Upgrade time is approaching..

redarrow

redarrow

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I'm finally planning to upgrade my system.. at the end of this month. :D
My current setup is as old as the hills .. still 32bit Athlon XP2600 :eek:


Anyways I'm really rather lost about whats the best route to go. I'm leaning towards AMD because I've always been with them and they still seem to be cheaper.


My budget: R7k at max. (less would be better ;))

Here's what I've currently got in mind:
Graphic card: Geforce 9600GT 512MB
New hard disk: Seagate Barracuda 1.5TB (however I might have to drop to the 1TB as the 1.5 seems a little pricey at the moment)

Ram: 2x 2GB DDR-800 modules

Motherboard: Asus M3A AMD 770

Processor: Phenom X4 9550


I've not decided where I'll be buying my upgrades from but I've been looking at Sybaratic as a pricing guide. I'll definitely be shopping around for good prices though.

Basically I'm open to any suggestions/opinions/flames on my choices, the only points I should make is:
I do want quad core. I like the idea of decent multitasking.
I do not need an ultra-mega-nitrous-powered graphic card - I'm a linux user and I do not game a lot (at the moment), however I would still like to be able to play the occasional game (especially now that I'm connected to the PEWUG :))

My current casing is quite fine, I'm not too sure however if I'd need a new PSU (I have a not so old 550W)

Thanks for reading! :eek: ;)
 
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1) :p @ AMD fanboi ..... lol. Other than that I'd get an 8800GT or 9800GT instead of the 9600 .... is only like an extra couple hundred at max and it'll handle muuuuuuch better :D

(that 550W should be fine too).
 
Mephisto_Helix said:
1) :p @ AMD fanboi ..... lol.
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:p
Not actually a fanboi.. I'd be perfectly willing to try out intel.. it's just that the intel quad cores seem sooo much more expensive. :p

Mephisto_Helix said:
Other than that I'd get an 8800GT or 9800GT instead of the 9600 .... is only like an extra couple hundred at max and it'll handle muuuuuuch better :D
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Shows how little I know about graphic cards.. I thought a 9600GT was better than a 8800GT :o

Mephisto_Helix said:
(that 550W should be fine too).
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Thanks! :) That's good to know. :)
 
Intel is only R200 more .... but stick with what you know and are used to I say ;)
 
For good Phenom performance(I had the board, I had to swap it though because I upgraded my Phenom) is the ECS A780GM-A motherboard..flip I loved that board, super fast especially at start up. Was R900 and well worth it. Also instead of the 9600 go for either the new ATI 4850 or 4870. Awesome cards and 4850 is cheap and powerful.

My personal experience and I can assure you that you have an awesome gaming rig for a long time. :p
 
Sure, Intel is more expensive than AMD... but it is a lot faster (benchmarks don't lie). The Phenom 9850 is only 80% the speed of the Q6600 quad core.

Quad Core is not really there for games yet. Or other way round actually. A Core2 Duo E8500 (3.16GHz, 1333FSB) is really really fast and only sets you back around R1600.

Based on prices before the Rand went haywire:

E8500: R1600
Motherboard: ~R1200, depending on specs
RAM: 2x2GB Kingston/ Corsair 800: R700-R750
1TB Seagate: ~R1600
9600GT 512MB DDR3: R1300-R1400
========
This would be ~R6500.
But with prices rocketing at the moment it could be a lot more.
 
Don't get a 9600GT though, the 8800gt isn't that much more and if you can't scrape the funds I think someone on here was selling a second hand 8800gt for R1000
 
Thanks for all the info guys!

The reason I thought of the 9600GT is because my brother just recently upgraded his machine (intel dual core) and he got the 9600GT, from seeing what it does on his system, I'm pretty sure it'll be fairly adequate for my needs. :)

As for the ATI cards all I know is that they do not have a brilliant reputation for working with Linux.. I do think the situation has improved lately, but I'm quite used to configuring nvidia cards on Linux so it's really simpler to stick to nvidia.. :o :)

froot said:
Sure, Intel is more expensive than AMD... but it is a lot faster (benchmarks don't lie). The Phenom 9850 is only 80% the speed of the Q6600 quad core.
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I do realise that, unfortunately the wallet has to rule these decisions sometimes.. :(
froot said:
Quad Core is not really there for games yet. Or other way round actually. A Core2 Duo E8500 (3.16GHz, 1333FSB) is really really fast and only sets you back around R1600.
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Yea.. but I as I said I don't really game very much.. ;)

I'd really like to be able to run some intensive tasks in the background (such as video encoding) without being grossly negatively affected as I try go about my usual computing tasks. (i.e., like I experience on my current system) :)
 
did you see what that link said about screen resolutions (with regards the 96 vs 88). What monitor/s do you have?
 
