Is the Q8200 a good CPU?

[Dark Comet]

My friend is buying a PC for games like WOW, Warhammer and maybe some of the latest games. He has no experience with building computers at all. He has a budget of £500 to buy a prebuilt system. So far the best computer we have found is a "Zoostorm Advanced" computer. It has a Q8200 CPU with 4GB RAM and a 9800GT. It also comes with Vista Home Premium.

Has anyone used Zoostorm's PCs before?

With the Q8200 having a low clockrate would games suffer?

 

[Mondoman]

I think the bigger thing to worry about is the graphics card. I'd want to see at least an HD4850 or faster.

 

[Dark Comet]

Cheers, yeah the graphics card is not the best. But its hard to find prebuilt computers with good graphics cards at this budget. He is coming from a laptop with a built in graphics card that gives him 15 FPS average on low settings on WOW at 800 X 600. He has somehow got by playing the game like this for over a year.

 

[Mondoman]

Perhaps he might consider building his own computer? Alternatively, perhaps buy a cheaper prebuilt with slow graphics card and upgrade it with a decent graphics card (and perhaps power supply).

 

[Dark Comet]

Yeah he was thinking about that but upgrading the graphics card would void the warranty I assume. I think the main reason for buying a prebuilt PC is the warranty for him really.

That computer he was looking at just went out of stock. Back to square one.

 

[mike99]

For a prebuild, that seems a pretty good spec. I haven't used that company myself, but they are often reviewed in Computer Shopper and seem OK. My sons have bought variou prebuilds from Scan in Bolton and had very good service. You can specify whatever you want or they have very good technical assistanc and would reccommend a system to a price. The pric is that of the components plus a very reasonable assembly charge, which gives a warranty on the system.
Go to http://www,scan.co.uk

Mike.

PS I have bought comnpoments from them to build my own PC for years, very good service.

 

[13thmonkey]

I was just about to say have a look at these: http://www.scan.co.uk/TodayOnly/Index.aspx

but someone beat me to it...

 

[Dark Comet]

Ok Cheers guys I'll tell him to check them out.