Need some advice Upgrading on a Budget

Gretzky99

Gretzky99

Gretzky99

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Joined
19 Sep 2008
Posts
20
Hey, I'm trying to upgrade my computer with a budget of about £300. The main aim is to be able to play Fallout 3, Far Cry 2, GTA IV etc as well as possible. At the moment my specs are:

AMD Athlon 2.40 Dual Core (AM2)
Radeon ATI X1650 (512MB) (AGP)
2 gig of DDR2 RAM
2 IDE hard drives
Power Supply 420w

My motherboards is a kind of AM2/AGP Hybrid which I bought to reuse my X1650. From what I can tell I'm definatly going to need an AM2 pci-e motherboard, a 550w power supply, a new graphics card, and a SATA Hard Drive(?)

I'm in desperate need of advice tho, is my processor okay to upgrade around? Should I go for a CrossfireX or SLiReady motherboard? Is a 550w Power Supply necessary? or do I need it even more powerful than that (650w)? Do I need another 2Gig of RAM? Would I be better off getting 1 decent graphics card or dual mounting 2 budget cards? Nvidia or ATI? I know SATA is the way forward but do modern boards still accomodate an IDE master hard drive?

I'd really appreciate any advice
Thank You
Al

PS: Completely lacking the knowledge of what I do and dont need my first idea was:

Graphics Card:
Asus ATI Radeon HD 4850 512MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (£117)
Motherboard:
Abit AX-78 AMD 770 (Socket AM2) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard (£52)
SATA Hard Drive:
Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 500GB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (£45)
Power Supply:
OcUK Huntkey 550W PSU (£41)
Total: £255

That leaves £45 (enough for 2gig more RAM), but granted I shouldnt skrimp and save when it comes to the power supply. The Leadtek GeForce GTX 260 896MB GDDR3 caught my eye too. But I just dont know what is the priority. Thanks again for any help!
 
Product Name Qty Price Line Total
Intel Pentium Dual-Core E5200 "LGA775 Core 2" 2.50GHz (800FSB) - Retail £49.99
(£58.74) £49.99
(£58.74)
Abit IP43 Intel P43 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £54.99
(£64.61) £54.99
(£64.61)
Powercolor ATI Radeon HD 4850 PCS Extreme 512MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - Retail £94.99
(£111.61) £94.99
(£111.61)
Corsair VX 450W ATX PSU (CMPSU-450VXUK) £41.99
(£49.34) £41.99
(£49.34)
Samsung SpinPoint F1 320GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (HD322HJ) £32.99
(£38.76) £32.99
(£38.76)
Sub Total : £274.95
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £9.95
VAT is being charged at 17.5% VAT : £49.86
Total : £334.76


That's what I would do, touch over budget but hey ho!!!

If you want to stick with AMD (in fairness looking at it you have a reasonable CPU anyway...) your upgrade looks OK-I have no idea about AMD motherboards, so I guess you will have to work that out for yourself. I would change the HDD to a Samsung F1 (either the 320 or 640gb). Spend the remainder of your money on the Corsair VX 450W ATX PSU and 2GB more RAM.

I would wait for somebody who knows more about AMD's motherboards to come along and confirm this though, if I were you...
 
Thanks a lot for that build manic111 I dont have much of a clue when it comes to 775 or AM2 so I'll take your advice and switch over to intel.

I'm upgrading on wednesday so I'll keep taking advice but that looks great!

Cheers!!!
 
Hello again all, after looking round at prices a bit more I've decided to get:

Intel Pentium Dual-Core E5200 "LGA775 Core 2" 2.50GHz (800FSB) - Retail
Abit IP43 Intel P43 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
Powercolor ATI Radeon HD 4850 PCS Extreme 1024MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - Retail
Samsung SpinPoint F1 500Gig
and 2 gig of RAM

I just have 2 quick questions: First of all can I use a SATA drive as the System drive, and then use the IDE socket to transfer my old files onto my new drive? or does IDE automatically take over as the master/slave? (I'd expect to at least have to root around in bios which isnt a problem, just wondered if it's possible)

Second, I heard that the 1 gig version of that powercolor graphics card isnt as powerful as the 500mb version...something about how the ram is clocked? Is that true? At first I'll be useing my old 19 inch monitor, but I'm getting a 30 inch LCD in a month.

Thanks for your help
Al
 
The gfx card you've specced runs the RAM at a slightly slower clock speed to the equivalent 512mb version. It's swings and roundabouts really over which one is faster. Personally, I'd save a few quid and get the 512mb version, and put the saved cash into getting a 640gb hard drive instead of the 500gb. The 640gb has more dense platters and is therefore faster :)
 
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