Upgrade or replace?

My mates got an 'old' computer, which he wants to upgrade to play 'spore' and other newish games. Selling the parts on ebay to recoupe some cost.

The Specs are:
- Althon XP 2100+
- Geforce4 MX440
- 1*256mb ram
With a 60gb HDD, CD-RW/DVD combo drive, and a 250watt psu, all in a really awfull case.

So yeah, he's looking to upgrade the ram, becuase its low, but then also the CPU and Graphics card, which will properbly force a Mobo change. And the stick a larger HDD in it.

I said that he should just just sell the PC, and build a new one, seeing as all he's going to be left with at the end is a new pc, in a old box!
- What are your thoughts, and what sort of specs would he be looking at being about to afford. Budget of about £300/400ish


Daniel

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Originally Posted by oshta

Budget of about £300/400ish

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Bloody hell! Now that's a challenge. On that budget you'll be building a system entirely with sub £100 parts, which imho will have a disappointing outcome. I'd recommend saving up a bit longer until you have at least double the budget.

but if you really must;
AMD Athlon 64 3000+ Venice (Socket 939) - Retail = £45.81 (inc VAT)
Abit NF95 GeForce 6100 Micro ATX (Socket 939) PCI-Express = £46.99
Crucial 1GB DDR PC3200 CAS3.0 Dual Channel Kit (2x512MB) = £82.24
Connect3D ATI Radeon X1900 XT 256MB = £144.99
Antec NSK4400 Mini Tower Case - 380W SmartPower PSU = £50.51
Pioneer DVR-111BK 16x16 DVD±RW = £24.66
120 Gb Western Digital WD1200JS Caviar = £37.59

total = £432.79

If you shop around a bit (cos I didn't) you may be able to knock a bit off that total.

Anybody else want to add/change owt then feel free :)

It would be remiss of me not to point out these deals:
DFI Lanparty Skt 939 motherboard £29.
Corsair VS (always a good choice) 2 X 512mb sticks £75.
Occasionally you can find silly deals on Opterons for £50 odd, but can't find any right now.

Edit: Done some more checking, still cant get any better processors for the money. Other than that Weetabix has suggested a very nice, reasonable, and quiet system that will game nicely. I'd personally add £13 for an Arctic CPU cooler and maybe you can also shed a few quid or upgrade with an OEM CPU, (eg this for £55) but again it's about how important that budget is.
It might be easy to simply reuse the current hard drive, but you may also be surprised how much a difference a modern hard drive can make in terms of speed to one from 4 to 5 years ago. The GB extra size is a bonus.

Start looking in the classifieds, should be able to upgrade really well with some good 2nd hand purchases.

Weetabix makes a good point, he could spend up to £400 on the parts he suggested, but at the end of the day its an AMD64 Venice 3000+ which isnt really going to set the world alight.

He's best of getting hold of a couple of hundred quid more and going all out on an Intel dual core rig

alternatively, he could always go down the shuttle route

Quote:

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Originally Posted by MSIC

It would be remiss of me not to point out these deals:
DFI Lanparty Skt 939 motherboard £29.
Corsair VS (always a good choice) 2 X 512mb sticks £75.

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Hoooooly smokes, missed the DFI there! That's a cracking price. Although I would think twice about paring it with Corsair RAM as the two really don't mix too well. My DFI board positively refuses to boot with my Corsair in slots 1+3 (have a look at DFIstreet). However, with the DFI's overclocking features, you'll be able to drain the absolute max out of a budget chip. An excellent choice of M/board for the gamer on a budget. Well spotted that man :)

Erm from Standard retail i got this - mix and match with offers i suppose. This is based on AM2 as well which gives upgrade potential for the future. I think the reduced graphics but dual core cpu is worth it for overall use tbh

Code:

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1Gb (2X512Mb) Corsair Value Select, DDR2 PC5300        71.12
256Mb Leadtek 7600GT        99.51
Antec SLK1650BUK 350W PSU        47.48
Asrock ALiveNF4G-DVI, NF410        42.99
250 Gb Samsung SP2504C SpinPoint P120        50.36
NEC ND-5170A-0B Black x18 DVD±RW Dual Layer        20.1
AMD AM2 Athlon 64 3800+        105.74

        437.3

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