Need your help please - 4 years on

Mobium

Mobium

Mobium

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Joined
30 Mar 2007
Posts
27
First , thank you for the wonderful advice back in 2007 , when everyone helped me to spec a PC with limited budget.

This time I have even more of a limited budget circa £400. The below is what I have currently and would like to reuse parts wherever possible. Already have an ANTEC P180 case, which I will keep.

The biggies for me to replace are :- Graphics card and new monitor. The monitor I have currently is a Viewsonic 17inch LCD.

The 2140 is currently running at 2.66Ghz


ABIT IP35 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
Intel Core 2 Duo E2140 "LGA775 Conroe" 1.60GHz (800FSB) l
Crucial Ballistix 2GB (2x1GB) DDR2 PC2-5300C3 667MHz Dual Channel Kit * 2
Tuniq Tower 120 CPU Cooler
OcUK GeForce 8800 GTS 320MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express)
Samsung SpinPoint T HD160HJ 160GB SATA-II 8MB Cache
Corsair HX 520W ATX Modular SLI Compliant Power Supply (CMPSU-520HXUK)
Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium SP1 64-Bit
Samsung SH-S183ABEBN 18x18 DVD±RW Dual Layer Serial ATA ReWriter

It has been 4 years since I ordered that kit , and it has served me well. PC is primarily used for Gaming and it is starting to suffer with some of the new games.

I am looking at this as starting point for Graphics card, though I have no real preference between ATI or Nvidia.

Asus GeForce GTX 460 1024MB DirectCU GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics £129
Samsung BX2235 21.5" Widescreen LED Monitor - Mystic Black £134

So that leaves me with approx another £130 to play around with.
So I was thinking of this chip:-
Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 LGA775 'Wolfdale' 3.00GHz (1333FSB) - £134

Which takes me just under the £400 budget, and allows me to keep the motherboard and current RAM.

What I am not too sure on is if the Power Supply is upto the job of supporting the Asus GTX.

I welcome your advice. Many thanks Jeff
 
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your PSU should handle that set up without an issue, i use a hx520 with an i5 750 and an ati 2900XT with 8GB of ram
 
i would go down the 2nd hand route tbh. you ll pick up a nic eq6600 or e8400 for £50 - 70 , also look at a 5770 which can be had for 90ish now. leaving you plenty for a nice new monitor
 
eXist said:
i would go down the 2nd hand route tbh. you ll pick up a nic eq6600 or e8400 for £50 - 70 , also look at a 5770 which can be had for 90ish now. leaving you plenty for a nice new monitor
Click to expand...
This is what I did a year ago. I upgraded from a E4500 to a Q6600, and replaced my graphics card with a 5770. I think it's the best way to squeeze some more life out of your current hardware for a year or two. I also added 4GB of RAM, so I now have 6GB.

I would buy a Q6600 G0 and overclock it, a graphics card such as the 5770, and an extra 4GB of RAM (all second hand). Then you'll have quite a bit of money left over for a monitor.
 
Do not buy a new socket 775 cpu. They are simply not worth the money now, especially the dual cores.

What i would do is sell your current cpu/mobo/ram/gpu and put that money with the £130 you have left over and buy a AMD AM3 cpu/mobo and DDR3. DDR3 is ridiculously cheap at the moment with 4GB costing as little as £29!! Add in £80-100 for a decent AM3 mobo and another £48-90 for a Athlon ll cpu or £72-160 for a Phenom ll cpu.
 
Thanks Gents, in terms of seond hand market , I don't have access to the forum here where people list kit for sale.

Where would you recommend 'Ebay' or is there a more preferred site for getting 2nd hand parts etc.

Thanks
Jeff
 
Ok, had a quick look at AMD and options , this is what I put together.

HIS ATI Radeon HD 5770 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £99
OCZ Platinum 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C9 1333MHz Ultra Low Voltage Dual Channel Kit (OCZ3P1333C9ELV4GK) £29.99
Foxconn A7DA-S 3.0 AMD 790GX (Socket AM3) DDR3 Motherboard £54.98
AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 955 Black Edition "125W Edition" 3.20GHz (Socket AM3) - Retail £107
IIyama Prolite E2271HDS 22" Widescreen LED Monitor - Black £137.

So if my Math is correct, that comes to about £427 and no need to sell off parts, which I can use for the kids PC's.

Any problems with the Mobo I have chosen ?

Thanks
Jeff
 
its not really worth upgrading that right now the Core 2 Duo's are not worth it anymore you can get quad cores with that kind of money, your RAM is slow and you only have 2GB and your HDD is also a bit small.

