Upgrading my PC... Could use some advice.

[kadean]

Hey all, thanks in advance for helping me out, I built my PC from the ground up late last year, you can see my specs in my signature. As you can see I went with the DX9 card because the DX10 was too expensive back then. But now, Im planning on upgrading to Vista with a DX10 card and I have a few questions. I am planning on using my PC for mostly games, new DX10 titles such as Crysis and Age of Conan. I, like all people, want to get the most bang for my buck so I dont really want to spend the money on the top DX10 card. I was thinking somewhere along the lines of the 8800gts 640mb. So what Im mainly asking is if I just upgrade my OS to Vista and my GPU to a DX10 card, will I have to upgrade any other parts of my system to support them, like my PSU. And another question I have is if I should upgrade my ram to some with better timing, and if 2gb is enough these days.

I know its quite a few questions but I would greatly appreciate any and all replies .

 

[Cutthroat]

Sounds like you have a good plan. I don't see any problems with your setup, you should be able to handle everything fine. Before moving to Vista run the Vista Upgrade Advisor to see if any of the hardware or software you currently use will be ok with Vista.

Try overclocking your fsb to 333 MHZ so your CPU and RAM run at 1:1 ratio. With your value ram you might not be able to overclock more than that. But don't upgrade your RAM for better timing, only upgrade if you want to move to 4GB, or you want to overclock it more than it's able to go, cause your processor can get to 3.2GHZ easily which at a 1:1 ratio with your RAM would require DDR2-800.

 

[kadean]

Thanks for the reply. I ran the scan and it looks pretty good. But one more thing I was wondering, whats the difference in getting the 32 bit or 64 bit Vista, and what are the advantages of having 64 bit?

EDIT: Actually, at closer inspection it looks like there are a few things that might affect me using Vista, heres what it says:

uGuru Micro-Processor | ABIT | There is no compatibility data available for this device. For more information, go to the device manufacturer's website or Windows Marketplace, or contact your retailer.

And:

Realtek | RTL8168/8111 PCI-E Gigabit Ethernet NIC | Realtek Semiconductor Corp. | There is no compatibility data available for this device. For more information, go to the device manufacturer's website or Windows Marketplace, or contact your retailer.

Are these serious issues that I cant solve with downloading new drivers?

 

[Cutthroat]

I'm assuming the NIC is onboard, and I'm not sure what the other device is, but it would seem it's also taking about your motherboard. AFAIK your motherboard should be fully compatible with Vista, but check around to make sure.

The only difference between 32bit and 64bit is you can use 4GB+ RAM with 64bit. If you are thinking of upgrading to 4GB RAM soon you should get 64bit.

 

[kadean]

Cool thanks for all this help, one last question (i hope!). If I were to buy 2gb of new RAM close to what you have in your signature, could I run that with the 2gbs I have in my system now? Or to have 4gb, does it all have to be the same type. And is there any major disadvantage of having different RAM types in my PC?

 

[Cutthroat]

You shouldn't add RAM that is different from what you have now, unless you are going to buy 2x2GB sticks, and ditch your current stuff. If you buy faster RAM and put it with your slower RAM it will all run at the speed of the slowest RAM.

I'd stick with the RAM you have until you're ready to upgrade to 4GB DDR2-800, and overclock your current rig as much as you can.

 

[kadean]

Okay sounds good. Do you think my current PSU will be able to handle the 4gb of DDR2-800 and 8800gts 640 mb upgrades?

 

[chynn]

I'm a gamer as you can see by the gear in my signature.

Vista runs games best with 4G memory, just like XP runs games best with 2G memory. At least that's what I have read on Anandtech's and other techie websites.

The 64-bit Vista OS has more flexibility when addressing more than 2G memory, but suffers from having fewer drivers for anything "not Intel". 64-bit Vista is faster, in some scenarios, than its 32-bit variation.

Anandtech has some articles about Vista explaining 32-bit addressing versus 64-bit addressing along with its benefits and drawbacks.

Then get 4G memory in 2x2G configuration. Some Intel chipsets can support 4x1G DIMM configurations but most other chipsets cannot ... at least not with the same fast timings ... and none of them support 1T command timings in 4x1G memory configurations.

But that's not important. Getting 4G memory is important, so get more of the same memory you have now ... but not until you get one of those new, "must have Vista", games.

In the meantime, just put up with the performance drop Vista gives you as a reward for using up twice the memory ...

 

[kadean]

Although this has been some great advice, I wouldnt mind some other peoples input to see what everyone else thinks. So that I can make the most educated decision I can.

 

[Noema]

I suggest you wait for the next generation of DX10 cards. Current DX10 cards (not even the high end) can't really play DX10 games satisfactorily (at least the few examples we've seen), often getting less than 50% of the frames you'd get in DX9.

Your 7950GT is fine at DX9, so that should hold you back until nVidia's rumored G90 is released.