Who cares about Crysis. It's not optimized that well...that PC will run damn near everything else at max levels.

So long as it can run left 4 dead well...

Fixed.

Because people are buying a new comp to be able to play 4 year old games at 640x480 resolution?

As you said yourself... no system is better than their weakest link..

Someone replied in the thread saying you shouldnt buy an AMD CPU because bla bla bla. That's bull. Any desktop CPU you buy will be able to run the latest games! (the CPUs that are too slow are no longer sold anywhere). As long as you choose the right GPU.

Stop posting FUD. That is nowhere near the truth. A 8800GTS is at best 15% faster than a GT in a few games, but on average less than 10% faster.

You're also making dangerous statements like "your CPU is too slow", "go all out on the memory" and "Dont go cheap on your memory".

Memory is cheap today, the only thing that matters is that you get enough of it. Higher performance RAM is only meant for over-clockers.

You are welcome to disagree but I am quite confident it will unless you are trying to run it a a high sceen resolution. Almost all testing on games is done at 640 x 480 and I base it on that. If you want everything on at 1280 x 1024 say, then no you will need dual video cards.

Actually I am not a graphic designer I am in medical research imaging to support things like 5 dimensional fluorescent microscopy where a single experiment may produce 500 MB of images at a time. The work requires moving a lot of pixels as fast as possible and thus workstations that are essentially identical to a good gamer. (which they are occasionally used for after hours.

I was not trying to compete with the highest end Alienware $3k and up gamer. I said if you could afford one go get it. This was intended obviously at someone who had not built computers and was on a budget. What I suggested is actually extremly powerful compared to mainstream computers but I also listed a commercial gaming computer of essentially the same power for $999, only some $300 more expensive.

I'm sure that there are limitless other choices, there always are, but I don't think you will do much better for under $700. Thats my opinion, if you have something you like better, fine post it along with data to support it and people will be able to make their own choice.

I would say that the main reason to get one now is because it has a superior dual slot cooling arangement, and it can overclock a little better if you're that way inclined.

I would wonder, how can we find the truth to the last statement, don't buy a cheap motherboard. What is cheap and what is just feature poor?

But agreed on anything else.

Fine, please then post your part list with prices and those that want to can build their own. I'm sure you are very skilled and the exception but yes home built with parts not tested together have a higher failure rate compared to a good name brand commerial ones, where the failure rate is quite low. It has to be. The industry is so competitive that profit margins are quite thin. One industry study indicated that just two technical support issues even not requiring parts wiped out the profit

Lenovo is a direct spin off of IBM and is regarded in the industry as the maker of robust and dependable computers. Obviously I haven't tested this particular motherboard but it should be very good quality.

Son, you speak in riddles. But I guess you are refering to something Kwaad said about motherboards?

Sorry, I think I left a line out. Theres the myth about cheap/expesive ram, theres the myth about CPU power but the real question is what are you paying for when you get a cheap motherboard? Is it that much worse or better or indifferent. Does anyone know HOW a $100motherboard is better than a $50 and not just in features?