Upgrading a mates PC

northun_munky

northun_munky

northun_munky

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1 Mar 2008
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Near Longleat, Raaaar!!
I built a PC for a mate of mine a good few year back now and he's thinking of getting back into gaming on it and has asked me (oh joy!) to bring it up to speed.


XFX ATI Radeon HD 4830 512MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI/HDMI (PCI-Express) - Retail

Antec Basiq Plus 550W Modular Power Supply

Intel Pentium Dual-Core E5300 "LGA775 Core 2" 2.60GHz (800FSB) - Retail

Kingston HyperX 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 6400C4 800MHz Dual Channel (KHX6400D2LLK2/4G)

Hitachi Deskstar P7K500 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (0A35415)

Asus P5QPL-AM Intel G41 (Socket 775) DDR2 microATX Motherboard

Samsung SH-S222A/BEBE 22x DVD±RW IDE Rewriter (Black) - OEM

DPD Next Day Parcel Saturday: £0.00

Order Total: £319.91

I get the impression he doesn't want to spend a load of cash on it but does want to game at 1080p...

I know the CPU doesn't meet a lot of newer games minimum requirements but would we get away with OC'ing the hell out of it, another 4gb of DDR2 and maybe a r9 280?
 
You could do that.

But he will be held back by the CPU.

But if you can find out how much he has to spend than maybe I can do something else.
 
Minimum fuss would be a quad core 775 CPU (anything from a Q6600 to a Q9500, they're very cheap these days) and a powerful GPU. The GPU can be kept and used in a future new build. I wouldn't bother with more RAM at this time. Most games cope fine with an old CPU.
 
I was thinking maybe a quad, i used to have until only last year a q6600 which was an awesome CPU. I'll try to find out how much he has. Knowing him he's a short arms long pockets kind of guy...
 
off the MM:

1) i5 2/3rd gen or i7 first gen + its associated mobo
2) heatsink
3) 7950/7970/280(x)
4) 8gb ddr3 ram
5) ssd

overclock and profit?
 
true, without op stating how much his friend's budget is, quite hard to spec...

but £300 for that is a pretty impressive deal if i do say so ;p
 
tamzzy said:
true, without op stating how much his friend's budget is, quite hard to spec...

but £300 for that is a pretty impressive deal if i do say so ;p
Click to expand...

Trying to get hold of him all morning to find out how much of his hard earned cash he wants to part with... Can't imagine it's going to be much though. He's the kind of guy who thinks the power of his PC depends on how many blue lights the case has... (true story... ish..) It does look a good deal but I think it's going to be way over budget.

stulid said:
I found this - http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showthread.php?t=18633097&highlight=q6600

But comes with a board that is better, but not needed.
Click to expand...

Did see this, great mobo/cpu combo and good money too. Like you say though the ip35-pro isn't really needed so might look at trying to find a cheap q6600 and drop it in the existing mobo, then source a decent 2nd hand 280.
 
Ok, got hold of him. He's decided he wants to make it a future proof as he can for £250, £300 at a push :) He wants to get a tb hdd in there and about £50 of it for a new case I think so that leaves £200 ish for the rest?
 
YOUR BASKET
1 x Raijintek Agos Midi Tower - Black £39.95
1 x Zalman Z3 Plus Midi-Tower - Black £39.95
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200RPM 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST1000DM003) HDD £39.95
Total : £129.44 (includes shipping : £8.00).



Two cases, plenty of fans each.


YOUR BASKET
1 x MSI Radeon R9 280 Gaming 3072MB GDDR5 PCI-Express Graphics Card £149.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200RPM 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 64MB Cache - OEM (ST1000DM003) HDD £39.95
1 x Zalman Z3 Plus Midi-Tower - Black £39.95
Total : £239.48 (includes shipping : £8.00).

 
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