Smallsasaurus

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000CMLZEG These are what I use. They aren't specifically made for gaming, but they work superbly for it. They do make it look like you are an air traffic controller, like my roommates joke. They are also more open then the fatality headsets, meaning people around you will be able to hear more through your headphones and you'll be more likely to hear them too. And since it doesn't have a mic, I bought this mic clip: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00029MTMQ If you use your mic a lot, this thing picks up background noise, so in a noisy house it might be a pain, but since I don't talk all that often it was a perfect and affordable fix.

Yeah, some more information would be handy. My two automatic answers to this question usually are the Dell XPS 1500 series and a Macbook. Both are well balanced, do everything laptops and you can nab them both in the $900-1200 range. If you are looking for something cheaper, just say so and I'll throw some other options out there.

I had been messing with the idea of getting a netbook for a while, finally found one I liked for a great price in the Lenovo s10 (on sale) and bought it. I put a clean install of XP on it (I hate most computer companies bloatware), added some of my favorite lightweight programs, and found out it can actually run a handful of games surprisingly well (Diablo 2 ftw). Then I ran into a post talking about installing OSX 10.5.6 on it and how easy it was to do. My roommate picked me up a student copy of the Mac operating system, I followed a few tutorials and bam, I got myself a Mac Mini Laptop. It runs awesomely for how little it cost. I know hardcore gamers with laugh at how underpowered netbooks are, but that's why I have my badass desktop, to play games and do high end stuff. When I need something to sit on the couch with and surf the web or take with me on vacation, I now have my dual booting XP/OSX Lenovo s10. Here are some pictures. Look how small it is next to my 22" and 19" monitors. Sorry for the crappy quality. I only have my phone's camera right now.

Another vote for the G5. I spent like 20 minutes getting the weight and settings right and it's just been the best thing ever. Never had a single problem with it, fits your hand like a glove, and it has been kicking for almost 2 years now.

If you have access to another computer, you can burn yourself a copy of Hiren's Boot CD. From that you should be able to run malware and other anti-virus programs without even having to boot. Hopefully that catches the little bugger.

http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/PublicWishDetail.aspx?WishListNumber=12677528 I built a pretty badass budget one out of boredom a little while ago that costs right around a $1000. Worth a look. This doesn't include a monitor/mouse/keyboard though. You could play around with the setup a little. If anything you could go for a slightly cheaper videocard and get a second hard drive for storage depending on how many files you have, although if you don't have a ton of movies/music/pictures 300 GB is more than enough for most people and Raptors are sweet. I wouldn't change the CPU, but if you want a different brand/slightly faster RAM, by all means, go for it.

My current setup includes a pair of audio-technica headphones and a zalman clip on mic. If you can handle some backround noise, I recommend getting yourself a good pair of headphones and a clip on mic. It's cheaper then a headset and the headphones will probably sound better.

Hurray! Congrats all.

Hurray for the new CA's! Congrats guys.

Sorry to hear that Garfield.

Panda, there is a program called GIMP, which is a freeware version of Photoshop. Also Paint.Net is pretty handy. Both good programs for simple designs.

Tom's Hardware - Benchmark Doom 3 Click the link for a full comparison of FPS on a couple of games, but I compared you card to the 8800GT and the ATI 3850, both of which are fairly average cards for around $100 now, and your card really struggles, and that was with me assuming you have the highest model X1300 possible. These scores are in order of 8800GT, 3850, and X1300: 3D Benchmark Scores: 6023.00 5389.00 1733.00 FPS in Obilivion 32.80 24.30 7.50 so, about 1/4 to 1/3 of what I would consider average nowadays. I hope I'm helping and not completely overloading you with info.

Your videocard came out in 2005, so as far as videocards go, its very outdated and probably the most likely source of your slow downs and your computers overrealiance on RAM. Both your CPU and RAM seem to be on par with decent gaming levels. You can try updating the drivers for you videocard by going to ATI's website, going in the support/download section, and downloading the most recent drivers for your specific video card and OS. You have to be careful not to screw up and pick the wrong one, but as long as you don't just click willy-nilly, you should be alright. Btw, your video card is a Video Adapter Radeon X1300/X1550 Series Secondary (256 MB). I can't compare the specs to other cards right now, but it was compared to a nVidia Geforce 6300, so I can't imagine its made for modern games.