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- Joined
- 9 Jun 2008
- Posts
- 349
I think its time to replace my withering old amd 939pin 4200 x2, pc3200 ram and a8n-sli motherboard.
Even though this computer does everything I want it to, I use other people's computers now and realize I could do with an upgrade 
Basically what I will use from this computer is:
- Case...basic ATX case to be fair...it holds it all and presume is has good cooling. At the moment my AMD is OCed from 2.2Ghz to 2.8Ghz...has been for a few months now, although admittedly I did replace the fans that come with the case with some decent ones. Looking to replace in the future though.
- PSU...Antec NeoPower 55OW ATX2.2...no arguments there? Unless new mobo's need a new connection or something.
- GFX card...BFG 8800GTX 768MB OC2...although its old by today's standards its still a good card that I paid a lot of money for at the time.
- Sound card...X-Fi fatality pro.
- HDDs...got a 250GB and 300GB HDD in here...Sata 16MB cache basic 7200rpm. I WILL upgrade these, but I'll get onto that further on
- DVD-RW...I want to use my computer as a media centre...and will want a blu-ray player somewhere down the line...whereas I think the players are OK priced...the blu-ray films are not :X
I want to upgrade my computer in 2 parts;
1. Motherboard / CPU / RAM
2. Hard drives and any other upgrade I think
I can't give an accurate budget as of yet, I'm on a monthly wage which can go easily and learning to drive which makes it worse. Basically the provisional budget is around £550 for the first part of the upgrade, and around £300 for the second part of the upgrade.
I use my computer primarily for gaming, but will be using it much more soon when I get the equipment to make a decent media centre out of it...which on the agenda are some decent speakers and blu-ray player...and possibly a remote.
P.S I'm using Windows XP 32bit Home at the moment, Vista still hasn't grabbed me and I had loads of problems on 64bit XP.
So what do I have to overcome?
Obviously the AMD or Intel thing...then to go DDR3 or not? Back when I got my AMD they were the clear winner and the only logical choice...now I'm like...AHHH! I've checked benchmarks and the new Phenom II/DDR3 combo seems better for gaming, but the equivalent Intel one...the i7 920 isn't that much worse but seems better at everything else...I'm stuck
So I would like help on that please!!! This looks tasty but I'm thinking off getting the same with some faster RAM.
The other questions are...is it logical to get a solid state drive for the OS (thinking OCZ 30GB), and a decent sized sataII for my main storage and other games? I'm reading mixed reviews about the solid state drives, but comments on this site show its good if you use it for the OS...but they are 2.5"...do they even fit in the base?.
Also...is Vista worth it yet?
Any help appreciated and thanks in advance!


Basically what I will use from this computer is:
- Case...basic ATX case to be fair...it holds it all and presume is has good cooling. At the moment my AMD is OCed from 2.2Ghz to 2.8Ghz...has been for a few months now, although admittedly I did replace the fans that come with the case with some decent ones. Looking to replace in the future though.
- PSU...Antec NeoPower 55OW ATX2.2...no arguments there? Unless new mobo's need a new connection or something.
- GFX card...BFG 8800GTX 768MB OC2...although its old by today's standards its still a good card that I paid a lot of money for at the time.
- Sound card...X-Fi fatality pro.
- HDDs...got a 250GB and 300GB HDD in here...Sata 16MB cache basic 7200rpm. I WILL upgrade these, but I'll get onto that further on

- DVD-RW...I want to use my computer as a media centre...and will want a blu-ray player somewhere down the line...whereas I think the players are OK priced...the blu-ray films are not :X
I want to upgrade my computer in 2 parts;
1. Motherboard / CPU / RAM
2. Hard drives and any other upgrade I think
I can't give an accurate budget as of yet, I'm on a monthly wage which can go easily and learning to drive which makes it worse. Basically the provisional budget is around £550 for the first part of the upgrade, and around £300 for the second part of the upgrade.
I use my computer primarily for gaming, but will be using it much more soon when I get the equipment to make a decent media centre out of it...which on the agenda are some decent speakers and blu-ray player...and possibly a remote.
P.S I'm using Windows XP 32bit Home at the moment, Vista still hasn't grabbed me and I had loads of problems on 64bit XP.
So what do I have to overcome?


The other questions are...is it logical to get a solid state drive for the OS (thinking OCZ 30GB), and a decent sized sataII for my main storage and other games? I'm reading mixed reviews about the solid state drives, but comments on this site show its good if you use it for the OS...but they are 2.5"...do they even fit in the base?.
Also...is Vista worth it yet?

Any help appreciated and thanks in advance!