System holding me back, help needed!

clownstyle

clownstyle

clownstyle

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Joined
27 Oct 2004
Posts
22
Hi all

My specs are as follows:

Intel Core 2 Quad Q9400 @ 2.66GHz Yorkfield 45nm
Gigabyte G31M-ES2L (Socket 775)
Asus NVIDIA GeForce GTX 550 Ti 1GB GDDR5
OCZ 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 1066MHz/PC2-8500 Gold Memory
M-Audio Audiophile 2964
OCZ 750w PSU
OCZ Petrol 128Gb SSD SATA-III 6.0Gb/s
and various other storage sata drives...

Now from what I understand the board is quite crappy, but was purchased at a time when I had little money and needed an urgent replacement due to a fault with the old one.

I cannot get the memory to run at 1066Mhz from the bios, I believe it's due to the board but I'm not 100% on that.

So the rig is starting to show its age I think, with some newer games unable to run at a frame rate that I class as "enjoyable" the rig is also used for music production and with 4Gb of ram everything seems quite painful after using machines with more memory for this task..

Again, I think the board is the limiting factor, as far as I can tell you can't use more than 4Gb in the board. :mad:

Does anyone have any tips on what I should upgrade first? I know the board would be a good contender, but how bad is it really? :confused:

I think to myself - If I'm upgrading the board, had I might as well upgrade to a newer socket type ... Then there is the other issue. MONEY!

Me and my partner have just had our first child so the upgrade would really have to be on a shoe string budget, so most bang for buck upgrade I can do really, with links if possible ;)

Thank you!
 
I would say around £150-200

EDIT - Changed my mind about the funds available, I think I should be able to get some upgrade at least for this price? :)
 
Last edited:
I'll be honest, it's going to be tough on that budget. If it's a gaming PC primarily then I'd be tempted to keep the GPU and upgrade that motherboard, ram and cpu. This will given you a solid base to add a new GPU when funds permit.

YOUR BASKET
1 x AMD Piledriver FX-6 Six Core 6300 Black Edition 3.50GHz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail £89.99
1 x Gigabyte 970A-DS3 AMD 970A (Socket AM3+) DDR3 Motherboard £59.99
1 x TeamGroup Elite Black 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TED38GM1600HC11DC01) £49.99
Total : £211.37 (includes shipping : £9.50).



You could get just 4gb of ram instead of 8 and lower the cost a bit, with the option of adding more later.
 
ExRayTed said:
I'll be honest, it's going to be tough on that budget. If it's a gaming PC primarily then I'd be tempted to keep the GPU and upgrade that motherboard, ram and cpu. This will given you a solid base to add a new GPU when funds permit.

YOUR BASKET
1 x AMD Piledriver FX-6 Six Core 6300 Black Edition 3.50GHz (Socket AM3+) Processor - Retail £89.99
1 x Gigabyte 970A-DS3 AMD 970A (Socket AM3+) DDR3 Motherboard £59.99
1 x TeamGroup Elite Black 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TED38GM1600HC11DC01) £49.99
Total : £211.37 (includes shipping : £9.50).



You could get just 4gb of ram instead of 8 and lower the cost a bit, with the option of adding more later.
Click to expand...

I agree it will be tight on this budget, but after looking at finance options it might be a better option to go that route and end up paying less than £20 a month is more than manageable, and saves me having to fork out a lump sum. Plus my credit rating is sweet as a nut

So with that in mind, could you price up for spending £600... Now I'm guessing that will still be the same option - Replacing board, memory and CPU to a newer architecture.

Do that AMD machines have much benefit over Intel? Never had an AMD machine before so I'm unsure on the terminology, as in, everyone knows what an i5 / i7 is (Great marketing intel)

I'm not fixed into a m-atx board either, although I would have to factor a new case if it was just an atx but that would be a benefit... It's a bit cramped in there!
 
AMD are good but definately 'budget' processors.

£600 is a very healthy budget for an upgrade.

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-4670K 3.40GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £197.99
1 x MSI HD 7950 Twin Frozr III Boost Edition 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card **NEW REVISION** with FREE GAMES £189.95
1 x Gigabyte Z87-D3HP Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ATX Motherboard £109.99
1 x TeamGroup Elite Black 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TED38GM1600HC11DC01) £49.99
Total : £560.82 (includes shipping : £10.75).



This is a very good build. The GPU is the new revision and doesn't suffer the 100% fan fault of earlier versions.
 
ExRayTed said:
AMD are good but definately 'budget' processors.

£600 is a very healthy budget for an upgrade.

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i5-4670K 3.40GHz (Haswell) Socket LGA1150 Processor - Retail £197.99
1 x MSI HD 7950 Twin Frozr III Boost Edition 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card **NEW REVISION** with FREE GAMES £189.95
1 x Gigabyte Z87-D3HP Intel Z87 (Socket 1150) DDR3 ATX Motherboard £109.99
1 x TeamGroup Elite Black 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C11 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (TED38GM1600HC11DC01) £49.99
Total : £560.82 (includes shipping : £10.75).



This is a very good build. The GPU is the new revision and doesn't suffer the 100% fan fault of earlier versions.
Click to expand...

That looks a lot better. Thanks for all your help :cool:
 
 
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