Dell Dimension 8200 upgrade question

[DesiPower]

I have a 9 year old Dell Dimension 8200, its unable to properly play many videos including netflix and full HDs recorded by Sony HX5V. The videos play with unwatchable jerks. Its a 2.4GHz P4 processor, 512 MB RDRAM and FX5200 128MB video card.
For about $80 I can upgrade to a FX6200 512 MB video card and 1GB of system memory.
My question is, will it be worth it? will be able to play full HDs or netflix properly? or it has reached its age, its time to move on...?

 

[Davidh373]

For about $80 you could order a 10x better card off newegg.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-342-_-Product

or

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-543-_-Product

I would just trash that though. Honestly, I'd get a new one for ~$600. If you don't have it the video card MIGHT help. The 512mb ram isn't very promising either.

 

[nsafreak]

Yeah I doubt that a video card will help much at all since the applications you noted aren't going to use it that much for video decoding. It's mostly CPU bound for those particular applications. You definitely need to ditch that old system and get a new one. Not only would any upgrade be of limited use but it would be very expensive, especially the RAM since you're using RDRAM.

 

[Blain]

For about $80 you could order a 10x better card off newegg.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-342-_-Product

or

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-543-_-Product

The Dimension MB has an AGP not PCI Express slot for video.

 

[DesiPower]

Got it, ditch it is...

So what is the minimum requirement for playing my kinda videos (netflix and full HD videos recorded from my Camera/camcorder)? I mean what processor series? what FSB, controller? what Video card line? definitely wanna stay within $500 if possible

 

[DominionSeraph]

Got it, ditch it is...

So what is the minimum requirement for playing my kinda videos (netflix and full HD videos recorded from my Camera/camcorder)? I mean what processor series? what FSB, controller? what Video card line? definitely wanna stay within $500 if possible

Just about any recent dual-core will do just fine. I'm on an old-ass X2 5200+ and I do just fine.

You can pick up a Dell Inspiron 570 with an Athlon II x2 240 for $400. That processor is quite a bit faster than mine.

Or check out the Dell Outlet. I'm looking at five Athlon II x4 630 systems with 1TB drives right now for $389. That's quite the deal. (To put it together yourself you're looking at $100 processor, $100 OS, $80 hard drive, $50 motherboard, $40 power supply, $75 RAM, $20 DVD burner = $465)

(Okay, links didn't work. But I was looking at the Inspiron 570's and also the 560's with Pentium Dual Core 5400's and 4GB RAM for $319 refurb/$299 scratch & dent)

 

[mfenn]

Just about any recent dual-core will do just fine. I'm on an old-ass X2 5200+ and I do just fine.

You can pick up a Dell Inspiron 570 with an Athlon II x2 240 for $400. That processor is quite a bit faster than mine.

Or check out the Dell Outlet. I'm looking at five Athlon II x4 630 systems with 1TB drives right now for $389. That's quite the deal. (To put it together yourself you're looking at $100 processor, $100 OS, $80 hard drive, $50 motherboard, $40 power supply, $75 RAM, $20 DVD burner = $465)

(Okay, links didn't work. But I was looking at the Inspiron 570's and also the 560's with Pentium Dual Core 5400's and 4GB RAM for $319 refurb/$299 scratch & dent)

This is a very good option if you don't want/care to build yourself. Any of those machines will do HD video no problem.

 

[DesiPower]

Just about any recent dual-core will do just fine. I'm on an old-ass X2 5200+ and I do just fine.

You can pick up a Dell Inspiron 570 with an Athlon II x2 240 for $400. That processor is quite a bit faster than mine.

Or check out the Dell Outlet. I'm looking at five Athlon II x4 630 systems with 1TB drives right now for $389. That's quite the deal. (To put it together yourself you're looking at $100 processor, $100 OS, $80 hard drive, $50 motherboard, $40 power supply, $75 RAM, $20 DVD burner = $465)

(Okay, links didn't work. But I was looking at the Inspiron 570's and also the 560's with Pentium Dual Core 5400's and 4GB RAM for $319 refurb/$299 scratch & dent)

Wow! looks like a deal! so these machines, even without dedicated v-card will play all those videos?! What about blu-rays? if i plan to slap in a reader, will it play Blu-ray movies? I have this box permanently connected to a Sony 46" LCD through VGA, or for Blu-ray will it need a dedicated video card (TV connected through VDI-HDMI adapter)?

 

[mfenn]

Wow! looks like a deal! so these machines, even without dedicated v-card will play all those videos?! What about blu-rays? if i plan to slap in a reader, will it play Blu-ray movies? I have this box permanently connected to a Sony 46" LCD through VGA, or for Blu-ray will it need a dedicated video card (TV connected through VDI-HDMI adapter)?

The 560 and 570 actually both have HDMI connectors already, so you'll just need an HDMI cable.

Both systems are powerful enough to play Blu-ray videos without hardware acceleration. If they're close to the same price, I would go with the 570 because the 785G's onboard graphics can provide blu-ray decode acceleration, resulting in an overall quieter and more energy-efficient system.

 

[0roo0roo]

a p4 2.4ghz is so slow a modern 500mhz processor probably beats it

theres no point trying to get gpu accel working on a p4, its just not somethignt be relied on.
most any half decent priced dual core can handle hd video these days, cpu or gpu decode.

 

[DominionSeraph]

Both systems are powerful enough to play Blu-ray videos without hardware acceleration. If they're close to the same price, I would go with the 570 because the 785G's onboard graphics can provide blu-ray decode acceleration, resulting in an overall quieter and more energy-efficient system.

Actually a single Inspiron 570's just popped up with the Athlon II X2 240 for $319, putting it at the same price as the Inspiron 560 with the Pentium Dual-Core 5400.

And there's now an X4 with 500GB for $329.

 

[DesiPower]

I looked at the dell outlet, nice machines, I am glad I discovered them! I never looked at AMDs before. Will buy one next month.
But one thing, @mfenn, I looked at the specs but nowhere could I find about the HDMI output that you mentioned, is it standard in all Inspiron 5XX series?

 

[mfenn]

I looked at the dell outlet, nice machines, I am glad I discovered them! I never looked at AMDs before. Will buy one next month.
But one thing, @mfenn, I looked at the specs but nowhere could I find about the HDMI output that you mentioned, is it standard in all Inspiron 5XX series?

560
570

 

[Davidh373]

The Dimension MB has an AGP not PCI Express slot for video.

It also has 3 PCI slots. 1 AGP

 

[Blain]

It also has 3 PCI slots. 1 AGP

True, but you're not advising him to go PCI over AGP, right?

 

[RebateMonger]

You have a lot of things going against that old Dell. 512 MB of memory is none too much, the video card is a nightmare, and that P4 is none too powerful to handle HD, although it should handle Hulu/Netflix type online video if everything else is right. We really don't know what kind of shape your XP install is in, either. I wouldn't spend any significant money on new sails, since there are too many anchors dragging.

As noted, pretty much any "modern" Core2Duo (or AMD equivalent) with 1 GB (or more, minimum) memory and a recent video card should handle your needs.

 

[Davidh373]

True, but you're not advising him to go PCI over AGP, right?

Not necessarily, but those are PCI cards. AGP doesn't have all that many cards out, so whatever. It doesn't seem to matter since we all seem to be advising a cheap dell now.