I'm switching from AGP (finally) to PCI Express, so a whole system upgrade is in order. But I'm on a tight budget. I don't need the best - just an overall, noticable increasee in performance and gaming is good enough, as well as an upgrade path. I do plan to overclock, but with the stock heatsink for the CPU and memory. Anyway, the stuff I'm planning to purchase are:
CPU: AMD Athlon 64 3000+ AM2 socket --- $91 (won't get much cheaper after price cuts, would it? Pretty certain it's overclockable to 3500+ speeds with stock cooling.)
Mobo: BIOSTAR TFORCE 550 --- $80 (need 4 pci slots, and the only decent mobo I can find)
Video Card: EVGA Geforce 7900gt --- $237 after $25 MIR (tempted to save $80 and go for the 7600gt, but uncertain how it'll handle games 1 year from now. I'll be fine with gaming at 1024x768 on med-high settings a year from now, but not sure if the 7600gt could manage that)
Memory: CORSAIR XMS2 2GB (2 x 1GB) --- $158 after $40 MIR (about the cheapest DDR800 memory available, and heart it overclocks decently.)
HDD: Western Digital Caviar 250GB --- $75 after $10 MIR (Does Sata and 16mb buffers provide much of a performance boost compared to PATA HD's with 8mb buffers? My PATA drives would be running on an IDE constroller -another $15) on the Mobo since it only has 1 IDE slot, and I heard controller cards might run slower? It feels as if IDE is a dying technology for HD's compared to SATA)
As a reference, my current comp is using a 533fsb P4 clocked to 3ghz, 1gb Corsair Value Ram running just below DDR400 and in single channel 🙁, geforce 6800, and 2 PATA 8mb buffer HDD's
Everything would cost just around $800, but can't think of any other way to cut costs without severely impairng the performance the above offers. I'm contemplating the 7600gt - BF 2 runs on 1024 on lowest settings with just acceptable framerate for me, and I need something to run 2142 well once it comes out. Any thoughts and recommendations would be appreciated
CPU: AMD Athlon 64 3000+ AM2 socket --- $91 (won't get much cheaper after price cuts, would it? Pretty certain it's overclockable to 3500+ speeds with stock cooling.)
Mobo: BIOSTAR TFORCE 550 --- $80 (need 4 pci slots, and the only decent mobo I can find)
Video Card: EVGA Geforce 7900gt --- $237 after $25 MIR (tempted to save $80 and go for the 7600gt, but uncertain how it'll handle games 1 year from now. I'll be fine with gaming at 1024x768 on med-high settings a year from now, but not sure if the 7600gt could manage that)
Memory: CORSAIR XMS2 2GB (2 x 1GB) --- $158 after $40 MIR (about the cheapest DDR800 memory available, and heart it overclocks decently.)
HDD: Western Digital Caviar 250GB --- $75 after $10 MIR (Does Sata and 16mb buffers provide much of a performance boost compared to PATA HD's with 8mb buffers? My PATA drives would be running on an IDE constroller -another $15) on the Mobo since it only has 1 IDE slot, and I heard controller cards might run slower? It feels as if IDE is a dying technology for HD's compared to SATA)
As a reference, my current comp is using a 533fsb P4 clocked to 3ghz, 1gb Corsair Value Ram running just below DDR400 and in single channel 🙁, geforce 6800, and 2 PATA 8mb buffer HDD's
Everything would cost just around $800, but can't think of any other way to cut costs without severely impairng the performance the above offers. I'm contemplating the 7600gt - BF 2 runs on 1024 on lowest settings with just acceptable framerate for me, and I need something to run 2142 well once it comes out. Any thoughts and recommendations would be appreciated
