Old Dog Spec Check

as-if

as-if

as-if

Associate
Joined
16 Feb 2003
Posts
169
Location
London, UK
Hello.

I am gutting and upgrading my old dog of a PC that I built in 2003 (Athlon 2400+, GForce4 etc...).

I am mainly going to be usingn it for video editing (AVI, DV) with Blu ray playback and occasional gaming. I would also like to be able to playback 1080p video smoothly).

I only have to upgrade the motherboard, CPU, ram and graphics card at the moment (have SATA HDD and Blu ray/HD-DVD drive with Hiper 580 PSU).

Spec:

Intel Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient SLACR 95W Edition" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - OEM

Scythe Ninja Plus Rev.B CPU Cooler (Socket 478/754/939/940/AM2/LGA775)

Sapphire ATI Radeon HD 3850 Pro 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - Retail

Asus P5K Premium/WiFi-AP Intel P35 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard

Crucial Ballistix 2GB (2x1GB) DDR2 PC2-8500C5 1066MHz Dual Channel Kit (BL2KIT12864AA1065)

How does that look? Any advice would be gratefully received.

Thanks!
 
Thats pretty much a good all round set up.
The only thing I would really say is look at the Thermalright Ultra 120 as a better CPU cooler around the same price. But I doubt the difference will be anything major.
 
The CPU cooler is supposed to be quite difficult to fit and the Ram is probably overkill unless you are aiming for 3.6ghz+ but other than that it looks fine.

Oh and go for a 512mb video card if you can.
 
Thanks guys!

Thanks for the replies. Just a couple more questions:

1) I'm looking for a good fan that I can use later to overclock with but will be really very quiet. Most people seem to be using the Freezer 7. Is this as good as the thermalright? I can spend upto £50 if necessary!

2) I'm a bit lost in the p35 vs X48 chipsets. Which is better?

3) Should I bother with an 8800 videocard? I've heard these are the best value vs price at the moment.

Thanks again for the advice, these boards are as great as they were five years ago!
 
the freezer 7 which i have is a racket above 60% fan speed.

IMO go for the Noctua NH-U12P

the x48 is better, but IMO its not worth the premium unless you are using crossfire, as its a speedbinned p35.

the p5k premium is a superb OCing board.

and IMO if you are video editing, etc the 3850 will be fine :)
 
shaffaaf27 said:
the freezer 7 which i have is a racket above 60% fan speed. - and doesn't cool as well as a TRUE

IMO go for the Noctua NH-U12P- imo go for a TRUE with a decent 120mm fan

the x48 is better, but IMO its not worth the premium unless you are using crossfire, as its a speedbinned p35. - agreed, but bear in mind that p45 chipsets, a direct replacement for a p35, including price, is available soon (they are already on pre-order)


and IMO if you are video editing, etc the 3850 will be fine :) agreed, as well as ATi being the ones to go for for playing HD content etc. it might be worth waiting for the new ati cards (16th june is the release date
Click to expand...
 
4gb of PC6400 800mhz C4 memory, 100%sure, you have no choice ;).

And for cooling I can ofcourse recommend the well known Tuniq Tower which im using myself if your case can fit it.

Radeon will be fine, tho I would go with the 512 version. Or as other have said you might want to wait a month or so for the 4xxx series.


----
One more thing, I wouldnt trust hiper psu, you might want to change it for some corsair/tagan/thermaltake/enermax if you got some spare cash. 420w will do for this build.
 
ben M, i agree about the p45, but it seems to be priced at x38 chipset/cheaper x48, so i dont see the point.

but if it priced lowered another £20, im 100% upgrading to it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom