Computer help- Buying

Not been about recently as the computer blew a gasket(or the HD likely) and i need another.

My usual would be to have one built to my spec, which is usually arrived at after much comparing and ohhing and ahhing.
But tbh i cant really be that 4r5ed these days so was just gooing to buy something capable, and if that cost a few quid more then so be it.

I like online fps so need it to be based around the gpu/ram but looking at the base alienware system im wondering if its such a good idea to go with them over another pre made set up.
The system i had was from about 2009, but included the top gpu of the time.
Looking at the comparison on spec between a 6 year old top card with a modern what is a bottom to mid range,the old 9800GTX+ seems to outclass the gtx745 in many sections and where it does score lower,i dont think that too much and maybe that large difference is skewing the results.
http://gpuboss.com/gpus/Nvidia-GeForce- ... ce-GTX-745

But its been a long time sincee ive looked into this so havent a clue if its all radically different and the higher score is in the area that matters.

The old system was
Athlon 64 X2 6000+ @3.00ghz
3gb Kingston Ram(this was probably the only problem) not sure of speed
XFX GeForce 9800 GTX+ 512mb
Gigabyte M/b one of the ultra durable ones- mdu770 maybe :?
700w psu

The base Alienware X51-
i3-4150 processor (2-cores,3MB Cache, up to 3.5GHz)
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 745 with 4GB DDR3
6GB 1600 MHz DDR3

What does you think ?
More ram do it or the time is just too long, games requirements have changed and tthe X51 would be a better idea ??.

The power draw is really small seems to be one change :? 750-1000w wasnt uncommon but the current X51 is 330w which is a lot of difference.

Re:

I recently build a computer with this spec for not too much I though (Nov 2014)

Used my old case and PSU from back in the Athlon XP/64 days

Gigabyte Z97P-D3 (£62)
Intel i5-4460 (£132)
Crucial Ballistic SportXT 2x4GB (8GB) RAM (£5
Gigabyte GTX 750Ti (£104)

Made a nice very stable base system, far faster than anything else I have

and as a treat
Crucial MX100 512GB (£120)

Currently run Windows10 Insiders Fast Ring on it, but Win8.1 was fine.

Switch the 750Ti for something more powerhungry and noisy if you want, but the sytem quiet I forget it's on half the time.
(Even with BOINC crunching away with the CPU crunching on 3 or 4 cores, the IGP in the CPU crunching away and the GeForce GPU crunching a few instances away.)

A few tweaks in the BIOS needed to bring out the best and that was it. (XMP memory mainly)

The last PC for the boy was home built but the one before was a Chillblast which seemed pretty good "off the shelf"

Shaun

Re:

What's your budget?

Also, if the case, power supply, CD drive and peripherals you already have are still in good order and reasonably up to date, you can save a fair bit by re-using those and upgrading just the motherboard, RAM, HD and graphics card.

Alienware tends to be overpriced and often far more noisy than it needs to be. Prebuilds in general also tend to have cooling and dust issues far more than proper custom PCs and are often difficult when you later decide to upgrade them.
Also, a 745 is really a mid to low-end graphics card nowadays. Considering you mentioned you like online FPS games, a 760-770 would be the bare minimum if you want to play new games at a decent framerate on anything other than minimum settings.
Also keep in mind that games do keep evolving and asking for more powerful GPUs. Getting a low-end one now means you'll be forced to upgrade in a year or two because you won't reach the minimum specs for those upcoming games.

Use PC Parts Picker for easy compatibility checks. Also you could ask in the LinusTechTips forum. The people there tend to be rather hardcore gamers and PC builders. They can come up with several very good bang-for-your-bucks PCs as long as you give them a clear budget.
Be sure to mention if that budget includes a Windows license, monitors, mouse, keyboard etc or if it's just the bare tower.

Considering the old system specs, I wouldn't transfer any part except maybe the case itself and the DVD reader. And I'm not even sure about the case either, the last few years we have seen huge leaps forward when it comes to airflow optimization and cable management options.
The RAM is going to do no good for modern games. Speed isn't the issue because that has been proven to have no noticeable effect, but 8GB is the norm really nowadays.

Re:

While the airflow has changed by placing things upside down compared to traditional, it'll not be a problem unless you are pushing the systems. But a case is not much more if you fancy something new anyway.
Cable management just means you don't need to worry about tape and cable ties, again any system (like mine) which is not being over clocked will not notice a few cables dangling around. Hard drive caddies have improved but the old screw it in still work fine.

The 750Ti will run any few years old game I run at 1050 which both my dual monitor setup is at full details, even overriding in the graphics setup to enhance them.

The 760 is a bit faster, my brother had that but for gta5 he has just upgraded again, mind he has plenty of money ;-). But its quite a bit noisier which I don't want any more.

Anyway, plenty to think about and all will be a lot quicker than what you have now.

Look at the lower capacity SSDs if you don't mind sticking a new 2TB drive in with it for storage.

Thanks for the replies so far, something to work on :?

One of the problems i have is finding a company to do the build, especially as i cant get online easily so research is haphazard at the mo, but the bottom line is there arent many shops willing to build a system and test it. theyll happily sell you all the bits but not the build.
The x51 ticks many of the boxes :?
Ill talk to one of the shops i have seen but was looking to avoid the likes of budgetcomputers or priceless.

I thougt places like pcspecialist, dabs , mesh etc woul be quite happy to take your money to build it?

Shaun

Re:

They're very simple things to build, itf you can put a chainset together then you can build a computer. It's a few screws, possibly even pushfits, pop the cabels in the socket they fit in and turn it on.
Have your OS on a USB pen and install it. (or DVD/CD if you're going retro)

They motherboard manual pretty much tells you what goes where anyway.

Build it youself.

It's not worth going into the effort of learning which parts to choose and spending the time putting it together if it's not something you find fun or interesting.

I always used to go into the route of reading up on the latest tech, seeing what was on the market, comparing what was best value for money part etc, then buying it all and spending a day putting it together.

Can't be arsed now. Much nicer to take something out of a box, plug in, turn on. Done. Depending where you're buying from it's not even more expensive.