My current computer processor is a hamster in a wheel and my memory consists of a gnome writing things down on posted notes. So I need a new computer. Basically the only thing I want to do with it is stroll the internet and play World of Warcraft.

The thing is though is I don't actually know what kind of system requirements I Need for World of Warcraft. I know it says on the box but I want it too run flawlessly on the highest settings and the requirements on the box aren't necessarily for that.

I'm not very good with computers. Kind of having trouble understanding what kind of graphics/video card I need. I am trying to do all this for as cheap as possible(may have a friend build it for me).

So if anyone can provide the system requirements needed to play World of Warcraft at its best settings and perhaps tell me what I need that would be greatly appreciated.

what exactly is the price cap? and try fiddling around on newegg to get the best bang for your buck

The best option IMO is to Build your own computer and boot Linux ( Ubuntu is a great build, despite what elitists say about it )

But since you dont know what parts to get and have never built your own before and haven't installed your own OS using the bios, its a differant story.

As a gamer, you probably dont want a mac. Really the only problem with buying a new PC these days is that Vista is a failure that eats up way to much memory for software and features that are inferior to other software that can be downloaded on an XP for free that use A LOT less memory which is important to you as a gamer for obvious reasons. None of the new features Vista has, save for backwards compatibility ( which is unethical anyways ) cannot be replicated on windows XP using free based GNU software or even commercial software.

Im not sure if their is still a way to get a new PC with XP pro, all I'm saying is that Vista is pretty fail and if you just go to Best Buy or any general electronics store you will be stuck with a lackluster/poorly designed OS.

^ DDR2 prices are falling so rapidly these days that RAM isn't a problem to get. 1 gig sticks are 25 bucks at best buy. Or if you need the 800mhz sticks they're 30 bucks on amazon.com.

I looked around Dell's site and some of their models have the Windows XP option but if I can get my friend to build it for me im sure he can get Windows on it. The biggest problem I'm having at the moment is finding out what specs I need to play World of Warcraft at on its optimal settings...because thats basically all I'll be using it for. As oon as I find that out I can figure out how good of a processor and memory I need but am not too sure on what kind of graphics card I will need.

The budget it is cheap...Im not tring to run Crysis or anything on this just little old WoW and Firefox.

There are good and bad things about vista. Since you're just going to run WoW, office and firefox only, that wouldn't be a problem. Vista had this technology called superfetch.. and it's better than XP when it comes to handling multitask. I read this somewhere, and I think it's true because I owned one before (yeah... it got deleted after I installed linux Fedora 8 and Windows XP ).

But if you're kind of person who like to install lots of things on your computer, don't use vista.

World of Warcraft doesnt require much, any system with gig or more processing power around a gig of memory and good 256mb to 512mb video card with 3d capabilities should work well at full capabilities of the game. I am not a big fan of microsoft but if that is what you like then get xp it will work better than vista for ya. I highly recomment a mac or a linux box, I like Ubuntu but there are several versions of linux that would work well for this.

I heard that Superfetch eats up memory constanty. Here is a link that tell you how to turn it off.

LINK

The Dell XPS is a great PC by the way.