Need a system overhaul

[Jeradln82]

Hello everyone, well its been a very long time since I've been on the boards here and I can say I do miss it. I am here today because I really need to upgrade my current system. I still play games such as Battlefield 2142 and I would like to purchase Call of Duty 4, however my system is definetly showing its age. I've been so out of touch I don't even know where to start and what the latest and greatest is anymore. I'm really looking to reuse as much of my current stuff as possible and get a nice performing system. My system specs are in my sig, however I don't think I updated I have a 600W Seasonic PSU and running WinXP Pro. I'd like to update my Motherboard, CPU, GFX card, and have a total of 2gig RAM. I just need some suggestions if anyone could, I'm looking to stay under $1500 if possible.

Thanks Ya'll

[Katreat]

Do you have a brand preference, AMD or INTEL?

Kat

[Jeradln82]

I used to be all AMD, but I'm pretty much open anymore. I just realized RAM isn't as expensive as it used to be, I wouldn't mind an example of a $1000 budget as well at a $1500 budget if possible.

Thanks!

[Jeradln82]

Well I looked into some Intel and AMD CPUs, however I'm not sure what would be best. I did find one in my price range the Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 Wolfdale 3.0GHz LGA 775 65W Dual-Core Processor Model BX80570E8400 - Retail. I also don't know what motherboards and chipsets are best, I do like the Asus brand.

As for Video cards, I've always been partial to ATI chipsets but I am open to Nvidia chipsets. I'm not looking to the best highest end card but maybe the mid/upper end range. I am still using a CRT monitor but I beleive it is still a very nice monitor and I see no reason to get rid of it just yet.

I think I can keep my HD at this time, I don't know If I would really need a SATA HD at this time. I'd like to have a 10,000RPM SATA but its not a high priority.

I currently have 1gig of ram which is two sticks of DDR400 RAM that If I can reuse would be great. I can just add another 1-2gig by purchasing a 1gig stick or 2 1gig sticks depending on which route would be more beneficial.

I would keep my existing PCI Sound Card, PSU, optical drives, and tower.

Any input would be greatly appreciated.

Thank You

[Katreat]

OK, here is a nice basic Intel mid-high gaming build:

CPU - C2D E8400
MB - ASUS P5K-E
PSU – Corsair 550
RAM – Corsair XMS 4GB (2x2GB Kit) DDR2 800MHz
Video Card – GeForce 8800 GT
HD - Seagate 7200.11 500 GB SATA II
Optical Drive - Lite-On DVD Burner SATA Retail (free software with retail)
Sound Card - Try the on-board sound first.
OS – Vista 32 Home Premium or XP
Case - Your choice. Try to get one without a power supply.

If you really want to go with ATI GPU I would recommend the 3870 toxic by sapphire. It is very close in performance to the 8800 GT and all around a nice card.

The ram will have to be replace. The E8400 is a 1333 FSB processor so you really want you ram to be a step up from the processor speed. This site generally recommends 800.

I tend to recommend that people change out IDE HD and burners for SATA if buildiing new. All of the newer boards have stopped supporting IDE natively so support is by a 3rd party controller. It usually works but there have been some issues at times you read about. So if it fits in the budget consider picking up SATA, if the budget wont handle it then give the IDE a try and hopefully everything will work out.

As for 10,000 rpm it is really not needed. The new 32 mb cache 7200 drives are very fast and for most the extra cost and small size of a raptor is just not a good investment.

Your existing tower should work fine but you might need to change PSU, dont see it listed in your sig. If you have a quality ATX 2.0 PSU of 500w or more then you can probably re-use.

[Jeradln82]

Here is the PSU that I currently have, a Seasonic 600W unit http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817151030

I like the price on that build, I thank you for taking the time to get the stuff together

I do have one question, does that mobo and cpu combo OC well at all? Another thing is I guess I can try the onboard sound, would it really be better than my Audigy, I know my sound card is old and all. I did find the newer Audigy PCI-Express version but I don't know if it would make much difference.

The games I play are BF2142 (which lags b/c my system bottlenecks) and I want the latest games such as COD4. I'm hoping this system would be able to hang for a couple years playing these games and future DirectX10 games fairly well at high settings.

[Katreat]

I dont personally OC at all anymore but from what has been posted the E8400 and Asus P5K is a great OC combination. If you really want to push it though you would probably have to invest in an aftermarket CPU cooler.

Your PSU should be fine, Seasonic is an excellent unit and the size is about right for giving you a bit of headroom for a future video card upgrade.

The on-board sound is very nice for on-board sound, much better then what was provided on older boards. The P5K-E even has a higher end sound chip than other P5Ks. As to how it rates with your exisitng sound card I really cant say, generally sound cards are better than on-board, the gap has just closed quite a bit.

For gaming I doubt the CPU will ever be a bottleneck in the life of the computer. The 8800 GT and 3870 toxic are two cards that today can play most games very well. You probably cant max out video setting on Crysis but you would still be playing with them very high. Price wise those cards sit in the sweet spot. There are better cards out there but you will pay alot for only a little more performance. If you budget will allow both the 8800 GTS 512 and the new 9800 GTX 512 would be nice upgrades to max gaming performance, but as stated, they will add quite a bit of cost for only minor gains.

Kat