Another Upgrade Query I'm afraid...

Tiny Clanger · 3 Jul 2010 at 19:19

Hello there

Current system is:
Intel Core 2 Duo E6300
4.0GB Dual-Channel DDR2
965P-DS3
256MB Radeon X1950

PC is used primarily for gaming.

Question is - with a £200 budget am I going to see a marked improvement in speed if I was to update the CPU and graphics card? If so - what would you recommend?

Cheers

TC

thingemajib · 3 Jul 2010 at 19:23

looks to me like a radeon 5770 and 2nd hand q6600 job

looking around you should be paying ~£120 and ~£80 respectively

Redmint · 3 Jul 2010 at 19:26

What's your power supply?

Tiny Clanger · 3 Jul 2010 at 19:31

It's an OCZ Modstream - 500W I think...

Redmint · 3 Jul 2010 at 19:43

Should be fine, in that case I agree with thingemajib's suggestion.

If you don't currently have an aftermarket cooler I'd make sure you get one of those to go with the Q6600 though so you can do some overclocking.

Tiny Clanger · 3 Jul 2010 at 19:50

Thanks for the replies guys - three further questions if I may...

1. Is there anything to choose between the various manufacturers for the 5770?

2. Are you able to recommend somewhere to get a Q6600 second hand (not eligable for the Members Market here

)

3. Will these upgrades give a significant boost? (the current system has been fine until recently - even ran Crysis on low/medium quite happily - but the poor old graphics card falls over after a minute or two of Borderlands)

Thanks again

TC

stulid · 3 Jul 2010 at 19:51

thingemajib said:
looks to me like a radeon 5770 and 2nd hand q6600 job

looking around you should be paying ~£120 and ~£80 respectively

this

Marine-RX179 · 3 Jul 2010 at 22:34

Tiny Clanger said:
3. Will these upgrades give a significant boost? (the current system has been fine until recently - even ran Crysis on low/medium quite happily - but the poor old graphics card falls over after a minute or two of Borderlands

What do you mean by "falls over"? You mean low frame rate?
Sometimes games can become more CPU demanding when playing multi-player games online than playing a game in single-player mode with fewer models/characters appearing on screen at the same time.

Either way, with the Q6600 overclocked to higher it will certainly increase the frame rate.

Tiny Clanger · 3 Jul 2010 at 22:39

I think that what happens is that the graphics card gets too hot under the strain (this weather doesn't help of course) - the game freezes and then I get a pop up warning about the cards temperature.

cmndr_andi · 3 Jul 2010 at 22:51

+1 for thingemajib's suggested Q6600 + 5770 upgrade

Tiny Clanger said:
Thanks for the replies guys - three further questions if I may...

1. Is there anything to choose between the various manufacturers for the 5770?

Yes, some do use different quality components, different cooler types, BIOSs and offer different terms of warranty. I strongly suggest going for the ASUS CuCore 5770 - as it has a non-reference cooler (which is a bit better than the stock one), the BIOS allows you to "voltage tweak" the card for really good overclocking and it comes with a 3 year warranty (which is 1 year more than the rest).

Tiny Clanger said:
2. Are you able to recommend somewhere to get a Q6600 second hand (not eligable for the Members Market here )

Unfortunately not, we can't link or suggest competitors - we can only say "have a google". However, your forums account has 102 post (and more than enough time), you may want to consider getting involved in some discussions (GD and speakers corner are always great) and ask some relevant questions - who knows in a weeks time you may have the 250 posts you need to snap up one of the Q6600 that regularly appear there.

Tiny Clanger said:
3. Will these upgrades give a significant boost? (the current system has been fine until recently - even ran Crysis on low/medium quite happily - but the poor old graphics card falls over after a minute or two of Borderlands)

Massive boost. Not only will you be able to play games with higher detail levels, but your framerates will be much higher, giving you smoother gameplay.

You may also want to consider selling your E6300 CPU - for the price of selling that you may be able to buy a nice CPU cooler (like this) and give your Q6600 a nice overclock.

Finally, make sure you update your BIOS to the most recent version before you install the Q6600 - as earlier BIOSs won't support the Q6600.

Tiny Clanger · 4 Jul 2010 at 10:12

Thanks again all for your help and advice

Cheers

TC

Tiny Clanger · 4 Jul 2010 at 17:13

Out of interest - how many posts will I need to clock up to be able to access the MM?

Could anyone have a quick look and see if there are any Q6600? listed at the moment - I'm assuming that it's against the rules to buy on someone elses behalf....

Finally - if it's going to take forever to clock up the required posts - could you recommend a new CPU for about the same cash?

Thanks all again!

TC

Redmint · 4 Jul 2010 at 17:50

cmndr_andi said:
we can only say "have a google"

Maybe try searching for 'Buy Q6600 G0'. The results should give you a good idea of where you can find one.

(you need 250 posts for MM access)

Tiny Clanger · 4 Jul 2010 at 19:56

Ooops - sorry - should take more care reading replies

Thanks again all

TC