have just bulit a similar spec PC myself. I used a Shuttle barebone kit as the basis as they extremely quiet.

Mine is..

Shuttle S61G2 with 800 Mhz FSB from http://www.overclockers.co.uk
P4 3.0 GHZ with Hyper Threading
512 Kingston PC400 RAM (costly stuff)
120 GB SATA HDD
128 MB ATI 9600 Pro.

I haven't overclocked it like Ish as it is jolly fast....But not fast enough for the recently released Painkiller demo with everything set to max.

If you must but a pre-built PC I would probably go for DELL. Just make sure you get at least all of the above specs, better if you can.

Good luck.

[Concept]

Thanks for the informative information guys.

I'm still considering my options but I'll be deciding early next week what I'm going to do. You've certainly given me food for thought.

[Edame]

I just built my second system last night (with some last minute help from Ginger Tosser).

Shuttle XPC SN85G4 (barebones with mobo)
AMD Athlon 64-bit 3200
120Gb S-ATA HDD
Radeon 9600XT 128mb
1GB Crucial PC2700 RAM
Sony DVD +-RW

I salvaged a few bits and pieces from my old system (peripherals, soundcard and 512mb of RAM) so it set me back around ?700. For ?1000-1500 you should be able to build a kickass system.

My shuttle system also came with the clearest installation instructions I've seen yet, step-by-step with photos the whole way.
I haven't put the PC through it's paces yet, but it looks great (it's so much smaller than my tower system) and it doesn't sound like there's a harrier jump-jet outside my window when it's switched on.

[Montaver]

Dude, dont get a 9600 XT, for 156 u can get a 9800pro brand new sapphire from overclockers.co.uk, or scan are doing a deal where u can get an OTES ABIT 5900 for 135, both of those cards would CANE a 9600xt. Otherwise good choice of kit!