Continuing the buyer's guide this week is the highly anticipated high-end gaming system. The second high-end buyer's guide and the fifth buyer's guide over all, our mission remains the same:

What we will keep doing is bringing you up to date system configuration suggestions on the type of system that you are interested in. Although it is impossible to suggest a single configuration for each individual in each situation, what we can and will do is provide you with recommendations towards a system setup; recommendations which can be altered appropriately for each user's specific needs. We will do what we have always done in buyer's guides: spec out a system using reliable components from reputable vendors. Remember, these prices are not necessarily the lowest prices on the web but are meant to be representative of what is out there and representative of what we think is the best solution in one of the six categories.

Changing this time around will be the format of the buyer's guides. We will maintain the six specific categories, value SOHO, value gaming, value professional 3D, high-end SOHO, high-end gaming, and high-end professional 3D, but this time around the recommendations will not be lumped together. Instead, we will be publishing one recommendation from each category weekly. We kicked off the buyer's guide with the value SOHO category and continue this week with the value gaming category. After the value and high-end recommendations are made we will do one article on a dream configuration. At this rate, new recommendations for each system will come every eight weeks so in eight weeks from today you can expect an updated value gaming buyer's guide. Not only does this keep the system recommendations fresher, it also keeps the price estimates more accurate.

Every component in a recommend system, from case to monitor, is covered. The only hidden costs are shipping costs, which can add anywhere from 5% to 10% to the total system cost depending on what you get and from where. The best way to keep shipping costs down is to order as much as possible from a single vendor or pick things up locally. Be sure to take a look at the AnandTech Hot Deals Forum to see if any AnandTech readers have posted a special deal on a piece of hardware in the recommended system. Also be sure to check out our Weekly CPU & Video Card Price Guide and our Weekly Memory & Motherboard Price Guide to see if prices have been updated since the buyer's guide was last posted.

Like before, an OS for each system is recommended but the OS price is not included in the final system price listed.

This Week

Again, configuring a high-end system is not as easy as some may think. If we were simply to choose the highest performing components available regardless of the cost, we could have a machine that would satisfy the needs of almost all users. The problem with such a system is that items necessary on one high-end system may not be necessary on another. In addition, we must be somewhat price conscious when specing out our high-end systems. Our dream system configuration is aimed at building the ultimate system regardless of price, but our high-end system recommendations are set out to build a fast system on a reasonable budget, not a limitless one.

The goal of our high-end gaming system: to configure a system that displays some of the fastest frame rates in 3D games today and has the ability to handle 3D games well into the future. Our high-end gaming system recommendation is to chose a set of fast, reliable components to create one mighty gaming machine.

High-end Gaming

Processor - Intel Pentium 4 2.4B GHz - $340.00

Three months ago we saw the Athlon XP fall from it's position as top dog in the CPU world. It was then that the 533MHz FSB Pentium 4 processors were revealed. Two chips came out that day, the 2.4B GHz and the 2.53GHz. We found that even the Athlon XP 2200+ running at 1.80GHz did not have enough oomph to keep up with either of these speed demons. When we were looking to build our high-end gaming system, going with one of the new 533FSB Pentium 4 solutions only made sense.

We had an easy time deciding between the 2.4B GHz chip and the 2.53GHz one as soon as we looked at prices. The 2.4B rang in at a fairly pricey $340 this week (shedding only $5 from last week). This wasn't so bad when we compared it to the 2.53's $513 price tag. There is no question that the money saved by going down a mere 133MHz in clock speed would be better spent elsewhere. Even with the slower 2.4B chip, this system will be able to go head to head with almost anything else out there.

Read more about the 533MHz FSB Pentium 4 solutions in our Pentium 4 2.53 and 2.4B review.

Motherboard - Gigabyte 8IEXP - $130

To be safe we decided to choose between one of Intel's own 533FSB chipset offerings. This left us deciding between the 845E, the 845G, 845GL, and the 850E. When push came to shove we decided upon the 845E chipset for our high-end gaming system. This was decided upon for a number of reasons. First off, we stayed away from the SiS and VIA solutions because we wanted the utmost stability in our system. Intel's track record is historically much better than either of these chipset manufacturers. Although we have not had any problems with the SiS 645DX or VIA P4X333 chipsets, we still decided to play it safe.

Next we were able to eliminate the 850E as a potential solution simply because of cost. Not only are 850E motherboards more expensive and harder to come by than 845 series motherboards, RDRAM prices remain higher than their DDR SDRAM counterparts. Finally we were able to decide upon the 845E because of the fact that we really had no need for the integrated graphics on the 845G and 845GL series chipsets. On a high-end gaming machine such as this, our focus is in 3D graphics. We can therefore rule out any integrated graphics solutions on the market.

