upgrade advice..

nintenjo · 15 Apr 2007 at 10:06

Im in a bit of a dilema... I am looking to build a new HTPC.. or at least upgrade my curent PC and plonk in a HTPC case. But im questioning the cost effectivness etc and wanted some advice..

OK my Current rig:

3400+ Socket 754
Zalman Flower All Cooper 92mm Cooler
DFI LAnParty Ultra 250Gb
2 Gig PC3200 Cas 2 Mem
Geforce 6800LE 128mb (Unlocked to GT Pipes)
450Watt PSU
SATA Plextor 760SA 18x DL DVD-RW

.... Now i was orginally looking to spend about £600.. on upgrades.. but i really cant justify that as i dont use my PC for many games anymore. I just play ARMA and SupCom occasionally.

So.. If i was to spend about £200 (excluding OS and CASE) on upgrades what would you go for? Is anything salvigable? Bare in mind 1 thing i really need a Audio card that does Dolby Digital LIVE! or mobo that supports it.

All second hand btw:
I originally thought an AMD Mobile 4000+ (But looks to hard to get hold of)
7900GS AGP
Terractec 7.1 Aduio card with DDlive!
and 1 Gig extra of RAM..

To keep me ticking over for another 8months until i can justify a Full system upgrade once DX10 is well into games.

Advice welcome?

nintenjo · 15 Apr 2007 at 19:58

No one

?

Netvyper · 15 Apr 2007 at 20:30

2gb of Ram should be fine unless your moving over Vista.

The socket 754 makes life difficult

Perhaps a Cheap s939 board; alongside an X2 chip? each of these can be picked up for around £50 new now I believe. and then a 7900GS would do well alongside; perhaps an ATI X1950Pro - which can be had for a little over £100.

I honestly dont know much about sound though im afraid.

nintenjo · 15 Apr 2007 at 21:11

well the main issues i saw...

Firstly i was planning to switch to Vista.. but it makes the whole process trickier.

A s939 board and chip would be ok.. but then that still leave me with Single channel memory so id have to get a Single channel board.
So the other alternative is a new board, memory and CPU.. plus a new Grfx card.. all in all the price rockets up and im back to my 600 first figure.

And ive seen a 8800 GTS for £150.. so by the time ive got the 1950 i might as well spend a few extra pennies to get that and then its all vista ready. I hate upgrading when it gets to all new stuff..

Im glad AMD are planning on AM3 cpus that run on AM2 mobos.. should help give older boards a new lease of life.

Netvyper · 15 Apr 2007 at 23:50

nintenjo said:
well the main issues i saw...

Firstly i was planning to switch to Vista.. but it makes the whole process trickier.

A s939 board and chip would be ok.. but then that still leave me with Single channel memory so id have to get a Single channel board.
So the other alternative is a new board, memory and CPU.. plus a new Grfx card.. all in all the price rockets up and im back to my 600 first figure.

And ive seen a 8800 GTS for £150.. so by the time ive got the 1950 i might as well spend a few extra pennies to get that and then its all vista ready. I hate upgrading when it gets to all new stuff..

Im glad AMD are planning on AM3 cpus that run on AM2 mobos.. should help give older boards a new lease of life.

Well; My rig is happily running vista-64 atm; but obviously its got an aged gfx card. While i've not met anything it cant handle; More memory wouldn't hurt

Single Channel board?
I assume then that its a single 2gb memory stick you possess? that will work in any dual channel board, you'll just be missing a little bandwidth.

If you can grab an 8800GTS for that; go for it.

Indeed; ripping a pc apart and effectively starting again is no fun

AM2/AM3 stuff might make life easier for those who made the jump.

Lolcb · 16 Apr 2007 at 00:21

Lol, what you said made me laugh a bit sorry.

You said you don't game as much, but the games you play is known to be hardware killing. And 600 quid =! gaming machine in my eyes.

If you really want to play ArmA and SupCom, I would recommend Intel Core 2 Duo as your processor and at least an 8800GTS. Of course, if you can sacrifice graphical quality, you might be able to go by using 1950 series cards.