Is it worth upgrading?

milgo · 21 Nov 2007 at 16:39

Hey there,

Not really been into the pc gaming for a little while now. Things move on so quickly its hard to keep up.

So i was wondering whether its worth upgrading my pc. Main reason is so i can play the latest games with ease and because i fancy having a GFX with a HD out put on it.

At the moment i have a shuttle with the old 478 type socket if i remember correctly. I've got a 3.2 prescott overclocked to 3.6, 1gig of corsair xms pc3200 ram, audigity 6.1 sound card and an AGP nvidia 6800gt running at ultra speeds.

I have a wavemaster case and decent psu knocking about so was thinking of putting some bits in this as its cheaper than getting a new shuttle.

Budget is around the £400-£500 mark. Spending less is better and i don't mind overclocking. For that sort of money will i notice a worth while difference in performance? I tend to run my games at 1680 x 1050 and i imagine my current setup would struggle with the more recent games.

Would really appreciate peoples help, dan.

Bacardi · 23 Nov 2007 at 01:24

Im in a similar situation myself, running a 3200xp watercooled (pics should still be in the watercooled gallery thread in the overclocking forum) , 6800GT, 1Gb ram etc.

Like yourself I aint into gaming on the PC anymore, I think I burnt myself out through years of playing the Battlefield series (1942 then Vietnam then BF2, even have BF2142 sitting there unopened which was a gift about a year ago).

What I do like to do now is a bit of photo and video editing and this PC is now struggling a bit.

Roughly the same budget (£400ish), and again, like yourself, less is better and and have no problems overclocking.

Anyway hopefully this bump will get some attention from the more updated peeps.

jak731 · 23 Nov 2007 at 01:48

if you want a new pc then the one below can be a good starting point, i suggest that you post a more detailed list of what you might want if you decide to buy.

this spec is more for a general user (someone who does a bit of everything) in my opinion, but it will beat both of your aging machines though and may need editing to suit your needs.

Your basket
Product Name Qty Price Line Total
Pioneer DVR-212D 18x18 DVD±RW Serial ATA Dual Layer ReWriter - (Black) OEM £16.99
(£19.96) £16.99
(£19.96)
OCZ 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C4 Dual Channel Platinum Revision 2 XTC Series DDR2 (OCZ2P800R22GK) £31.99
(£37.59) £31.99
(£37.59)
Corsair HX 520W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU (CMPSU-520HXUK) £57.99
(£68.14) £57.99
(£68.14)
Sharkoon Silent Eagle 2000 120mm Fan - 3/4 Pin £6.99
(£8.21) £6.99
(£8.21)
Thermalright Ultra-120 Extreme CPU Cooler (Socket AM2/LGA775) £34.99
(£41.11) £34.99
(£41.11)
Intel Core 2 Duo E2180 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.00GHz (800FSB) - Retail £46.99
(£55.21) £46.99
(£55.21)
Akasa AK-ZEN-01-BK Zen Black Case - No PSU £26.99
(£31.71) £26.99
(£31.71)
PowerColor ATI Radeon HD 3850 Pro 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - Retail £94.99
(£111.61) £94.99
(£111.61)
Abit IP35 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £69.99
(£82.24) £69.99
(£82.24)
Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 250GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (ST3250410AS) £37.99
(£44.64) £37.99
(£44.64)
Sub Total : £425.90
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £10.95
VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £76.45
Total : £513.30

remove any components you dont need and either make a saving or improve the spec, for a gamign rig maybe imporve the Graphics to a 8800GT, for video and photo encodign, maybe a quad or a cpu with a larger catch or more memory (cant remember whats more important).

and finally remember to overclock the CPU

Bacardi · 23 Nov 2007 at 02:23

Thanks for replying jak.

Current bits I hope to re-use are:

IDE Dual layer dvd burner
SATA WD Raptor 36GB
IDE 160GB hard disk for general, local storage
Case (Big, grey Antec thing)
430 Watt True Power 2 Antec PSU (is this good enough for a dual core Intel?)

Display is dual 19" CRT monitors @1280x1024 with a view to upgrade to dual TFTs in the near future. I dont game anymore but occasionaly the young'un has a blast of Battlefield Vietnam (not important though). Will be mostly used for photoshop/surfing/word processing usually while downloading from usenet.

The mobo, cpu and ram you specced I have seen mentioned in quite a few threads so they are on the list.

I would rather use the stock cooler purely to save cash and the video card is a bit more than I would like to pay.

Couple of questions:

Is my PSU up to the task?

What video card would you recommend with Dual DVI (is dual dvi needed if I am going to upgrade to dual tft's in the future?). The cheaper the better but not if it is going to struggle.

Is the cpu up for a decent overclock with the stock cooler and would I even want to initially?(running a 3200Xp at the moment)

Should I head back over to the Dell website as I am getting to old for this carry on?

jak731 · 23 Nov 2007 at 02:37

at stock the cpu should analiate your xp3200, reports on the forums show a average OC of 3ghz wth similar MB+cpu setups.

