Ye Old Computer Upgrade

Posted by Wolfen in General, Hardware

As mentioned in my previous post, I have a new gaming computer on the way. Unfortunately, due to the holidays, shipping is rather slow. So, that leaves me with only being able to write about it instead of using it. Currently, I’m using an Apple Macbook Pro and running Bootcamp to game with. It’s a higher-end model running at 2.4ghz, with 4gigs of RAM, and a Nvidia 8600GTm 256mb video card. It runs Everquest and Lord of the Rings Online surprisingly well at the 17″‘s native resolution of 1920×1200.

Since I’m going to start up Everquest 2 and Vanguard again, I wanted to get a beefier machine. I don’t like to play games on lower settings and I was worried that Vanguard would be a problem. That prompted me to order a desktop PC with a stronger video card. I have built my own computers for years, but this time around I went with a pre-built solution. Computers are so inexpensive these days that it wasn’t worth my time doing all the parts/pricing research that usually goes into my building a custom PC.

It didn’t take me long to find a decent PC at at great price. I ended up purchasing a HP Pavilion m8200n Multimedia PC from Amazon.com for $669. The specifications include an AMD X2 6000+ processor, 3gb RAM, 500gb hard drive, TV tuner, etc. The included video card is very weak, so I found an Nvidia 8800GT 512mb card on sale at Best Buy for $250. This system is certainly not the best, but it’s a fast computer at a cheap price. The bummer for me is the estimated arrival date isn’t until January 2nd, so here I am waiting for it. But, soon enough, we’ll find out how well it performs with these games.

–Wolfen