Thinking of replacing PC - When is the right time.

DiscoDave

DiscoDave

DiscoDave

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Hey Everyone,

My current situation is I have a PC which I've been using for the past 3-4 years or so. The specs are:

AMD 64 3700+ (Socket 939)
2GB DDR 3200
nVidia 7800GT
500Gig HDD
200Gig HDD
etc...

This PC has been good over the years and got me through uni etc. As you can probably tell from the specs that it's getting on a bit and will struggle playing recent games and high settings.

My personal situation is I've finished uni and have returned home. I start my new job on the 1st of October. Realisticly, I won't be able to get the parts until my first paycheque which will be on the 1st of November.

Or alternatively, if now is the right time I may try and find places that do 0% interest on a finance deal where I can pay it all off within a few months (rather than an entire year or so).

Therefore my question is - Will November be a good time to purchase new parts? I know from experience that you'll always be in a situation where there's "Something better just around the corner" But I would like to get some input from you guys first.

Your comments are appreciated.

David
 
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There is never a right time to upgrade a PC.. they are out of date in a weeks time :p

Depends what kind of specs you would be after. The new i7 chips out november-ish look tasty, if you have the money for it. Otherwise you could just pick up a bargain Wolfdale/Kentsfield/Yorkfield and clock them up.

Same for graphics cards really, the best ones aren't worth the money at the moment tbh (See 280 GTX).

Also you didnt say what you use your PC for.
 
My apologies I should have explained a bit more.

When I get a new PC i'll be looking at the £800-£1000 area. I mainly use my PC for gaming, some development, listening to music and watching tv shows.

David
 
i had a similar spec to you and it was starting to sturggle so i upgraded a couple of weeks back to a q6600 (very quick very cheap) 4gb ddr2 ram (very quick very cheap) and 4850 (very quick very cheap)

so now was the time to upgrade for me as it is about 4 times as fast as my old pc, only cost me just over £500, and does every thing that i want it to do (bioshock 100fps cod4 fast as you need and crysis fast enough)

i thought about waiting for i7 but i can't seeing it coming out at much under £200 and ddr3 ram is currently 3 times as expensive as ddr2, and with new motherboards new chipsets and all that sort of thing with imature bios' i think i7 will be very expensive and a possibly foolish for the time being.

If your computer just about works at the moment i'd keep it and wait till summer 2009 when intel start re-evaluating their pricing.

my old spec (brought in easter 2005)
amd 3500+
Abit AX8 mobo
ati X800XL
2gb ddr 3200 ram
250gb and 300gb hdd
(cost £563)

new spec (brought last week of july 2008)
intel q6600
Asus P5K mobo
Sapphire Ati TOXIC 4850
4gb ddr2 6400
500gb hdd
case
zalman fan
£530

i only brought mine now because i'm going back to uni and needed somthing faster (renderings a git on a 2.2 single core)
 
The only right time I would say is when a whole new socket & cpu is out such as the upcoming nehalem.
Graphics cards and other hardware comes and goes but sockets don't go outdated for a long time.
If you can bare your current rig until it's release I'd advise to.
 
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C64 said:
The only right time I would say is when a whole new socket & cpu is out such as the upcoming nehalem.
Graphics cards and other hardware comes and goes but sockets don't go outdated for a long time.
If you can bare your current rig until it's release I'd advise to.
Click to expand...

If it's coming out this year/early next yeah then I can wait until then.
 
Given it's not too long till entirely new architecture and a new socket is being introduced I'd wait till then.

The fact you have your current PC still indicates that you are not a serial upgrader so I would wait a few months for something that would be a lot more futureproof than buying something now.
 
~D~ said:
Given it's not too long till entirely new architecture and a new socket is being introduced I'd wait till then.

The fact you have your current PC still indicates that you are not a serial upgrader so I would wait a few months for something that would be a lot more futureproof than buying something now.
Click to expand...

Well to be honest since I started uni I didn't game as much and didn't have the money to upgrade. Before I normally upgraded when I was 2 generations behind.

I think that's a good plan though, to wait until the i7's as they're not a standard update from previous chips but encompass a radically different design. Sounds like I'll do that then.

Thanks for the advice all.
 
~D~ said:
Given it's not too long till entirely new architecture and a new socket is being introduced I'd wait till then.

The fact you have your current PC still indicates that you are not a serial upgrader so I would wait a few months for something that would be a lot more futureproof than buying something now.
Click to expand...

lol @ serial upgrader
 
My personal advice would be wait till January/February next year. This will give you enough time to um and ah about exactly what you want (use the time to trawl forums and read loads of reviews etc) and hopefully their might be some sales on :D. Although saying that there is never a 'right' time to buy it's always the case that the longer you wait the better the deal (well unless the pound weakens rediculously!).
 
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