Upgrade A64 939 -> Core2Duo

KaylanCloud

KaylanCloud

KaylanCloud

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Joined
23 Oct 2004
Posts
230
Location
Cardiff
Hi guys upgrade time is upon me, current specs :-

AMD Athlon 64 3000+ "Winchester"
DFI LanParty UT NF4 Sli-DR
GeIL 1GB (2x512MB) PC3200 Value Dual Channel Kit CAS2.5
XFX 6600GT 128MB PCI-Express

Budget = £500 inc VAT & Del

Expectations :-
Core 2 Duo (Most bang for buck?)
650i Based Mobo (Leaning towards the Asus)
2GB PC6400 Ram (Most bang for buck?)
Best I can get for remaining cash (Hoping 8800 series)

Cheers

*NB* None of old kit will be funding the upgrade as it's being donated to a friend.
 
Having all those for under £500 isn't easy:

Intel Core 2 DUO E4300 "LGA775 Allendale" 1.80GHz (800FSB) - Retail
£94.99
(£111.61)

BFG GeForce 8800 GTS OC 320MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail
£179.99
(£211.49)

OCZ 2GB (2 x 1GB) PC2-6400 Dual Channel Platinum Revision 2 XTC Series DDR2 (OCZ2P800R22GK)
£101.99
(£119.84)

**B Grade** Gigabyte GA_965P_S3 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
£40.00
(£47.00)

Sub Total : £416.97
hipping : £8.95
Vat : £74.54
Total : £500.46

The best compromise I think if you use your computer for games. A little overclock on that chip will give a nice performance increase. Only thing is the B-grade mobo might not come with any cable.
 
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Product Name Qty Price Line Total
GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC6400C5 800MHz Value DDR2 Dual Channel Kit (GX22GB6400DC) £84.99
(£99.86) £84.99
(£99.86)
Asus P5N-E SLi nForce 650 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £69.99
(£82.24) £69.99
(£82.24)
BFG GeForce 8800 GTS OC 320MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £179.99
(£211.49) £179.99
(£211.49)
Intel Core 2 DUO E4300 "LGA775 Allendale" 1.80GHz (800FSB) - Retail £94.99
(£111.61) £94.99
(£111.61)
Sub Total : £429.96
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £8.95
Vat : £76.81
Total : £515.72

The really cheap 8800GTSs are out of stock, of course, but its as close as. In the end I chose a relatively cheap mid-range card for my rig as a placeholder until theres some competition and choice in DX10 cards. And maybe some DX10 games to run on them.

No idea about the Geil RAM really.

Thumbs up for the Asus P5NE, easy to use and a good clocker.
 
Thanks very much guys, seems these 2 are the keepers :-

BFG GeForce 8800 GTS OC 320MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express)
Intel Core 2 DUO E4300 "LGA775 Allendale" 1.80GHz (800FSB)

= £323.10 + Del (£332.80)

So that leaves £167.20 for Mobo/Ram... split that in half gives £83.60 for each.

As far as I am aware theres no worthwhile 2Gb ram for that price so, if I use more of my budget to go onto ram then i'd have to reduce the budget available for the motherboard.

So which is more worth while to invest in? Ram or Motherboard, also would I miss much by going for 1gb instead of 2 as if I can get away with reducing ram to 1gb then I can increase the available budget for the motherboard.

Hope it makes a little sense... early morning ramblings ;) lol
 
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1Gig is ok(ish) but really not the way you want to be going with a new build, more and more games are wanting 2Gig and if you want to go Vistas it is practically essential. Go with one of the specs above you going to have to find an extra 20-30 quid but it will be worth it!
 
steve258 has pretty much nailed the budget, the S3 is a good motherboard - the only significant difference between it and the more expensive DS3 is that it doesn't use solid capacitors. You could ask your mate to give you £20 for the kit since it is more than fair and go with d1am0nd g33z3r's specification if you really want the P5N-E and new rather than B Grade. B Grade should be fine but will likely be missing manuals or cables. :)
 
Does anyone rate the Corsair 2GB DDR2 XMS2-6400C5 TwinX (2x1GB)?

Reason being I've shopped around a bit and I can get :-

Leadtek PX8800GTS-TDH320 DVI PCI-E
Asus P5N-E SLI 650i Socket 775 Onboard Audio ATX
Intel Core 2 Duo E4300 1.86ghz Socket 775 FSB800
Corsair (TWIN2X2048-6400) XMS2-6400 2048MB 5-5-5-12

For £497.80 inc VAT & Del from a competitor, unfortunatley the same kit is £531.35 ish depending on the manufacturer of the 8800.
 
i read a review on that ram and it ran 4-4-4-12 @850
cant find it in my favs now tho as i was gonna get it
 
I got the following for £501 inc vat. It could have been cheaper if i went for any ordinary 8800GTS 320mb.

Gigabyte 965P DS3P £75
C2D E4300 £99
2GB Geil Ultra PC2-6400 C4 £115
EVGA 320MB 8800GTS Superclocked £212.

You can get 8800GTS cards from £178 so you can knock a big chunk off from that total.

It's a huge jump from my old 4000+ clocked at 2.75ghz with it's pair of BFG 7800GT's in Sli. With the [email protected] and the 8800GTS at it's stock speed i now get 9793 in 3DMark06 compared to the 4000+ rig's 6321. I have'nt even clocked the card yet!! The change in games is awesome. The IQ is so much better and i can now play everything maxxed out again. :D

I did briefly have the Abit 650i motherboard but as it was so buggy and unuseable it promptly got returned for a full refund. I even got my postage back too. :D
 
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I'm not sure why everyone is pointing you at the 4300. Sure it's got the 9x multiplier but it just can't get to the performance level of the 6300 especially not when it comes to memory bandwidth. With decent memory a 6300 will clock to 3.4 or even 3.5 with a good cooler. 4300 won't ever get past 3.2.

Well worth the £10 difference.
 
Darg said:
I'm not sure why everyone is pointing you at the 4300. Sure it's got the 9x multiplier but it just can't get to the performance level of the 6300 especially not when it comes to memory bandwidth. With decent memory a 6300 will clock to 3.4 or even 3.5 with a good cooler. 4300 won't ever get past 3.2.

Well worth the £10 difference.
Click to expand...

What utter bull!!! My 4300 easily get's to 3.4ghz Orthos stable and even boots into windows at 3.6ghz, although i have'nt had a chance to run Orthos yet at 3.6.

430034ghz7hoursorthosnz4.png


I can definately call that "bang for buck" which is what he wanted. Mine was also only £99.
 
I agree. The E4300 is much better for a budget build. You could even get cheaper ram than the PC6400 and get 2GB of PC5300/5400. That will get you to a rock solid 3GHz and keep the ram at its rated speed of 667mhz.
 
Nymins said:
I agree. The E4300 is much better for a budget build. You could even get cheaper ram than the PC6400 and get 2GB of PC5300/5400. That will get you to a rock solid 3GHz and keep the ram at its rated speed of 667mhz.
Click to expand...

I completely agree with you on the ram. This was my first EVER Intel rig and the 4300 was meant to be a stop gap until the price drops when it would have been replaced by one of the new cpu's. That is why i got the 6400 ram. I am not so sure now that i want to replace the 4300. It really is a cracking little cpu and i am more than happy with it. This is by far the easiest overclocking rig i have ever had.

For a 4300, PC2-5300 is more than enough. Even some of that stuff will happily exceed it's rated speed.
 
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