Hardware Advice

RoBird

RoBird

RoBird

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Joined
21 Feb 2008
Posts
3
Dear All! To my horror my current system has seemingly reached the end of it's life!

P4c 3.2Ghz
Asus P4C800 Deluxe
1Gb DDR-400
ATI 9800XT recently replaced with HD2600 AGP.

On boot I have a message saying "System failed CPU test" with no display. Does not change when using different PSU or PCI graphics card. Replacement 478 processors seem difficult to source and see little point spending cash on a wild goose chase to fix an obsolete system.

Although happy with the performance of the old pc (really liked the setup!), I am looking to build a solid medium-spec replacement system that will last me a while. Mainly user of Flightsims mainly but do dabble in battlefield/COD and C&C.

Unfortunately haven't kept up with hardware since building my last system, so I am entirely baffled by the array of cores and different graphics options!

Am looking to spend roughly -
~£100 Processor
~£50 Motherboard
~£50 RAM
~£100 Graphics
Looking to use existing SATA disks, DVDRW, case, software and if possible akasa 400W PSU (!).

First question perhaps can it be done? But otherwise AMD 6000/6400 or Intel C2 duo E6550?

Many Thanks!
Rob
 
Welcome to the forums RoBird, I'm sorry no-one else has answered your question!

If you're an overclocker definatly go Intel. If not the choice is mostly down to how you're feeling this morning. AMD motherboards tend to be a bit cheaper though.

If it were me (and I am an overclocker) I'd be going with an E2180, a P31 chipset motherboard, 2GB DDR2 800Mhz RAM of any brand (not generic stuff unless it was OCUK generic stuff) and a 512MB Geforce 8800GT. Now the graphics is a bit more expensive than your spec but I like to game a bit every now and again. If I wasn't going to get the 8800GT I'd get an x1900xt(x) second hand. If I was going Vista I'd get 4GB RAM.

Hope this helps.
 
Chris Beard has given you some good advice there, if you go with the E2180 then you have saved enough to get an 8800GT into the budget but if you aren't a heavy gamer then the system below might do.

Gigabyte GA-P31-DS3L Intel P31 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £44.99
(£52.86) £44.99
(£52.86)
Intel Core 2 Duo E2200 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.20GHz (800FSB) - Retail £48.99
(£57.56) £48.99
(£57.56)
OcUK ATI Radeon HD 3850 Pro 512MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £84.99
(£99.86) £84.99
(£99.86)
G.Skill 4GB DDR2 PQ PC2-6400C5 (2x2GB) CAS5 Dual Channel Kit (F2-6400CL5D-4GBPQ) £51.99
(£61.09) £51.99
(£61.09)
Sub Total : £230.96
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 : £41.98
Total : £281.89
 
Thanks Chaps - Sorry to move the goalposts after your posts, I have come to the conclusion that a higher spec might be advised for sufficient future proofing - I don't plan to upgrade for another 5 years if I can avoid it!!! £400ish seems a little more realistic if not still a bit mean.

I'm inclined to stick with an Intel processor as I perceive them (perhaps wrongly?) to be of higher quality! I have been disappointed with ATI's Linux support so looking more at the NVIDIA cards. My other major considerations are quietness and longevity.

This seems to be in the ballpark -
Processor - E8200 (E8400 much better?) or Q6600
Cooler - Arctic Freezer 7
Motherboard - Asus P5k P35
Memory - CAS4 2Gb ~ £35
Graphics - 9600 or 8800 (or 3870)???

Since FSX is not multi threaded I assume there would be no advantage - possibly even a disadvantage to getting a quad core?

Cheers!
RoBird
 
Last edited:
RoBird - you haven't answered the most important question of all on these forums - would you like to overclock?

I also imagine you'll want a PSU upgrade?
 
Rob,

The PSU should not have an issue but might be quite loud. You said you wanted a quiet PC - hence my consern.

For the chip I'd go dual core unless you want to do video encoding or something else that'll benifit heavily from the other two cores. Quad core is just 2 dual cores linked together (more or less) so is much hotter - read louder.

Things to reduce noise:

Replacement (quiet) coolers for GFX card and CPU
PSU fan swap or quiet PSU
2.5" drives/drive susspension/drive enclosure
Replacement case fans to quiet fans (possibly volt mod/fan controller)

Can't really comment very much on your choice of components (except that the Freezer 7 Pro has lots of reports of not really being that quiet - still a lot quieter than stock cooler) - maybe someone else will know more in this area.

Oh - and if you want to replace the GFX card cooler consider the AC accellero s1
 
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