Why did we go with the Gigabyte 8IEXP? Our latest Intel 845E roundup tells us why. As that review concludes: "We think the 8IEXP offers the best combination of features, performance, build quality, and price out of the eleven 845E motherboards we tested." In fact, we liked the Gigabyte 8IEXP so much that we gave it the AnandTech Editors Choice Gold Award. The price, at $130, is not bad either.

Read up on the 845E here and check out the roundup while you are at it.

Memory - 512MB Mushkin Basic PC2100 DDR SDRAM - $109

One of the least expensive higher quality memory providers we were able to find this week was Mushkin. Currently a single 512MB stick of Mushkin Basic PC2100 RAM costs $109 ($6 less expensive than last week's price for the same memory). As usual, you can go with any brand name memory you want as long as the price is good. We do caution you to stay away from the small-time memory producers as the problems you can run into are far more costly than the $20 or $30 it costs to go with Mushkin, Crucial, Kingston, or the like.

Video card - Gainward GeForce4 Ultra/750XP NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti 4600 - $340

Obviously, one of the most important aspects in configuring a high-end gaming machine is what video card goes in the system. As of today, there was little question of what video card we would like to find in our high-end gaming system: an NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti 4600. The GeForce4 Ti 4600 goes untouched by any other video card currently available on the market today. The GPU's framerate in even the most stressful games of today is more than enough to suggest that the GeForce4 Ti 4600 will be able to play games fairly well down the road.

We went with the Gainward GeForce4 Ti 4600 solution because the card won our recent NVIDIA GeForce4 4400/4600 Roundup. The Gainward GeForce4 Ultra/750XP won as a result of its strong feature set (including IEEE-1394 card), dual DVI capability, and impressive overclockablity. If you are just looking for speed without the extras offered by a card like the Gainward GeForce4 Ultra/750XP, you are safe going with the least expensive GeForce4 4600 card you can find. As of this article, some GeForce4 Ti 4600 cards are available for as low as $280.00 (saving you $60).

We do have a word of caution for those in the market for a high-end gaming system in the next few weeks. It may be worth your time and money to hold off a few weeks before putting your money into a new system. We say this because the ATI Radeon 9700 Pro cards should be hitting the shelves of some retailers before the end of this month. As we saw in our Radeon 9700 review, the chip not only has the potential to beat the NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti 4600 but to completely dominate it. Plus, the suggested retail price of the card is said to be $399, meaning that the street price of the Radeon 9700 should not be much more expensive than the Gainward card we chose to go in our high-end gaming system this week. Although being patient is hard, in this instance we think it may be in your best interest.

Read more about the NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti 4600 in our NVIDIA GeForce4 4400/4600 Roundup and more about the ATI Radeon 9700 in our ATI Radeon 9700 (R300) review.

Monitor - Sony StylePro CPD-E540 - $550

Let's start by saying that you are safe going with any quality 21" monitor from a large monitor manufacturer. With that said, we choose the Sony StylePro CPD-E540 21" monitor for really any high-end machine. The perfectly flat Trinitron tube monitor offers a maximum resolution of 1920x1440 and has a 0.24mm aperature grille pitch. We have had very good experience with the high end Sony CRT displays and we suspect that the CPD-E540 will fit in perfectly. Text will be clear, colors bright, and resolution superb: all the itmes you need to make the most out of your gaming expirence.

We are still a bit hesitant to recommend an LCD display for those looking to do some serious gaming. Even some of today's best LCD monitors suffer from fairly distracting streaking and ghosting. For this reason we would steer those specing out a gaming system away form LCD displays, especially when high framerates are of utmost concern. The truth is that a CRT will most likely do a better job keeping up with your hardware.

Naturally, we have not had a chance to test every LCD out there and undoubtedly some exist that perform fairly well under gaming situations. Try asking some of our forums members what their gaming experience has been like on their LCD monitors.

Case - Antec Performance Plus PLUS1080 - $145

In building a high-end system one does not want to be limited by expansion options. For this reason we chose the Antec PLUS1080 case to provide shelter for our high-end gaming setup. The case is designed is large and spacious, offering 10 drive bays (four 5.25" and six 3.5") as well as a good cooling setup. Also included is a 430W Pentium 4/Athlon XP ready power supply.

With it's two rear and one side panel fans standard, the system wont be quiet but it will be cool As a side note, the system that we are putting inside the PLUS1080 should be fine without the case cooling meaning that the fans can be disabled to reduce noise level.

If you are looking for something smaller, try the Antec PLUS660 on for size. This mini-tower offers many of the features present on the PLUS1080 except in a smaller package at a price that runs about $45 less.

Sound card - Onboard Creative CT5880E - "Free"

Sound becomes a bigger deal in our high-end gaming system than it is in other high-end system configurations. A good gaming system involves not only the visual but also the audible.

