Upgrade Advice?

[ThetaOrionis01]

Well, the laptop idea has been shelved, and I'm now looking for upgrades to my computer instead.

 

It's been a couple of years since I looked into components, though, so I'd appreciate some advice on what to look for. Budget's flexible, but I don't want to spend more than I have to.

 

Main components I'm looking for advice on are CPU (prefer AMD to Intel), motherboard (I've been quite happy with the current Gigabyte one, so would prefer to stick with that manufacturer, unless they've really gone downhill recently), graphics card (out of principle I don't want to buy another card manufactured by Asus - bad experience with their meaningless warranty) and a case with good airflow and ideally a dustfilter.

 

There's a good chance I might replace the whole system (at least my son hopes I will, so he can get my current pc ;D ) and just keep the 'storage' drive out of my current computer - so some advice on memory would be good, too :)

 

I'm not looking for something top of the range, but something that's a step up from my current system (AMD Athlon XP 2600, Radeon 9600 pro, 1gig RAM) but will be upgradeable in the future.

[Switch]

Well, I can't advise you on cases, as I've yet to find a decent supplier. Ebuyer has a bunch of those ugly shuttle things. I usually go for barebones as opposed to just cases anyway (assembling motherboards is a bit beyond me :P). For the motherboard though making sure it has a PCI-E slot and 4 RAM slots would be a good idea.

 

As for CPU, the AMD 64 3000+ has served me pretty well. It's not top of the range by a long chalk but it still seems to pack a punch. I went from an AMD Athlon XP 2600+ to it and the difference was noticeable.

 

Graphics card... you tend to go for ATIs don't you? If you intend to continue with that, that PCI-E slot is a must, as just about all their decent cards don't support AGP (which is why I'm still stuck with a GeForce). Overclockers.com seem to offer good quality cards, but they might be a bit pricey. I got my GeForce 7800GS from there, and thus far it runs like a dream. It's XFX manufactured and they've tweaked it and fitted their own fan, which keeps it below 50 degrees C even when playing Oblivion near max.

 

You can pick up 512MB sticks of RAM for around £20-30 now. Four of those would give you quite a significant boost. There are 1GB sticks now too, but they're more like £50-60, and really 4GB of RAM isn't necessary at all.

 

That's about all the advice I can think of off hand, hope it's been at least a little bit helpful. :P

[Dark0ne]

Overclockers do handy bundles so you know what you're getting is compatible. Throw in a new GFX card and there's your new PC!

 

LINKY!

 

EDIT: RE: Gigabyte (or Gigash*te as some people refer to them!) I'd really move onto Abit who are commonly recognised as the gaming optimised mobo developers.

[Stampede]

PFEH! Graphics cards, gigabytes...APPLESAUCE!!!!

 

You need something that will go the extra mile.

 

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/e/ef/AcornBBCMicroImage.jpg/180px-AcornBBCMicroImage.jpg

 

Now that's a computer for REAL MEN and beer swilling dames. You could probably throw it down the stairs and still play manic miner 5 minutes later. The mark of a true computer.

 

She has a fat 32k of ram and is clocked at 4mHz to take the edge off.

 

Thank me later.

[ThetaOrionis01]

But I don't like beer....

[Mercbird]

Nice doorstop Stampede! Where on earth did you find that pic?

 

I can only tell you one thing Theta, my brothers ATI Radeon X800 XT, Platinum Edition runs Oblivion perfectly with every setting at the maximum. He runs it off a pent 4, 2.6 GHz with 1G ram.

 

I start crying and have to leave the room when he plays.