Advice on upgrading needed

[greenclaws]

Hi everyone,

My sister wants to upgrade her PC and has a budget of about £500. It is to be for general use as well as amateur music recording.

Is now the right time for upgrading? I know no time is the right time for upgrading, but is there some leap or price drop coming soon?

She currently has a P4 system which can't be upgraded any more due to the slots it uses. We're looking at a main 4 components only upgrade though, the motherboard, ram, cpu and graphics card. Due to the cpu and ram intensive nature of music recording when you start adding samples and effects, the main emphasis will be on these points. We're considering a dual or quad core cpu, however quad might be overkill due to no programs really using it. However this upgrade will have to last 3 or 4 years. E67500 might be the best compromise between speed, price and redundancy, a quad could be put in when they get faster, cheaper and more supported?

Can anybody recommend a combination of components? A good motherboard at least would be a great start..

Thanks

[staffsMike]

If you're planning on doing just those 4 components we'll need to know what psu she is already running.

£500 is plenty to do a whole system.

Off the top of my head.

Q6600 for £175
abit IP-35 for £85
2gb of Ram £60
8800GTS 320mb for £170

With those rough prices you're at £490

If this isn't for gaming which you havnt mentioned then around £60 for 8500GT should be fine..so more like £380 overall.
that way you could get a corsair 520HX PSU to power this new beast nicely and a nice new HSF like the scyhte ninja so it's quiet.

[greenclaws]

Thanks for the quick response!
300W. If it needs replacing, it would need to be a quiet PSU. Quietness is an issue.

[staffsMike]

300w sounds a little tight.

as above the corsair 520w HX modular is essentially inaudiable.

You can get a passive 8500GT, i use this one

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Produ...oductID=615614

[shadowmaster]

If quietness is an issue, then the Antec Sonata III ( also comes with A 500 Earthwatts PSU) might be a good option. Looking at the reviews the Antec Sonata III case along with the earthwatts psu are apparently very quiet. You can get it for about £70, which is a reasonable deal.

[greenclaws]

Is there a reliable place to get the Scythe Ninja apart from Overclockers? Their prices and postage are extortionate.

Thank you for the recommendations but what is the reasoning behind getting a quad core? Will it actually get used?

Shadowmaster, that is a good idea and a good deal but I believe she has a Sonata 1 already, it might be a waste to get an even bigger case with notihng to do iwth the Sonata 1.

[staffsMike]

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Produ...oductID=296802

you're eligable for free delivery from scan as you have more than 25 posts..

Check the scan forum for how to sort it out.

I'd get everything from there to be honest.

[greenclaws]

Ahh thanks, it doesn't show up at ascan if you look at the list of intel CPU coolers. As for the quad core, why are you recommending that?

[staffsMike]

because it's a fantastic processor. Make sure you go the G0 stepping one and then you can easily overclock to 3.0 / 3.2GHz with the ninja if you feel the need.

More and more programs are using all the cores, especially professional software such as music editing software i'm sure.

You Could get the E6750 and probably not notice the difference right now but i'd take the q6600 everytime. I've built one system with one and it was so smooth and fast. I want one now.

[godsdog]

I went shopping for some similar kit today.

Scythe at ebuyer:
http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/searc...he&x=653&y=136

Scythe at Microdirect:
http://www.microdirect.co.uk/product...s=13&se=scythe

8600 graphic card + passive cooling @ ebuyer:
http://www.ebuyer.com/UK/product/126985

8600 graphic card + passive cooling @ Scan
http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Produ...oductID=661334

[greenclaws]

Thank you both.

godsdog, how would the 8600 compare to an ATI X1950 Pro? The system will be used for some gaming, at the native resolution of 1440x900 with games such as Bioshock and games coming out in the future. It would be a stopgap until something better came out (DX10) at a similar price range (<= &#163;100) in a couple of years.

[godsdog]

Sorry greenclaws, you're asking the wrong person, my last long term encounter with an ATI card was with the 9000 AGP card - so that's not classed as relevant. ...Others will be more qualified to opine on that one.

I'm not sure just how long either of those cards will last as a stopgap, not long I wouldn't have thought. The people using the MSI card for similar stuff you mentioned are all reasonably satisfied with it's performance short term. It's got good overclocking mileage.

I bought the gigabyte card for a non gaming pensioner to "grow" into (he's getting tempted with games).

[gt81]

Thank you both.

godsdog, how would the 8600 compare to an ATI X1950 Pro? The system will be used for some gaming, at the native resolution of 1440x900 with games such as Bioshock and games coming out in the future. It would be a stopgap until something better came out (DX10) at a similar price range (<= &#163;100) in a couple of years.

I'd say you'd be a lot better off with an X1950 Pro that the 8600, from the benchmarks I've seen, so long as DX10 isn't an immediate issue (which is shouldn't be, as there aren't any DX10 specific games worth getting atm).

If you can stretch to an 8800GTS, the 320mb version is reasonably good value and should cope with everything with ease at that resolution, and last the few years you plan to keep the system.

[staffsMike]

yeah if you want a stop gap card the x1950pro is the best but.. i don't know how noisey it is..

[greenclaws]

We could always fit a cooler to it. Only thing stopping us ordering now is that Scan have no Saphire x1950 pros in stock "Awaiting ETA from Manufacturer". Is it worth paying the extra tenner for 512mb? Not that that's in stock either.

[staffsMike]

Not at your resolution you might as well stick with the 256mb.

I think you get free delivery above &#163;50 on ebuyer..can't remember