$250 internet surfer

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6856167032

or

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6856167037

The only difference in these two is that the latter is the newer dual core atom...you can check out the benchmarks on them...im not so familiar with its performance as i was using the atom 270 in my netbook which is in the first linked to setup

Just add some ram and an hdd + a mouse and keyboard and use this...its not the best at halo or cs but it will play them pretty well if you tweak em...that keeps the budget down a bit...and hey you can install osx on it pretty easily as well...

Check out this forum....we also help out the nettop owners as well and since the hardware is literally the same minus bios overclocking youve all the info you would need on installing any os or any problems you could possibly run into...

http://forums.msiwind.net/

http://forums.msiwind.net/memberli [...] ile&u=6996

Edit:BTW! you don't need a dvd drive with this system...atleast for os installs you can either used specialized apps for installing osx or a simple 1gb usb stick for installing xp...but the dvd drive can of course be for movies or burning etc so yeah if your not using it for that there is not reason to spend the extra atm if you want to save a few bucks

And like i said this system has been worked out so there are tons of guides on doing everything without a dvd or cd drive...

Also make sure you pick the right ram...these use the same chipsets as the netbooks so its laptop ram...stick with 2gbs

Last addition...make sure to go and read the reviews at newegg atleast a couple of pages...im sure you will quickly see that this would be a great system for your intended use..btw it runs great with emulators so anything up to ps1 and n64 and back will play GREAT! and that can keep you busy for a while...

Feel free to ask any questions on the system as i had a great run with my Msi wind netbook for a good 5 months...

I like it very much. It's got twice as much RAM and hard drive space, a better graphics card and a dual core athlon. That's much better than the parts I picked.

The integrated graphics on that board are pretty impressive, it can run Far Cry with AA and AF enabled at playable frame rates. That is a lot more than I expected for this price.

I got a few questions.

1. The CPU is OEM, this means it does not come with a cooler, correct? I picked this one. The reviews say it comes with thermal paste already applied, but will that be good enough for what I'm doing, or should I buy some other paste for it?

2. The motherboard supports DDR2 1066 RAM, but does it also work with the DDR2 800 memory you picked? And it says it has 2600MHz Hyper Transport but the CPU only has 2000. These are still compatible with each other, right?

1. Yes as it is an OEM product, it will not come with CPU cooler...
Well mayb instead of spending $8(maybe will come to $10 after shipping) on CPU cooler and $40 on OEM CPU, which totals to $50, get this Retail CPU for $53...It is much faster than that CPU and will come with CPU Cooler...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6819103255
or this with the case combo...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Comb [...] .188526...

2. You dont have to worry about the Mobo and RAM...they are backwards compatible...and generally they list the maximum supported...
The main thing that you should see when buying a CPU and compatible mobo, just check the Socket Type and for RAM, the type - such as DDR2/DDR3 and the MHz speed should be less than or equal to the specs given on the Mobo...

Heh...wrong it can play both of those titles...

And have you not heard of the edit button?

Meh im not going to argue with performance for the price with you...it works great as a portable lite gaming system for those who want it to be....this guy only needs a small HDD a slower than what even the intel atom cpu offers and any torrented os will do...although most netbooks ship with xp anyways...screen size is preference....

Either way its not the optimal system for much fpsing above the unreal engine....try the asus with the 9300 or the soon to be released ION platforms...those should be able to play quite a few titles....would eat halo up no problem should do nice on the source engine

The reason i didn't suggest a netbook in the first place is this guy doesn't need one....a nettop is something he could use though...

Because you cant play any games with onboard video.

maybe, doubt it though.

I'd like to see those benchmarks.

I've seen users on this site say the onboard 3200 is not good for CS, and thats what the OP wants to play.
Back in the day I played CSS with a ti4200 and my buddy had a FX5500 and it was flawless on both systems, I find it hard to believe it wouldnt be twice as good on a 7200GS.

Yup.

Oh snap..another fight. Why can't we all just get along LOL

Yeahp anyone who is so immature they think they need to lash out and call someone fat isn't the most polite forum member

And Zip where not here to recommend him a gfx solution to play newer games so stop trying to prove you where right in the first place no one cares....he WILL be doing just fine in cs 1.6 and halo with the onboard graphics...

I hate listening to people say oh no you can't game with onboard graphics they suck....sounds so narrow minded...im glad your not recommending my hardware...you sure he won't need a gtx 295 for cs 1.6....

http://forum.notebookreview.com/sh [...] p?t=368975

http://boards.ign.com/pc_general_b [...] 599137/p1/

As you can see any IGP that does 1280x720 on the source engine with medium settings is decent in my book...should do cs source maybe...with some configs to gain fps

I read the review of the 780G months ago my friend. I'm no expert on 7200GS or whatever it was, but I know we played CS on FX5500 and Ti4200 just fine so it should play twice as good on a 7200GS. My point is that he wont be happy with either onboard or a 7200GS because as soon as he goes to play something more current, and finds out his onboard is crap, he wont be happy.

If you go back and look at that article, you'll see that the games they tested at 1024 x 768 (warhammer, supreme commander, Prey, quake4, unreal tournament, and serious sam 2 were all pretty much unplayable with onboard 3200. The most fps coming from unreal tournament at 32fps. Next fastest fps was from serious sam 2 with 24fps. All the rest of the game tests ranged from 8fps to 12fps.

Outlander, are you still sure you want to recommend onboard 3200 for gaming? LOL

http://www.tomshardware.com/review [...] 85-10.html

http://www.tomshardware.com/review [...] 85-11.html

You are just plain wrong, face it. From first hand experience, I can tell you an overclocked 7300gs scores 900 in 3dmark06. An overclocked onboard hd3200 scored 1700. Now quit pissing into the wind and let it go.

GeForce 7200 GS (3Dmark06): 489
hd3200 (3Dmark06): 1552

I don't think he's looking to play crysis here.

quesitons?

This computer is not supposed to be a high performance gaming PC, and if I wanted that, my budget would have been 4 or 5 times as much. This is a gift for my mom, who basically uses yahoo mail, ebay and craigslist, and that's it. That's all she does, so I don't think this computer needs the latest and most powerful $200 graphics card. You're kind of missing the point. You're right both the 7200GS and onboard HD3200 are weak, but they are supposed to be. I knew it would have weak graphics before I started this thread, and I don't care. It's a $250 computer FFS.

I would like to be able to play some older games on it when I go over there, but like I said, that is not a high priority. But I'm pretty sure the onboard GPU can handle those games, because they are even less demanding than Unreal Tournament 04. Halo was released in 2002, and CS was released in 1999. But if it can't run those games, I won't really care too much, as long as it CAN surf the internet. I already have a PC with a Core 2 E6600 and a HD 3870 video card, and that will be good enough for my gaming needs until the time Windows 7 comes out, which is when I'm going to build another gaming rig. But that's NOT what I'm doing right now, and I've already made up my mind that I'm gonna get the ASRock board that gkay linked to. So you can stop arguing onboard vs. separate video card, because I already decided that the onboard is good enough for this computer.

Now the OP tells us he has a separate computer for gaming. Oh brother.....


Theres a website with the same name as my avatar? LOL.

My avatar has to do with the fact that I have a pilots license and I fly my own home built kit plane.

If you derive something else from it then you really must be grasping at straws.