Although some will jump to criticize our use of onboard audio on the high-end gaming setup, let us defend ourselves. The Gigabyte board uses the Creative Sound Blaster CT5880 sound chip, the same found on many of Creative's Sound Blaster PCI cards. Since the chip is actually a discreet solution simply placed on the motherboard, CPU utilization while playing sound is just as low as CPU utilization using a separate sound card. In fact, we proved this in our KT333 Roundup where we took a look at integrated sound solutions. In fact, the CT5880 chip we tested in this review scored as one of the best onboard sound solutions we took a look at, scoring a "good" or "very good" rating in all tests but one (where it got "average").

The Gigabyte implementation of the CT5880E is also unique in the fact that the motherboard ships with an S/PDIF output connector located on a rear bracket. This gives the motherboard the ability to provide the speakers with a digital stream of audio which is always a nice feature.

Truthfully, the CT5880E onboard audio solution should provide about the same audio quality as the newer Creative Labs sound cards. If you are looking for the highest quality audio possible and are really an audiophile, we suggest you look into the Creative Labs Sound Blaster Audigy Platinum. The card is currently shipping for around $170.

Speakers - Logitech Z-560 - $140

We have heard really good things about the Logitech Z560 speaker system. $140 gets you a 4.1 speaker setup with 400 watts of power, thus giving the speakers its nickname "Klipsch Killers." Although we have not reviewed the Z-560s, others have had nothing but good things to say about the speaker set. It is powerful, crisp, and inexpensive considering the alternatives. All in all, it is a perfect match for our high-end gaming system.

Ethernet - Integrated Intel PRO/100 VE - "Free"

No reason to spend money on a discreet network card when our Gigabyte 8IEXP motherboard includes a controller for free. The Intel LAN chip used on the Gigabyte motherboard works great and will be just as fast and stable as any good LAN card on the market today.

Hard drive - Maxtor DiamondMax D740X 6L080J4 80GB - $110

We are sticking to the same hard drive we used in the value system recommendations for one reason: these drives are fast. This time around we have upgraded the capacity of our hard drive. Previous systems used 40GB versions of the D740X but we felt it necessary to bump up the capacity of the drive some in our high-end gaming system. If gaming is what you will be using this system for then hard drive space will be at a premium. Current generation games can take up to a gigabyte or more of hard drive space per install. Because of this we decided to spring the extra $45 to double the capacity of the 40GB D740X.

CD-RW - Plextor PX-320A/SW 12x20x10x40 DVD/CDRW Combo drive- $170

We decided to outfit our high-end gaming system with a DVD/CDRW combo drive. This type drive was decided upon based on the fact that systems, such as high-end gaming ones, will likely be used in the home where DVD functionality is a plus. In addition, there is the potential for games to begin shipping in DVD format down the road. Obviously being able to install future games is an important part of our high-end gaming system.

We decided upon the Plextor drive for two reasons. First off, it is among the fastest DVD/CDRW combo drives currently available. Secondly, we have had very good experience with Plextor products and suspect that the PX-320A/SW will be no different.

OS - Microsoft Windows XP Professional - $275

Gaming or not, Windows XP Professional remains the OS choice for our high-end systems. Not only is Windows XP a step above older Microsoft operating systems when it comes to gaming performance and compatibility, the Professional version adds some unique features that power users may find extremely useful.

You may be able to find an OEM copy of Windows XP Professional out there for significantly less. If you are building the machine from scratch, by all means go for it.

Bottom Line - $2034 (without software)

Summary

High-end Gaming	Component	Price
CPU	Pentium 4 2.4B GHz	$340
Motherboard	Gigabyte 8IEXP	$130
Memory	512MB Mushkin Basic PC2100 DDR SDRAM	$109
Video Card	Gainward GeForce4 Ultra/750XP NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti 4600	$340
Monitor	Sony StylePro CPD-E540	$550
Case	Antec Performance Plus PLUS1080	$145
Sound Card	Integrated Creative CT5880E	$0
Speakers	Logitech Z-560	$140
Ethernet	Integrated Intel Pro/100 VE	$0
Hard Drive	Maxtor DiamondMax D740X 6L080J4 80GB	$110
Hard Drive Controller	None	$0
CD-ROM	None	$0
DVD/CD-RW Combo Drive	Plextor PX-320A/SW 12x20x10x40	$170
Bottom line		$2034

A high-end gaming system that has the potential to perform at close to the maximum possible speeds of today's hardware for slightly over $2000. Not a bad deal at all considering that last year's high-end gaming system set one back almost $600 more ($591 more, to be exact). There is little question that the system as speced out above will be fast in 3D games. The only other advice we leave you with is that perhaps waiting a two or three weeks until a ATI Radeon 9700 card can find its way into your high-end gaming system may be worth it.