Here's a decent Dell system...

JCitron

Trainzing since 12-2003
http://www.dell.com/us/business/p/i...224687360123c99833680&ven3=476503501828683591

This isn't a bad system which actually has the room to upgraded and updated to another video card should that warrant.

As decked out and shown it's a bit over $1100.

With this coupon code,

Coupon: ?K6H5M3MV545KD

You save $523 - or 48% off the list price.

It may not be the greatest as spec'd, with the video card being the weaker of the items in the chassis, but it's a starting point for a new system, and don't have the knowledge, time, or stamina to build a system of their own.

Being a tower, the video card can always be updated at a later date.
 
Upgrade to a better video card, and a higher wattage PS, and more ram ?

I would focus more on the video card. The power supply will most likely support another card. There's plenty of RAM in the system to start with. 16 GB if I recall, which isn't so bad actually.
 
Seeing as to it holds an R9 360, I'd assume a 500+ Watt supply is in there. The AMD R9 360 itself needs a 450 watter to work, but this is considering the lower spec side of the rest of the PC. The I7 and other features in here for cooling and such, I'd assume the possibility of throwing a GTX970 or even a 1060 isn't out of the question. If one wanted to keep the AMD set, R9 380X isn't a bad choice probably. RAM isn't an issue really, I assume it's expandable to 32GB's. Thanks for showing it John, this is probably the most upgradable base inspiron that I've seen yet to date. Inspirons are great desktops, but in class of building them into powerhouses, they just don't usually have the capability. Dells have a good track record if you get them from the factory good. I have been using Dells now since I stopped using HP. The system I'm on right now is 8 years old and still going strong. It's a Dell XPS8500 and is very up-gradable. I just put two better sticks of RAM inside to give me 16GB, and I will soon be replacing the HDD for a bigger and faster one. I'm also running a GTX960, probably a bit low spec for TANE, but runs nearly all of my games as smooth as silk, so I'm quite satisfied of the performance it has provided.
 
I checked it here:

http://computers.woot.com/offers/dell-inspiron-3650-intel-i7-mt-desktop

Lousy power supply, 180Watt!

But, found this...

Power Consumption
With a rated board TDP of 85W, it requires at least a 450W PSU with one available 6-pin connectors.

LOL! We'll never know...

Good luck, that GPU is garbage, too.

http://gpuboss.com/gpus/Radeon-R9-360-vs-GeForce-GTX-960

Performance
Radeon R9 360 (OEM) is a cut-down power optimized Radeon R7 260X. Therefore, its performance stands somewhere between Radeon R7 260X and the weaker Radeon R7 260.

You have to replace the PSU, the GPU, and maybe more. Not such a good deal, really. I honestly would not waste the time, too much proprietary stuff to deal with when trying to customize a Dell.
 
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With so many builders of gaming computers out there, I personally wouldn't waste my money on a Dell. Just my opinion.

Cheers,

Dave
 
Seeing as to it holds an R9 360, I'd assume a 500+ Watt supply is in there. The AMD R9 360 itself needs a 450 watter to work, but this is considering the lower spec side of the rest of the PC. The I7 and other features in here for cooling and such, I'd assume the possibility of throwing a GTX970 or even a 1060 isn't out of the question. If one wanted to keep the AMD set, R9 380X isn't a bad choice probably. RAM isn't an issue really, I assume it's expandable to 32GB's. Thanks for showing it John, this is probably the most upgradable base inspiron that I've seen yet to date. Inspirons are great desktops, but in class of building them into powerhouses, they just don't usually have the capability. Dells have a good track record if you get them from the factory good. I have been using Dells now since I stopped using HP. The system I'm on right now is 8 years old and still going strong. It's a Dell XPS8500 and is very up-gradable. I just put two better sticks of RAM inside to give me 16GB, and I will soon be replacing the HDD for a bigger and faster one. I'm also running a GTX960, probably a bit low spec for TANE, but runs nearly all of my games as smooth as silk, so I'm quite satisfied of the performance it has provided.


It's not a bad system for the money spent. I never expect it to be a blow away system that would cost a whole lot of money. It's a good starting point I think for a lot of people looking for a bit higher than a low-entry level computer, which many people ask about here. Heck the system that's spec'd out by N3V in their part's picker link has a dual core Pentium in it!

I've never had bad luck with a Dell system either , in particular with their Latitudes laptops and the business-equivalent to these systems the OptiPlex systems, which I found always to be reliable and stable with long running lifetimes.
 
I checked it here:

http://computers.woot.com/offers/dell-inspiron-3650-intel-i7-mt-desktop

Lousy power supply, 180Watt!

But, found this...

Power Consumption
With a rated board TDP of 85W, it requires at least a 450W PSU with one available 6-pin connectors.

