PC Upgrade Options

[drthomaspopple]

Choices, choices!!

My trusty Athlon XP3200 CPU has recently failed and have to consider a
low/mid budget upgrade to my system.

So, main choices are:

1 - do I look to purchase a direct replacement CPU on eBay for and
rebuild the same PC [cost ~£55]
2 - do I invest in a E2160 and a Asrock board so I can continue to use
my 1.5Gb of DDR and my 6800GT AGP card [cost ~£95]
3 - do I invest in a E2160 and another board, buying a PCI-E Radeon
HD2600XT and 1Gb of new DDR2 [cost ~£190]

I'll be running XP Pro off IDE drives.

I'd welcome the advice of the forum on price/performance and any other
options I should be considering.

Thanks

 

[Dave]

Choices, choices!!

My trusty Athlon XP3200 CPU has recently failed and have to consider a
low/mid budget upgrade to my system.

So, main choices are:

1 - do I look to purchase a direct replacement CPU on eBay for and
rebuild the same PC [cost ~£55]
2 - do I invest in a E2160 and a Asrock board so I can continue to use
my 1.5Gb of DDR and my 6800GT AGP card [cost ~£95]
3 - do I invest in a E2160 and another board, buying a PCI-E Radeon
HD2600XT and 1Gb of new DDR2 [cost ~£190]

I'll be running XP Pro off IDE drives.

I'd welcome the advice of the forum on price/performance and any other
options I should be considering.

Thanks

(my reply)

I'd advise you to go with number 4. Get a micro-ATX board with built-in
video and sound and LAN, plus an open X16 PCI-Express expansion slot. Put
2GB of RAM in it. (2 X 1GB).

That way, you can spend the money you might have spent on the video card to
get a little more RAM and a faster CPU. When you save up a little more
cash, pop in a decent video card.

Something else to be aware of though... you'll need a new power supply ALSO,
making number 4 a better choice.

It's rarely as easy as replacing the mainboard and CPU and video card.
People forget that the new components are more power hungry. And any power
supply older than a couple years should be replaced anyway, during a major
upgrade. -Dave

 

[DonC]

Choices, choices!!

My trusty Athlon XP3200 CPU has recently failed and have to consider a
low/mid budget upgrade to my system.

So, main choices are:

1 - do I look to purchase a direct replacement CPU on eBay for and
rebuild the same PC [cost ~£55]
2 - do I invest in a E2160 and a Asrock board so I can continue to use
my 1.5Gb of DDR and my 6800GT AGP card [cost ~£95]
3 - do I invest in a E2160 and another board, buying a PCI-E Radeon
HD2600XT and 1Gb of new DDR2 [cost ~£190]

I'll be running XP Pro off IDE drives.

I'd welcome the advice of the forum on price/performance and any other
options I should be considering.

Thanks

I second Dave's recommendation to go with option #4

I did just that in moving from an Athlon XP3000+ to more current technology.

I bought an ASUS M2NPV-VM MB for $96US shipped. It has built-in video and
sound. Best of all it supports 4 PATA (IDE) and 4 SATA drives so I wasn't
forced to ditch my existing drives

I purchased 2GB (2x1G) Corsair memory for $47US after a $40 rebate.
Picked up a 600W Cooler Master PS for $8US after a $50US rebate.

At Newegg boxed CPUs run from $60 for an Athlon 64 4000+ 2.1GHz to $170 for
6400+ 3.2Ghz. I choose a 4600+ 2.4Ghz for $76. I recommend picking a CPU
running an even multiple of .4Ghz to enable running your memory at a full
800Mhz. (2.0, 2.4, 2.8 or 3.2)

At this point I could have stopped for a total cost of $211 to $227. I
could have used my 4 IDE drives and the integrated video was more than
adequate for a non-power gamer.
===============================
But the performance enhancement realized by switching to SATA 3.0Gb/s drives
was too enticing. So I purchased an 80GB and 250GB for a total of $116. It
turned out to be well worth the money! I still have one 200GB PATA drive
installed crammed with my data which makes it easier to transfer a file I
forgot. Guess I could have just replaced the system drive for $43 keeping
my minimum cost at $270.

So far $270 to $343US depending on how far you want to migrate to SATA.
================================
Not willing to stop there I picked up a Diamond Viper radeon X1650PRO 512MB
PCI Express x16 for $40US shipped after rebate.

$383 bottom line for the full project.