Doing some research, need some help.

I need to figure out what the best parts you could have bought back in 2005 to build the best gaming rig for $600, $1000 and $1500.

Anyone willing to help me out with this?

The parts needed would need to be;

CPU, Motherboard, PSU, Case, Keyboard, Mouse, DVD Drive, GPU, Operating System

Monitor and speakers not needed; The parts would need to be compatible to connect to an HDTV via HDMI however for this study/test I am doing. If HDMI output is not possible with the budget, then a monitor and speakers will also need to be included.

Display output needs to be no greater than 720P.

Skillz said:

I need to figure out what the best parts you could have bought back in 2005 to build the best gaming rig for $600, $1000 and $1500.

Anyone willing to help me out with this?

Click to expand...

I'm actually interested in doing this, and coincidentally I built one around 2003 - 2005.

I think that at the $600 price point or lower, an Athlon XP or Athlon 64 model is going to be the processor of choice because those were REALLY cheap then, but were as good or better than many Pentium 4s. They were a great deal back in the day. I personally went with the Athlon XP because I didn't need 64-bit and the performance seemed adequate.

The latest model of Athlon 64 available on that date seems to have been the Athlon 64 4000+.

EDIT: Wait, I think there was also something called the FX-55, a step above the 4000+. I think it was pricey, though.

I did too, but I upgraded and therefore used parts from my older system. Here is what I bought and the prices I paid.

AMD Athlon 64 3200+ Venice 2.0Ghz 939 - $152
Cheap Mid Tower Computer Case - $19.50
DFI nF4 Ultra-Infinity 939 nForce4 Ultra AMD MB - $96
Leadtek 6800GT 256MB PCI-Express - $285

I had also bought a PNY Factory Overclocked 6800GS card for $246 for another system

Don't have that system with me anymore, so I can't really test it.

I actually still have my system, and remember all the parts I got... but I don't remember the prices exactly. I'll try to list the approximations, though.

Linkworld 3166D-C8888U Beige Metal ATX Mid Tower Computer Case - ~$20
Shuttle AN35N-Ultra 462(A) NVIDIA nForce2 Ultra 400 ATX AMD Motherboard - ~$50
AMD Athlon XP 3200+ Barton 2.2GHz Socket A Single-Core Processor AXDA3200BOX - ~$100
CORSAIR 2GB (2 x 1GB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM DDR 400 (PC 3200) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model VS2GBKIT400C3 - ~$100
PNY VCG6600GAPB GeForce 6600GT 128MB 128-bit GDDR3 AGP 4X/8X Video Card - ~$300
Western Digital Caviar SE WD1200JB 120GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache IDE Ultra ATA100 / ATA-6 3.5" Hard Drive -Bare Drive - ~$100
Windows XP SP1 OEM - ~$100
Sony 32x CD-ROM Drive ~$30
Unknown Floppy 3.5" Drive - ~$10
Unicomp Customizer 101 - ~$59
Logitech Optical Mouse - ~$10

This is the computer I built... but I don't think it was that great, I had to adhere to a budget of some kind, and was really desperate to upgrade from a K6-2 350MHz, so everything and anything looked great. Also, I can't remember what PSU I used originally... I didn't know much about them so I used one from another system or some off-brand, and I ended up replacing it after a year or so, though, because it wore out. That computer still works, though. I can power it up today... only issue is that I need to point several fans at it and take the side off while gaming on it, so it's a real pain to use, but I struggled by with it for 3 years, and just used it for non-gaming purposes after that.

That's actually a bit more than I remember paying in total, wish I could find the exact prices..

The only part on it I would recommend is the Unicomp... I still use it, and actually purchased a USB one for a computer with no PS/2 ports.

Pretty sure the Socket A is pre 2005 date, like I think it started back in like 1999 or 2000 and it's EOL was somewhere around 2003/2004 being replaced by 754 or something, then that got replaced by 939 which was released somewhere in 2005.

Yeah sorry man, I didn't get into building PCs until late 2005. But it wasn't until late 2006 that I began to build good PCs and PC build lists (i.e with good PSUs I mean).

Skillz said:

Pretty sure the Socket A is pre 2005 date, like I think it started back in like 1999 or 2000 and it's EOL was somewhere around 2003/2004 being replaced by 754 or something, then that got replaced by 939 which was released somewhere in 2005.

Click to expand...