I'd suggest selling your old rig and build a complete new one. You have £400 you should be able to get around £200 to £150 for your old build.

For £550 or £600 you could build a pretty sweet machine.
 
6644kp said:
its not really worth upgrading that right now the Core 2 Duo's are not worth it anymore you can get quad cores with that kind of money, your RAM is slow and you only have 2GB and your HDD is also a bit small.

I'd suggest selling your old rig and build a complete new one. You have £400 you should be able to get around £200 to £150 for your old build.

For £550 or £600 you could build a pretty sweet machine.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the advice, appreciate it.
 
This is my most current thought on the build.

LG W2246S-BF 22" Widescreen LCD Monitor - Glossy Black
AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 955 Black Edition "125W Edition" 3.20GHz (Socket AM3) - Retail
Sapphire ATI Radeon HD 5770 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card
Gigabyte GA-MA770T-UD3 MA770 (Socket AM3) DDR3 Motherboard
OCZ Gold 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C9 1333MHz Low-Voltage Dual Channel

All told comes in at £434

I maybe able to scrape more pennies together in a month or two , birthday coming up in March.
But does that look ok ?
 
welshdragon said:
That looks good mate, I would certainly opt for an nvidia Asus 460 or AMD Asus 6850 for an extra £30 though
Click to expand...

Good idea, I will certainly consider the AMD card, seems a little more juicier than the Nvidia, and looking at Anandtech , it seems to come out better.

Thanks !
 
Product Name Qty Price Line Total
BenQ G2222HDL 21.5" Widescreen LED Monitor - Black £107.99
(£89.99) £107.99
(£89.99)
AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 955 Black Edition "125W Edition" 3.20GHz (Socket AM3) - Retail £107.99
(£89.99) £107.99
(£89.99)
HIS ATI Radeon HD 5770 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £99.98
(£83.32) £99.98
(£83.32)
Gigabyte GA-MA770T-UD3 MA770 (Socket AM3) DDR3 Motherboard £59.99
(£49.99) £59.99
(£49.99)
OCZ Platinum 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Ultra Low Voltage Dual Channel Kit (OCZ3P1600C9ELV4GK) £28.79
(£23.99) £28.79
(£23.99)
Sub Total : £337.28
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £11.25
VAT is being charged at 20.00% VAT : £69.71
Total : £418.24
 
In my opinion you don't have to change the whole platform yet. You can buy quad Q9400 under 100 (used, because CPUs don't get damaged like other components), if lucky you can even hit some Q9450.

Comparison Q9400 and Phenom 955 is here (Q9400 sometimes is quicker, sometimes is slower):

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/76?vs=88

Some good thermal paste should help to keep temps below 70 when CPU o/c-ed to ~3.5-3.6 GHz which you should achieve with ease (Zalman STG2, AS5). Overclocking is used for most demanding apps/games, where stock 2.66 is not enough.

You add some memory:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MY-072-OC&groupid=701&catid=8&subcat=813

(bearing in mind that OCZ stopped to produce memory sticks, so it might be warranty-ing issue in the future, but for that price you can presume it's worth to take a risk). If you are lucky enough, old sticks might be overclockable to 800 MHz - if not, there's no big impact between 800 and 667 MHz in gaming. You still have 4 gigs, it's enough for majority apps.

Asus GTX 460 1 GB costs 130 this week in OCUK.

Samsung LCD 120 OcUK
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MO-135-SA&groupid=17&catid=949&subcat=

100+4+28+130+120 = 382 pounds.

If you sell old stuff (LCD, CPU) , you might buy bigger HDD.

All above is when you don't like to reinstall system/settings, and hate change all computer parts (esp. mobo) - which is a pain sometimes :)
 
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Product Name Qty Price Line Total
MSI ATI Radeon HD 5850 Twin FrozR II 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £137.99
(£114.99) £137.99
(£114.99)
Samsung BX2235 21.5" Widescreen LED Monitor - Mystic Black £134.39
(£111.99) £134.39
(£111.99)
Intel Core 2 Quad Q8400 LGA775 'Yorkfield' 2.66GHz 4MB-cache (1333FSB) Processor - Retail £124.99
(£104.16) £124.99
(£104.16)
Sub Total : £331.14
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £11.25
VAT is being charged at 20.00% VAT : £68.48
Total : £410.87


Here
 
Stop recommending brand new C2Q's!! The Q8400 is a overpriced pile of crap with a pathetic 4mb of cache. It occupies the price point that the far superior Q9450 used to occupy. It would be madness to spend £125 on a cut down old tech cpu. Your original AMD build was a better bet. At least he got a complete new rig and monitor for the same price.
 
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