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Time to upgrade

K

Kilgore65

Senior member
It's time to upgrade my 9 (!) year old system and need some help, as I haven't been keeping up with the latest hardware developments. I want to reuse as many of my components as possible, so I'm just going to start with a new case and motherboard/CPU. I need a minimum 2.0 G CPU in order to run the programs I need, and I want to be able to run the upcoming generation of games such as Battle of Britain: Storm of War and Silent Hunter V. My Asus P4B mobo has delivered rock-solid performance for 9 years, so I would prefer to go with a new Asus board and an Asus case that will do all this for the least possible cost, as I employment-challenged at the moment. What are y'all's recs?
 
AMD leads the value segment right now. I am not certain what your price range is, however, so it's hard to overtly recommend anything.

With a 9 year old machine, and for what you want to do, you will likely have to upgrade everything save the case, DVD-rom (if you have one), and the hard drive.
Still, as a starting point, I would recommend the Athlon II line and a reasonable ASUS board (ASUS' AMD offerings are more reasonably priced). DDR2 and DDR3 RAM are both pricey, so eh.
 
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Kilgore65 said:
Prefer to keep it as inexpensive as possible, say $300 to $400 for the new case, mobo, and cpu.
Click to expand...

You're also going to need new RAM, video card, and PSU at the very minimum.

In the price range you're talking about, it may be worth your while to get a low-end Dell and put something like a Radeon 4670 in it (or whatever the best card you can get without needing a PCIe power connector).
 
Nah, no Dells for me; I've had bad experiences with them. As for vidcard, I'll reuse my Radeon 9600 till the games come out, then buy the best I can afford.
 
Kilgore65 said:
Nah, no Dells for me; I've had bad experiences with them. As for vidcard, I'll reuse my Radeon 9600 till the games come out, then buy the best I can afford.
Click to expand...

See, that's the problem. Any new motherboard that you get today is going to be using PCI-E for video, and your card is most likely AGP, since PCI-E didn't exist 9 years ago.

The first PCI-E Radeons were the X800 and X600 cards. Source: http://techreport.com/articles.x/6801
So your card is definately AGP, and not transferrable to a new system.

If you want to re-use your AGP video card, then your best bet for a motherboard that can accept a modern CPU is this: http://3btech.net/as77recoduo7.html
Add an 800/1066 FSB Core2Duo CPU, and some DDR1 RAM, and you will be golden. I don't know whether your existing motherboard uses DDR1 or what, but if it does, then you can just transfer it over.

Edit: Your motherboard uses PC133 SDRAM, which is not compatible with the motherboard that I suggested. Therefore, you would be better off, if you have to buy RAM anyways, to go with a more modern motherboard that can take DDR3 memory. I suggest a 785G motherboard, which has onboard graphics comparible to your 9600 card, and also supports PCI-E. It only has a single IDE port, so you would be able to re-use one HD and one CD/DVD drive.

Biostar 785G, DDR3, $60
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813138182
Or if you prefer Asus, slightly more
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131609

Some RAM, DDR3-1600 CAS9.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231193
Or
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231277
 
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Forget about using old, slow and incompatible components on a new build.

And don't limit yourself to Asus (unless you have some kind of brand discount). With such a low budget you can't afford to limit yourself to only one premium brand.
 
VirtualLarry's RAM recommendations are good,

For video, look out for an ATI 4670 (as recommended by mfenn above). It's advantages are low cost and power draw, while making the grade for mid-range gaming. OP mentioned some game titles: are these played at low-res on an old screen?

A quality brand PSU delivering 300-400W should be more than enough for this sort of build (no major power-hog components).
 
VirtualLarry said:
See, that's the problem. Any new motherboard that you get today is going to be using PCI-E for video, and your card is most likely AGP, since PCI-E didn't exist 9 years ago.

The first PCI-E Radeons were the X800 and X600 cards. Source: http://techreport.com/articles.x/6801
So your card is definately AGP, and not transferrable to a new system.

If you want to re-use your AGP video card, then your best bet for a motherboard that can accept a modern CPU is this: http://3btech.net/as77recoduo7.html
Add an 800/1066 FSB Core2Duo CPU, and some DDR1 RAM, and you will be golden. I don't know whether your existing motherboard uses DDR1 or what, but if it does, then you can just transfer it over.
Click to expand...
That's just a waste of good money.
VirtualLarry said:
Edit: Your motherboard uses PC133 SDRAM, which is not compatible with the motherboard that I suggested. Therefore, you would be better off, if you have to buy RAM anyways, to go with a more modern motherboard that can take DDR3 memory. I suggest a 785G motherboard, which has onboard graphics comparible to your 9600 card, and also supports PCI-E. It only has a single IDE port, so you would be able to re-use one HD and one CD/DVD drive.

Biostar 785G, DDR3, $60
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813138182
Or if you prefer Asus, slightly more
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813131609

Some RAM, DDR3-1600 CAS9.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231193
Or
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16820231277
Click to expand...

Much better.

OP, you're basically going to be building a new system at this point. Don't think of it an an "upgrade" per se, but as a new system that you might be able use a few of your old components (if you're lucky)

I would also recommend against re-using your old HDD. Hard drive technology has advanced A LOT in 9 years, and any new system would be hamstrung by such an old drive. Reusing the optical drive and case are fine as long as you're happy with their features.

I haven't seen anybody recommend a CPU yet, so take a look at the Athlon II X2 240 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-688-_-Product. Not a bad CPU for $57.

You'll want a new video card for gaming (although the integrated graphics on the 785G board Larry recommended are probably quite good compared to your 9600). Here's a specific 4760 recommendation http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-854-_-Product. At $75 it's the cheapest 4670 with GDDR3 and Sapphire is a good brand.

You can't really go wrong with a Corsair PSU, and 400W is plenty for the type of system we're talking about here, $40 after $15 MIR. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817139008

The 500GB Spinpoint F3 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822152181 is $50 and is probably 2-3 times faster than your old HDD. The HDD is ALWAYS the slowest part of any system, so it doesn't make sense to hobble an otherwise nice system with an ancient HDD. Plus the new one is higher capacity, quieter, and uses less power.

Between Larry and my recommendations, you're looking at $395 shipped (after MIR).
 
Secure wishlists are not publically accessible. Cut'n'paste?

Old 350W PSU is not a gamble I would take. That's even if it has modern connectors such as SATA power, PCIe power, 24pin motherboard power etc.
 
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Another question: If I decide to go the build-my-own route, what is the best way to get my old IDE drive transferred over to a new SATA drive? I'd prefer to just copy the contents of my IDE drive to the new SATA drive, rather than tediously reinstalling everything? What would be the best way to accomplish this? Would I need to use a IDE to SATA converter?
 
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