Major Dilemma!

[aj_march]

Ok people, here's my problem

I have just payed off the last of the money I owe my parents for my computer, and in 3 weeks I will be receiving a £500 paycheque.

My current system is:

2.8 GHz Prescott P4
1GB PC3200 RAM
160GB SATA HDD
128mb Asus ATi Radeon 9600XT

All in a Shuttle XPC. I also received for Christmas a Digimate L-1715 monitor, which my Dad says he will buy off me for full price if I didn't want it.

So what do I do with some of the money??

I was thinking of...

1) Upgrade my 2.8 processor to a 3.2

2) Take back my monitor and get a 19" Liyama E481S monitor (in black to suit rest of kit )

3) Ditto but 17" E431S

or 4) Sell on Shuttle case and get the new quiet one (they are damned noisy )

Any ideas what else I could do??

Thanks

[StormPC]

Asking that question is kinda like asking us if you should shoot yourself or go bowling. Only you can decide what is valuable to you. How can we know whether you should get a 17" or 19"? 2.8 or 3.2 GHz? And how important is quiet to you? More important than a good monitor or 400MHz?

You are basically asking us to determine what's valuable to you. The only honest answer is that we can't.

Ask if you should get this hard drive or that, this motherboard or that, etc...these are things that are not so subjective because some are clearly better than others. Ask if you should buy a Volkswagon Beetle or a Hummer? Can't help you there.

[aj_march]

Hmmm, basically I want a really decent gaming comp, what would you do in my situation?

[StormPC]

Well you should really be running an A64. Since you are not looking to change the best I can tell you is get a monitor you are happy with and get a better videocard. If your power supply will handle it I'd go for an nVidia 6800GT. I love the ATi cards for benching and they're ok for games, but the nVidia kicks butt in games.

If you are not happy with your current rig you should sell the whole thing and get yourself a Winchester based A64 rig. Best bang for the buck for the moment!