Full Powered, Compact, Gaming Rigs? 247
Michael Buffington asks: "I frequently go to LAN gaming parties, and because I'm not all that interested in toting my higher power mid tower machine around, I bring my lower powered notebook. I want to build a full powered machine complete with a fast, 3.5" HD, CD-ROM, Pentium III or similar in speed CPU, at least 1 AGP slot, and at least 2 PCI slots (or integrated sound, or network, or both), as small as possible. I've considered going the PC 104 route, but don't know of any vendors who sell complete systems (which I'd be more comfortable with, on the PC 104 route), and honestly don't know the pricing on PC 104. I've also considered finding the smallest motherboard I can, and hand building a machine as small as possible with normal equipment (duct tape being part of the 'normal' equipment). Does anyone have any ideas, examples, or stories to help with my new obsession?"
Greetings from Kyoto (Score:1)
But maybe you could get a carrying case designed for DJs (to hold their mixer and SL1200s (or whatever) in). There should be plenty of room to fit a motherboard and other stuff, also you should be able to do some slight modifications. You'll probably have to drill a few holes too and so on. The point is that you get a suitably large container with a handle (and/or wheels) and install your computer inside that. Then get a small LCD screen which fits in your backpack and you're set to go!
PS. Bush blows goats
Re:why don't you go out and play a sport (Score:1)
Small Lan Computer! I have one! (Score:1)
i built a system like what you were describing (Score:1)
1. it must use standard components (to make it easier to find parts to buy)
2. it must be cheap (at least cheaper than a comparable laptop)
this is a list of components that i used to build the system.
i updated parts of the list to reflect what components i would buy if i was going to build it today.
case mini tower [enlightcorp.com] $60
monitor 14" lcd [viewsonic.com] $600
motherboard micro atx [yimg.com] $100
processor P3 800Mhz 100FSB $160
ram 256MBpc100SDRAM $100
video Geforce2GTS64MB [newegg.com] $195
keyboard mini-keyboard [worklink.net] $40
mouse cordless optical [logitech.com] $70
hard drive 40GB ide $100
cd-rom drive Plextor16/10/40A [plextor.com] $250
floppy 1.44MB Generic $10
sound card SB Live Value [soundblaster.com] $40
network card netgear FA310TX [netgear.com] $20
cat5 cable 14 feet $20
headphones koss td61 [koss.com] $20
carry strap GearGrip Pro [thinkgeek.com] $35
other stuff:
cable bag a small, strong bag to attach to the side of the case to hold all the cables
power cable with 3 outlets that have 3 prongs each to accommodate the power cables for your system and monitor
i attached the lcd monitor to one side of the case and the cable bag to the other side. i put all the cables attached to the computer inside the bag to get them out of the way. then, when i went to a lan party i would only have to take one power cable, one network cable, the mini-keyboard, cordless mouse, and headphones out of the cable bag. everything was already connected at the back of the computer so there was no onsite setup involved.
i also screwed a piece of plexiglass onto the lcd monitor to protect the screen. (yes it was stupid to drill holes into a monitor that i just spent $900 on at that time, but it worked)
i had a lot of fun with that computer. i even dropped it down a flight of stairs once and the case was bent and all the pci cards popped out of their sockets. i put it back together and it worked fine.
the only downside to building this system was that it weighed about 30lbs. although if you spent more money on a lunchbox case with integrated lcd it would still weigh a lot.
unfortunately i never took any pictures of it for posterity and i ended up dismantling it for parts about 6 months ago, but i'm sure you get the idea.
-stan
Compact system (Score:1)
Er... (Score:1)
- A.P.
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Forget Napster. Why not really break the law?
i810 3d is *horrid*... (Score:1)
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Forget Napster. Why not really break the law?
bsi fieldgo (Score:1)
I have used the bsi fieldgo portables http://www.fieldgo.com they are great but very pricey, a laptop may be cheaper than these things. I've had one apart, they seem to have very standard pc stuff in them. The military bought lots of these things to run linux out in the field on. So maybe with luck we can pick these things up at surplus sales or on ebay in a few years.
Good luck finding PC hardware (Score:2)
Re:Easy... (Score:1)
Rackmount (Score:2)
Just buy a dell.... (Score:1)
MicroATX (Score:1)
If you wanted to make your own chassis, you might thin it down by using riser cards so you can mount the video/PCI cards sideways, but you'll still be stuck trying to find a way to mount the power supply, so it'll still be somewhat bulky.
