New Windows 7 machine ....

[ragnar]

My old Windows XP box died.  Don't want ot fix it.  So I intend on getting a new or refurbed Dell running Windows 7.

I can go cheap (about $300) and get a dual core system that is more powerful than what I have now.  Let’s assume an old Athlon X2 at 3.0 GHz.  This should run mostly everything.

My old system could only run the later Mortal Kombat (3+) and Street Fighter games.  I’d like to be able to run them all.

Would an Athlon X2 @ 3.0 GHz do the trick for the MK and SF games?

What would more horsepower give me?  Are there any games that could use the power of an Intel i3, i5 or i7?  I remember reading a while ago that there is a good football game that needs a high end i7 setup.  One game is not worth $400+ extra dollars.

Any advice is appreciated.

Update:
Found a refurb with a 3.2GHz i3 processor and everything else I wanted.  So, I ordered it.  See a few posts down.

[eds1275]

I'm running all the MK's and SF's [except the 3d ones like MK4 and Street Fighter Ex] with a single processor and 2 gigs ddr ram. I'm sure with a dual core and a gig and a half or more of ram you'll be smokin'.

[ragnar]

Could I ask what exact processor you have.  If you know anything else like motherboard information and chipset, that would be great.

best yet, grab CPU-Z (google it) and see what hte exact system is.  That program tells you everything you know about your PC and more.

[newmanfamilyvlogs]

I've got a mame test-system running on a 3.0Ghz Pentium 4 (Prescott 630) with 768 megs of ram and WinXP64. So far it has run non-3D mame games just fine, and I just finished testing the Naomi version of Marvel vs Capcom 2 using Makaron, which it also ran at 60fps using a 256meg GeForce 6200.

[xmenxmen]

with my p4 2.4 prescott, I can run everything up to sfIII perfectly.  mk3 works fine too.  have never tested mk4.  sfex slowwwwwww.... 

[ragnar]

Found this for $300 (refurb):
3.2 GHz i3 processor.
4 gig of ram
1 TB hard drive
Windows 7

I just could not walk away from this deal!
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?type=product&id=1218402862931&AID=10474050&PID=3332167&SID=u00000687&URL=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.bestbuy.com%2Fsite%2Folspage.jsp%3Ftype%3Dproduct%26id%3D1218402862931&ref=39&CJPID=3332167&loc=01