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.

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Most motherboards can handle 2 easy. If you're computer is even moderately new, it should be able to handle 3 as well. Just search google for your computer's specs and see what it says. And you can get RAM at just about any serious electronic store or just order it online at Amazon or Newegg.

Alright, here is my mug submission. Working on a shirt and hat now.

1 GB of Ram is balls. If you have a laptop it costs $20 to upgrade to 2GB and if you have a desktop it might be $30. Upgrading to 4GB probably wouldn't even cost more then $60. And it's worth it. That should help if you are looking to upgrade. Your videocard is alright, but a little outdated and kind of low end. Anything nVidia lower then GeForce X600 (X being any number in any series) wasn't made for video games, and really isn't all that good. As for immediate fixes, lower you gaming setting/screen resolution. And just because you meet the requirements or recommendations doesn't guarantee it'll run well, just that it'll run. Trying running Vista with required specs and I bet it's slow as hell.

If you really want to you can use this, you don't have to though: http://www.filehippo.com/download_everest_home/ It's a program designed to create a report of your system specs. If you install that, run a quick report, and then just paste the summary section only in a reply (should be like the first 40 lines or so), we will all have a better idea of your basic specs and might be able to offer you a little bit better advice. I would recommend updating your videocard drivers, but you would need to know what videocard you have in order to do that. And lower the settings in L4D, such as a lower screen resolution or lower quality graphics. That should help. And a graphics accelerator is something a lot of laptops have that attempt to make games run faster, but its not nearly as good as a video card and can strain your CPU. It's essentially a software version of a videocard (which is hardware). And MB stands for motherboard.

QFT. If you are using a laptop that has integrated and not discrete graphics, its going to put a whole lot more pressure on your CPU and Memory.

http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?sduid=0&t=700167 Looks like this guy wrote a whole review talking about upgrading his inspiron 530 and a few other people talk about it too, so its worth the read. The PSU he bought sounded like it worked fine, so take a look at it.

New PSU like everyone else is saying. Here is an OCZ 600 watt one on newegg for $50: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817341010 And a 9800GTX overclocked for only $125 after mail in rebate: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814130420 And if you like badass ATI cards here is a 4850 and 4870 for $145 and $190, respectively. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102770 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814102810

Only thing you have to be careful about with our logo for the forum is we would be selling mugs with another companies copyrighted material on it, which I'm pretty sure is a no no.

I'll get working on it today/tomorrow. Been busy up to this point, but I'll get some stuff out there.

Hells yes Garfield. Hells yes.