Spec for a Vista Ready Pc

Rollo Tamasi

Hi guys, I did a quick search but I couldn't find any thread relating to this although i'm sure there probably have been one or two already...

I'm going to be building a new pc in the new year and my OS of choice for it will be Vista. I'm curious as to find out what recommened spec I should be looking at. I'm not a gamer and I don't need to spend the bulk of my money on a graphics card but i don't tolerate my system running slow at all. I will be running a dual monitor so obviously that is a requirement for the graphics card and I would prefer to stick with a AMD processor if it's applicable.

Budget is about 800euro which does not include a case, monitors or keyboards. I'm just looking for a recommendation on a PSU, CPU, RAM, Mobo, hard drive and graphics card as well as maybe a DVD drive.

Cheers

Blazer

Any of the current AMD's will be fine for Vista..
You're biggest concern would be memory..get at least a gig of it..
Video cards..anyone with the dual vga/dvi will be fine although if you want to run the aero interface you'll probably want the following card
Support for DirectX 9 graphics with a WDDM driver, 128 MB of graphics memory (minimum)2, Pixel Shader 2.0 and 32 bits per pixel.

TerrorFirmer

Basically any dx9 class card from the last 2 years, even a crap one like the FX series, would be perfectly fine for vista. Vista is more demanding then XP true, but it's not so demanding that you'd need to specifically ask what sort of hardware you need to run it. Any decent processer, Celeron D and Sempron included, along with a decent 1gig of ram and any old dx9 graphics card will be perfectly fine.

If you definately won't be gaming, a dirt cheap sempron processor, some cheap 7300 class card with dual dvi and a gig of ram would fit easily within 800 including your case, monitor, keyboard, mouse, and probably even monitor.

Look at this komplett AMD entry PC for example....http://komplett.ie/k/ci.asp?sku=10248

Change that to an X2 3800+ instead of the 2800+, 1gig ram, dvd-rw and 17" monitor. All you need to add is a graphics card like this 7100GS for 47 euro and you're sorted.

Basically for about 850, you have a nice dual core machine, more then enough for Vista that includes the 17" monitor. You could even leave the Sempron 2800+ in there and you'd have a vista capable machine easily for about 740.

Another option is the X2 3800+ machine without monitor for a 620, or the Sempron 2800+ for 510. Both would be plenty enough for vista.

subway

im running vista at home on the following beast:
intel p4 2.4ghz
512mb ddr400
nvidia 6200 128mb

it gets a 4.1 out of 5 for vista readyness....
i reckon its worth close to 150eu...

mukki

subway wrote:

im running vista at home on the following beast:
intel p4 2.4ghz
512mb ddr400
nvidia 6200 128mb

it gets a 4.1 out of 5 for vista readyness....
i reckon its worth close to 150eu...

4.1??? you sure

i am running vista on
x6800
1gb ocz ddr2 ram
2 sata drives on raid0
and it gets a 3.1 in vista performance


i also have it installed
on a xp2000
with a 30gig ide drive
504mb sd-ram (8 is shared)
8mb vga on board

it actually runs okay, boots quick enough, and opens apps fine
but i cant get drivers for the graphics card, so its 1024x768 @60hz until i slot in another one

i think vista has dropped drivers for a few of things
my usb cam was autodetected in xp, but cant be installed in vista
would be supprised if they cut off everything below 64mb in vga cards

subway

think it was a 4.1,
remember it was higher than my laptop which got a 3.something.

stereo_steve

I'm also 4.1 with...

3500+
1024 RAM
6600GT

Are you sure your 4.1?? May be different releases measure it differently? Im RC1

Rollo Tamasi

is there some application you can download which checks your current system spec against the requirements for Vista?

aidan_walsh

Microsoft's Vista Upgrade Advisor?

mukki

stereo_steve wrote:

I'm also 4.1 with...

3500+
1024 RAM
6600GT

Are you sure your 4.1?? May be different releases measure it differently? Im RC1

that might be it, i am beta testing the RTM (it looks nice, but blue screened 3 times in a week, and ie7 crashed twice)

8T8

To run Vista optimality with all the bell's & whistles I'd probably recommend something like this though you could get away with less and none of the below has to be uber equipment entry level stuff will do fine;

Dual core CPU
1GB of RAM
Ready Boost compatible USB stick 1GB+ (ideally match size of RAM in machine)
Direct-X 9 GPU with 256MB of RAM (no virtual RAM like Turbocache for optimal usage)
Any recent SATA hard drive
Widescreen display with DVI (not essential but looks nice)

K.O.Kiki

Ready Boost?
I've only heard a little about that (other than the HDDs with built-in flash); know of any manufacturers?

subway

mukki wrote:

that might be it, i am beta testing the RTM (it looks nice, but blue screened 3 times in a week, and ie7 crashed twice)

beta testing the rtm
bit of a contradiction in terms really...;)

im running the rtm version too.

8T8

ReadyBoost is sort of the DIY version of ReadyDrive that brings some of the benefits, with RD the tech is built into the actual hard drive but with RB you can use any compatible USB drive to act as a cache between the RAM & HD.

At the moment most manufacturers are not marketing USB drives as RB compatible but that should change quickly once Vista is out.

ExtremeTech did an article about it and listed some of the compatible USB drives they have tested for example the Crucial Gizmo ones are.

According to Microsoft ideally the size of the RB USB drive should be equal to or greater than the amount of RAM in the system for optimal performance.

mukki

subway wrote:

beta testing the rtm
bit of a contradiction in terms really...;)

im running the rtm version too.

well you see its the rtm, but i used a beta key to activate it, nuff said

subway

mukki wrote:

well you see its the rtm, but i used a beta key to activate it, nuff said

i still dont get what you mean.
its an rtm version not a beta.

are you stating that your illegally using vista?

mukki

subway wrote:

i still dont get what you mean.
its an rtm version not a beta.

are you stating that your illegally using vista?

not illegally, as i stated i am "beta testing" it

that readyboost sounds intertesting, sadly me usb key is too slow, strange since its a 31/20

subway

under what program are you "beta testing" - as you call it.
i would be interested to know more about it.

mukki

subway wrote:

under what program are you "beta testing" - as you call it.
i would be interested to know more about it.

i'll say no more..... you seem to be getting grumpy about it!