HP or Lenovo for moderate gaming

[jessupftw]

Hello everyone,

Wondering if there are any PCs from HP or Lenovo that you would "recommend" as moderate gaming platforms for like WOW and DIII. I would absolutely upgrade to a better GPU but just have no desire to build my own system. I mention HP or Lenovo as I can get a pretty decent discount on either through my company. I've been running a HP XW4400X (dual core) workstation with an older Nvidia GTX 550 that finally blew up so its time!

For the most part, this old setup was working fine for me but then again, I'm not sure I know what I've been missing out on!

Thanks in advance!

 

[tsnor]

I've build a few HP refurbs into gaming machines. They were all fine. Case airflow, std ATX PSU, std x16 slot with clearance for video. Guess the same for lenovo.

1. Avoid Small form factor case, card won't fit. duh
2. Verify x16 video card slot exists on MB, some don't have them
3. HP has nice PC and MB specs online. Read them. Look for PSU size.
4. 460W HP PSU is plenty for gaming. Most HP come with 300w that won't power a big card. Plan on PSU swap.
5. You will not abe able to OC, so CPUs like AMD that rely on high OC to be competitive are fails in an HP PC. Intel that won't OC (e.g. i3-2310, i5 non-K) is fine in an HP system because BIOS won't let you OC anyway.
6. I buy refurbs beause the money saved pays for the video card. In a server there's not much to fail.
7. If you buy now make sure pc comes with a free upgrade to win8 or that you buy the limited time cheap win8 upgrade. You might not use it, but if you later install win8 you'll pay $$ for it.

(I'm currently using this pc w/GTX260 : http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=c01911661&cc=us&dlc=en&lc=en&product=4066665&tmp_track_link=ot_search )