Intel or AMD?

d3moliti0n · 14 Feb 2010 at 19:21

Hi

Due to my motherboard and/or CPU crashing on me I need to buy new core components for my computer so I need a new motherboard, CPU (and aftermarket fan for overclocking) and memory.

I want to spend between £200 and £300, and I was wondering if I should go for an AMD Tri/Quad Core or an Intel i3?

Also, could you spec me a new motherboard, CPU and memory within that price range, basically the stuff I should be looking at getting.

Thanks for your help.

d3moliti0n · 14 Feb 2010 at 19:51

How easy is it to unlock the AMD chip to use the four cores? Also, is it a guaranteed unlock? As I'm looking at some of the reviews on OCUK and people say it's the luck of the draw as to whether it will actually unlock to four cores.

If it does unlock, can I then overclock it? And what is a good aftermarket cooler to use if I do want to run it as a quad core?

Thanks.

d3moliti0n · 14 Feb 2010 at 23:55

So, does that mean they will unlock to four cores or not? If I buy one, I will be expecting to be able to unlock four cores straight out of the box with an aftermarket cooler, so I definitely won't be buying one to expect a dual core.

d3moliti0n · 15 Feb 2010 at 11:37

LEUVEN said:
Are you 100% sure you need new components?

Are you sure you have'nt got a failing PSU or RAM, overheating GPU/CPU, corrupt drivers etc.

You could buy new parts, put them in your old case with PSU and it starts crashing again..............

Ok, so my computer basically just shutdown completely, turned itself off. And when I went to turn it back on it would power up but it wouldn't do anything else, no boot screen or anything. But the hard drive activity LED would be constanly 'on', not flickering etc, just 'on'.

I unplugged both hard drives, and just tested one, still getting the same problem, I unplugged all hard drives, still getting the same problem. I unplugged my GPU and plugged the monitor into the motherboard onboard graphics port, still getting the same problem. I re-seated the memory, still getting the same problem, I tried each memory stick separately, still getting the same problem. So I'm assuming that has narrowed it down to either being the CPU or the motherboard, both of which are getting on a bit these days and I have owned for nearly two years so either way, an upgrade would be a good thing.\

Thanks.

d3moliti0n · 15 Feb 2010 at 13:08

mame said:
Have you cleared the CMOS ??

I feel like a fool now because yesterday I was wondering to myself, should I reset the CMOS...and then I thought, nah, this doesn't seem like it could be something to do with that.

Yet I have just reset the CMOS (but I had to install the stock fan for my CPU, I managed to break my aftermarket one when I was fiddling about checking the CPU was ok, so now I doubt I can overclock my CPU back up to 3GHz), and now my PC is working again. It came up saying 'CMOS checksum error - reverting to default settings', or at least something along those lines, and now here we are, working PC.

Ah well, crisis averted, I doubt I'll be upgrading now then, I will probably just buy a new CPU fan as I broke the other one.