Simple America

Anybody that has read me for any length of time realizes that I am a major game geek. I play board games, role playing games, card games, and video games. It is rumored that I play Scrabulous too (and getting abused there too).

When I got my Xbox 360 I figured that I do not require any other platform for my video game needs. All of the games I want to play should be produced for Xbox. The months went by and there are a lot of good games developed for XBox. But I was missing a few games that would really entertain me. So I bought Half Life 2 and World of Warcraft to play on my laptop. And it was fun. I purchased a wireless keyboard and mouse so I could have better control while playing. But for both games I had to play at minimum graphics. And there were crashing issues. I could count on crashing every two hours while playing World of Warcraft. That is really bad when you are part of a group working through an instance. It can get you kicked from the group real quick, and it kills the fun as you stress through the five minutes it takes before I can return to the game’s server.

Another thing that has always irked me is that I cannot load Burning Crusade, the World of Warcraft upgrade. I have been wanting to play a Dranei shaman for the longest time, which is impossible without Burning Crusade. Then I looked at the money I have been depositing in my Paypal count from Blogging and I said I can afford the power.

But I did not want to just go to the store and buy a box and bring it home. I wanted to have a computer that I knew exactly what was on it and provided flexibility for me to adapt as technology progresses. I don’t really need the best state of the art boards right this minute. My goal is to run the games that I want to play that are going to be coming out over the next year. 

For a couple of months I have been visiting all of the techie sites reading about Core 2 processors, Radeon versus Nvideo, and how it all connects. During the process I focused on assembling a budget that would allow me to be a power player under $800.

Last Friday I picked up the paper as I always do. I pulled out the Fry’s Electronics sales section and I could not believe what I saw. The major components that I wanted were on sale. They offered the motherboard I had been stalking with a Core 2 chip for $98. My jaw dropped to the floor. The processor I had budgeted was 1.867 GHz and here they bundled a 2.0 GHz processor with my board of choice. My budget for these items was $98 and $67 and here I was getting them both for $98. Fry’s also listed the Antec 9000 case for $75 bucks, which is five bucks more than I was budgeting as I had been eyeing a Coolermaster case. But the Antec lists for $150 and it is just a dream. There is enough space for nine 5.25″ bays, and it comes with four fans and space to add two more if I need them. They also had a 500 watt Antec power supply unit for $60, and I had been budgeting this at a hundred bucks. When I picked up my son from school we went to Fry’s and shopped.

This is what we came home with. In addition to the previously mentioned items, I picked up two 1 GB 667 GHz RAM memory, which is the max this board can hold. Cost is $70. That foil package holds a Maxtor 300 GB SATA drive for $80. I picked up a Pioneer 18 X 18 RW DVD for $40. I grabbed an e-Geforce video card for $80, though I have a rebate for $30 that I can mail in. This uses a Nivdeo chip for those that are interested. I bought the Windows XP OEM for my operating system at $100 and the Burning Crusade for $30. I was so happy to see the final total came in under $700. That’s more than one hundred under my budget.

 

I put everything on the dining room table, so I would have plenty of room to assemble the parts. First, I took out the case, which is huge.

Front view.

Rear view.

The top of the case provides jacks for head phones, microphone, firewire, and two USB connections.

Left side panel off. The case provides a great deal of space for large mother boards and lots of peripherals. Plenty of space for air to blow through to. Cables conveniently provided for the ports and fan electricity. I anticipate using this case for many years. Long after the other components have been scrapped.

Right side panel removed. This lets you have access to secure devices within the bays such as DVD players, and hard drives.

Antec 500 watt power supply.

The power supply fit in quite snuggly in this case. I just pushed it under the metal tab and I am certain it cannot bounce.

Here is a view of the case’s rear, where the power supply fan , on/off switch, and electrical outlet can be seen. It secures to the case with four screws.

We have power. Nice and snugly fit. More to come soon on the assembly of my new power player maker.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 7th, 2007 at 12:21 pm and is filed under Gaming, Personal. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.