Jikuu

Hmm. I seem to be adept in "buying at the right time"... the right time around here at least. I usually buy a completely new system (leaving the old intact, got 5 PCs in full working order, up from 386/20mhz) every 2½-3½ years, maybe a new 300 euro graphics card or so but usually no other upgrades along the way. I bought my current rig around christmas 2007 (top of the sane-price-line then), and by now the price has come down only about 2-300 euros. I usually don't play the "hottest new titles with insanely cool graphics" anyway, with few exceptions, so I get by fairly well. When I do fire up that new game, I do want it to run well though. I'm not much into graphics, but gameplay must be smooth. I'm one of those who say "they don't make games like they used to. It's all about the graphics engines these days." Sure, the flashy games are fun for a night or two, but for some reason nearly all of the games that have taken up thousands of hours of my time have graphics ranging from extremely bad to poor on modern scale. Average when they came out. Ah well, getting side tracked now, so I better quit me rantin'.

Spazghost

/thread

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airbozo

Sadly most of the budget went to the SO's computer this year and I chose to upgrade my motorcycle instead of my computer. Then my mobo died so I am on a server board until next years spending (if I can wait that long...)

I bought a new system for the SO (but she got my cpu and memory) since she was tired of getting all my hand me downs. Then she got a new MF printer and a monitor. Next she wants a small LCD TV for the workout room...

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sLowEnd

About $600 every 3-5 years

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intelextreme

All I know is next year is going to be expensive. A new Core Extreme, the i7 or whatever they call it, plus a new motherboard with the new socket, plus another 4870 x2, which means an expansion of my thermoelectric chilled water system so we are likely looking, assuming the new CPU costs $1,600, the new motherboard $360 (Gigabyte), a new case (I need one to fit a larger cooling pump) and Boreas cooler to cool two cards and a CPU ($800). So thats $2,760 just next year and it does not even include the gaming keyboards, mice. games, etc. I am constantly buying nor the 4870 x2 2gb I purchased a month ago. This year was a year of video cards, a Shapphire HD 4870 X2 2gb, a Asus 3870 X2 1gb, and a Shapphire HD3870 512 kb (the 3870's were running in tri-crossfire and were just as fast as my new 4870 x2 [a 3dMark06 of just around 18,500], likely as the driver is still new fot the 4870 X2; and I recall my 3dMark06 score changed a lot on the 3870's as the drivers matured. They would not even work in tri-crossfire until a driver that came out about a month and a half ago. But bottom line that was over $1,000 just in video cards. For some reason years went by when "early adopters" of computer products paid more, but we knew we did, and we also had some ability to rely on the timing of releases of say a new "Extreme" P4 CPU, or the release of the new top of the heap CPU (I.e., AMD's FX-60), or graphics card; prior to the Core 2 Duo and maybe in terms of video cards the Nvidia 7950 GTX these types of big releases did not happen every two months, but more like annually if not longer (the FX-60 reigned for over 2 years I believe and the P4 3.4 Extreme, while hot as can be, also was out for awhile I believe (I still have one in a dedicated flight simulator I built my son). Even the first switch I made back to an Intel Core 2 Duo Extreme from the FX-60, which was to the X6800, as not that bad as the X6800 was not immediatly supplanted. However, recently, it seems that Intel is releasing a new Extreme CPU every two months and there is not a large difference between the QX6850 and the QX9770 when benchmarked. The main speed difference seems be be that the QX6850 can, using thermoelectric cooling, be overclocked to a stable 3.8 ghz, while the QX9770 can overclock to 4.0 ghz. Bottom line I for one as far as CPUs go have quit being an early adopter as long as Intel keeps trying to line its war chest by releasing new cpus when not needed and so soon together. Assuming the new Core i7 Extreme represents a significant breakthrough in technology and speed (which used to drive Intel's releases) then I will likely purchase it and a new motherboard. As for graphic's cards, Nvidia and ATI are also playing one upmanship and releasing cards too quickly. I purchased my first Asus 3870 X2, switching from a Nvidia 8800 GTX, when I purchased a new motherboard back in March of this year, which is about when they started hitting the market. Since then Nvidia has come out with their 9800 GX2, the GTX 260 and the GTX 280 and finally AMD has come out with the 4850, 4870 and my latest card the HD 4870 X2 2gb. Now there is controversy over whether the 4870 x2 2b (PC World) or the GTX 280 (Computer Shopper) is the better overall card. Bottom line, however, to me it seems sort of a disservice to customers to come out in a single year with over 9 new3 video cards, a number of which compete for the high end of the market. Bacically since March there have been four cards which have competed for the top spot (9800 GTX, 3870 X2, GTX 280, 4870 X2). Competition has become so fierce between AMD and Nvidia at the high end spot of gaming graphics (leaving out high end medical/cad type $3,000+ cards) that I at least can no longer afford to be an early adopter of graphic's cards either. I already regret my purchase of teh HD4870 X2, given that its 3dMark06 score is actually less then my 18,548 score with an HD3870 X2 and an HD3870 in Crossfire. I may just sell it on Ebay and put my old cards back in unless the driver gets better or water cooling makes a big difference. So from now on I am going to try to be more like Jikuu and purchase at the right time, enough early adoting as the big component companies have decided to take advantage. One last enormous example of Intel trying to make a quick buck was their dropping the T7000 Notebook CPU line in exchange for the T8000 and T9000 overnight. Only a couple of companies adopted the new CPUs overnight (Sony and HP must have cut good deals and sold off their old stuff as refurbished) but frankly the T8000 series as well as the T9000 are not, in my mind, technologically superior to, or faster than, the T7000 series to warrent their release, dropping the T5000 and T7000 series, and the resulting price inflation of Notebooks. I would take a Notebook with a T7600 or T7700 over any single T8000 series and most all T9000 series CPUs and if their was a price difference I would go for the 7000 every time.

pjlietz

Um, ok... You think you could break that up abit?

Wall of text = bad.

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nafljhy

hehe... just a bit hard to read.

and to fill in this thread with my own anual spending which can't be said for annual as i've only started. usually would be like... $600 every two years. they were dells before.. this year, i got a dell in october then from july through now... i've spent around $7k on 3 rigs.. 1 is still WIP. 1=personal computer, 1=techstation(testing blocks), 1=server, 1=dedicated folder(even though all of them are folding all day, all night)

i don't plan on upgrading them until after nehalehm passes so it'll even out eventually.

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CorryBasler

way to much! About $1500 a year!

Cubeman

About 1500-1800 a year. Spent 1604$ on my recent rig that is in my sig

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yomama9388

I usually sell all my old hardware so things even out a little bit, but I'd say I easily spend 2-3k a year, maybe more :/

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