Finally Upgrading

DarkShadow · Post by **DarkShadow** » Fri Feb 08, 2008 10:42 am

My current system Asus A7V333, Athlon XP 2400+, Micron 512meg PC2700, Nvidia Geforce 6600 256meg,
Maxtor 40 gig, 2 Western digital 80 gig 8 Meg in raid 0, Optiarc DVD RW, Win XP Pro, Linksys WRT54G Router and a
MGE Vigor 450 Blue PSU.

I am looking to upgrade not too expensive but get a good leap in performance. This is what I have come up with so far if you have any better ideas let me know .

ABIT IP35 Pro LGA 775 Intel P35 ATX Intel Motherboard
http://www.newegg.com/product/product.a ... 6813127030

XFX PVT84GUDF3 GeForce 8600GTS 256MB 128-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card - Retail
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814150228

Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 Conroe 2.66GHz 4M shared L2 Cache LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor
http://www.newegg.com/product/product.a ... 6819115029

Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3320620AS (Perpendicular Recording Technology) 320GB 7200 RPM 16MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive
http://www.newegg.com/product/product.a ... 6822148140

CORSAIR XMS2 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory – Retail
http://www.newegg.com/product/product.a ... 6820145589

Currently out of stock at newegg.com so
https://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductD ... e=85025-30

Any help is appreciated.

Testiculese · Post by **Testiculese** » Fri Feb 08, 2008 12:09 pm

I'd say drop the HD specs a little and get a much, much better vidcard.

Krom · Post by **Krom** » Fri Feb 08, 2008 1:42 pm

Nah, the hard drive is fine, you won't do much cheaper than a 320 GB drive anyway, and the 7200.10 series is very nice (I have that exact drive in my system). But I would agree on the video card, scraping together enough to get an 8800 GT would make several worlds of difference in the final machines price/performance.

I currently have one of these: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814150272 in my system and I am extremely satisfied with it, best price/performance and overall value I have ever had in a video card.

Everything else looks good.

Testiculese · Post by **Testiculese** » Fri Feb 08, 2008 1:52 pm

I didn't look at the drive price, never mind. I have almost the same card (mine's evga) and it's most worthy. COD4 @ 1920x1080 full detail is a scream!

DarkShadow · Post by **DarkShadow** » Fri Feb 08, 2008 2:15 pm

I would love to but that puts it way out of my price range.

I need to keep it to around $700 and I don't play much in the way of new games anyway.

Grendel · Post by **Grendel** » Fri Feb 08, 2008 3:03 pm

Get an E8400.

Edit: ack, they seem to be in low supply, hence overpriced

JMEaT · Post by **JMEaT** » Fri Feb 08, 2008 4:37 pm

I have that exact hard drive. It's quiet and fast.

DarkShadow · Post by **DarkShadow** » Sat Feb 09, 2008 11:57 pm

One minor change from:

EVGA 256-P2-N751-TR GeForce 8600GT 256MB 128-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 SLI Supported Video Card
http://www.newegg.com/product/product.a ... 6814130085

to:

XFX PVT84GUDF3 GeForce 8600GTS 256MB 128-bit GDDR3 PCI Express x16 HDCP Ready SLI Supported Video Card - Retail
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6814150228

for the faster speed and better warranty.

DarkShadow · Post by **DarkShadow** » Thu Feb 14, 2008 11:56 pm

Got the parts in this afternoon. Doing all my backup stuff from this computer since I will be splitting the 2 drives that are in raid 0 back to single drives for when I get a case and power supply to put this one back together for my kids.
Now I just have to wait till tomorrow for a friend who wants to learn how to put one together. That why I saved my backup stuff for tonight. It keeps away the temptation of building it now.

here are the new goodies

http://www.newegg.com/product/product.a ... 6813127030

did know what this was right away till i looked close enough to see the little tube inside.

http://www.newegg.com/product/product.a ... 6835100007

http://www.newegg.com/product/product.a ... 6822148140

http://www.newegg.com/product/product.a ... 6820145034
Got this one since newegg and zipzoomfly were out of the one listed in the first post.

http://www.newegg.com/product/product.a ... 6814150228
http://www.newegg.com/product/product.a ... 6819115029

http://www.newegg.com/product/product.a ... 6820145157
Picked this up for my wifes Acer Aspire 3680 laptop. 512 meg wasn't enough to run Vista on it very well.

DarkShadow · Post by **DarkShadow** » Fri Feb 15, 2008 7:17 pm

Up and running and this is so much faster than my old one it is amazing. Of coarse I said that about my last computer after upgrading also. Thanks for the help.

AceCombat · Post by **AceCombat** » Sat Feb 16, 2008 1:41 pm

make sure to post the guts installed in the workstations thread

DarkShadow · Post by **DarkShadow** » Sat Feb 16, 2008 6:03 pm

I was going to wait to get the camera back to do that but I took a pic with my cell phone for now.

Krom · Post by **Krom** » Sun Feb 24, 2008 11:12 pm

You might be kicking yourself right about now since the 9600 GT cards just came out... Either your card is in for a big price drop, or you could have grabbed one of the much higher performing cards for not much more cost. These cards hit as hard as a 256 MB 8800 GT (if only because they have 512 MB standard).

DarkShadow · Post by **DarkShadow** » Mon Feb 25, 2008 5:19 pm

No it doesn't bother me since the week I ordered it would be the only week I could since I had to do it before my wife found something else we should spend the money on.