Upgrade help...

complex.

complex.

complex.

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18 Sep 2011
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65
Hi guys,

I'm looking to upgrade my components and would appreciate some help as i'm years behind the hardware scene :(

What I have right now
Thermaltake Tsunami Dream case
Antec High Current Gamer 620W
ASUS A8N SLi-Delux motherboard
AMD Athlon 64 4400+ X2
nVidia GeForce 7800 GTX
Audigy X-Fi Fatal1ty
2gb Corsair RAM
...and a hard drive of some sort :D

The PC will be used for playing games such as Counter-Strike:Source, Counter-Strike:Global Offensive, F1 2011 and maybe Battlefield 3.

I have a budget of £300 to spend - Is this enough to upgrade and notice a big difference in performance?

I'm happy with my case, so i'd prefer not to replace that. I've also recently bought the Antec PSU, I take it this will be sufficient for a new build?

Final question :p - Will I be able to use my sound card (its pretty old) in a new motherboard?

Thank you all verrrrrry much! :D

complex
 
I've also recently bought the Antec PSU, I take it this will be sufficient for a new build?
Click to expand...

Yes, great PSU.

Final question - Will I be able to use my sound card (its pretty old) in a new motherboard?
Click to expand...

Yes.

I have a budget of £300 to spend - Is this enough to upgrade and notice a big difference in performance?
Click to expand...

I think a CPU/RAM and board upgrade is the first thing to do, then swap the graphics card over later.

Your basketProduct Name Qty Price Line Total
Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - Retail with FREE TrackMania 2 Canyon PC Game £173.99
(£144.99) £173.99
(£144.99)
Asus P8P67 LE Intel P67 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard ** B3 REVISION ** £72.59
(£60.49) £72.59
(£60.49)
G.Skill RipJawsX 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (F3-12800CL9D-8GBXL ) £39.98
(£33.32) £39.98
(£33.32)
Sub Total : £238.80
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 20.00% VAT : £49.66
Total : £297.96

One question is your current HDD and optical drive, are they SATA or IDE?
 
Hi Stulid - thanks for your reply.

I'm not sure what the HDD is to be honest, i'll have to check tonight.

Hmm I think i'd want to upgrade my graphics card to be honest... Is there anyway to squeeze a decent one into my budget? :p
 
Doubt it, most graphics cards cost around 200 quid, and you would then have to add 175 for the CPU (so that's already waaaaay over your budget) but then you gotta change the mobo too.....
 
complex. said:
Hmm I think i'd want to upgrade my graphics card to be honest... Is there anyway to squeeze a decent one into my budget? :p
Click to expand...

Of course:)

Your basketProduct Name Qty Price Line Total
HIS ATI Radeon HD 6850 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card with DIRT3 & Deus Ex PC Games £112.99
(£94.16) £112.99
(£94.16)
Intel Core i3-2100 3.10GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - Retail £94.99
(£79.16) £94.99
(£79.16)
MSI H67MA-E35 Intel H67 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Micro-ATX Motherboard - (Sandybridge) **B3 REVISION** £64.99
(£54.16) £64.99
(£54.16)
Kingston HyperX Blu 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (KHX1600C9AD3B1K2/4G) £23.99
(£19.99) £23.99
(£19.99)
Sub Total : £247.47
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 20.00% VAT : £51.39
Total : £308.36

This H67 board has SATA3.0 (useful if you want to add a SSD later) and USB3.0

There are cheaper boards without these two features - http://www.overclockers.co.uk/productlist.php?groupid=701&catid=5&subid=1965&sortby=priceasc

the i3 2100 is fast chip - http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/core-i3-2120-2100_5.html#sect0

Compared to what you currently have, this CPU+GFX combo are multiple times faster.
 
Hi guys,

I'm trying to find out if my HDD is SATA or IDE... i've tried going into my BIOS but my monitor just flickers on and off :(.

Is there any way to find out in windows?
 
Just checked my device manager and it has 'MAXTOR 6L200M0' - I guess this is my HDD. Google says its SATA... Is this compatable with the upgraded hardware listed above?
 
Yes that's fine :)

However, since you're in for a new system,, I would invest in a new HDD anyway. Storage is so cheap and because older drives have a greater risk of failure I would start a new.
 
Hi guys,

I've decided I will be ordering a gfx card aswell.

I'm going with the spec that Stulid recommended;

Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - Retail with FREE TrackMania 2 Canyon PC Game £173.99
(£144.99) £173.99
(£144.99)
Asus P8P67 LE Intel P67 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard ** B3 REVISION ** £72.59
(£60.49) £72.59
(£60.49)
G.Skill RipJawsX 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit (F3-12800CL9D-8GBXL ) £39.98

What gfx card would be suitable to upgrade to? I can spend around £100...

Thank you
 
Last edited:
The 2500K is currently £6 cheaper.

The motherboard is £2.39 more expensive.

The RAM is £14.01 more expensive.

For the graphics card you could do with stretching your budget a bit for a GTX 460 or HD 6850.
 
So is this spec still the best option to get for my budget?

The 2500k as you said is cheaper (on offer for today only)

Is there any other RAM i can get that will be as good as/better than the G.Skill RipJawsX 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit for the price?

Thanks
 
RAM prices are on the way up.

You can get the Corsair Vengeance Blue 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit on This Week Only for £43.99.

This will give you identical performance to the G.Skill.

The only thing to watch out for is the tall heat spreaders which may interfere with large CPU coolers. But then you'd have a similar problem with the G.Skill.

If you're using the Intel stock cooler it's a none issue.

Edit

Or on Today Only Corsair Vengeance Arctic White 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit £41.99.
 
Last edited:
Thanks for your help Surveyor.

So whats the difference between

Corsair Vengeance Arctic White 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit

and

Corsair Vengeance Blue 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit
 
Okayyyyyy so i'm seconds away from ordering...

Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - OEM £149.99
(£124.99) £149.99
(£124.99)
MSI GeForce GTX 460 Cyclone 1024MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £119.99
(£99.99) £119.99
(£99.99)
Asus P8P67 LE Intel P67 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard ** B3 REVISION ** £74.98
(£62.48) £74.98
(£62.48)
Corsair Vengeance Arctic White 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit


Does that look ok? I'm going with the GTX 460 over the HD 6850. Good choice? Which would be better for running BF3?
 
Last edited:
I've no idea which would be better for BF3.

If you're not buying a retail processor then you'll need to buy a CPU cooler.

Retail = 3 year warranty + Intel stock cooler

OEM = 1 year warranty and no cooler
 
There's a review here which says it's OK.

But there's a review here which says it's a pile of poo.

Perhaps the fact that they used to be £70 and are now being dumped for £13 says steer clear.

At the lower end of the price range I suggest you take a look at these:

zaward vapor 120 multi socket cpu cooler review

cooler master hyper 212 plus cpu cooler Review

If you order hasn't shipped yet then ring OcUK first thing in the morning and they might be able to add a cooler on to save you paying more postage.

You can also ask them about changing to a HD 6870 if that's still bothering you.
 
Last edited:
Ok thanks.

Its already been shipped sadly :(

Do I need to buy anything else to fit the CPU cooler? i.e thermal paste or do they come with it?
 
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