No offence was meant Sir G, I didn't realise you knew him. Just saw you mention that he quickly passed over the AMD chipset for the more expensive Intel when performance and price would suggest otherwise for a gaming machine.

[ 02-19-2006, 05:50 PM: Message edited by: shamrock_uk ]

No problem, I was sure that I'd mentioned it earlier which is why I was getting a little frustrated. [img]smile.gif[/img]
He did ask me which one I would prefer, but I'm not well knowledged in these things so I asked him and he said I should get Intel so I dunno.

For a gaming system right now you may want to consider the AMD chips and as previously mentioned make sure the graphics is pci express.

On a side note see if you can help build the computer (good for when you wnat to upgrade your computer, and next time you may want to try to build the computer yourself).

Help? Ahehhha... I'd probably end up breaking it. [img]tongue.gif[/img] Not to mention I have enough school and work to keep me busy. [img]smile.gif[/img]

<font color=skyblue>I found that information I had been looking for on Tom's Hardware Guide. This is a cut/paste of what they say about it.

</font>

With the NV34, NVIDIA introduces DirectX 9 features into the low-budget market segment and replaces the GeForce4 MX (DirectX 7) line of chips. As far as DirectX features are concerned, the FX 5200 offers everything its bigger brothers offer. However, NVIDIA has reduced the number of pixel pipelines to four. The memory interface also differs from that of the other FX cards, as the 5200 is still equipped with GeForce4 Ti memory technology. The vertex shader performance has been limited as well. The 45 million transistor chip is produced on a 0.15µ process.

Considering the chip's limited performance and its comparatively low clock speeds, the DirectX 9 support is more of a paper feature than a real bonus. In practice, the chip is simply too slow for DirectX 9 calculations at resolutions of 1024x768 and above. Thanks to the memory interface it has inherited from the GeForce4 Ti, as well as its average anisotropic (trilinear) filtering performance, the chip nonetheless offers very solid performance for an entry-level chip. Beware the cheaper non-Ultra versions, though - some are only equipped with slower, 64 bit memory chips.

Versions:

GeForceFX 5200 64/128 MB 128 bit DDR (250/ 400); official price: $99.
GeForceFX 5200 Ultra 128 MB 128 bit DDR (325/ 650); official price: $149.