LOL! We'll never know...

Good luck, that GPU is garbage, too.

http://gpuboss.com/gpus/Radeon-R9-360-vs-GeForce-GTX-960

Performance
Radeon R9 360 (OEM) is a cut-down power optimized Radeon R7 260X. Therefore, its performance stands somewhere between Radeon R7 260X and the weaker Radeon R7 260.

You have to replace the PSU, the GPU, and maybe more. Not such a good deal, really. I honestly would not waste the time, too much proprietary stuff to deal with when trying to customize a Dell.

This is not meant to be a kill-all system and as I've said an entry-level system which many people have inquired about. Remember not everyone can afford a system dual GTX1080 with a Skylake 6960, 128GB RAM, and 2x 2TB SSDs which is connected to a 4K 48-inch Surround display. Maybe you can, but I know I surely can't and there are many other people who definitely can't, but still want a system that they can grow with. The power supplies used today in these systems is far different than the ones used in their older Inspirons, meaning they can be replaced. This is all unlike HP desktops where a third-party power supply definitely will not fit without reworking the case.

So the video card here is equal to a GTX960. That's not a bad entry-level card here, and runs quite a bit under my GTX780Ti. Sure compared to a GTX1080, this is a kid's toy. Again, it's all about budget. They may not be able to run full sliders in T:ANE, but even I don't do that with my GTX780Ti or even my Alienware running a GTX980.
 
I have a GTX 980 SC Active Cooling 2.0,, Intel Core i7 4790K, Corsair 1866 Mhz DDR3 32GB RAM, Asus Z97-A (USB 3.1) MoBo. It is not something that is going to break the bank, but yet I can turn up all the sliders without issues in T:ANE. You should be able to, with your setup, too. Heck, even my Asus ROG laptop can.

So, that Dell, has a GPU that is a power optimized R7 260X, basically. That is not as good as a GTX 960, if you actually looked. Maybe a good start, if you want to continue older versions of Trainz, I guess... The CPU is good! The storage is a lower end drive too. But, you get what you pay for.
 
I have a GTX 980 SC Active Cooling 2.0,, Intel Core i7 4790K, Corsair 1866 Mhz DDR3 32GB RAM, Asus Z97-A (USB 3.1) MoBo. It is not something that is going to break the bank, but yet I can turn up all the sliders without issues in T:ANE. You should be able to, with your setup, too. Heck, even my Asus ROG laptop can.

So, that Dell, has a GPU that is a power optimized R7 260X, basically. That is not as good as a GTX 960, if you actually looked. Maybe a good start, if you want to continue older versions of Trainz, I guess... The CPU is good! The storage is a lower end drive too. But, you get what you pay for.

I did look at the article. It is at the lower end, but it should still handle T:ANE with sliders down some, which is what I would expect. But it will run T:ANE fine and a lot better than the Intel integrated graphics.

According to this article here: The card is closer to the GTX770 and is a bit faster than the GTX960 on some tests, but on par with it on others. It also uses the older AMD 7970 chip but clocked a bit faster.

http://www.notebookcheck.net/AMD-Radeon-R9-280X.105863.0.html

The website title is deceiving because it has nice information on both desktop and notebook video cards. :)

I have run my systems with full sliders, and they only got really hot and things started to stutter. This may have to do with my routes which are all East Coast type routes with lots of assets - mostly trees - vying for GPU and CPU, so it's probably not worth pushing things in particular the draw distance because it's not worth the heat when you can't see 15km out of a forest. ;)

I agree that hard drive is on the lower-end too which I expect, but it's a lot bigger than some I've seen in other systems which come with those ancient 64GB SSDs. Wow you can fit a lot on one of those these days. A 1-TB drive is nothing to sneeze at to start for a starter system.

John
 
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John - the R9-280X you've linked to is way faster than the R7-260X - I have the Asus R9-280X DC2-TOP which will run happily at 1170Mhz and has a 384 bit memory bus with memory bandwidth faster than a GTX-980.
AMD R7 cards are much slower.
 
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John - the R9-280X you've linked to is way faster than the R7-260X - I have the Asus R9-280X DC2-TOP which will run happily at 1170Mhz and has a 384 bit memory bus with memory bandwidth faster than a GTX-980.
AMD R7 cards are much slower.

Thanks for pointing that out.

So now according to this, the card is in the lower mid-range of cards, which is okay but not stellar using the 750Ti for its review which is a bit faster.

http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-GeForce-GTX-750-Ti-Desktop-Graphics-Card.126721.0.html

The only info I could find based on the actual name is the R7 M260X which is closer to the GTX830 series.

I still think it's a good base to start with for many people looking at desktops.

Dell has another system on sale now which has another video card, also an AMD but I can't remember what that one is without opening up my mail...
 
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