Yeah, actually you're right. The parts were a little old when I purchased them, so I think that's why they were on the cheaper side. I had been planning that build for a year.

The best single-core processor from that year would be the Athlon 64 FX-57, which had an MSRP of over $1,000, MORE expensive than the Intel Pentium 4EE. This was a year in which AMD was on top.

The best dual-core processor would have been the Athlon 64 X2 4800+. Both from AMD, and both over $1,000 not counting retailer discounts.

The best processors Intel had to offer... were the Pentium Extreme Edition 840 for $999, and the Pentium D 840 for $530. The only difference between the two was that the Extreme Edition had HyperThreading, so Intel's processors were actually LESS expensive than a lot of AMD's offerings at this point. Though plenty of people on the low end were content with Athlon XP anyway. That thing is still good enough to run Chrome, Office, and a few other applications to this day. It's about as good as a cheap netbook, but it works.

I can confirm that the current platforms in 2005 were all Socket 939 and LGA775.

Okay, I'm back with some more research.

The absolute best video card from 2005, based on all available data... was the nVidia 7800GTX 512MB, and it was even more powerful in SLI configurations which were just starting to take off. Apparently they really pushed that thing to the max, and there wasn't a lot of overclocking headroom... so any version of the card you could get would be about the same. The 512MB version was more than just extra memory, it was a PCB redesign that actually increased the reference clocks and used FASTER memory.

ATI's X1800 XT launched late in the year, and it was enough to make them competitive but not overtake nVidia's card.

eVGA seems to have had some of the best versions of nVidia's cards. They had a KO version of the original 7800GTX, and they had a decent version of the 7800GTX 512MB. XFX was apparently nearly tied with them, though the eVGA was considered slightly superior.

I know that it wouldn't have been practical to use these particular cards and processors, but they do help us establish a baseline and give us an idea of what series to look in. I'm probably going to end up designing a top of the line build for that era, and scaling them back along the model lines to meet the right price points.

I can find MSRPs easily if I need to, but retail pricing rarely reflects those and is usually cheaper. Not sure how I'll compensate for that, maybe knock 20%-30% off the prices as an estimate?

Havent had time to really search yet, but IIRC one of the top enthusiasts CPUs was the Intel e4300. It was a dual core Intel processor that overclocked like crazy. Their was also an ATI video card that was cheap that you could flash the BIOS and it became a much more powerful higher end GPU.

I think that setup is the setup I am going to focus on, I just need to get a price list of those parts to see if it can fit in the $600 budget or the $1000 budget.

Skillz said:

Havent had time to really search yet, but IIRC one of the top enthusiasts CPUs was the Intel e4300. It was a dual core Intel processor that overclocked like crazy. Their was also an ATI video card that was cheap that you could flash the BIOS and it became a much more powerful higher end GPU.

Click to expand...

That CPU didn't come out until late 2006 - early 2007... if it has to be 2005 and no later, then that won't work. The release price on it was $163, though.

Closest Intel CPU to that price from 2005 would be the Pentium D 805 ($143) or Pentium D 820 ($241). Only thing AMD offered in this range were single-core processors like the Athlon 64 3200+ and Athlon 64 3500+. Their dual-cores started at $350 or so.

Looking at some of these past prices, I'm surprised Intel isn't gouging us more.

Gotcha. Posting and reading on my phone atm, haven't had a chance to research yet. Got a friend with a lga 775 board from 2005 im gonna borrow. Sadly he's rocking the e4300 and an 8800 series.

athenian200 said:

That CPU didn't come out until late 2006 - early 2007... if it has to be 2005 and no later, then that won't work. The release price on it was $163, though.

Closest Intel CPU to that price from 2005 would be the Pentium D 805 ($143) or Pentium D 820 ($241). Only thing AMD offered in this range were single-core processors like the Athlon 64 3200+ and Athlon 64 3500+. Their dual-cores started at $350 or so.

Looking at some of these past prices, I'm surprised Intel isn't gouging us more.

Click to expand...

