Upgrade-A-Noob!

WARHURYEAH

WARHURYEAH

WARHURYEAH

Associate
Joined
11 Feb 2009
Posts
653
Location
Barnsley, South Yorkshire
So I'm wanting to upgrade my gf's pc, cheaply and efficiently...

Current specs (as I know)
Mobo: GeForce 6100 AM2 Socket something or other.
RAM: 2GB
Processor is AMD Athlon 64x2 @ 2Ghz afaik
GPU: ATI 4850 XFX
and a whopping 76GB hard drive!

Now, what I want to upgrade is the RAM, Processor and get a new Hard Drive.

But that might not be completely possible.

So, I want to get as much performance as I can, as cheaply as I can, with doing as little work as I can as I'm very inexperienced on building PC's.

The only game I play on it is TF2 so it doesn't need to be upgraded to a 1337 machine.

Thankies for all suggestions.
 
Product Name Qty Price Line Total
AMD Athlon II X3 Tri Core 445 3.10GHz (Socket AM3) - Retail £70.49
(£59.99) £70.49
(£59.99)
Patriot Viper 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C7 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (PVS34G1600LLK) £58.74
(£49.99) £58.74
(£49.99)
Asus M4A78LT-M 760G (Socket AM3) DDR3 Motherboard £48.99
(£41.69) £48.99
(£41.69)
Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (ST3500418AS) £29.99
(£25.52) £29.99
(£25.52)
Sub Total : £177.19
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £9.50
VAT is being charged at 17.50% VAT : £32.67
Total : £219.36

cheap enough for you?

what is the make and model of your PSU?

what is the make and precise model name of the motherboard? maybe possible to just add a decent AM3 CPU and stick more ram in?
 
Last edited:
Hey, upgrading what you want is actually down to what you actually want to use it for.
From your post, I see that you don't play huge amounts of games, and so you don't need to upgrade your graphics card IMO.

That leaves you with:
- RAM
- Mobo
- Processor
- Hard drive.
- Software

Now, the first thing i'd look at in that system, is your hard drive. Is it nearly full? Just to check the size of your hard drive/ how much is full you can click on my computer, and it will tell you how big it is, and how much is free.

Hard drives are cheap, really cheap. Just to give you the space you might want for music, movies, maybe another game i'd personally upgrade that first for the price. I doubt you'll see any improvement in speed unless you go for 10k rpm or a SSD, but you might aswel.
So... what we need to know for this first upgrade, is if your motherboard supports SATA or just IDE. So,.. a quick google shows us: .....
( will update thread, currently googling )
Your fine with sata.
So,.. lets find you a hard drive
Stulid's suggestion : Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (ST3500418AS) £29.99 looks good.
Maybe you don't want the OEM version though as you may be in a situation where you don't have the cables.

My next step would genuinely be to look at your windows setup, if you're on vista, i'd recommend you upgrade to windows 7. I genuinly think Vista was THAT bad that i'd rather change that than upgrade my PC. You can get upgrade discs relatively cheaply, and if you are a student, you can get it for £40

Next, if you still have money after these upgrades...
you're looking at the more expensive parts, your processor, memory and motherboard.
The thing is, as you say you want to do relatively little, upgrading the motherboard means removing almost everything, you might aswel be building a new PC if you're doing that.
So... we need to look up your current motherboard again and see how far we can upgrade that with the motherboard we already have. ( Unless you really want to go for it with a new mobo, but then.. you have put in a new hdd, new motherboard, new ram and new processor = new pc really. )
 
Last edited:
NutterzUK said:
Hey, upgrading what you want is actually down to what you actually want to use it for.
From your post, I see that you don't play huge amounts of games, and so you don't need to upgrade your graphics card IMO.

That leaves you with:
- RAM
- Mobo
- Processor
- Hard drive.
- Software

Now, the first thing i'd look at in that system, is your hard drive. Is it nearly full? Just to check the size of your hard drive/ how much is full you can click on my computer, and it will tell you how big it is, and how much is free.

Hard drives are cheap, really cheap. Just to give you the space you might want for music, movies, maybe another game i'd personally upgrade that first for the price. I doubt you'll see any improvement in speed unless you go for 10k rpm or a SSD, but you might aswel.
So... what we need to know for this first upgrade, is if your motherboard supports SATA or just IDE. So,.. a quick google shows us: .....
( will update thread, currently googling )
Your fine with sata.
So,.. lets find you a hard drive
Stulid's suggestion : Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (ST3500418AS) £29.99 looks good.
Maybe you don't want the OEM version though as you may be in a situation where you don't have the cables.

My next step would genuinely be to look at your windows setup, if you're on vista, i'd recommend you upgrade to windows 7. I genuinly think Vista was THAT bad that i'd rather change that than upgrade my PC. You can get upgrade discs relatively cheaply, and if you are a student, you can get it for £40
Click to expand...

huh?

hes already listed what he wants upgraded in his opening post, but you seem to have decided what to upgrade for him?

he can get the OEM harddrive as the new motherboard will come with all the cables needed.
 
