PC Spec Again - New to Intel

thepominlaw

thepominlaw

thepominlaw

Associate
Joined
8 Aug 2005
Posts
234
Hi,

Have a limited budget to uprate my PC. By limited i mean no more than £250 or the wife will kill me.

Currently my PC struggles in games like Test Drive Unlimited and i want a little bit of oomph. (maybe thats vistas fault)

Current kit

S939 3700 San Diego @ 2.6ghz
Freezer 64 Pro
2gb 3200 DDR
Asus A8N SLI Premium
Sapphire 1900GT (newer lower clock speed one)

Looking at upgrading to

Fatality IP9 SLI
Core 2 Duo E4300
2 Gb 5300 Corsair Ram

Couple of questions whats the new spec like will it be any better (never had an intel processor) than what i already have?

Whats a good cooler?

Is the onboard Audio ok or should i get a Xfi Extreme Audio?

Finally i stupidly bought an OEM vista Home Premium and activated it about a month ago is there any chance i can use in on the new build?

Thanks

John
 
Test Drive unlimited is quite GPU limited as I upgraded from X2 3800+ @ 2.6hz to E4300 @ 3.1Ghz and see no difference in TDU, but I am not sure how much boost you will get moving from single core to dual core though. But in general the E4300 is a much better CPU.

You can try installing the Vista on the new machine but strictly speaking you need to get a new copy.

The onboard sound nowadays are very good. Don't get the extreme audio as it doesn't actually offer the X-Fi goodies e.g. crystaliser that other X-Fi cards offer (Extreme Music/gamer).
 
thanks for the reply,

i have just managed to sell my pc for £400 so here is my new spec - opinions please

Asus P5N-E SLI
Core Duo E4300
AC Freezer Pro
2 GB Corsair 5400
OCUK 8800GTS
Pioneer DVDRW
2 x 160GB HDD (from my old PC)
Antec 900 or P180 (which is better)
Tagan Easycon 530W

will the 4300 cope with the 8800gts?
 
Looks good, has good oc potential as well.

E4300 is fine for 8800GTS but a bit of overclock will give you nice performance boost.

Strictly between the 900 and P180 I'll go for the 900 simply because I don't like front door design. Lian-Li PC7 would be my choice everytime within the same price range.

I have the same PSU and it's rock solid but the Corsair HX520 is a better buy at the moment.
 
buyer fell through so back to limited budget :(

is a stock E4300 faster or slower in real terms than my 3700 @2.6ghz

how easy would it be to OC the E4300?

Looks like my GT is staying for a while or would i be better with a 8600 GTS
 
Well my 4300 was quicker at stock than my old 4000+ @2.75ghz in 3Dmark05 and 06 as well as aquamark. Now it's overclocked and has a 8800GTS 320mb instead of Sli'd 7800gt's @500/1.20 it's massively quicker.

My current rig is the easiest clocking rig i have ever had. :D :D

The 8600GTS is a complete waste of time and money. The only thing it offers is DX10. You can get a 320mb 8800GTS for as little as £170. I have seen 8600GTS cards for up to £196. :eek: :eek:
 
Last edited:
thepominlaw said:
buyer fell through so back to limited budget :(

is a stock E4300 faster or slower in real terms than my 3700 @2.6ghz

how easy would it be to OC the E4300?

Looks like my GT is staying for a while or would i be better with a 8600 GTS
Click to expand...

Yes the E4300 is faster at stock and it's easy to overclock, just don't have too high expectation though - 3Ghz is a good speed to aim for, consider anything more to be bonus.

And no 8600GTS is not worth the money, stick with your 1900GT until the prices come down.
 
think for now i am just going to go for a 8800gts and stick with what i got.

this hopefully will give better game performance than my old 1900gt and a E4300 / 650 mobo

hope so anyway
 
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