University upgrade

DiG

DiG

DiG

Associate
Joined
16 Mar 2004
Posts
2,257
Hi, I'm off to uni in october and need a flat screen to take with me, thought it would also be a good time to upgrade!
At the moment:
A64 3000+
1gb DDR
Asus K something or other
DVD/CDRW
DVD drive
120gb HDD
40gb HDD
Vista Ultimate

I'd quite like a big flat screen, 22" or something, not sure if thats a bit ambitious!
The main thing is I want it to be fairly compact and quiet! I'm thinking of getting the Antec Sonata III case, is this a good choice?

I haven't really kept up with the hardware market so the core 2 duo and AMD X2 make no sence to me! Any help with the spec would be great!
A dvd writer, keyboard and maybe some speakers would be good aswell but not essential!

Budget of no more than £600 NOT including VAT

Thanks for any advice
 
How about:

GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC6400C4 800MHz Ultra Low Latency DDR2 Dual Channel Kit (GX22GB6400UDC)
£57.99
(£68.14)

Antec Sonata II Piano Black Quiet Case - 450W Smart Power PSU
£52.99
(£62.26)

LG L226WTQ 22" Widescreen LCD Monitor - Black/Silver
£174.99
(£205.61)

Asus P5N-E SLi nForce 650 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
£67.99
(£79.89)

Sapphire ATI Radeon X1950 Pro 256MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail
£79.99
(£93.99)

Intel Core 2 Duo E4300 "LGA775 Allendale" 1.80GHz (800FSB) - Retail
£68.99
(£81.06)

Sub Total : £502.94
Shipping : £10.95
VAT : £89.93
Total : £603.82

The best you can get with £600

Not sure if you play games or not if not you don't need to spend that much on the graphics card. The 1950pro is not gonna be enough for games at 1680x1050 with all details on though.
 
Looks good, thanks mate, I do play games but not very many, or very seriously! The most would like to play Test drive unlimited, but don't need it to be the best settings!

Bit worried about the processor, I know its dual core but the clock speeds slower than my A64! Are the core 2 duos 64 bit as well??

I've got £600 without VAT so thats £90 under budget! Would there be anyupgrades worth it for the £90 extra?
 
If you have £90 extra I'd probably go for a better CPU (E6320) and get the X1950XT instead. Or keep that CPU and get a 8800GTS 320Mb instead which will match that screen very nicely.

C2D at 1.8Ghz will be way faster than a single core A64 3000+ (1.8Ghz/2Ghz) in every aspect not just because it's dual core but the architecture itself is more efficient, just do a quick google for the performance comparison. And yes the C2D is 64 bit as well.
 
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I'd personally sell your current system and put the money towards the £600 you've put aside for upgrading and then buy a laptop.

Compact, pretty silent and for for your budget you can get a pretty decent spec model.

You'll also have the benefit of carrying it around campus if you need to but also it'll be far easier taking a laptop home with you during the semester breaks than a 22" monitor and base unit.
 
GuruJockStrap said:
I'd personally sell your current system and put the money towards the £600 you've put aside for upgrading and then buy a laptop.

Compact, pretty silent and for for your budget you can get a pretty decent spec model.

You'll also have the benefit of carrying it around campus if you need to but also it'll be far easier taking a laptop home with you during the semester breaks than a 22" monitor and base unit.
Click to expand...


Aye, I have a PC inside a LianLi PC7, which I was lugging home every long break, aswell as a 19" ViewSonic VX922 monitor. The whole lot is very cumbersome certaintly and not nice to have to drag home. But then I only dragged it all home out of choice as I didn't need to take it home, just wanted to.

You my prefer PCs (as I do), and so a laptop is not part of the equation. I know I'd like one, but only as a second system to this one, I'm glad I didn't buy a laptop of the start.

InvG
 
I had thought of a laptop, but I don't like them, there two small and I can have a more powerful pc for the same money, upgrading a laptop is hard as well, having had a look of the website the E6600 looked good, would it be overkill?
 
Ok, I've put together a spec on overclockers, does it look ok? any changed I should make?

Intel C2D E6600 £127.99
Asus P5N-E SLi nForce 650 PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £67.99
OcUK 2GB (2x1GB) PC2-6400C5 800mhz DDR2 Memory £49.99
Asus GeForce 8500GT 256MB DDR2 Silent £54.99
LG L226WTQ 22" Widescreen LCD Moniter - Black £174.99
Antec Sonata III £62.99
Noctua NF-S12 1200rpm 120mm silent fan £11.99
Noctua NH-U9F Heatsink £27.99
Samsung 20x20 DVD+RW Dual Layer SATA ReWriter £16.99
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Music 7.1 Soundcard - OEM £41.99

Sub-Total: £637.90
Shipping: 12.95
Total (ex VAT): £650.85
 
Stay away from 650i chipset. P35 is the way at the moment. Not much more expensive, more reliable, better overclocker, more future-proof (Penryn). If you're not serious about gaming there's no point shelling out for an SLi board. SLi sucks anyway and it's not like you'll be using a massive res. There'll always be a better one card solution at that res.
 
@ OP - Do you have SATA hard drives or PATA (IDE)? I suggested the P5N-E assuming that you have PATA hard drives as it has 2 PATA ports.

Even if you are not serious about gaming I wouldn't go for the 8500GT, the performance is a lot worse than 1950pro and can't even handle small screen let alone a 22" one.
 
I've got IDE harddrives, so the two IDE ports are very usefull! What do you think would be best to downgrade to get the extra 50 or so for a X1950 pro?
 
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