Upgrade P4 2.6GHz?

[sps]

I have a P4 2.6 GHz (800 MHz FSB ? overclocked to 3.1 GHz) on an 865PE MB and am trying to figure out if an upgrade is worthwhile. I desperately need more RAM and plan to buy a new video card (currently have GF4 Ti4200) for DVI out and Vista support. Since my MB doesn?t support PCI-E or DDR2 RAM, I am wondering if I should just swap out the MB and processor while I?m at it so I don?t put more money into DDR1 and an AGP card. I don?t use the system for gaming at all, but I do use it for DVD encoding. If I did upgrade, I?d be looking at spending only $200 or so on the CPU and MB, so I certainly wouldn?t be getting the latest and greatest? Is it worth upgrading the CPU and MB while I spend $ on RAM and video, or will I not see much of a speed increase for that amount of money? Any advice is appreciated.

 

[Tarrant64]

You don't want to go to low when spending $ on an upgrade. You may regret it later. If you are only looking for a $200 upgrade for your CPU and MB, then I would suggest AMD dual core processors. They are dirt cheap now and can give you the processing power you need.

With this shoot for at least 1gb of RAM(I suggest 2gb however if you are to run Vista). If you aren't looking for the greatest video card then check up on driver support for the video card you think will best suit you.

 

[A554SS1N]

An X2 3800+, cheap AM2 6150 motherboard making use of the onboard graphics (which has SM3 so will run Aero in Vista) and has a DVI slot, plus around 1GB RAM would be quite a nice upgrade for a non-gamer wanting better video encoding performance.

 

[hardwareking]

u can get a x2 3600+ for about $100.Plus a really cheap nforce 6150 board will give u plenty of processing power.
Although u will still need to buy some value ram.

 

[sps]

Originally posted by: A554SS1N
An X2 3800+, cheap AM2 6150 motherboard making use of the onboard graphics (which has SM3 so will run Aero in Vista) and has a DVI slot, plus around 1GB RAM would be quite a nice upgrade for a non-gamer wanting better video encoding performance.

Hmmm... that's pretty tempting. It looks like I can get that processor for $109 and a mobo for $90. Since I was going to have to spend about that much for the video card anyway, that means the only additional cost is the $109 CPU. That would allow me to buy DDR2 RAM and gives me the ability to upgrade to a PCI-E video card and SATA drives in the future. Would I need a new power supply for that mobo/CPU? I can't remember what PS I have now, but I did an exhaustive search to find a good one when I upgraded to my P4 from my Tbird 1GHz...

 

[A554SS1N]

If you open up the side of your case, usually the sticker on the PSU will contain details of the PSU wattage and 12v rail ampage. Seeing that it is only a low power system, I would think it would run Ok though.

 

[s44]

Try to find the Abit NF-M2 Nview: it's 6150 and a very good overclocker for only ~$90.

 

[jgigz]

Originally posted by: s44
Try to find the Abit NF-M2 Nview: it's 6150 and a very good overclocker for only ~$90.

Yeah and that brisbane 3600+ is 65nm so it'll more than likely stay nice and cool on stock at high speeds.

 

[sps]

Cool. This sounds like a pretty cheap upgrade. I was reading on the articles section of the site and it seems as though the consensus there is that the Intel C2D chips are the best right now (and seem to overclock very well, too). For only a $50 or so difference in chips, why is everyone recommending the AMD over Intel (I?m not trying to turn this into Intel vs. AMD ? I?ve used both and will go with whatever offers the biggest bang for the buck for budget chips)?

 

[A554SS1N]

Originally posted by: sps
Cool. This sounds like a pretty cheap upgrade. I was reading on the articles section of the site and it seems as though the consensus there is that the Intel C2D chips are the best right now (and seem to overclock very well, too). For only a $50 or so difference in chips, why is everyone recommending the AMD over Intel (I?m not trying to turn this into Intel vs. AMD ? I?ve used both and will go with whatever offers the biggest bang for the buck for budget chips)?

The chips are that much cheaper, true, but the cheapest motherboards are also quite alot cheaper for AMD AM2 than for Intel socket 775 (that support Core 2)- so the overll cost is much cheaper - plus the fact you said around $200, so we're trying to keep things as cheap as possible while still being good - an AMD X2 processor is perfectly good enough, and unless you intend to do alot of overclocking, something like a low end X2 is perfectly fine and respectable in performance. This is the best bang for buck for what you need. Plus the fact I'm not too sure of there being any decent onboard graphics chips for Intel motherboards.

 

[sps]

Originally posted by: A554SS1N
The chips are that much cheaper, true, but the cheapest motherboards are also quite alot cheaper for AMD AM2 than for Intel socket 775 (that support Core 2)- so the overll cost is much cheaper - plus the fact you said around $200, so we're trying to keep things as cheap as possible while still being good - an AMD X2 processor is perfectly good enough, and unless you intend to do alot of overclocking, something like a low end X2 is perfectly fine and respectable in performance. This is the best bang for buck for what you need. Plus the fact I'm not too sure of there being any decent onboard graphics chips for Intel motherboards.

That seems like sound logic. Thanks a lot for the good info!