"RAM, Processor and get a new Hard Drive"

Yep, the only difference is i've suggested windows. I'm sure he/she's open to suggestions,.. and... why wouldn't we be upgrading windows?
I was merely reasoning with why he would want to upgrade them particular componants, sometimes it's best people understand what and why,.. rather than just saying "Do this" and then getting stuck not having a clue what they're upgrading, why they are upgrading it or how to.
 
PSU is a trust 570w dual fan.

Can't remember the exact make of the mobo but I will try and find out soon.

I use a laptop with 250GB space and I'm running out, I need more space on the PC as it will be my main use once I upgrade it and there's only around 60GB of space left out of 75GB.

And my budget would be around £350 max. Not sure about the hardware and if it will fit in the case.

The probably 6 months later I will buy a new case etc.

And ya'll gonna have to explain the cables and stuff needed as I have no clue.

Also I'd be open to upgrading Windows, we are on WinXP but for some reason it's not authorized and we don't have the disk to reinstall, so we'd probably have to move to Win7 :(

And another thing, I might need a network & sound card, not sure how onboard sound drivers are but if they're good enough and can avoid buying a new one that's cool.
 
NutterzUK said:
"RAM, Processor and get a new Hard Drive"

Yep, the only difference is i've suggested windows. I'm sure he/she's open to suggestions,.. and... why wouldn't we be upgrading windows?
Click to expand...

all win7 really brings is DX11, but you have stated there is no need to upgrade his DX10 card so upgrading to win7 is pointless. :D
 
stulid said:
huh?

hes already listed what he wants upgraded in his opening post, but you seem to have decided what to upgrade for him?

he can get the OEM harddrive as the new motherboard will come with all the cables needed.
Click to expand...

And, don't "Huh?" me...
"with doing as little work as I can as I'm very inexperienced on building PC's."

Just bang a new motherboard in...
punk.
 
WARHURYEAH said:
PSU is a trust 570w dual fan.

Can't remember the exact make of the mobo but I will try and find out soon.

I use a laptop with 250GB space and I'm running out, I need more space on the PC as it will be my main use once I upgrade it and there's only around 60GB of space left out of 75GB.

And my budget would be around £350 max. Not sure about the hardware and if it will fit in the case.

The probably 6 months later I will buy a new case etc.

And ya'll gonna have to explain the cables and stuff needed as I have no clue.
Click to expand...

the spec I listed will be perfect, with nearly £100 left over for future upgrades.

all the cables are supplied with the new motherboard, so no need to worry there.

if you can find out the current motherboard, then you could potentially upgrade for even less money!!£££
 
Done the spec below, does your case take a full atx?

Stuck a quality PSU in.

Your basketProduct Name Qty Price Line Total
Asus M4A87TD Evo AMD 870 (Socket AM3) DDR3 Motherboard £86.99
(£74.03) £86.99
(£74.03)
AMD Athlon II X4 Quad Core 630 2.80GHz (Socket AM3) - Retail £75.19
(£63.99) £75.19
(£63.99)
Patriot Viper 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C7 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (PVS34G1600LLK) £58.74
(£49.99) £58.74
(£49.99)
Samsung SpinPoint F3 1TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (HD103SJ) £42.29
(£35.99) £42.29
(£35.99)
Corsair CX 430W ATX Power Supply (CMPSU-430CXUK) £37.98
(£32.32) £37.98
(£32.32)
Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro Rev 2 CPU Cooler (Socket 939 / AM2 / AM3 / 775 / 1156 / 1366) £15.98
(£13.60) £15.98
(£13.60)
Sub Total : £269.92
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £10.00
VAT is being charged at 17.50% VAT : £48.99
Total : £328.91
 
And to clarify, Nutterz is being helpful to me and giving me explanations of suggested upgrades :)

As I said I really don't want to do anything to complicated, just plugging stuff in was a struggle for me when I put a new GFX card in ( I knocked out the HardDrive cable without me knowing and for 2 hours I was spamming everyone I knew asking for explanations :D)

MOBO: Just found a yellow sticker on the box with:

NF61S MicroAM2 SE
Socket AM2/HT 2G
Dual DDR2
Sata2/RAID

Not sure if it helps.
 
Last edited:
RJC said:
Done the spec below, does your case take a full atx?

Stuck a quality PSU in.