I think would be difficult to build a system smaller than that for less than the price of an equivalent laptop, mostly because you'd have to find a kick-ass power supply and get other expensive components (SBC motherboards, etc.)
Re:Is this what you were looking for? (Score:2)
Sure is more palatable to look at a motherboard at lunchtime instead of, well, I just won't go there...
Chris Cothrun
Curator of Chaos
Re:Try a 500 MHz TiBook running OS X... (Score:1)
Re:Whats the point of making the case small? (Score:1)
Lighter is more important than smaller (Score:1)
The guys here at work just got in some aluminum cases and I think it may just be about time for me to upgrade to one. They run about $200, which is a little high for a quality case but they are very light. My current case is 45 lbs, the aluminum ones here are like 12 (both empty). Bolt a handle on and your set.
If you're intersted, details on the cases are available [lian-li.com].
PC104 (Score:2)
Look I get 8fps in Q3A, but my box is smaller than my head!
Sod the power, go retro (Score:2)
After I get four F1-races, I'm going to start on 16 Faceball 2000s and a few more four player adapters.
Does anyone remember when two player PC games connected with a simple null modem connection? I played so much Populous this way...
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Try a 500 MHz TiBook running OS X... (Score:2)
The selection of games should be better by then too.
Re:Easy... (Score:3)
Mouse?
Trackpad is *the* ultimate killing device. Back in my Q1 days, I was the absolute master of the triple rocket frag. That was on a trackpad. I tried going back to a mouse, and while I'm not bad, I'm nowhere near as good as I was on the pad.
See, the wonderful feature is that my accuracy was through the roof. Rocket just under the feet to send him up, a second just as he starts to fall (and thereby still in the blast radius), and then a third as he's falling back down, but this one to the actual body. Bled off most of the armor and health, and then...
SPLUT. Shower of gibs just before he hits the ground.
Fear the trackpad.
Raptor
Re:Is this what you were looking for? (Score:2)
Re:I normally take... (Score:1)
sweet! (Score:1)
I would probably agree with pcgamer - hell, video in laptops has been crap for years.
is it available yet? do you know what line it's going in?
You might want to wait... (Score:3)
However, it does take a while to get a new video chip in a laptop because each individual model has to get certified (this is what nvidia told me). So, even though the nvidia chip is out now, it might still be another four months or so until you see it in action.
Now, if you have money, i would suggest this route - microatx. You can get some pretty sweet [caseoutlet.com] plastic cases that are very small, and decent motherboards [asus.com.tw] from good manufacturers like Asus. Pair this up with a flatpanel and you'd have a trick gaming machine for sure.... if you're really into hacking you can mount the flatpanel in the side of the case, but you might need to get a slightly bigger case for that.
So, if you don't want to wait, go microatx. if you do, just keep your eyes open until a laptop with the gf2go comes out.
Re:"At least one AGP slot"? (Score:1)
I can. Multiheaded gaming is not all that uncommon. [planetquake.com] It's quite neat, but to be honest I would prefer it over THREE monitors as opposed to two. The reason I say this is that in Quake 3 the crosshair is divided evenly between monitors, and that is a pain for railgun use.
Geforce2 Go... (Score:1)
It's a 850MHz PIII with a 15" LCD...
Firewire, integrated ethernet, integrated modem, integrated smartmedia reader, integrated 8x DVD/4x CDR/RW burner, two free PCMCIA slots, etc.
Came with 128MB ram, add another 128 for ~$50 after a quick search on PriceWatch.com...
This laptop cost me ~ $2500 (retails for $2599) and probably offers better gaming performance than any currently available laptop.
The Geforce2 Go performance is more or less like a under clocked (143MHz) Geforce2 MX. It plays Q3, Black and White, etc. very well.
Sometime around the end of this month Dell will also have a laptop (Inspiron 8000) with a Geforce2 Go priced roughly at $2650 for the base model.
I recommend going with one of these two laptops if you're going for compact gaming.
