Just order parts for new Gaming RIG. Which OS should I choose?

A

apopilot

Weaksauce
Joined
Aug 6, 2004
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Well folks here is the rig I ordered.

ASUS A8N-SLI PREMIUM
AMD 3200+ VENICE
CORSAIR XPERT 2-2-2-5 1GB Memory kit
Maxtor DIAMOND 10 SATA drive with 16MB cache. 250MB
NEC ND3540 DVD-R drive
Thermaltake Water cooling kit.
PC Power and Cooling 510 SLI
BFG tech 7800GTX
Thermaltake Armor Case (Silver)


1.) I of course plan on having more drives added in near future. I however am a little rusty when it comes to building a new system. I have been out of building for 3 years. So it was time to upgrade. I currently have DISH NETWORK satellite television. I was planning on purchasing MEDIA CENTER 2005. Should I go with this OS or should I stick with WIN XP PRO?

2.) My 2nd question pertains to what is the best way to install MEDIA CENTER and seperate the MEDIA content drives from the GAMING drives? I am an AVID gamer and would like to play games and at the same time enjoy all of my programs recorded on MEDIA CENTER 2005.
 
That's going to be a long wait for Longhorn. The RTM probably won't be out until this time next year or later.
 
Media Center 2005 is pretty much XP Pro with the MCE apps on top. I used to run it on my gaming system, and all of my games run just the same as with XP Pro. If you do go with MCE2005, you just have to make sure you eventually get a TV Capture card that works with your TV signal and with MCE2005.

As far as how to partition your system, that's entirely up to you. It's not our system, so we don't have to live with the way it's done. For my system, I had a single Raptor drive as my C:, where my OS and all of my apps were installed, including games. I had a second physical hard drive, formatted to one single large partition, named Media, and this is where I stored all of my "media" and content for MCE.
 
64 XP PRO is a bit too early for everyone. I will be doing this when LONGHORN MEDIA CENTER 64 bit is released.

In the meantime I will be purchasing a complete PVR-250 and NV Decoder package with XP MEDIA 2005.

My question now pertains to how should I partition the drive? How much space does a program take up. Or should I install XP PRO and dedicate this PC as a gaming rig and then build a more affordable MEDIA CENTER solution?
 
I would partition your drive into a 50 GB C, and make the rest a primary partition of D. That's more than enough space to hold recorded TV shows.
 
djnes said:
What about it? 50 GB is plenty of space for the os, apps, and games.
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I have to disagree. When it comes to installing/downloading games, patches and mods... space builds up fast. Eventually I am going to put in a second hard drive to hold just my games and the other drive can be used for everything else like videos, graphic design and whatnot.
 
p0intblank said:
I have to disagree. When it comes to installing/downloading games, patches and mods... space builds up fast. Eventually I am going to put in a second hard drive to hold just my games and the other drive can be used for everything else like videos, graphic design and whatnot.
Click to expand...
And your arguing with me over an opinion. I wish I had the free time to sit and keep up with that many games that would use up that much hard drive space, but I'm not a kid anymore.
 
I don't like to partition the OS drive at all, but really that's like asking if you like a square or pie shaped cake.
 
Ok. Two questions. Does partitioning a drive effect its speed and performance?

2nd question. How much space does a 1 HOUR program thats not HD take up. And what does an HD 1 hour program take up?
 
I'd go with XP Pro. Compatible with almost every game... old or new. Plus you can switch it out for XP Pro 64bit when you'd like to after a while. That way they can get all their kinks worked out with software compatibility.
 
apopilot said:
How much space does a 1 HOUR program thats not HD take up. And what does an HD 1 hour program take up?
Click to expand...
You really should read up on all the variables that will go into answering this question, such as resolution, quality, file format, etc.
 
From the sounds of it, you want to do both high end gaming and high end HTPC things, and often at the same time. If this is indeed the case, you might want to consider a two machine solution, with a machine configured for gaming with WinXP, and one with a lot of hard drives and WinMC for HTPCing.
 
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