Alright I think I am going to put together a system with;

$241 - Pentium D 820
$285 - Geforce 6800 GT
$57 - 80GB Hitachi Deskstar 7K80*

Not sure which board it is, but one of my good friends that has the e4300 in a LGA 775 board claims the board is from 2005 and will let me borrow it for my testing purposes. I just need to figure out the original cost of the board and the price of similar boards that will use the technology I intend to use. (IE: Don't need to pay extra for things like Firewire and the like)

A good article on the prices of Nvidia based cards from 2005 for future references.
http://www.sharkyextreme.com/guides/article.php/10704_3561901_2/November-Video-Card-Price-Guide.htm

Sharkyextreme has a list for RAM too;
http://www.sharkyextreme.com/guides..._2/Memory-Prices--Week-of-December-5-2005.htm

And a CPU Price List:
http://www.sharkyextreme.com/guides...eekly-CPU-Prices--Week-of-December-5-2005.htm

edit 2
Well Crap, they have an HDD price history list as well.
http://www.sharkyextreme.com/guides/article.php/3556241/October-Hard-Drive-Price-Guide.htm

Well, if you're looking for cases... I found some great resources on the type of cases available, complete with prices. I think I had this bookmarked way back when I was building my machine.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/1604

This shows some nicely priced cases that should fit your budget.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/1783

And this shows some of the more interesting cases of that era.

All of them mention pricing, which is nice. I'm thinking you might end up using your old case, though, but this is here in case you don't.

Check the model number and make sure that board is actually from 2005, though. People often forget or mix dates up. He may think it's from 2005, but that doesn't mean it is. Also need to know more about it so I can advise on RAM in any case.

Anyway, I'm off to see what I can find out about PSUs next. What kind of wattage would you want?

Dont intend to use a case at all. I will be running the system naked for the tests I intend to do with it. With that being said, the prices of cases will be a factor in the imaginary budget.

I will check the model/specs of the motherboard to ensure it's from or at least was available in 2005.

As for PSUs, depends on what I end up with and what kind of power draw it has. PSU rating/information from back then wasn't as good as it is now; so all I need is basic pricing. I intend to use a modern PSU to power the system for now. Since PSU shouldn't have any effect on the performance of the system, much like a case, I don't need a PSU from that era.

In fact, the only physical parts I need are the GPU, CPU, Motherboard, RAM. Depending on the motherboard and whether or not it has SATA ports, I might need to use an older PATA hard drive; otherwise since it wont be effecting the performance I am measuring any hdd will work so I intend to use what I got laying around; doesn't really matter the performance of it or lack of. I do, however, need to factor the cost of a size able HDD into the budget however.

Right now I am looking for Pentium D processors that I can buy; because I will need one of those. I think another friend of mine has a couple Pentium D processors in his parents old computers. I'm gonna call him sometime today and talk to him about it. Pretty sure they will give me the systems complete. Which means I should have two more motherboards from around the same time frame (I think) but I will have to look at them.

The main goal here is to test modern games on a system built in 2005 with a budget of $600 - $1000 and $1500 just for the heck of it.

Skillz said:

Dont intend to use a case at all. I will be running the system naked for the tests I intend to do with it. With that being said, the prices of cases will be a factor in the imaginary budget.

Click to expand...

Yeah, that's the main reason I included them... because it included prices. I kind of figured a case is a case, if I were doing an experiment like this.

In fact, the only physical parts I need are the GPU, CPU, Motherboard, RAM. Depending on the motherboard and whether or not it has SATA ports, I might need to use an older PATA hard drive; otherwise since it wont be effecting the performance I am measuring any hdd will work so I intend to use what I got laying around; doesn't really matter the performance of it or lack of. I do, however, need to factor the cost of a size able HDD into the budget however.

Click to expand...

Yeah, that makes sense. You're doing a good job pricing this out so far. You already have price lists for some of the major components, but I'll see if I can verify those.

The main goal here is to test modern games on a system built in 2005 with a budget of $600 - $1000 and $1500 just for the heck of it.

Click to expand...

You know, come to think of it, I think I might have some spreadsheets from around that era where I built a machine like that in Excel, and that would be quite useful for your needs. If I find them, I'll post that info up.

I've always been fairly obsessed with building imaginary computers, even before I started building real ones.

Main thing I need to find then, is pricing on PSUs from 2005. Unless you end up using a case that comes with a PSU for the budget, but I don't think enthusiasts/system builders usually did that even back then.

Well, here's some pricing/review on Motherboards... from December 2005, too. Would have the most up-to-date prices.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/1883/4

As for Power Supplies... this is a real pain because most of the major reviewers don't mention price at all. Some of them do testing, but they're some of the first serious PSU tests and are thus terribly disorganized and made into a big event. I can only find pricing by looking up model numbers for the PSUs once I verify their existence.