Your basketProduct Name Qty Price Line Total
Asus M4A87TD Evo AMD 870 (Socket AM3) DDR3 Motherboard £86.99
(£74.03) £86.99
(£74.03)
AMD Athlon II X4 Quad Core 630 2.80GHz (Socket AM3) - Retail £75.19
(£63.99) £75.19
(£63.99)
Patriot Viper 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C7 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (PVS34G1600LLK) £58.74
(£49.99) £58.74
(£49.99)
Samsung SpinPoint F3 1TB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (HD103SJ) £42.29
(£35.99) £42.29
(£35.99)
Corsair CX 430W ATX Power Supply (CMPSU-430CXUK) £37.98
(£32.32) £37.98
(£32.32)
Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro Rev 2 CPU Cooler (Socket 939 / AM2 / AM3 / 775 / 1156 / 1366) £15.98
(£13.60) £15.98
(£13.60)
Sub Total : £269.92
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £10.00
VAT is being charged at 17.50% VAT : £48.99
Total : £328.91
Click to expand...

= new PC.

I recently build a core i5 3gz system for £410

Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro Rev 2 CPU Cooler (Socket 939 / AM2 / AM3 / 775 / 1156 / 1366)

Not necessary, is the OP wanting to overclock?
Jesus seriously... if you're spending £328, and want £100 left, just buy this. and save yourself the hastle
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=FS-226-OK

I think it's really for the OP to decide, if he/she wants to actually upgrade or buy a new PC.

I was suggesting a new hard drive, a new version of windows,.. then moving on to the processor and memory if that's what the OP likes. I was explaining exactly why and what these parts do.

Anyway, @ARHURYEAH, i'll finish my post above, sorry for getting sidetracked.
 
stu, is it just me or did big.wayne just tore them apart in that thread?
god id hate to have an argument with him lol
 
If you download CPUID ( here http://www.cpuid.com/ ), you will be able to find out what motherboard you have in it. I think from that we should be able to decide if you need to upgrade your motherboard or if you can just upgrade the other components.

Pretty much, your upgradability depends on your motherboard, if your motherboard can't take any more than it already has, then you will have to upgrade your motherboard, if there is plenty of room to upgrade... you can upgrade your memory and processor without the mobo. That also saves you some money
 
Jony27 said:
stu, is it just me or did big.wayne just tore them apart in that thread?
god id hate to have an argument with him lol
Click to expand...

but when he has a point its hard to disagree with what he says, abit like wasting money on a copy of win7 when a simple reinstall of the o/s will clean the system up nicely from years worth of junk.

especially when the OP states he has a DX10 4850 and only plays TF2!!!:D
 
NutterzUK said:
If you download CPUID ( here http://www.cpuid.com/ ), you will be able to find out what motherboard you have in it. I think from that we should be able to decide if you need to upgrade your motherboard or if you can just upgrade the other components.

Pretty much, your upgradability depends on your motherboard, if your motherboard can't take any more than it already has, then you will have to upgrade your motherboard, if there is plenty of room to upgrade... you can upgrade your memory and processor without the mobo. That also saves you some money
Click to expand...

NF61S MicroAM2 SE
Socket AM2/HT 2G
Dual DDR2
Sata2/RAID


thats all the info I have on the mobo :) well, it's from the box that the mobo came in.

would it be cheaper to buy a new PC and just replace the GPU with the one I have now?
 
Link to motherboard:

http://www.biostar.com.tw/app/en/mb/content.php?S_ID=23

Can only handle upto 2gb of RAM.

AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual-Core 6000+ ADV6000IAA5DO 3100Mhz 2000Mhz 89W
AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual-Core 5200+ ADA5200IAA6CS 2600Mhz 2000Mhz 89W
AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual-Core 5000+ ADA5000IAA5CU 2600Mhz 2000Mhz 89W
AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual-Core 4800+ ADA4800IAA6CS 2400Mhz 2000Mhz 89W
AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual-Core 4600+ ADO4600IAA5CU 2400Mhz 2000Mhz 65W
AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual-Core 4400+ ADA4400IAA6CS 2200Mhz 2000Mhz 89W
AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual-Core 4400+ ADO4400IAA6CS 2200Mhz 2000Mhz 65W
AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual-Core 4200+ ADO4200IAA5DO 2200Mhz 2000Mhz 65W
AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual-Core 3800+ ADO3800IAA5CS 2000Mhz 2000MhZ 65W
AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual-Core 3600+ ADO3600IAA5DL 1900Mhz 2000MhZ 65W
AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual-Core 3600+ ADO3600IAA5DD 1900Mhz 2000Mhz 65W
AMD Athlon™ 64 3500+ ADH3500IAA4DE 2200Mhz 2000Mhz 45W
AMD Athlon™ 64 3200+ ADH3200IAA4DE 2000Mhz 2000Mhz 45W
AMD Athlon™ 64 3000+ ADA3000IAA4CN 1800Mhz 2000Mhz 62W
AMD Sempron™ 3800+ SDA3800IAA3CN 2200Mhz 1600Mhz 62W
AMD Sempron™ 3000+ SDD3000IAA3CN 1600Mhz 1600Mhz 35W
AMD Sempron™ 2800+ SDA2800IAA2CN 1600Mhz 1600Mhz 62W
Click to expand...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom