Buying a new rig - CPU question

I did look at the various treads but decided to create a new tread on this particular subject. I guess I should mention that I'm looking at the high end type rig.

Is buying a new rig right now good timing? With all the changes coming with Conroe a month or 2 away it seems like it's a good decision to wait for a few months to both get the benefit of more options and possible better performance. Then again it always looks like a good idea to wait when considering new tech.

Views, comments and insights welcome.

-Xino

Waiting is hard, but its the right thing to do. Buy online! Dont get it at your local Fry's just because its close, you will save so much money which can be used to buy beer or another stick of ram. Buy everything around the CPU before hand that way you will have what you want, looks wise and sound card wise. Video card(optional, but the longer you wait to buy this puppy the more of a chance you get of it going down in price), RAM, and CPU, mobo should be bought together. Thats all I got. Peace out!

You will ALWAYS get better technology or price if you wait a few months. So generally I'd say just go for it.

However... I'm about to get a new system too. In fact, I was all set to get an AM2 system until I did some reading on the Conroe processor so I'm waiting for them to come out to get some real data. (Same performance, half the cost.. how can I lose!?)

So in this particular instance, I'd say hold off.

Conroes have been launched.

Apparently Dell's will be shipping with them starting 7/17.

However, there is expected to be a shortage, so that the aging pentium d's and core duos can be fire-saled, so it may be a few months before they are readily available.

So I would cross my fingers for september if ya cant get lucky in a few weeks.

Do not go to Fry's. You will pay a $100 premium on every piece of hardware you buy.

The good news is that the core duo's are being firesaled and are pin compatible with the core 2 duos (conroe). So you can easily upgrade in a few months.

So, I am in the EXACT same position. I need to make the Dual/PCIe/New Graphics upgrade sometime before fall. I've decided to hold out until I get the Conroe, mostly because I have heard that the next version of Flight Sim will make heavy use of its fiddlybits.

I buy EVERYTHING from Newegg, and I have never been unhappy. Between work and personal machines, I've probably built 20 machines with their parts, and while I have had to return a few DOA bits, they've been extremely easy to deal with.

Same situation as well but only when a game comes out and I can't run it to my liking.

I would wait for Conroe to release. Even if it's not god's gift to budget computing it'll still give you more options, put a little more competition on the market, and potentially lower some prices on various other processors.

Thanks for the input. I've decided to wait for a while to see how it goes. I guess my FX 55 is going to have to hang in there a while longer. I'm done building machines so I'm looking to buy a complete rig. I've used 2 different companies in the past and not been impressed with either of them. Anyone have recommendations?

-Xino

Xino2 wrote:

Thanks for the input. I've decided to wait for a while to see how it goes. I guess my FX 55 is going to have to hang in there a while longer. I'm done building machines so I'm looking to buy a complete rig. I've used 2 different companies in the past and not been impressed with either of them. Anyone have recommendations?

-Xino

Well, what's your price range?

Hard to tell you to go with Falcon Northwest if we don't know whether you have five grand to spend or not

The only packaged rig I ever bought was an alienware, maybe 7 years ago. At that time, their service was just unbelievably great. They shipped with the games I wanted already installed and tweaked (I sent them my copies ahead of time), they sent this complete 3 ring binder with every spec of documentation, setup steps they went through, recovery disks, and a prepaid return label should I need to send it back for any reason whatsoever.

Alas, I would suspect the days of such service are gone, esp since they got bought by Dell.

Well, what's your price range? Hard to tell you to go with Falcon Northwest if we don't know whether you have five grand to spend or not ;)

I was thinking somewhere between 4-6k. Going for 4GB RAM and some sort of RAID setup + SLI. Think I have to spend that kind of money to get that these days.
-Xino

Here ya go. At just under $4300, you can get the other 3 gigs of ram and keep it under 5k.

http://www.alienware.com/product_det...

Or you might consider this monster that runs quad SLI. Just under 4k.

http://www.ibuypower.com/ibp/store/c...

Xino2 wrote:

I was thinking somewhere between 4-6k. Going for 4GB RAM and some sort of RAID setup + SLI. Think I have to spend that kind of money to get that these days.
-Xino

Get something from Falcon Northwest. Their customer service destroys most of their competition and you absolutely can't beat their warranty.

If you have that kind of money for a computer, I don't think there's a better place to buy that kind of rig.

WidowPC. Admittedly, I like to point people there just so I can imagine jaws dropping. I occasionally pop in and max out a system just to see; my latest effort came up at a hair under $16k.

Edit: Check that. With quad 32" displays and every option checked under "Input Devices," you get to $21,500.

Check out:

http://www.boxxtech.com/

For all your quad processor, 16gb of ram, SLI Quadro and multiple terabyte raid goodness...

I think their prices go in the $20k-50k range.

I have yet to see a Windows XP 32bit system stable enough for day to day use with over 2gb of Ram installed..