Upgrade advice

[Matt_2000_17]

I'm looking to upgrade my system over the next 2-3 months, I'd appreciate any suggestions on what you think would be worth upgrading from my current setup. I enjoy gaming. I am mainly looking at graphics, CPU, hard drive and possibly the motherboard but if you think something else could do with an upgrade don't hesitate to mention it. I'd have about £150 max to spend on each component. I can go higher but want to limit myself for financial reasons. You can see my current system setup at the side.

Many thanks in advance.

[staffsMike]

Spend it all on an ATi HD4850 and maybe a hard drive since you probably need that and then overclock a bit Nehalem is out soon, might as well wait for that to be released and drop in price a bit.

[Matt_2000_17]

Thanks. Looked at that one, also looked at the HD4870 aswell. Also I've got £150 to spend on each other component (CPU, HDD and motherboard), any suggestions?

[staffsMike]

Ohhh I thought you meant as a whole.

Well intel Q6600 ~£125 + scythe ninja/mine ~£25, Asus P5Q pro ~£85, 640GB Western digital AAKS ~£60 would be my choices

Q6600 overclocks very well under those coolers, the motherboard is decent enough and more than capable of the necessary overclocks and the drive is very fast and very quiet

[kr00t0n]

I would strongly recommend getting a new PSU, Hiper Type-R's have a dodgy track record.

Plump out for a nice Corsair/Enermax/Seasonic instead

[Zhaoman]

unless you play crysis or supreme commander, i'd suggest an e8400 instead of a q6600, uses less energy, runs way cooler and = more overclocking headroom!

750Gb samsung F1 - £60 and arguably the fastest drive on the market today, what a bargain: snapping up 2 would give u speed and storage!

the new p45 chipset should provide good future proofing, although not as overclockable as the old p35, any mobo over £100 should provide more features than you'll ever need.

as for graphics, why not get a brand new 4850 or 4870 to go with ur new crossfire enabled p45; they scale incredibly well in crossfire as well so ur basically sorted for the next few years!

[Noxvayl]

I'd go for an E8400(dual core is more than adequate for what you need, only CAD and serious multi-task applications require Quads which doesn't include games yet), Gigabyte EP53-DS3R motherboard, Seagate WD or Samsung 320Gb HDD(whichever you prefer all pretty similar tbh), Gigabyte HD4850 and an Enermax MODU82+ 525W PSU. That should all come to around £395 from Scan

Then if you like to overclock just get a cooler like the Scythe Mine for £23 and go for it

[Matt_2000_17]

This is what i've decided on getting

Sapphire Radeon HD4870 512Mb GDDR5
Q6600
Coolermaster TX2 and appropriate thermal compound

What do you think? Is the fan ok? I doubt i'll be overclocking so thought that fan should be ok. One concern I have is that my mobo is PCI-E 1.0a compliant, will this impact on perforamce with the HD4870? I'll update my mobo next month or would it be worth waiting for the Nehalem CPUs to arrive?

Many thanks.

[staffsMike]

As long as the PCI-E lane is full size then it should work you might just not get all of the performance from the card until you upgrade.

If you have the extra money the schyte mine is very quiet and will keep the Q6600 nice and cool. I seem to remember the TX2 being quite a noisey cooler.

[Matt_2000_17]

As long as the PCI-E lane is full size then it should work you might just not get all of the performance from the card until you upgrade.

If you have the extra money the schyte mine is very quiet and will keep the Q6600 nice and cool. I seem to remember the TX2 being quite a noisey cooler.

I'll see how much I get paid next Friday and then see if I can afford the schyte. My mobo has the full 16x with the single card. Thanks.

[staffsMike]

I'll see how much I get paid next Friday and then see if I can afford the schyte. My mobo has the full 16x with the single card. Thanks.

Sorry yeah, I miss read, no you don't need PCI-E 2.0 to run these cards

[Matt_2000_17]

Thats good to hear

[Matt_2000_17]

I'm back looking to upgrade my motherboard tomorrow so can anyone recommend me a good S775 motherboard to go with the Q6600 i'm getting aswell? My budget is around £130.

Many thanks

[Noxvayl]

I'm back looking to upgrade my motherboard tomorrow so can anyone recommend me a good S775 motherboard to go with the Q6600 i'm getting aswell? My budget is around £130.

Many thanks

Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS4

[shrek101]

I been thinking of getting the Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS4 board

Along with Sapphire HD 4850, Antec Sonata III 500 Case with 500Watt PSU case, 4gb Corsair ram, but I am torn between Quad and dual core 2. Also Samsung f1 spinright HD (1TB),Pioneer DVR-215DB DVDR

[Noxvayl]

I been thinking of getting the Gigabyte GA-EP35-DS4 board

Along with Sapphire HD 4850, Antec Sonata III 500 Case with 500Watt PSU case, 4gb Corsair ram, but I am torn between Quad and dual core 2. Also Samsung f1 spinright HD (1TB),Pioneer DVR-215DB DVDR

Get the quad with that system... future games will be making use of 4 cores so it will be better than a dual core system in the long run.

Everything else you mentioned are good quality components