Advise needed pleease!

Hey guys, I've been needing a computer for a while now and I now have the opportunity. I'm fairly good with computers but I need some help and advise with this. I want a PC that I can play games on, make music on (music production) and I'd really like to be able to plug in the TV, playstation, XBOX etc into it and use it as an amplifier / equilizer and have 5.1 surround sound from the computer... did that make sense?! I thought I could build it myself but im getting too confused with all the different components and their compatability. Does anyone know of a good reliable company who will build me one for a decent price!? I also need it to be upgradable so I dont have to buy a new one in 2yrs! I have a budget of around £800, £1000 at a big push! Is this unrealistic?

Cheers in advance!

Kris

Your budget is more than enough.

I'm just off to bed but will follow this up in the morning.

Dave.

P.S. Welcome to the forums.

Glad to be here! :D

You want:

Intel Core 2 Duo - Any speed

2GB Ram

200GB + Hard Drive

DVD Burner

A decent sound card ie: Sound blaster X-Fi Xtreme Music

Also for music production screen size is important.

I'd get a 19" wide-screen to be honest if you can afford it.

Let me know if this helps.

Dave.

As for a company its dificult as you want something fairly custom spec.

I could always do you a quote and build it for you if you like.

My company builds and installs PC's everyday and I have trade accounts so could probably do a good deal.

Thanks dave, yea I would appreciate a quote with the spec you suggested.

If you could do another quote for a system slightly better also, a 400GB hard disc and maybe a bit more RAM. I have over 150GB of multimedia on my 'familly computer' that I'll be transfering. The games i'd want to play would also need a half-decent graphics card too wouldn't they? It would also need to support some kind of external screen as my TV (Toshiba LCD) has a computer input and I would play DVD's / films from the computer and watch them on the TV and have the computers surround sound. For the computer, the 19" widescreen sounds about right.

Sorry I'm going on a bit, it's just I don't want to go to PC world and have them sell me a 'bargain' that will expire in a year and only do some of the things I want it to. Thas why I came on this forum as it's more independant advice.

Cheers,

Vista or XP?

I'd recommend XP for your situation as with music production you'll have problems with the software compatibility on vista.

Yea I would go with XP, I was worried about Vista and the compatibility of bits!

Oh, instead of the sound blaster xtreme music could it be the Sound Blaster X-Fi Platinum. I just did some research and found it has more inputs and a more choice in speaker setup and I believe it would be more suited to my needs!

You originally said you had £800+ for a music production PC.

Adding more than 2GB ram, a graphics card to play games and an extra 200GB of hard drive space is going to push this up.

I'll pm a quote shortly and we can go from there.

Dave.

EDIT*

Having that other sound card is again going to blow your budget.

I know! It's just soo easy to get carried away! As you said, lets get the quote and go from there. I may be able to stretch for a system that will do what I want it to do and last me a long time.

Thanks for your help Dave. I feel a bit lost with this kind of thing, sorting out software I can do but I have no experience with the hardware.

PM Sent.....

Hope your happy with your new system Kris...

Nice chap and smooth transaction, thanks.

Shroomo, I'm jealous. When you get that system built, it'll be something! I could deal with something like that!

Systems all up and running and (as I keep telling everyone!) is the fastest computer I have ever used. I've thrown some pretty demanding software and games at it and it hasn't even glitched. Very impressed and happy with it, just having a few probs with getting it to play a DVD! I think I need to download some kind of driver for it but I thought the DVD drive would come with it? Either way it's not a hardware fault, so I'm not placing blame. Does anyone know of a bit of trusted freeware or cheap software that will play/rip/burn DVD's?

Cheers Dave, great job.

Kris

I definately would imagine Dave would have included the software with the DVD drive shroomo.
What exactly is the problem/s you are getting?

To play DVDs you will need some software like PowerDVD.

The drive was OEM so did not come with any software.

If you get Ace Codec Pack and Winamp you should be fine, both are free