Upgrading my wife's computer

[prescott28]

So, my wife's machine consists of an old Core 2 processor running at 1.6GHz and old hard drives. It takes ages to boot or to do anything (well to me anyway but my hardware is new!) It's time to upgrade but what to

She doesn't play games - apart from things like Digger (think back a century or so to an old DOS game) but she does our accounts, runs Family tree maker for the family history she does and, obviously, office programmes.

So what would be the best choice for upgrade? I was wondering about an i3 but I'm not sure how much upgrade it would be. I'm going for something like the Western Digital Black drive for nit to boost performance and will need a motherboard that support the fast 6GB sata the drive needs.

What processor would you suggest?

 

[T345]

Budget?

 

[prescott28]

Whoops! Well up to say £300? I'm only going to need the mobo, processor, memory and disk as the rest is already there to use.

 

[T345]

1 min, making a spec

 

[T345]

Which OS? Which type of HDD and Optical drive? Which formfactor case

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i3-2120 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - Retail £89.99
1 x OcUK Value 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C9 1333MHz Low-Voltage Dual Channel Kit £29.99
1 x **B Grade** Gigabyte H61M-S2 Intel H61 (Socket 1155) DDR3 (MB-355-GI) £25
Total : £156.37 (includes shipping : £9.50).

 

[Doomedspeed]

YOUR BASKET
1 x Intel Core i3-2120 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor - Retail £89.99
1 x Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 1TB SATA 6Gb/s 32MB Cache - OEM (ST31000524AS) £61.99
1 x Intel 330 Series 60GB 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s Solid State Hard Drive - Retail £50.99
1 x Gigabyte H61MA-D3V Intel H61 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard £47.99
1 x Crucial Ballistix Sport 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 PC3-10666C9 1333MHz Dual Channel Kit (BLS2CP2G3D1339DS1S00CEU) £19.99
Total : £282.35 (includes shipping : £9.50).

 

[prescott28]

Thanks for the advice, guys. I was thinking Intel was the way to go rather than AMD. I'n not sure how good they are these days.

 

[Fire_fly]

Best to go with Intel unless you need the extra graphical power of a AMD A series.