That said, here's a few prices taken from individual reviews:

Seasonic S12-500: $130 http://www.silentpcreview.com/article247-page1.html
Seasonic S12-430: $99 http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleid=1775&page=4

They seem to be VERY decent PSUs for the era, but let me know if you need anything cheaper.

Also, here are some reviews that include lists that include lists of models available back then:

http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/psu/1359-hexus-psu-power-supply-unit-roundup-taoyuan-2005/

And this site is still around, but doesn't seem to have DONE many PSU ratings since 2005:

http://insanetek.com/power-supplies

This might help. Purchased on 12/25/2005

Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD3200KS 320GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Hard Drive -Bare Drive
Item #: N82E16822136003
This item is serviced by the Western Digital. Please call 800 832 4778 for service.
$155.50
1
ZALMAN CNPS7700-ALCU 120mm 2 Ball CPU Cooling Fan
Item #: N82E16835118114
$38.99
1
OCZ Platinum 2GB (2 x 1GB) 184-Pin DDR SDRAM DDR 400 (PC 3200) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory Model OCZ4002048ELDCPE-K
Item #: N82E16820227210
For Tech support call: 408 986 8400 or email [email protected]
$239.99
1
ASUS A8N-SLI Premium 939 NVIDIA nForce4 SLI ATX AMD Motherboard
Item #: N82E16813131540
For Asus Tech Support, Please Call 502-995-0883 or http://helpdesk.asus.com/
$163.00
1
Antec Performance One P150 White Steel ATX Mid Tower Computer Case 430W Power Supply
Item #: N82E16811129166
$159.00

1
AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ Manchester 2.0GHz Socket 939 Dual-Core Processor ADA3800BVBOX
Item #: N82E16819103562
$322.00
Shipped from NJ, USA - Tracking #: 1Z5AE6661219305585
1
SeaSonic S12-500 500W ATX12V SLI Certified CrossFire Ready Active PFC Power Supply
Item #: N82E16817151024
$129.00
Shipped from TN, USA - Tracking #: 1Z04WF351219261851
1
GIGABYTE GV-NX78T256D-ZK GeForce 7800GT 256MB 256-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 SLI Support Video Card
Item #: N82E16814125214
Gigabyte (626)-854-9338 option 4 www.giga-byte.com
$339.00
Subtotal $1,546.48
Tax $0.00
UPS 3 DAYS $25.28
Gift Cards -$130.00
Order Total $1,441.76

I bought this 11/25/2005
2 x Mushkin Enhanced 1GB 184-Pin DDR SDRAM DDR 500 (PC 4000) System Memory Model 991482
$265.04

2 x 1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.9 ST3250824AS 250GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s 3.5" Hard Drive -Bare Drive
$225.21

1 x Open Box: ASRock 939Dual-SATA2 939 ULi M1695 ATX AMD Motherboard
$32.16

1 x XFX PV-T73G-UDD3 GeForce 7600GT 256MB 128-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 SLI Support Video Card
$213.43

And I got my 939 with a cpu/mb special from Fry's during whatever black friday deal was going on that weekend.

One way to build a fairly accurate price list is go through the hot deals threads on this board during the time frame. That will give you a decent average price because I think most people on these boards wait for sale periods and upgrade. The only time a savvy consumer would buy during an off-sale period would be if he or she needed something immediately--but I doubt the average [H] consumer would just pay full retail for no reason.

Got the first system configuration setup and running now.

Intel Pentium D 920 Dual Core Intel CPU w/ 2GB DDR RAM and an X1950XTX GPU. So far I loaded up Battlefield Bad Company 2 and played a little bit of it, when two things dawned on me.

1. I need to buy a cheap desk/table with a chair so I can sit down to test these games. Since I intend to play them, just to prove that they are playable. Going to hit up craiglist and maybe the thrift store to see if I can't locate something cheap, since I'll be tossing it once I am done.

2. I need some way to record the FPS of these games as I play them, while the FPS isn't that important I still want to know what the hardware is capable of.

Also what games should I test out. So far I've got these installed.

• Battlefield: Bad Company 2
• Left 4 Dead
• Skyrim
• Serious Sam 3
• Sleeping Dogs
• Dark Souls

Really trying to stick with games that are on consoles & the PC. So I'm thinking I'm gonna have to buy some games here soon to get a good comparison.