Re: Please help: Athlon 64 or Pentium 4?
 

well, Sapphire is far from generic..........the other two i havent seen much off

Re: Please help: Athlon 64 or Pentium 4?
 

with out a doubt the AMD

Re: Please help: Athlon 64 or Pentium 4?
 

Hi, If I can ask, do you have a set preference for ATI in particular or? Because for just a little more you could also go with the geforce 6600GT, which is probably (give or take) the most cost effective/efficient card out right now. It runs just about everything out there with great performance for the price you pay for it. If perhaps other games besides the sims 2 would be installed and played in some future time, especially something like a doom 3 or half-life 2 or something along those lines, then this card will be able to go along just fine.

As far as branding goes, these days it doesn't really matter much anymore as to who makes the cards, they are all following the same reference design specs as laid out by either ATI or Nvidia, just that some manufacturers will go about it differently, for ex. BFG tech. makes their cards for both companies but, they overclock the core and memory over the design specs, so as to offer something different from the the other makers. You also pay a little more for that as well.

Re: Please help: Athlon 64 or Pentium 4?
 

6600GT will do ya good if you don't want the high end ATI XT card.

Re: Please help: Athlon 64 or Pentium 4?
 

Oh ok well, If you want to go with the x-series cards then from ati, I would go with maybe a step up from that x600 to the x700 or maybe the x700pro in particular. just that little bit more of performance out of the x700 over the x600, maybe not too much noticeable in actual gaming but it is a better card, for ex. 8 pixel pipes for x700 as opposed to 4 for the x600 etc. etc.

Price points for these x700's should be within your budget range too, low $100's not exceeding $150 with shipping even, from I believe places like newegg.com and zipzoomfly.com.


EDIT: Oh also, Glad to be able to help a fellow washingtonian out too! lol, I'm about 30 miles south of you by the way, down here in T-Town, Tacoma-lakewood.

Re: Please help: Athlon 64 or Pentium 4?
 

Thanks for the recommendations Everman Starkmoor, but I think that the 6600GT is a little steep for me right now. And no, I've got not preference as to brand. I'm really trying to keep the cost of the card at $150 maximum. Thanks.

Re: Please help: Athlon 64 or Pentium 4?
 

AMD for gaming... Intel for spreadsheets, word etc. Also buy a custom built so much cheaper

Re: Please help: Athlon 64 or Pentium 4?
 

AMD for gaming, plus it's cheaper too.

Re: Please help: Athlon 64 or Pentium 4?
 

^ Not really they work out about the same price

Re: Please help: Athlon 64 or Pentium 4?
 

Not really with the spreadsheets. AMD still seem faster for every day user stuff. Iv used a lot and the AMDs seem faster they don't lag at all when opening multi spreadsheets and word processors. But thats to me anyways.

But for what your going to do this be the best to get:

AMD 3500+
1GB of ram
6800GT or X800
A good $80 PCI-Express motherbored
120GB HD 7200 RPM
On bored sound or a Soundblaster Live PCI sound card