My only gripe about this laptop, and all other laptops, is that laptop hard drive performance is nowhere near as good as a cheap 7,200 RPM Desktop harddrive...
nVidia GeForce2 Go RatioMetric... (Score:1)
D'oh (Score:1)
Re:Try a 500 MHz TiBook running OS X... (Score:2)
Only having 25 games to chose from, instead of 100, doesn't really disqualify a platform from being use for "serious gaming" (whatever that is). On a Linux box or a Mac, you can still piss your life away, playing brand new games all around the clock until you get fired, and your wife moves out, and your mistress stops emailing you to set up quickie rendezvous, and your dog runs away, and your cat gets scared of the rats living in the empty pizza boxes piled up next to your computer, and your computer's fans all clog up with dust (unless you have a Mac) and overheats, and then you finally just can't read the letters on the keys anymore, because they're all covered with an opaque cake consisting of dust cemented by pizza grease, Mountain Dew, sweat, and possibly other bodily fluids. And by the time you get everything cleaned off so you can see again, there will be another few dozen games to choose from.
Saying that Linux or MacOS isn't suitable for "serious gaming" is like saying China can't do "serious nuking" because they don't have as many warheads as USSR. If you think you need Windoze to play games, it's probably because you're addicted to some very specific title.
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Re:pricing of ebx/pc104 components (Score:1)
Toshiba laptops w/ GeForce2 Go (Score:3)
Re:ATI graphics (Score:1)
I think the tests I ran on it said it didn't even support all the DirectX functions that most (if not all) the rest of the graphics cards in the world support.
The newer Dells can ship with a 32meg ATI Rage3dish card, which I hear is a thousand times better.
Re:Buy a decent laptop (Score:2)
Why?
I was shopping around for a laptop last year. My main two choices (retail) were Compaq and Toshiba.
Now part of the requirements for this particular purchase were that it run Linux. BSD would be a plus, but Linux was a requirement. Not only that it run Linux, however, but also that it run X on Linux.
I'd read up on Linux on laptops and had narrowed it down basically to one of three machines: A Compaq, an IBM and a Toshiba. I tried them all out at various stores and discovered that for the most part, they were all the same. The Compaq was really cool (I like the placement of the speakers and such) and the Toshiba seemed reliable. I was replacing a Toshiba Satellite Pro that finally went dead on me--or rather, the onboard memory did, and you can't replace that without a new board, which would run about as much as a used laptop.
But I digress.
I was about to buy it when a burst of something hit me. I asked if I could try installing some software on the test machine and they said "Ok." I popped in my Debian install CD, rebooted and just stared. The visible screen was reduced to about 1/5 normal. Mind you I got all 80x25 characters, but they were TINY!
In awe of this, I popped out the CD and booted back into Windows, opened a command prompt, hit CTRL-ENTER (turns it fullscreen) and got the exact same display.
As it turns out, even switching the resolution made it use less of the screen, and thus the icons were smaller.
Tried the same thing on the Toshiba and got the same results.
Tried the same thing on the IBM, and it worked just like it should--fullscreen 80x25, etc.
Needless to say, I went with the IBM.
Now I eventually took it back (the manager was REALLY cool about this) because running X required using the Framebuffer X server, which frankly sucks. Ended up with a Dell Inspiron 7500 and couldn't be happier.
Oh, and it *does* change resolutions correctly
Re:Just buy a dell.... (Score:3)
And actually, I have a GeForce 400mhz system at home and I work with Dell 700mhz Celerons with Ati 4meg graphics cards. The Dell actually beats my system in a few cases. Of course not in all, but it does in some.
My guess is he got a bad system or you tweaked the hell out of yours. Plus you DO have an ultra version of the card. That is a huge plus when it comes to 3d benchmarks.
And aside from *all* of that, the original poster wanted a machine he could carry with him. The Inspiron 8000 series is, flat out, a powerhouse. Up to 1ghz processor, up to 512megs ram, up to 32meg graphics card (Ati Rage == good, GeForce == better and coming soon), with DVD and CDRW. I was pricing them just last night and came up with a slightly reduced version of what I just said for around $2400. Not bad, and my current dell laptop rules my world except for the graphics card
Compaq EN SFF (Score:1)
MicroATX MB + mini case (Score:2)
Look here [esc-tech.com] for some info on the case.
If you're running Linux or UNIX and not using hardware accelerated 3D, you can use your laptop as the "monitor", by using it as an X terminal (or using VNC if you like that better). If you need HW accelerated 3D or are using windows, you will still need to drag a monitor around :(.