Or get an HIS IceQ 4670 Turbo edition, afaik its more powerful than an 8800gt and I think a 9800gt too. And its a hell of a lot cheaper.
 
froot said:
Sure, Intel is more expensive than AMD... but it is a lot faster (benchmarks don't lie). The Phenom 9850 is only 80% the speed of the Q6600 quad core.

Quad Core is not really there for games yet. Or other way round actually. A Core2 Duo E8500 (3.16GHz, 1333FSB) is really really fast and only sets you back around R1600.

Based on prices before the Rand went haywire:

E8500: R1600
Motherboard: ~R1200, depending on specs
RAM: 2x2GB Kingston/ Corsair 800: R700-R750
1TB Seagate: ~R1600
9600GT 512MB DDR3: R1300-R1400
========
This would be ~R6500.
But with prices rocketing at the moment it could be a lot more.
Click to expand...


I'm taking it that you haven't seen the fact that Far Cry 2 takes a strong liking to the quadcores, and more games are going to follow that will make use of extra cores...

but other then that, yes, i think that pc is right on the mark...
 
I would recommend getting pretty much what I have at the moment - 8800GT, Core 2 Duo 3 GHz, 2 Gig RAM, Asus P5N-D Sli (that way you can get another card for Sli later on). I would tone down on HD personally and go for a 500. The prices on HD's drop so quick you can get one later on, rather spend the cash on a better GPU or CPU.
 
Grimspoon said:
I would recommend getting pretty much what I have at the moment - 8800GT, Core 2 Duo 3 GHz, 2 Gig RAM, Asus P5N-D Sli (that way you can get another card for Sli later on). I would tone down on HD personally and go for a 500. The prices on HD's drop so quick you can get one later on, rather spend the cash on a better GPU or CPU.
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Not bad :D But I must have quad core!! I neeeeeed quad core .. I have quadcorewantism :p
What is "Sli" btw ? :o


Funnily enough I was just about to post that I could always save some bucks by buying a real cheap GPU like a 7200GS or something, and then upgrading the GPU in another month or two. :)

That way I wouldn't have to give up on my 1.5TB HDD idea :)
Oh and even the cheapest GPU available today will probably draw circles around my current 64mb Geforce 4 MX440 :o :p
 
redarrow said:
Not bad :D But I must have quad core!! I neeeeeed quad core .. I have quadcorewantism :p
What is "Sli" btw ? :o


Funnily enough I was just about to post that I could always save some bucks by buying a real cheap GPU like a 7200GS or something, and then upgrading the GPU in another month or two. :)

That way I wouldn't have to give up on my 1.5TB HDD idea :)
Oh and even the cheapest GPU available today will probably draw circles around my current 64mb Geforce 4 MX440 :o :p
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Ok go Quad then, nothing wrong with a quad.

Sli allows you to add 2 of the same graphics card on the same Mobo....So if you got a 8800gt, you could at a later stage add another 8800gt and have essentially double the power. That is my plan.

With regard to buying a cheap Gpu - If you are not a big gamer and don't plan on buying some of the latest games when you get your upgrade then go for a cheaper card, else don't waste your time....If you are going to go balls to the wall with games, don't mess about with cheap cards...Go Big or Go Home :)

Edit: In that case do yourself a favor and forget about space (1.5 TB drives) and get a 250 Gig and spend the rest on a NICE GPU...TRUST ME!! or not....
 
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yeah it all depends on what games bru ..... list what you currently play and what you want to play .... that gives an idea of what card is best for you, savvy :D
 
Grimspoon said:
Sli allows you to add 2 of the same graphics card on the same Mobo....So if you got a 8800gt, you could at a later stage add another 8800gt and have essentially double the power. That is my plan.
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You mean it allows two GPUs to combine their power but still only output to one display?
I suppose the GPU needs to support the feature as well?

Grimspoon said:
With regard to buying a cheap Gpu - If you are not a big gamer and don't plan on buying some of the latest games when you get your upgrade then go for a cheaper card, else don't waste your time....If you are going to go balls to the wall with games, don't mess about with cheap cards...Go Big or Go Home :)
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Well, the most recent game that I own is Battlefield 2, I bought it about a year ago but I've never played it, due to the fact that my current system is too rubbish and on top of that I was trying to run it via wine (i.e., under Linux) :o

Mephisto_Helix said:
yeah it all depends on what games bru ..... list what you currently play and what you want to play .... that gives an idea of what card is best for you, savvy :D
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The single "game" I play the most would probably be FlightGear flight simulator and even my current GPU manages (albeit with a humble resolution and no fancy stuff) :)

I played Medal of Honour Allied Assualt (plus the two expansions) recently.
I also played Call of Duty (the first one) a while back.
All under Linux for what it's worth :p :D
 
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