A long lasting gaming and multipurpose rig?

pparks1 · 31 Mar 2012

Dlf said:

If I run a virtual XP I may need upwards of 8 GB (or more), the system requirements for L.A Noire are supposed to upwards of ~8 GB - if I have background tasks going as well that'd probably take more RAM from LAN. Running and installing updates on 64 bit Home Premium and Ultimate my RAM use has gone upwards of 99% -- for 3 GB that's quite high.

If that game needs 8GB of RAM, it must be a terrible port. I think they list the specs as 2GB to 8GB just to be safe and because RAM isn't terribly expensive these days. I would highly doubt that game really needs 8GB of RAM.

A virtual XP machine needs 512MB to 2GB of RAM. You aren't likely going to run heavy applications or games within the virtual machine.

As far as RAM being used now, Windows 7 will attempt to use whatever it can. And a fair amount of it will be cached. On my laptop right now, with 4GB of RAM, there is only 100MB free...but 2.3GB cached. So, my actual RAM usage is only around 35%.

Dlf · 31 Mar 2012

Would this: Asus BC-12B1ST/BLK/B/AS Blu-Ray Reader, DVD/CD Writer - PCPartPicker be able to BURN blu-rays (for backup) or only play blu-ray movies?

pparks1 · 31 Mar 2012

^ That drive only reads blu-rays, it doesn't burn them.

Dlf · 01 Apr 2012

What I thought, won't be getting that. Speaking of 5.25 drive bays . . . . what other uses besides optical drives (like the above) do they serve in modern computers? We don't really need floppy drives anymore - although some do.

pparks1 · 01 Apr 2012

Optical drives are really the only thing that use 5.25 bays. Also sound card controls and card readers sometimes take advantage of the space.

205tim · 01 Apr 2012

I'm surprised that no one has said it already, but if you are making a 'long lasting gmaing rig' (which is a paradox in it's self), I would be looking at a better graphics card, probably with the money you save from not getting 32gb ram. The new 680gtx would be my current choice, or the 670gtx when it comes out (assuming it performs well).

Dlf · 04 Apr 2012

Ivy bridge should reduce sandy bridge prices plenty with the cheaper hardware I can get something like the 7970.