Portable Audio PC (Score:1)
Suitcase PC (Score:1)
It was nice, but he did say he had a problem with cooling the thing... but then again, I figure you can always do liquid cooling. I was thinking about doing one like that myself. It's the one and main reason I don't go to more LAN parties, other than the distance and sleep deprivation and bad food thing ;-)
Good Luck.
Flex Atx (Score:1)
They usually have two pci slots, and if you look hard enough you can find one with a decent embedded video card. I have seen one with the ati rage -whatever- in it. (they are all rage "something".) Ok, so embedded video isn't great, but it is the form factor that matters, not the power right?
Cuchullain
Re:PC-104 stuff (Score:1)
To make it easier to carry (Score:1)
Re:Ask Slashdot: drunken transatlantic flamefest (Score:1)
in portland, oregon its 9:40 and im already drunk!
Re:Lunchbox style portable (Score:1)
Another site, should be cheaper (Score:1)
Re:Lunchbox style portable (Score:2)
here's a HOW-TO (Score:1)
The Making of a Portable Athlon
http://myhome.netsgo.com/wesleycrushr/Hardware/gu
chris
Sharky helps you.. (Score:1)
The urls explain themselves sorta.
These two are buyers guides for computers...
http://www.sharkyextreme.com/theguide/value_game_
http://www.sharkyextreme.com/theguide/high_game_p
Now I suggest you look at these next ones for video cards since 3d cards are very essential to gamers. My card is a Hercules 3d Prophet2 GeForce2 GTS 64mb. If you plan on getting an NVdia card I suggeset getting any of the Hercules 3d Prophet Series. They are the best for gaming in my opinion. If you want TV out/in, dvd playback, and some decent 3d, you can go with the ATI Radeon, but I can't endorse it since I've never used it, I've only heard other people's stories.
Anyways here are the urls.
http://www.sharkyextreme.com/hardware/articles/va
http://www.sharkyextreme.com/hardware/articles/su
That's about it...
Disclaimer: I don't feel like running a spell check or grammer check on myself. I'll leave it up to the Anonymous Cowards to point out my mistakes or broken urls or whatever.
-PovRayMan
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Re:tool-box (Score:1)
"At least one AGP slot"? (Score:3)
1: Why would you want to have more than one graphics card?
Bearing in mind AGP is designed to optimise 3D texture transfer, the argument of a 2d and 3d card is irrelevnt, and pointless with modern cards.
If the system was to switch between work and games, then, and only then, can I see an argument for two cards. But for a games specific machine, nope.
2: To quote the AGP 2.0 specification [intel.com] (footnote 3, page 27)
In other words, one AGP card (the target is the motherboard, master is the card) has to be switched off during AGP transfers.
There is a reason AGP is a Port, not a Bus.
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small system (Score:1)
Long forgotten company... (Score:2)
Their focus is on industrial, ruggedized systems -- ones that you could install an oscilloscope PCI card in, for example. Some have 5 1/4" internal bays, and these are usually the ones sporting the ISA/PCI expansion capability, too.
All of these sport (of course) integrated keyboards , trackpoint mice, and LCD panels.
Of course, you could just look at their
Happy hunting!
Re:Incoherent Literary Reference? (Score:1)
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Re:MicroATX MB + mini case (Score:1)
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Re:Just buy a dell.... (Score:1)
I build my own systems, but I haven't seen an 800MHz PIII get beat by a 450MHZ PIII yet (assuming they are identical graphics cards).
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Re:i810 3d is *horrid*... (Score:1)
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Re:Just buy a dell.... (Score:1)
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Don't bother with PC/104 (Score:2)
Re:I normally take... (Score:2)
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My project (Score:3)
First, the processor has to be taken into consideration. I picked a Duron 700 at the time, and grabbed a micro-ATX (or whatever the smallest form factor is, I don't recall) board for this. It had integrated audio and ethernet.
I grabbed a decent 30$ power supply. Anything decent should suffice.
I grabbed a geforce2mx, for economical reasons in part, but also because it's relatively 'short' and was only 85$ at the time.
All I put in this thing was a CDROM drive, since floppy drives are virtually useless nowadays.
