Legit Reviews

Well, my friend contacted me asking me to pull together a list of parts for him.

This is what I've come up with so far:

case
power supply
motherboard
processor
memory
video card
hard drive
dvd drive

Plus, it'll have a generic floppy drive, blue case fans, and rounded cables.

He's currently got a slightly upgraded Gateway G6-450, so this will be a very significant upgrade. (About as much as mine was an upgrade from a G6-400.) He'll be getting an lcd, surround sound system (speakers and sound card), and better keyboard mouse too after this.

Thats a woefully inadueqate GFX card for anything really... 7300? are you sure?

Rest looks excellent, but that GFX card is gonna be one heck of a weak link in that system.

Maybe consider a 7800? 6800 even, or go ATI?

is he a gamer, if so, that gfx is not good enough. As for the memory, you should look into 2 sticks rather than 1 stick of 1gig and take the advantage of the dual channel. I think either go for 2x1gig or 2x512mb.

I would also look into other psu. that psu is nice but 400w and the 14amp and 15amp on the 12v maybe a bit low if your firend plans to upgrade to high end gfx.

this one is nice if you don't mind the rebate (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6817103931)

good set up, PSU is fine. but the only issue i can see if that video card, get a 7600GT and he should be set. that PSU will support upto i would say a single X1900XT

I'm curious as to why the 7300GS is inadequate for gaming? Since it has about double the clock and memory speeds of the FX-5500 (which I have) wouldn't it be a lot faster? The 5500 runs most things at mid-settings. Besides that he's just getting an entry level card for now, it'll be upgraded later too.

As will the ram (sooner than later for this one) as well as the PSU.

No, not at all. Clock speed is like the RPM of a car, the higher it is doesnt mean it must got faster.

Compare the 600Mhz speed of an 9600XT with the 300Mhz of the Radeon 9700, which is faster, the 9700 obviously, even though its double the speed.

Clock speeds mean very little compared to Pixel Pipelines, vertex Shader Units, Pixel Shader Units etc... go with the reccomendations here!

yah, 7600GT is the best video card for your money, if ur an ATi can u can get the X850XT but its gettin old..

Yes, I see what you mean...

It'll come down to what he wants to spend, but I'll recommend this instead. Would that work good?

take a look at this

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814127217

slot blowing. im sure the cooler is better than tthe stock 7600GT cooler

also this i sproven to cool better than the stock 7600GT cooler

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814125025

and its quiet.