what performance do i NEED.

[getagrip]

Ive been reading the forum all day, as soon it will be time for me to build my next pc. I have got loads of good advice and read most of the $500-$800 threads as my budget will be somewhere around here.

My current setup is a pc i built six years ago now. It has amd 64 3700 processor, 2g ddr2 ram, msi k8n plat mobo and geforce 6600gt.

As you can probably tell from the graphics card i haven't been playing games in a while and i would like to start again.

My query is that other than its inability to play games my pc still handles everything else just great. Multiple windows, programs, windows 7 os etc... Because of this i am wondering what kind of processing power i need.

In my first parts list i had chosen the phenom x4 but now im thinking that could be some serious overkill. If i spend $150-$200 on a graphics card/pair of cards what sort of cpu is needed. Can i get by on dual core or will x3 or even x4 give me better gaming results. If theres anything i learnt last time it is that sometimes you can spend a lot of money with very little return.

[glc]

other than its inability to play games my pc still handles everything else just great.

Why don't you just do a video card upgrade with your present computer? $200 to $250 will get you a very nice card such as a Radeon 5830. A ram upgrade to 4gb would help too. When you DO build a new one later, the 5830 could be reused - and you could even get another one and Crossfire them if needed.

[getagrip]

Not something i had thought about, i just figured after 6 years the socket 939 would be too obsolete to bother adding extra's to. Like another 2gig of ddr2 would be good but not transferable. The graphics card would be however so maybe i'll get one and see how it runs in my current setup. May give me some clues a to weather i need more power or not.

[glc]

Gaming is all in the video card, so I think you can get some more mileage out of that system.

I show that board takes DDR, not DDR2. Another 2 gigs will cost you about 75 bucks.

[getagrip]

yeah your right it is ddr. Even older than i remembered lol.