I took an old compaq presario case, and cut it up a bit, and slapped the board in it. Not exactly what I was looking for, but next time I'll do things differently...
Next time, I'll get moderately thick plexiglass and use that for the entire frame, while using metal L braces to connect the 4 sides. cutting the metal to fit for the ATX form factor board was a pain in the ass, and plexiglass is quite sturdy, not to mention a heck of a lot easier to work with. Provided you don't want a high level of complexity in case shape and design, you can rip out the normal bay mounting points from a normal case, and connect them in relatively easily to the plexiglass. I'd probably recomment 1/4th inch plexiglass, provided you support everything well. (putting metal strips along the the side that has the motherboard might be advisable).
This way, it not only looks awesome, but it's small and portable. You could even throw a black light into it, get some clear fish aquarium tubing, and make a closed-circuit tube full of antifreeze and put it around the seams of the case - you'd have a very nice glowing system. (I plan to do something similar.) Ideally, you can also make one of the sides easily removable or on a hinge, so hardware upgrades are feasable.
Something I've got in my design template is a small compartment near the bottom where all the system cables are easily retracted and extracted without too much mess and table. You might want to design something like that for yourself. (mouse and headphones fit nicely as well.)
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CAIMLAS
Whats the point of making the case small? (Score:2)
Regardless of the specs you mentioned the largest componet is going to be your monitor.
A normal, everyday mini case with more than what you requested is half the size of a decent gaming monitor.
How about getting a good quality lap top from Dell or another brand name with the new Nvidia or ATI mobile graphics chips and a good compatible sound card?
Re:"At least one AGP slot"? (Score:2)
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Genius dies of the same blow that destroys liberty.
TOSHIBA s402 (Score:2)
2799
Re:"At least one AGP slot"? (Score:2)
Concurrent AGP would be a great idea for several purposes:
As a faster way to do Ultra-320 SCSI [adaptec.com] (maybe) than 66MHz 64bit PCI [adaptec.com].
As a way to run 2 AGP video cards, each with two digital monitor outputs, combining the 4 resulting flat screens for a truly useful 3D workstation / desktop (see the SGI reality stations, etc. [sgi.com]).Re:"At least one AGP slot"? (Score:2)
Here's a starter gaming Rig (Score:3)
And you can't go wrong with a flat panel LCD [compusa.com] if you can afford it. You may want to check your local computer fair and see if you can buy a refurbished one.
spend more money (Score:3)
-Michael
Offhand... (Score:2)
The strength here is that you have all of the functionality (not to mention upgradeability) of a real computer with all of the mobility of an old 80s luggable PC.
This just a thought that I have been kicking around.
Re:Ever heard (Score:2)
Yes, the hard drives tend to be slow. A big enough laptop hard drive helps defeat some of this, and lots of memory always helps.
I'd rather SPEND more than CARRY more. Call me spoiled.
I can't wait to get ahold of a GeForce2Go based laptop.
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
Re:I normally take... (Score:2)
BTW - The ATI doesn't seem to take a performance hit as the scaling appears to be done in hardware somewhere between the Video Chipset and the LCD, or perhaps in the LCD display it's self. If that's the case, I think there is probably no reason that NVidia based Laptops can't have this feature.
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
Re:I normally take bait... (Score:2)
Dell now offers the 8000, which is some degree cheaper. It's not nearly as light as the 5000e, but in most respects it is a superior system minus the extreme compact nature of the 5000e.
It's easy to say that if I were buying the system today I would rather have the 8000, for $2000 less.
Incidently, you are very wrong. I have a Pentium III based desktop system graced with 256 megabytes of ram and a GeForce 2 GTS and I can honestly say from personal experience that my desktop doesn't game THAT MUCH better than my laptop.
Yes, there is a performance difference. And in some things you can REALLY tell. But no, it's not "half as fast" as you put it. I can EASILY say without a doubt that my Laptop was outperforming many desktops I saw present at Lanwar.
I speak as an owner of both. If my 5000e gets to the point where the latest, greatest game isn't going to play well, I'll buy a new laptop.
As for the question of my Laptop getting stolen, I've known of few items* turn up missing at Lanwars in general. Maybe it's the mentality of gamers that the only thing it's okay to steal is copyrighted material. Besides, at Lanwar 9 [lanwar.com], I think I was the only person out of 380+ that showed up with a Laptop. I looked for others, but didn't see any.
