Spec me an upgrade

[basmic]

Basically I'm looking to either upgrade, or get my money's worth from my existing system. I'm more looking for both value for money and low energy consumption - hopefully the two will go together!

My budget is £500 again.

My current specs:
http://g.imagehost.org/0023/spec3.gif
With a 600w Enermax PSU, Creative X-FI, some optical drives and SATA harddrives.

Basically I do want a new PSU. My current PSU is showing it's age, what with the lack of connectors for my graphic card and motherboard while upgrading - and I'm also considering lowering the wattage to 500w, in order to lower my energy consumption. I don't intend to have top end components, multiple graphic cards, dozens of harddrives.

Graphic card, I'd ideally like to upgrade - but I've been out of the gaming scene for a while, but am finding myself enjoying Crysis again so am getting into that! I'm tempted to just keep the one I've got, and wait until Nvidia release their GTX3xx range.

Motherboard, I like Asus. Gigabyte have let me down in the past, but I have read Asus's quality has plumetted as of late. Either way, I want a good quality motherboard but nothing OTT. Onboard sound I'm not fussed about, as I have a Creative X-Fi.

Processor, I'm after an Intel i5 or i7. Ideally I'd like the TDP to be =<65w with better performance than what I have. I might consider a 75w, but we'll see first. I'm confused about i5's though, as they have built-in graphic controllers - can these be disabled to reduce enerygy consumption?

I will upgrade my harddrive/s to SSD when the prices come down, but the ones I have will do nicely for now!

Sorry to go on about consumption, but I do pay for my own electric and the machine is perhaps used for 8-12 hours/day, and will be on for 24/7!

Thanks - anything you need to know, just ask.

[mr. Strawberry]

i would suggest this mainly because i can't seem to see a EVGA one on there
http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/prods/Components/Graphics-Nvidia/NvidiaGTX260Series/Asus/ENGTX2602TDI896MD3A.html
or look into this but i think that might push your PSU a bit
http://forum.novatech.co.uk/showthread.php?t=20023#post266493
looking at the price you are paying for the C2D and mobo you could go i3 with the option to go i5/7 in the future
http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/prods/Components/Motherboards/Intel1156P55ChipsetFori78Series/Gigabyte/GA-P55M-UD2.html
i know it is M-ATX but you do have crossfire support
http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/prods/Components/Processors/IntelCorei3Andi5/Intel/BX80616I3530.html

[basmic]

i'm probably not going to upgrade my graphic card just now, that way I can hopefully get an i5/7.

[Ajhayter]

Well I just had a look.

Our i5 bundle with an ATI 5770 comes to £530ish.
Little bit of a stretch but that would be a very good system with more options in the future.
Motherboard is an Asus P55D http://tinyurl.com/yf2p6cx
Memory is Gskill RipJaw
Cooler is stock, but the stock one isn't abysmal by any means.

http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b140/Ajhayter/Capture.jpg


Here is another build for £506. I've got this mobo myself. Very good board.

http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b140/Ajhayter/Capture1.jpg

[mr. Strawberry]

they are good systems :D
i gave you rep when i was ordering my 5770 :D after our chat on live chat :D

[basmic]

Well I just had a look.

Our i5 bundle with an ATI 5770 comes to £530ish.
Little bit of a stretch but that would be a very good system with more options in the future.
Motherboard is an Asus P55D http://tinyurl.com/yf2p6cx
Memory is Gskill RipJaw
Cooler is stock, but the stock one isn't abysmal by any means.

http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b140/Ajhayter/Capture.jpgNot going for another graphic card just yet, might wait another six months. But that bundle looks good value for money! :thumbs:
Here is another build for £506. I've got this mobo myself. Very good board.

http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b140/Ajhayter/Capture1.jpgI already have rev1 of that cooler, the P5Q Pro motherboard and I think that same RAM. Does the image in my first post show?

[brainiac361]

if your current budget if £500, i would sell your current components, as the 775 socket doesnt offer much in the way of upgradeability!

although this is a rough price check, post in the proper price check if you want a full quote.

CPU 8400 should get around £70
Mobo should get £60
Cooler = £10
That GTX260 should easily get £100
4gb ram, £45
PSU would get £40

and all of that if you sold it would come to a bit over £300. would that be included in your budget, because if it it, you could get yourself an i7, although an i5 is more sensible considering electricity costs (95w vs 130w TDP)

[Brad]

Yes I dont think people are reading the post properly and are thinking that pic is what your considering buying..

Have you overclocked your E8400? I really dont see you will see a great deal of either performace in gaming or power usage by upgrading to i5. I went from a E8600 @ 4.4Ghz, 4Gb DDR2 1066mhz to Corei7 920 @ 4.2Ghz, 6Gb DDR3 1800mhz and really was hardly any noticeable difference.


If you want your rig to feel faster and use less power then get a HD5850 and a 80Gb intel SSD. Also overclock your cpu to 4+Ghz and you will be laughing.

Quadcores are ok but a fast dual core is still a decent gaming rig. Video card and CPU speed is more important than CPU cores IMO.

[brainiac361]

if hes really wanting to conserve power, try the i3's. they have quite a low TDP. i wouldnt overclock as it would increase power used substantially. Also, get rid of the GTX260. i uses far more power while idling than the 5850.

[basmic]

After the above posts, I'm wondering if I should sit on my current rig and overclock it (I think it gave me 3.8GHz when I overclocked it last year) and upgrade my graphic card and PSU then?

Admittedly I'm been Nvidia person for the last 4-5 years, so am somewhat virginal to ATI. Would the 5870 give me power saving, while better performance in Crysis?

[Ajhayter]

After the above posts, I'm wondering if I should sit on my current rig and overclock it (I think it gave me 3.8GHz when I overclocked it last year) and upgrade my graphic card and PSU then?

Admittedly I'm been Nvidia person for the last 4-5 years, so am somewhat virginal to ATI. Would the 5870 give me power saving, while better performance in Crysis?

Generally yes.
GTX 260 is roughly the same as a 5770, so a 5870 would give very good performance.
Power consumption while in use is about the same, but idle is under 30w, with heat output to match (i.e. hardly any). From what I have heard the new nVidia chips will run very hot, so heat and power wise the ATi 5 seris make sense.
The GTX260 would give you good performance for a while, so unless you were having specific problems then I wouldn't worry too much about that.

My apologies for not reading the post properly, I glanced over and assumed the pic was what you selected (*headdesk*).
I think the i5 platform gives you the most options in the future. i3 is good and the on board graphics is good enough for blu ray. but for gaming the i5 chip would be better with a dedicated GPU.

If you did want to keep the same cooler you might need a new backplate for the 1156 socket, but I'm not certain on that.

[mr. Strawberry]

if you do you might have to see if you can get one off of there website or novatech might be nice enough to get one in for you

[basmic]

Sorry for not posting for a while!

Would it be worth going from my GTX 260 to an ATI 5750? Or just wait for the prices drop, when the GTX 4xx cards come out?

Thinking I will keep my rig for another year or two, and that an SSD drive (bought later this year when the prices (hopefully) fall) will make a bigger difference.

[mr. Strawberry]

the prices of the gtx 2xx cards will not drop i would get a 5770 at least

[basmic]

the prices of the gtx 2xx cards will not drop i would get a 5770 at leastSorry, I meant a 5850, not a 5750! :idea:

[mr. Strawberry]

yes a 5850 would be a perfect card for you to get :D