Old Alienware Upgrade

raaamcomputerma · 24 Jan 2011 at 13:56

Long story short I have saved myself a bit of extra cash this month to do upgrade my Alienware rig. My current specs are;

Motherboard: Alienware® Approved NVIDIA nForce™ 4 SLI Motherboard

Processor: Intel® Core™ 2 Extreme X6800 2.93GHz 4MB Cache 1066MHz FSB

Memory: 2GB DDR2 PC-6400 SDRAM at 800MHz - 2 x 1024MB

Video Card: My old card broke so im using a crappy temp X1900GT

All the other specs im pretty happy with. I've only managed to free up £200 so I am not sure where to throw the money to see the best performance rise.

I know I am going to need a new GPU and few extra gigs of RAM, but I am concerned my motherboard is too old tech now to support anything new?

This makes me think I am going to need a total upgrade which is just out of budget. I do a little gaming, a little video editing, nothing heavy, but as a benchmark, I would like to be able to play most new games at a reasonable resolution.

I am a big fan of my processor, as it seems to handle all my apps very well, minus a few RAM slowdowns (2gig...) and I've been told its not that far off the newest offerings. So a CPU upgrade seems silly, meaning I really need to keep everything LGA775 compatible.

Am I wanting something that can't be done on this budget?

subbytna · 24 Jan 2011 at 14:18

get the GTX460 GPU (150 ish) and put the other 50 towards another 2 gig RAM. job done

raaamcomputerma · 24 Jan 2011 at 14:20

will this run ok on my current motherboard though?

95thrifles · 24 Jan 2011 at 14:21

You can upgrade mobo/CPU/ram for £200 now then in month or two when you've got more cash upgrade gfx too
Look at AMD for board/CPU, should be able to squeeze in a Phenom II X4 955, board n 4 gig of RAM, I'd post links but I'm on phone ATM so cant

raaamcomputerma · 24 Jan 2011 at 14:28

ok dude that sounds like good advice, but is a CPU upgrade really going to make much of a difference?

infernox · 24 Jan 2011 at 16:43

The increase in L3 cache and a Quad like the 955 will give you vast increases in performance, then you can upgrade your gpu when you next get the chance.

how about.
AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 955 Black Edition "125W Edition" 3.20GHz (Socket AM3) - Retail £119.99
(£99.99) £119.99
(£99.99)
Asus M4A78LT-M 760G (Socket AM3) DDR3 Motherboard £42.98
(£35.82) £42.98
(£35.82)
GeIL 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz VALUE PLUS Dual Channel (GVP34GB1600C9DC) £33.98
(£28.32) £33.98
(£28.32)
Sub Total : £164.13
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £9.00
VAT is being charged at 20.00% VAT : £34.63
Total : £207.76

That will be a good choice that i would make .

Or.

Asus GeForce GTX 460 Direct CU TOP 768MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £109.99
(£91.66) £109.99
(£91.66)
GeIL 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 PC2-6400C4 800MHz Ultra Low Latency Dual Channel (GX24GB6400C4UDC) £49.99
(£41.66) £49.99
(£41.66)
BeQuiet Pure Power L7 530W Power Supply £46.99
(£39.16) £46.99
(£39.16)
Sub Total : £172.48
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £9.50
VAT is being charged at 20.00% VAT : £36.40
Total : £218.38

RomanNose · 24 Jan 2011 at 16:48

subbytna said:
get the GTX460 GPU (150 ish) and put the other 50 towards another 2 gig RAM. job done

So you really think Alienware would provide a power supply to do that job?
I doubt they would, so I would go for Gpu + power supply.

SouthEastBlue · 24 Jan 2011 at 17:19

If this is for gaming then I would assume a GPU upgrade (GTX 460/5850) couple with 2GB more ram would be the best upgrade path.

That said if you don't mind having your computer out of action you could prob sell your current dual core and swap it for a Q6600 quad for not much more.

And since Alienware PCs tend to cost so much I would assume the PSU will be fine with the above.

Orcvader · 24 Jan 2011 at 17:46

infernox said:
Asus GeForce GTX 460 Direct CU TOP 768MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £109.99
(£91.66) £109.99
(£91.66)
GeIL 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 PC2-6400C4 800MHz Ultra Low Latency Dual Channel (GX24GB6400C4UDC) £49.99
(£41.66) £49.99
(£41.66)
BeQuiet Pure Power L7 530W Power Supply £46.99
(£39.16) £46.99
(£39.16)
Sub Total : £172.48
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £9.50
VAT is being charged at 20.00% VAT : £36.40
Total : £218.38

+1

This is probably the best upgrade path for you. Also another reason for PSU is because the BeQuiet PSU is more reliable and stable. Hence you can reuse it for future upgrades with no worries.

95thrifles · 24 Jan 2011 at 19:37

Agree that route provides best upgrade path now, but it seems like a waste to me spending money on dead socket, £50 on DDR2 RAM is crazy IMO but you do need 4 gig, hence I recomended the new platform, but you will be very GPU bound, however going 460 route gives nice boost but your current CPU may very well be a bottleneck for the GPU, its a shame you cant do both now

hybrid572 · 24 Jan 2011 at 19:46

I'm guessing you're on a 32 bit OS? If so, upgrading to 4GB of RAM isn't going to go very far, because of the limits of the system.

As you're not CPU bound, I'd be tempted to spend a bit of time cleaning up your system to get that RAM usage down as much as you can, and buy yourself a new PSU and graphics card (gtx 460 / 5850 / 6850). That way, you can seriously upgrade your performance in a way that isn't a waste when you come to upgrade the rest of your system (as DDR2 RAM would be).

If you're running 64 bit however, I'd go with infernox's suggestion.