*(As I recall, someone's stuffed animal turned up missing at Lanwar 9. It was announced over the PA, but this doesn't mean it was stolen, it could have just been misplaced.)
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
I normally take... (Score:4)
128 megabytes of ram (ready for the other 128 megs any day now...) 30 gig HD, 850mhz Pentium III, Rage Mobility 128, 1600x1200 15+ inch display with RatioMetric Scaling, a DVD, and a 3Com CardBus 10/100+56k double height dongle-free Nic/Modem.
I've found that for almost any game I want to play, this groovy little gig is light, powerful, and a whole lot less trouble than "dragging along my big leather suitcase and my garment bag and my tenor saxophone and my twelve-pound bowling ball and my lucky, lucky autographed glow-in-the-dark snorkel" (well, hey, at least THAT'S what it feels like to drag your whole computer to LANWAR [lanwar.com].
Anyway, I normally get a lot of ooohs and aaahs from the people sitting next to me. Their first reactions are "You aren't seriously going to play on a Laptop are you?"
But by the time they see me pulling off acceptable frame-rates in Quake 3 they soon realize maybe it's not so bad for games after all. (Just bring along a good mouse, touch-pads blow for games.)
Incidently, it even plays Black And White fairly well, and of course it plays Diablo II like a dream.
One thing to note about portables that anybody looking to buy one should keep in mine is the RatioMetric Displays.
Some LCDs only look good in their native resolution, requiring lower screen sizes to be scaled up into a blocky mess or to be reduced down and not viewed fullscreen.
ATI's later offerings have used a method where somewhere between the video output and the LCD, any display that isn't full screen is blown up to fill the full LCD with a natural Anti-Aliasing effect. This form of "Mode Promotion" works really well for almost any display mode, though anything less than 640x480 does seem to suffer from a slight blurr, but who uses anything lower than that for games?
Anyway, the point of this message is that you shouldn't discount very high end Laptops as Lanparty material. Just get over the $5000 price tag of one with good performance and you'll be fine.
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
Re:Is this what you were looking for? (Score:2)
http://www.cnn.com_____________________:_______
Nicely hidden, while looking at mouseover like a legit url.
Is this what you were looking for? (Score:5)
Hope this helps.
-Jason
SBC (Score:2)
Re:Just buy a dell.... (Score:2)
BTW: this laptop was reviewed in the last Computer Gaming World, and the staff there had a very high opinion of it as a gaming machine. The first gaming laptop worthy of a gamers notice was how I think they put it.
So grab a copy of last months CGW if you can still find it.
Re:You might want to wait... (Score:2)
Umm...ATI already has a comparable laptop chip [ati.com].
So you want integrated 100bT, stereo sound, etc? If the PowerBook Titanium [apple.com] had Radeon instead of Rage 128, I'd recommend that in a heartbeat. Apple will probably upgrade the graphics chip this summer.
Re:tool-box (Score:2)
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Re:"At least one AGP slot"? (Score:2)
AGP is a cheap hack. It was created because it is slightly cheaper than 66 MHz 64-bit PCI (actually, quite a bit cheaper).
The 3dfx cards used AGP AS 66 MHz, 64-bit PCI (not using the AGP part).
We're NOT using AGP the way it was intended. The goal of AGP was to let you eliminate graphics memory by creating a direct link to system memory. Intel's goal it to make everything dependant on the primary system (CPU), and as a result, putting it to memory requirements is second best.
Intel wants to take the money AWAY from component makes and move it into CPUs, mobos, chipsets, and other core features that they dominate.
AGP isn't faster than 66MHZ 64-bit PCI, it just a less complicated approach.
The spec for server PCI has been on the Alphas for about 4 or 5 years now? That should have been the solution for new graphics cards. Instead of the ugly AGP hack (and REAL cards don't take advantage of the AGP part of the equation, because they will use the local memory, they only use the system memory so they can create 16MB and 32MB versions of their 64MB card AND so game creators can create games that would like a 256MB video card and it will fake it... real coders target a platform, but I digress), we'd have REAL system IO. Instead was now have PCI Modems and Sound Cards (yeah, so important that we got them off the PCI bus...), PCI sound cards that use the PCI bus like vid. cards use the AGP bus to avoid putting RAM there, etc.
