Mulling Over Changes

[brightside_]

I know theres hundreds of these posts every day, but still I'm posting. I've researched a fair bit, but i have a tendancy to make mistakes in expensive purchases! I've done a few searches and found some information, but not all that I was after!

Got a bonus from work (christmas bonus, in march...) so I'm going to upgrade my rig for the time being.

I currently have a big old Antec SOHO case ( i think its a SOHO, but i'm not 100% sure, no box and from the clearence section of a local bits store ) which is humungous, heavy and loud! I'm planning to buy the Antec 902 (what can i say, i like the Antec build quality) but, as I've had very few run-ins with the 900 apart from at LANs where you can't hear anything but fans wherever you are, I'm none too sure whether even with the fan controller it's going to be quieter than this old thing. So cooling is important (LANs are not cool places) but I don't want to be drowned in sound at home. Not planning on overclocking, as I don't do any major number crunching on this machine, games + movies (including HD stuff) so just wondering how quiet the case is with the fans on low, from anyone with experience of the 900 or 902 more specfically. If you reckon it won't suit, a tip of something to look at in the same price region would be good

I currently have in the case
Hiper Modular 580W Type-R (unsure whether the cables will reach far enough for the reversed position in the 902)
e6400 2.13GHz processor (showing its age after 2 years, has run everything to date fine though, just struggles with some video playback for some reason)
Gigabyte P965 DQ6 Mobo rev 3.3 (will be keeping this)
Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro (2 years old, not sure whether to replace with a new one or just give a good blow with a compressor)
2 x 1GB Geil Value DDR26400 (replace completley with 2x2GB?)
Reference 8800GTX, purchased off e-bay but works suprisingly well.
74GB Raptor (seems a bit slower than it used to be =\)
500GB Samsung Spinpoint F1 (storage drive)

So yes, the basis of the PC is the DQ6 mobo which has official support for up to the Q6600, and un-official support with the F12 BIOS (currently have F11 installed) for most of the current Q series (apart from the extremes, but my bonus isn't that big )
I'm in 2-minds as to whether to bother with a quad core, as like i said, no number crunching, but this rig will have to last a couple of years (deposit for house, car stuff will come first from this point on) and having a bit of grunt might help it hang on towards the back-end of the period. I know no games currently support quad core, but they will do, its just when . Opinions would be good, see what other people have done, and what they think in my situation.

PSU wise, it's 3 years old, and the voltages have never been what i'd call really static. I'm wondering about going for a new PSU around the £70 mark, but this is something I have no idea about, so need some reccomendations. I'm also not too sure that the PSU isn't part of the noise issue i have currently I've heard the Corsair 600W in this price range is okay? help Also, the LEDs are doing my head in. (yes i realise the 902 has LEDs but the fans are replaceable

Ram wise, 4gb of XMS2 w/DHX from Corsair should suit the board, so I'm in no worries there

Cooler wise, do people reckon this will carry on trooping? Wondering about just spending the £20 to be on the safe side and grab a new one.

All in all, I'm expecting to spend around £400 to get this rig sorted (sans case fans if I decide to replace them because of the LEDs)

thanks for any time

bright

 

[steve258]

Tbh the most cost effective way to gain speed would be to overclock your CPU. It should do 3Ghz easily with that cooler and mobo (top of the line DQ6 no less). You'll be surprised how much difference it makes to your games. As for the cooler don't replace it just give it a good clean unless the fan is making weird noises.

Only things you need really is a better case and ram. You don't need to spend anymore than £40 for a set of 4gb PC8500 kit.

Hiper type-r 580w was, for a while, notoriously unreliable (only certain batch though it seems) but yours should fine if it survived 3 years.

Have you considered antec 300? I have one of these and the fans are very quiet when set to low or medium. it's very similar to the 900 inside just without all the blings.

 

[brightside_]

just realise I posted this in the wrong section. meant to post in the general hardware section apologies mods =\

Steve- I've had a few tries at overclocking this CPU,there are 3 outcomes, I have a duff DQ6 or a duff CPU as I've got diddly squat so far. doesn't help that my overclocking experience is restricted to one AMD X2 cpu also, having a new toy to play with is also nice

 

[pastymuncher]

That motherboard should easily clock your cpu to at least 3Ghz. Don't forget that as you increase the fsb you also increase the ram speed so it may be the ram failing.

Your psu is a ticking time bomb too!! Check out the Hiper Explosive thread.