spec help please

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23 Jun 2006
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upgrading soon but selling my old kit to a friend. need idea of whats a fair price?

asus a7v8x motherboard
amd athlon XP 2600 CPU
512mb (2x256mb) pc2700 ddr memory
ati radeon 9800 pro 128mb

whats a fair price?

New system ideas
Want to change graphics card to play some next gen games smoothly. looking at pci express so need to change motherboard, memory, cpu and graphics in one go.

budget £300 - 350. mainly games machine

debating on socket am2 or 939.
looked at these motherboards but no idea which is better or are there any other decent options......Gigabyte GA_M57SLi-S4 nForce 570 (Socket AM2) OR Asus M2N-E (Socket AM2) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard (MB-147-AS)

Want to use existing IDE hard drives (is IDE still supported on sata motherboards), pioneer 108 Dvd writer and audigy2 PCI card

any ideas on new spec for that price?
 
my budget is £300 - £350 so unfortunately i think conroe is not an option. I need CPU, motherboard, memory and graphics for this budget.

anyone want to spec me a system
 
With that budget, I would reccomend:

AMD Athlon 64 3500+ 2.2GHz (Socket AM2)
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/acatalog/Socket_AM2_Athlon64.html#aCP_2d164_2dAM

Asus M2V (Socket AM2) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/acatalog/Socket_AM2_Asus.html#aMB_2d148_2dAS


Corsair 1GB DDR2 XMS2-5400 TwinX
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/acatalog/Corsair_XMS2_Memory.html#aMY_2d059_2dCS

XFX GeForce PCX6600 Extreme XXX Edition 256MB
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/acatalog/6600_6800_Series.html#aGX_2d058_2dXF

Thats £301; excluding p+p.

You could get a 64 3200, save a bit of money (only £10)
That graphics card should handle most things fairly well, and that RAM is top notch. The motherboard is also pretty good - I only ever use Asus, so have a look at Abit and Msi.

;)
 
you can get a conroe gig mate for around £400 for everything :) and overclock it so it will outperform that spec above....:)

what res do you game at?
 
if you game at that res then you may just be pushing it with a 256mb card especially with the newer games....dont get me wrong the 256mb will suffice but for how long is the question....

will spec you something a little later...meanwhile check out the conroe systems everyone else has been speccing for others...
 
Hey folks

Had another look at conroe and i just can't seem to get it to fit my budget.
looked at what other specs were suggested and i have come up with 2 possibilities. The first is slightly modified from an earlier suggestion. Feel free to suggest changes etc. Also which is the better one to go for? Still not sure on graphics card i.e. need something which will run doom3, half life2 etc better than my old ati 9800 pro 128. Realise that near xmas i may then upgrade to another graphics card so its a short term fix and dual core when the pennies are more free. Also which motherboard is better in the long term or are there other ones to opt for. I agree the cpu is slow on option B but i will change to dual core at a later date.

I could get a decent motherboard, cpu, memory and a crud graphics card and then upgrade graphics near xmas time as its an easier change. Whatdaya think?

need to use two ide hard drives on the motherboard. Is that possible on the new motherboards that have sata?

How does XFX GeForce PCX6600 Extreme XXX Edition 256MB compare with 7600 gt?

It may be better waiting to increase my budget but i'm getting the upgrade temptation jitters lol
all specs, or any other ideas etc welcome as my head is hurting :(

Thanks for all advice so far. much appreciated

Budget £300 - £350

------------------------------
OPTION A

AMD Athlon 64 3500+ 2.2GHz (Socket AM2)
£78.67
Asus M2V (Socket AM2) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
£64.57
Corsair 1GB DDR2 XMS2-5400 TwinX
£76.32
BFG 3DFuzion GeForce 7600 GT 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/DVI (PCI-Express) -Retail (GX-025-BG)
£117.44

TOTAL £337

----------------------------
OPTION B

Asus M2N-E (Socket AM2) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard (MB-147-AS)
£82.19
AMD Athlon 64 3000+ 1.80GHz (Socket AM2) - Retail (CP-162-AM)
£63.39
GeIL 1GB (2x512MB) PC5300 667MHz Value DDR2 Dual Channel Kit (GX21GB5300DC) (MY-030-GL)
£64.57
BFG 3DFuzion GeForce 7600 GT 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-025-BG)
£117.44

TOTAL £327.59
 
A 6600 is a lot slower than a 7600 GT, the original 6600 cards wouldn't be much of an improvement over the 9800 Pro (but that XFX version is a fair bit better than the old versions, still nowhere near a 7600 mind).
 
CP-126-IN Intel Core 2 DUO E6300 "LGA775 Conroe" 1.86GHz (1066FSB) - Retail (CP-126-IN)
£129.95 £129.95
MB-020-DF DFI Infinity 975X (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard (MB-020-DF)
£129.95 £129.95
MY-083-CS Corsair 1GB DDR2 Value Select PC5300 Dual Channel Kit (2x512MB) (VS1GBKIT667D2) (MY-083-CS)
£59.95 £59.95
GX-020-BG BFG GeForce 7300 GS OC 256MB GDDR3 TV-Out/DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-020-BG)
£44.95 £44.95
Subtotal £364.80
VAT £63.84
Total £428.64

Best i can do with Conroe...

Id still go for it, since you can sell the GPU and get a better one in due course, whereas a complete, slower AM2 setup would need a complete redo
 
thanks for that conroe spec. As you said, its prob a good idea to get a decent cpu, motherboard, memory and upgrading graphics to a decent card at a later date. yeah it might be worth increasing my budget or wait to see what happens with any price changes.

how big a difference are we talking when comparing conroe to am2?
 
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