Decent upgrade?

Saxon · 28 Jun 2010 at 20:16

Hi all,

As you can see from my sig, my pc is fairly old now, so I'm looking to upgrade. I don't want to spend crazy money like I did last time as it's not really been worth it. I'm looking for something that will last me well enough for 6-12 months.

So I'm looking to spend below £500 for at least a new motherboard, CPU, memory.

I will be keeping my GFX card (5770) monitor and sound card.

So I'm looking at the i3 @ 4ghz bundle for £305.99

A new Hard Drive for the OS which would be a SSD (Corsair 60GB) for £99.99

And possibly a new case as my old one lets in too much dust, so I was looking at the Antec 300 for £41.99

Any suggestions on this would be appreciated.

stulid · 28 Jun 2010 at 20:19

buy a Q6600

Redmint · 28 Jun 2010 at 20:31

Saxon said:
I'm looking for something that will last me well enough for 6-12 months.

As Stulid said the Q6600 will be more than enough for the next year.

I assume you have a reasonable cooler going by your current overclock?

Saxon · 28 Jun 2010 at 20:39

Ahh there's a problem with that. My 680i board was one of the ones that had hardware problems which meant Quad cores wouldn't work properly with it, not even with a BIOS update.

My cooler isn't too bad.

I'm open to other suggestions then if mine is a bad choice. Is the i3 not a good choice?

Redmint · 28 Jun 2010 at 20:44

Does your cooler have an AMD bracket?

If it does then you obviously wont need the cooler in this suggestion:

AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 955 Black Edition 3.20GHz (Socket AM3) - Retail £128.99
(£109.78) £128.99
(£109.78)
Gigabyte GA-890GPA-UD3H AMD 890GX (Socket AM3) DDR3 Motherboard £104.99
(£89.35) £104.99
(£89.35)
OCZ Gold Low Voltage 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C8 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (OCZ3G1600LV4GK) £92.99
(£79.14) £92.99
(£79.14)
Titan TTC-NK85TZ/V2 Fenrir CPU Cooler (Socket 754/939/940/AM2/LGA775/LGA1156/LGA1366) £32.99
(£28.08) £32.99
(£28.08)
Sub Total : £306.35
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £9.50
VAT is being charged at 17.50% VAT : £55.27
Total : £371.12

It's worth the extra over the i3 I think, fair bit faster in most things and the motherboard can do crossfire if you decide to go for a dual graphics card setup later.

If you're sure you'll never go for crossfire then this board is quite a bit cheaper:

Gigabyte GA-880GM-UD2H AMD 880G (Socket AM3) microATX DDR3 Motherboard

Saxon · 28 Jun 2010 at 21:38

Interesting choice. Yeah I think it came with that bracket as well.

I'll be using the computer for 3D rendering, encryption, and a few games like BFBC2 / GTA 4

I've just been looking at some benchmarks, and indeed the Phenom II seems a lot better than the i3. There is however another option I could go for.

Benchmarks

The i5 750 seems nice, well according to the above benchmarks, but is it worth the extra?

Thanks for all the advice so far.

I'm actually amazed at how the Q6600 still holds its own against these new processors.

Redmint · 28 Jun 2010 at 22:54

The i5 750 is also a nice choice yeah, however with the AM3 option you'll have better upgrade potential for the next few years.

Saxon · 28 Jun 2010 at 23:06

Thanks a lot, I'll take your word for that.

I will probably go with the option you mentioned then. Thanks again for your help.

-Ad- · 28 Jun 2010 at 23:42

stulid said:
buy a Q6600

I did exactly this and had a midly clocked E6300 and dead 8800gt (got a 5770). Don't waste your money on some fancy top of the range crap, a well clocked Q6600 will last you a long time yet unless you must have the top stuff to show off e-peen on a forum

Amazing upgrade and my nice stepping low VID Q6600 sits at a nice 3.6ghz, although with this hot weather she is down at 3.4ghz!

Made BFBC2 very very playable with AA + AF and feels far quicker in everything!

snaggster · 28 Jun 2010 at 23:45

Saxon said:
Ahh there's a problem with that. My 680i board was one of the ones that had hardware problems which meant Quad cores wouldn't work properly with it, not even with a BIOS update.

My cooler isn't too bad.

I'm open to other suggestions then if mine is a bad choice. Is the i3 not a good choice?

Thought it was only a problem with 45nm quads? I could be wrong. But q6600 all the way.

Marine-RX179 · 29 Jun 2010 at 06:58

I agree with other people that said get a Q6600. You can get one 2nd hand £70~£90 (depending on the VID) vs the AM3 stuffs which cost over £300 in total.

Saxon · 29 Jun 2010 at 21:08

Thanks again for all the advice. The Q6600 makes sense, but I now have another issue, in that my son needs a new computer. So I am tempted to give him mine and go for the Phenom II option above.