Your basket
Product Name Qty Price Line Total
OCZ 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C4 Dual Channel Platinum Revision 2 XTC Series DDR2 (OCZ2P800R22GK) £31.99
(£37.59) £31.99
(£37.59)
Corsair HX 520W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU (CMPSU-520HXUK) £57.99
(£68.14) £57.99
(£68.14)
Sharkoon Silent Eagle 2000 120mm Fan - 3/4 Pin £6.99
(£8.21) £6.99
(£8.21)
Thermalright Ultra-120 Extreme CPU Cooler (Socket AM2/LGA775) £34.99
(£41.11) £34.99
(£41.11)
Intel Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient SLACR 95W Edition" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - OEM £136.99
(£160.96) £136.99
(£160.96)
Abit IP35 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £69.99
(£82.24) £69.99
(£82.24)
Sapphire ATI Radeon HD 2600 PRO 512MB DDR2 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (11117-02-10R) £47.99
(£56.39) £47.99
(£56.39)
Sub Total : £386.93
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £8.95
VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £69.28
Total : £465.16

may be better.

will use the parts you have lyign around as well

unless video and photo editign are as demendign on the GPU as games like crysis (which i'm sure you heard of) most cards will do, however i put a 2600 in to allow for moderate gamign and so you can use the other funtions that the card features such as sound output. the card will support dual monitors.

the psu i left in because i personally will not feel comtable running that pc on a 430W psu even though it is a good brand and will (i think be up to the job of runnign a c2D, not sure about a c2Q though).

the c2q is better for encoding (provided you use multithreaded software)

left the third party cooler in so you can OC without too much concern for temps but remove and replace the cpu with the retail version if you dotn think the temps will be a problem for you

Dougiebabe2003 · 23 Nov 2007 at 02:48

Bacardi said:
Thanks for replying jak.

Current bits I hope to re-use are:

IDE Dual layer dvd burner
SATA WD Raptor 36GB
IDE 160GB hard disk for general, local storage
Case (Big, grey Antec thing)
430 Watt True Power 2 Antec PSU (is this good enough for a dual core Intel?)

Display is dual 19" CRT monitors @1280x1024 with a view to upgrade to dual TFTs in the near future. I dont game anymore but occasionaly the young'un has a blast of Battlefield Vietnam (not important though). Will be mostly used for photoshop/surfing/word processing usually while downloading from usenet.

The mobo, cpu and ram you specced I have seen mentioned in quite a few threads so they are on the list.

I would rather use the stock cooler purely to save cash and the video card is a bit more than I would like to pay.

Couple of questions:

Is my PSU up to the task?

What video card would you recommend with Dual DVI (is dual dvi needed if I am going to upgrade to dual tft's in the future?). The cheaper the better but not if it is going to struggle.

Is the cpu up for a decent overclock with the stock cooler and would I even want to initially?(running a 3200Xp at the moment)

Should I head back over to the Dell website as I am getting to old for this carry on?

Am I right in thinking you only need:

Mobo
CPU
RAM
GFX Card
maybe PSU?

Dougiebabe2003 · 23 Nov 2007 at 02:57

If money is an option this is quite good...

The GFX card is 512mb memory so the higher res will be ok but games will suffer due to lower clock speeds of GPU and DDR2 memory. The XT is £4 more, is only 256MB but has faster GPU and GDDR3 memory.

You could spend more on a mobo as well and get one with Crossfire support... That would alloow you to have more power for games if you decide to play more and have 4 monitors.

PSU would easily do the job as would the 450W of the Huntkey one or Corsair. (Your's would prob work but you would be better off gettting a new one)

The CPU I have speced is only dual core but will OC nicely to 2.5+ghz... There's also enough spare change to go Quad if you want it

CPU cooler will also be quiter and do a better job than the stock one.

Bacardi · 23 Nov 2007 at 03:53

Well gents, thanks for your kind assistance.

Using a combination of your specs. and my brain (which now hurts after looking at components for hours) I have decided on this:

Probably taking a gamble by using my old PSU but my finances are severely restricted due to having 3 young 'uns.

Gone are the glory years of being young, single and paying the old dear £30 a week dig money when a full watercooled setup could be had without a second thought with a couple of LED fans and a few rounded IDE cables thrown in for good measure.

So if you dont mind can you have a quick look and give this old geek a bit of reassurance his spec. is sound and true? (I cant believe I actually considered a Dell earlier, wheres the fun in that?)

Thanks again chaps.

Dougiebabe2003 · 23 Nov 2007 at 05:05

Bacardi said:
Well gents, thanks for your kind assistance.

Using a combination of your specs. and my brain (which now hurts after looking at components for hours) I have decided on this:

Probably taking a gamble by using my old PSU but my finances are severely restricted due to having 3 young 'uns.

Gone are the glory years of being young, single and paying the old dear £30 a week dig money when a full watercooled setup could be had without a second thought with a couple of LED fans and a few rounded IDE cables thrown in for good measure.

So if you dont mind can you have a quick look and give this old geek a bit of reassurance his spec. is sound and true? (I cant believe I actually considered a Dell earlier, wheres the fun in that?)

Thanks again chaps.

Your old PSU should do it fine (just make sure you have the 24pin mobo connector etc)

RAM is prefect

CPU will be a lot quicker than your old prescot @ stock due to the dual core but will blow it out of the water OC'd.... which could be a problem on the stock cooler. I would think about buying one in future if not now

Mobo im not sure on, I haven't kept up with all the mobo's.

I would pay the extra £6 and get the 512mb as you can then have two LCD monitors @ a nice high res when you get them

You should see a nice performance increase anywho :cool:

Trunks9486 · 23 Nov 2007 at 08:24

if u can afford Quad, then go Quad... it will keep you from upgrading for a while on the CPU side.

jak731 · 23 Nov 2007 at 11:03

if you plan to OC a lot, then get the E2180 it has a higher multiplier