upgrading my pc

[oliharan92]

hi,
i currently have a HP a6652uk desktop with the following spec

motherboard: Asus M2N68-LA
cpu: Phenom-9650 (A) 2.3 GHz (95W)
ram: 4gb PC2-6400 MB/sec
graphics card: Radeon HD3650 512mb
power supply:300w

i want to upgrade it but dont know what to do first, or weather to scrap it and start a new build?
i have about £300 to spend at the moment but i will be upgrading it more gradually as im not made of money!

i was looking at a Palit GTX 460 768mb graphics card?
or would this be overkill for the rest of the system?
and im hoping to get a 22" or 24" 1080p monitor in the future to game on if that makes ay diffrence
thanks for the help!
oli

 

[oliharan92]

sorry it was a Palit GTX 1gb***

 

[v8envy]

Your CPU is fairly slow but still good enough for the vast majority of older games. The biggest weakness in an overall low end package is the 300 watt PSU. That Phenom is a power hungry chip, and adding a video card which draws 200 watts on its own to an older, capacitor aging de-rated OEM PSU not designed to be run at 100%+ load is asking for pain.

Your best bet would be to sell that system and build a new one more suited to gaming. About the only things you could salvage from it are the hard drive, optical drive and case. The OS license is likely tied to the BIOS of the OEM motherboard, and won't transfer to a new build.

If not, your upgrade path should be to a quality PSU, followed by that GTX 460 graphics card. Then find out what the fastest CPU supported by that model was and get that.

 

[oliharan92]

thanks for the responce! i was leaning towards the new build, thanks for the advice, iv not been gaming on a pc for a while and im a bit behind on the hardware nowdays. would you reccomend an intel i5? or an amd?

 

[v8envy]

AMD has some nice budget CPUs, Intel has some higher performing CPUs. I run an i7 myself, and couldn't be happier. The answer depends on your budget, likely games, and willingness to overclock.

 

[toyota]

AMD Phenom 2 quad build may be 50-75 bucks cheaper up front but an i5 760 setup is faster and will last you longer. I am sure some will argue but the fact is the i5 760 is faster clock for clock and can can clock higher so it will handle those future gpu upgrades better.

 

[v8envy]

But the phenom II comes clocked higher from the factory. Same thing as the E2xxx vs old AMD dual cores. If you overclock it's a no brainer to go Intel. If you're looking at stock performance then AMD is quite compelling for the price.

And those 75 bucks could mean the difference between an i5 760 with a 5770 vs a phenom 955 with a 460 1gb. I know which option *I* would pick as my gaming box if I was budget constrained. Hint: not the one with a slightly faster than fast enough CPU.

 

[oliharan92]

i personally like a intel/nvidia setup. if i was to set a budget off around the £500 mark what short of setup would you reccomend considering i already have a case, dvd drive that i can use and maby my ram. thanks for the help. much appreciated

 

[toyota]

But the phenom II comes clocked higher from the factory. Same thing as the E2xxx vs old AMD dual cores. If you overclock it's a no brainer to go Intel. If you're looking at stock performance then AMD is quite compelling for the price.

And those 75 bucks could mean the difference between an i5 760 with a 5770 vs a phenom 955 with a 460 1gb. I know which option *I* would pick as my gaming box if I was budget constrained. Hint: not the one with a slightly faster than fast enough CPU.

so what because even at stock speeds the i5 760 is faster than the Phenom 2 quad. people that use common sense build a pc that can handle stuff for a reasonable amount of time not just currently. saving 50-75 bucks now on the price of entire build is nothing when you will have a superior platform now and for future gpu upgrades. heck that's actually going to be cheaper in the long run.

 

[betasub]

An Intel i5 build will require DDR3 RAM i.e. no re-using your old DDR2 (possible if you go with an older AMD AM2-type build).

UK prices are pretty steep (compared to the newegg prices familiar to most ATFers):
i5-750 or 760 £160+
i1156 P55 motherboard (ASUS/MSI/Gigabyte) £90-£120
4GB DDR3 £70-£100
Name-brand PSU (~500W) £40-£60
GTX460 1GB £160+

So just for the above you are looking at a minimum of £520 (although a deal on the GTX460 768MB could bring you in under £500 if that's a hard budget).