With RAM price this cheap, all my components should have some. Instead, All my devices want to graph system RAM (which is fine at 384MB), but that is sucking my my PCI bus from my SCSI card.
Next mobo will support the 64-bit, 66MHz PCI spec for my SCSI card, then I'll feel better.
Alex
Re:what about the x-box? (Score:2)
I also like wargame LAN parties, but those are harder to come by.
I have seen girls at them... but it's rare.
Alex
Some day I'll learn to hit preview (Score:2)
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heat (Score:3)
Re:PC/104 (Score:2)
Except that PC/104 only has an ISA bus and PC/104+ has ISA and PCI busses - No AGP. And I've never seen a PC/104+ 3d video card either.
Re:"At least one AGP slot"? (Score:2)
PC-104 stuff (Score:4)
Re:what about the x-box? (Score:3)
No way dude.. total babe fests. Hot chicks too.. all wearing "All your base belong to us" shirts. Those shirts turn me on.
-gerbik
Lunchbox style portable (Score:3)
ComputerNerd sells a decent prebuilt (Score:2)
Nice and small, but plenty powerful, and extremely well-built -- of course you'd have to add a monitor...
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One more opinion (Score:2)
My advice would be to stick with a desktop for gaming. Not only do they generally offer better performance overall (HD speed anyone?), but they're much easier to upgrade. A GeForce2 in a laptop might sound good now, but what about in a couple years, when Quake 4 or whatever wants a GeForce3, or you want to throw in a SBLive Titanium-Platnium-Gold-Silver-Bronze?
There's a lot of companies making specialized carrying straps for gaming rigs. Usually something like velcro straps with a handle on the top, perhaps some pockets for keyboard, mice, power cords, etc. Check out ThinkGeek, there's a couple listed there.
Re:Buy a high-end laptop if you can afford it. (Score:2)
Ooops. Sorry for the formatting error...
You'll also want to spring for a 15" LCD screen, I think.
Dell's GX150 SF can be seen here . [dell.com]
Compaq's EN SFF can be seen here. [compaq.com]
Buy a high-end laptop if you can afford it. (Score:3)
Sounds remarkably... (Score:2)
The Saint Song Espresso PC II (Score:2)
Re:Er... (Score:2)
That, of course, will be the topic of next week's Ask Slashdot: "How can I build a smaller monitor? I've heard I can get a nasty shock even when it's unplugged. What parts should I avoid touching?"
Seriously, it's easier to carry one bulky monitor and one small case (even if it's still separate trips) than it is to carry one bulky monitor and one large case, especially if you're dragging them somewhere like a 3rd floor apartment.
Hell, maybe his friend even has some extra monitors lying around. A cheap monitor is still significantly cheaper than a "cheap" PC with enough oomph to keep up with contemporary FPSes.
carrying handle for your full-size PC (Score:2)
-Leperflesh.
what about the x-box? (Score:2)
Having never been to one, I wonder what games are played. Half-Life, Quake, Unreal, I assume. Not Dr. Mario or Dig-Dug. I'm just curious.
I also wanted to know if these LAN thingies are mostly "sausage fests" or if women actually pretended to be impressed by virtual feats of destruction.
Check me out, ladies. I just rolled over this PacPan machine! [ridiculopathy.com]
Re:Smallest PC (Score:3)
Check this out... (Score:4)
If you've got that kind of money (Score:2)
You can eat up a lot of shipments of a brighter, clearer picture for the price of one $2800 flatscreen.
As long as the lan parties aren't last-minute, you have plenty of lead time. You don't even have to unpack the monitor at home. Just call for an evening pickup and do ground, 2nd day, or overnight as the case is required.
Re:Ever heard (Score:3)
Laptops are MUCH slower than their desktop counterparts and unacceptable for any modern LAN gaming. The new Geforce MX at least makes it POSSIBLE to use a laptop for hardcore gaming, but the major limiting factor is going to be the screen. Laptop screens are small, and LCD screens have a tendency to blur at high framerates/fast motion usage, making them totally unacceptable for any kind of serious gaming. In addition, laptop keyboards tend to be a bit cramped, so you would need to bring an external keyboard and mouse to maintain accurate control.
Laptop hard drives are notoriously slow, and the poster specifically asked for a fast IDE drive.