Upgrade Time

Riyal · 28 Mar 2006 at 22:43

Upgrade Time - Spec Check

With my recent purchase of Oblivion its dawned on me its come time to replace my 3200 barton/6800 GT with something a bit more up to date, this is what I have come up with so far;

AMD Athlon 64 3800+ Venice 90nm £164.95 (£193.82)
Asus A8R32-MVP Deluxe Crossfire £109.95 (£129.19)
Corsair 2GB DDR XMS3200C2PT TwinX (2x1GB) £119.95 (£140.94)
PowerColor ATI Radeon X1800 XT 512MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) £199.95 (£234.94)
Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Music - Retail £64.95 (£76.32)
Antec Performance TX1088AMG Metallic Grey Tower Case - 480w Truepower PSU £89.95 (£105.69)
Microsoft Windows XP Professional x64 Edition inc. SP2 - OEM £79.95 (£93.94)

Total £829.65 (£974.84)

Adding to that a Western Digital Raptor 74GB, and a I also have a couple of Seagate Barracuda 80G's I have stored. For a display i'll be using a Vision master Pro 454 19" crt.

My Idea was to have a good PC up and running for around £1000 and have scope for upgrading in the future. I've decided to go back to ATI cards as when I upgraded from a 9800 to the 6800 I noticed a drop in image quality on AA and textures. The X-Fi is to have an upgrade on my current Audigy ZS.
Any thought on this spec?

Few Questions if you'll be so kind;
Can you see anything I can save some money on or spend a little extra for more performance?
For the CPU does the 1MB L2 cache on the san diego models add any preformance worth the cost going up to the 4000+ or even worth going for a 3700+?
Dual Cores are a possibility
Is 480w PSU enough for all this?

Its pretty confusing getting used to the new hardware after a break from buying anything major :eek:

Thanks in advance

Ender · 28 Mar 2006 at 23:28

antec psus are good so it should be fine - i would maybe drop the xfi soundcard its not much difference i dont think to the zs unless your into sound production (i think)

use the spare money towards a x1900xt which would be a much bigger boast to speed then the xfi - or think about getting a x2 3800

Ender · 28 Mar 2006 at 23:34

try this maybe?

CP-134-AM AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 3800+ (Socket 939) - Retail (ADA3800BVBOX) (CP-134-AM)
£179.95 £179.95
MB-014-DF DFI LanParty UT NF4 Ultra-D (Socket 939) PCI-Express Motherboard (MB-014-DF)
£79.95 £79.95
MY-046-GL GeIL 2GB (2x1GB) PC3200 Value Dual Channel Kit CAS3 (GE2GB3200BDC) (MY-046-GL)
£89.95 £89.95
GX-047-CO Connect3D ATI Radeon X1900 XT 512MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (3056) (GX-047-CO)
£269.95 £269.95
CA-035-AN Antec Performance TX1088AMG Metallic Grey Tower Case - 480w Truepower PSU (CA-035-AN)
£89.95 £89.95
OS-001-MS Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition inc. SP2 - OEM - 1Pk (N09-01528) (OS-001-MS)
£49.95 £49.95
Subtotal £759.70
VAT £132.95
Total £892.65

Riyal · 29 Mar 2006 at 02:51

Cheers for the replies. As to the Xi-Fi I have to admit I really dont need to upgrade to at this time, even if I wanted to use my current PC still Its an force 2 with onboard sound.

Hmm with the money saved from that I could up to a x1900 xt, was there any particular reason tfor listing the Connect3D Card?
Sapphire ATI Radeon X1900 XT 512MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-112-SP) £254.95 (£299.57)
Is a tiny bit cheaper has the exact same specs listed and by the looks of the photo, bar the image on the cooler, is the same design. I have a Saphire 6800 at the moment and it hasnt had any problems so far.

I'm a bit dubious about dual core chips at the moment, probably something i'd buy as an upgrade. On the Windows Xp front I haven't a good excuse why i'd need this, it just seems to be the thing to do

Also the crossfire MB seems to me to have a lot of upgrade potential. Dual x1900's would be a nice thing have.

Corsair 2GB DDR XMS3200C2PT TwinX (2x1GB) £119.95
Asus A8R32-MVP Deluxe Crossfire (Socket 939) PCI-Express Motherboard £109.95
Antec Performance TX1088AMG Metallic Grey Tower Case - 480w Truepower PSU £89.95
Microsoft Windows XP Professional x64 Edition inc. SP2 - OEM - 1Pk £79.95
Sapphire ATI Radeon X1900 XT 512MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £254.95
AMD Athlon 64 3800+ Venice 90nm (Socket 939) - Retail £164.95

Subtotal £819.70
VAT £143.45
Total £963.15