Impromptu hardware survey by me

[Ed Oscuro]

If you're a PC gamer or would be interested in playing a game on your PC, this test is for you. I'm still working out the test, so I apologize for its current deficiencies. Comments and suggestions are very welcome. I'm conducting this because I became interested in finding out after Iron Draggon's thread. I'm also conducting it here, if you want to see how that's coming along. Only respond to one thread, please

Taking inspiration from Valve's Hardware Survey, I've been wondering what sort of systems our Forumers game on. If you would be so kind, list a few statistics for me (only as much as you wish), and I'll see if we can't get any sort of good statistics out of it:

Use System Requirements Lab to get these statisics. Easy, painfree, and requires just a small download.

1) Date of your system (if it's an off-the-shelf brand like Dell, Alienware, or eMachines, to name a few).
2) Video card, and rough date of introduction (if you can find that)
3) Type and amount of RAM
4) Type of CPU, speed, cache
5) Speed of internet connection (for dialup, your connection speed should be shown) and provider. Use this test: here
6) Size of hard drive, and free hard drive space
7) Removable drive media: CD-ROM, DVD, just floppies, or nothing? Just tell us what the biggest medium, of these four, available to you is. Don't offer any other choices, and the speed isn't relevant.

[syzygy]

This link:

http://www.srtest.com/referrer/srtest

Is a good test of wether your machine will run a specific game. I used it to see if my machine would run Oblivion.

My machine was built from scratch on December 01 2005

CPU:
AMD Athlon(tm) 64 Processor 3500+
2.2 GHz Performance Rated at 3.5 GHz

System RAM:
1023.5 MB

Operating System:
Windows XP Professional Service Pack 2 (Build 2600)

Video Card:
NVIDIA GeForce 6800 (GeForce 6800)

Sound Card:
Creative SB Audigy 2 (WDM)

DVD:
NEC DVD_RW ND-3500AG

Internet connetion: Cable 4.6 megabits per second

Drives:

A:
3 1/2 Inch Floppy Drive

C:
Size 74.53 GB (80,023,715,840 bytes)
Free Space 19.82 GB (21,283,913,728 bytes)

E:
Size 149.05 GB (160,039,239,680 bytes)
Free Space 36.04 GB (38,694,576,128 bytes)

[diskoboy]

Gaming rig specs -

1. Self built, Xmas day, 2005 (Abit KN8 SLI mobo - heatpipe cooled)
2. 2x BFG Nvidia 7800GT (overclocked)
3. 2g pc3200 Corsair XMS pro dual-channel RAM (2-3-3-6 timings)
4. Athlon X2 4400 (2x 2.2ghz cores, 2x 1mb cache stock heatsink)
5. 1.5 mb/s DSL / bellsouth.net. Upgrading to 6.0 mb/s cable, soon.
6. 4x 250 gig, 7200 rpm, Maxtor SATA HD's. 16mb cache each - RAID 0 array (1 terrabyte, folks! )
7. 1 lite on 16x DVD-ROM drive (from 2002), 1 HP 16x DL DVD-RW(+/-) with lightscribe (writes DL @ 8x in + mode) 1 floppy disc drive with 7 in 1 card reader.
8. Sound Blaster X-Fi Platinum soundcard - OS - Windows Proffesional edition SP2
9. Mad Dog modular 600w PS (Go ahead and make fun of me... I love this power supply! It keeps wires at a bare minimum)

[Ed Oscuro]

This link:

http://www.srtest.com/referrer/srtest

Is a good test of wether your machine will run a specific game. I used it to see if my machine would run Oblivion.

Oh, thanks a bunch - I used that recently but had forgotten (and didn't remember that it showed stats anyway). I have updated all the surveys with that information; it'll make things painless. Thanks!

[Sylentwulf]

1 - Constantly upgrading here and there, self-built
2 - Ati Radeon 9600 256mb DDRam
3 - 2GB DDR
4 - P4 3.0ghz
5 - Cable
6 - 158gb total, roughly 50gb free give or take
7 - DVD

[unwinddesign]

1) October 2005; built by moi (yay!)
2) BFG nVidia 6800GT OC
3) 2 GB Corsair XMS DDR RAM
4) AMD Athlon 64 Venice 3200+; 512 kb cache
5) 1.5 mbps downstream DSL (approx 160 kb/s download speed)
6) 160 GB (153 available); 132 GB free
7) 2 DVD-RW drives

You might want to include PSU as well, given that is a huge factor in computer performance.

[njiska]

1) Custom Built, last updated Dec. 05

2) ATI Radeon 9800 PRO 128 MB (256-bit Memory Pipeline)

3) 1.5 GB Dual Channel, Heatsinked Kensigton DDR

4) 3.4 GHz P4 with Hyper-Threading. I beleive the Cache is 1024KB but i'll check that when i get home using Intel CPUID

5) I can't preform the test from work, but it's rated for 10Mbit down, i'm unsure about up.

6) C: 10 GB 2 MB Cache
D: 250 GB 8 MB Cache (With 10GB partitioned for Debian Linux)
E: 80 GB 2 MB Cache

7) LG DVD-R,+R,-RW,+RW,-RAM,+R DL (I'll get the speeds later.)

[Ed Oscuro]

You might want to include PSU as well, given that is a huge factor in computer performance.

Yeah, if you don't have enough power, your computer won't work! Clearly this is just for midline specs, we aren't factoring in heat or anything that complex.

Also, just so everybody knows: this is your gaming computer. No computers at work if you don't use them as your PRIMARY gaming computer.

[diskoboy]

Should we include 3dMark or PCMark scores? That would be interesting to see...

My 3DMark 05 score is: 11234 (1280x1024 - SLi Mode - higest settings).

Cant imagine what my score would be if I maxed out my RAM! Still got 2gigs to spare until I do....

The only thing that sux about my mobo is that when you run in SLi mode, the PCI-e slot slows down to 8x

[Ed Oscuro]

That's a cool idea, but that'll have to wait for another test, I think. :P

Anyway, I'm both surprised so many people have posted (given the general apathy towards PC gaming in this Forum), but also kinda surprised there hasn't been more. If your PC isn't that great, this is your chance to get that information out there and say "hey, the industry cycle isn't favorable to me."

[Griking]

1) Built it myself

2)GeForce 7800GT

3) 2gb PC3200 RAM

4) Athlon 64 x2 4400

5) Comcast Cable Internet. According to this test I do 2.4mbps but I've clocked much faster on other bandwidth tests

6) Three Hard Drives, 100/50 200/93 & 250/170

7) One Lightscribe DVD/RW

[diskoboy]

That's a cool idea, but that'll have to wait for another test, I think. :P

Anyway, I'm both surprised so many people have posted (given the general apathy towards PC gaming in this Forum), but also kinda surprised there hasn't been more. If your PC isn't that great, this is your chance to get that information out there and say "hey, the industry cycle isn't favorable to me."

My only complaint about the PC market now.... Well, since I'm an AMD fanboy, I wish AMD would make dual-core processors that run at, at least, 3ghz each core. AMD hasn't even crossed the 3ghz threshold yet with their single core chips yet, have they? Even the FX-60 runs at 2.6ghz...

[CYRiX]

Off the top of my head:
NF4 DFI-UV SLI-DR
AMD 64 +3200
Nvidia GeForce FX 5200 (haha damn I need to update this)
1.5gb of random ram
120gb HD
Dell KB/Monitor
Creative 2.1 Speakres
Soyo Case and Mouse (Laser)
CD-RW Drive (Havea DVD one but don't have a use for it yet)
Video Capture Card