Buying advice for long-term (meaning: needs to last awhile) upgrade

[AndrewR]

Ok, currently I have a PIII-933 (overclocked 700) on an MSI motherboard with an ATI All-in-Wonder Radeon. My wife has her own system that I'm going to be parting out since we're only taking one computer -- moving to Japan, limited space.

So, I need to upgrade this system to something a bit faster to "future-proof" it as much as I can. Here is what I was thinking:
AMD Athlon XP 1.47GHz (1700+, I think)
256MB DDR
Asus A7V mobo (think that's the one)
or MSI board that Anand recommends, which seems to be hard to find
Video card??

Now, I'm limited on money so the sky is not the limit. However, I'll be selling the PIII and its board, a Duron 700 and its board, 256MB and 128MB x 2 of RAM, an AIW Radeon, a Voodoo 4500, a couple hard drives, an SB Live, a CD-ROM, and a smattering of other parts. I've been looking at the video options, and my preferred one is the ATI AIW 8500 though the price scares me (and I'm not even positive that the signal would work -- anyone know?)!

Any and all help is appreciated. Oh, I use the system for games (FPS and strategy), Office stuff, home graphics editing, possible future use for video editing, and the wife uses it for some games (Sims), web surfing, newsletter preparation. I also have a burner and a DVD hooked up as well as a scanner.

 

[osage]

future proof.........now days that means it will be OK till summer...

tough call, lots of new stuff in the pipeline, but we never know if it will work when and if it gets released.

I have no insight on this, but a bump for your question

 

[jaydee]

PIII 933 will last you another 8-12 months, where you can build something that will last longer than what can build now. Remember that P3 system you have now isn't too far off a P4 1.3 Ghz or so (due to megahertz inflation). So I'd wait it out if I were you, but if you're really set on here and now, than an AthlonXP 1900+ (1.6 Ghz) is about the right price, with KT266A, nForce or SiS735 being your motherboard chipsets to choose from. The Asus A7V I believe is a KT133 chhipset board which is well out-dated (although it would work, it would create a massive bottleneck with only 100 FSB and SDRAM).

 

[genius19]

The Asus A7V I believe is a KT133 chhipset board which is well out-dated (although it would work, it would create a massive bottleneck with only 100 FSB and SDRAM
I would suggest the ASUS a7V 266, or A7V 266-E, the 1700+ have dropped significantly in price, and I would not spend alot on a computer, because the thoroughbreds will be coming out soon, and that revolution would be worth the upgrade. TBs are a new processor with 32 bt core, and 64 bit Extentions. Please let me know what you choose.
Nick
Computery Systems & Service

 

[AndrewR]

Whew, forgot about this thread.

Hmm, well, the problem on this upgrade is that I'm moving to Japan and want to upgrade before I leave since we'll be going from two computers to one, and I would like to have the best possible one so I can possibly avoid upgrading at least for the next year or more (while using money from the sale of the parts and computer I'm replacing).

I didn't mean the Asus A7V -- I meant the A7V266 (whatever the exact designator is), for the XP processors. I don't need IDE RAID as I use SCSI, but an integrated network controller would be nice.

I took a gander at the nForce, and that looks interesting, especially since it seems like the sound processor is a good one. Thanks for the help (and any that might be forthcoming?).

 

[thraxes]

The N-Force is kinda sweet but I have no experience with it so I'll let others be the judge.

For a mainboard I would go for Epox 8KHA+ since I have worked with that board and I really like it. For an NIC get a simple D-Link card. The CPU and RAM you got figured out pretty well, and for graphics me and my customers have been very satisfied with Gainwards GeForce3 offerings (more specifically the GF3-Ti200 cards)