540$ System Budget; what can make the cut? =D

[Wariogiant]

Ok I have around 540-545 bucks to spend on a new comp system. I currently have an AMD Athlon Xp 2400+ Barton, an Asus A7V333 Mobo, and 512mb of Crucial Ram.

I was thinking of buying an AMD Athlon 64 3000+ Venice, 1gb of Corsair ValueSelect, an MSI K8N Neo4-F mobo, an Antec Sonata II case, and a Leadtek PX6600TD-256 Geforce 6600 256MB. Good choices? Or anything I might want to concentrate more on? You decide.

 

[mwmorph]

what will be it's main use?

 

[Wariogiant]

Gaming.

 

[mwmorph]

looks good. is worthless for gaming now. get a 6600gt at least.
256mb is even more worthless on a 6600 since the architecture(8pp/3vs, 128bit memory bandwith, low clocks) cant take advantage of it.

 

[t3h l337 n3wb]

Yeah, if you're going to get a 6600, try an X700 Pro instead. It performs like a Radeon 9800 Pro. But I agree with mwmorph, the 6600GT is an incredible card for a great price.

 

[KoolDrew]

Why not just get another crucial stick for a total of 1Gb and use it in your new system? Then with the saved money you can buy a better video card.

 

[Wariogiant]

Well my new motherboard wont support the ram; at least I dont think. It's PC2700 and the corsair is 3200.

 

[unfalliblekrutch]

you should be ok mixing ram, it will just clock all sticks to the lowest speed

 

[UptheMiddle]

Can you use your current case and apply that money towards a better video card? Or use those extra bucks to buy some newer games (like BF2!)

Either way, you're gonna see a large improvement in your games. Have fun!!!

 

[MrCodeDude]

Get the X800 GT.