Topic: making a new super-beast!!

[Jaminxz]

right i don't know if there's a point in posting this as this is all hypothetical (Spelling???) but ina year or so i thought of upgrading either by getting new stuff for my pc orbuilding a new super beast!

right i've got a 4 month old time pc, good general stuff geforce4mx128mb,512 mb ddr ram,120 gb hard drive amd xp2700+, i'm happy enough with it but for the money i paid for it i expected a little more. it's about 2.15 ghz, where as i misunderstood the xp 2700+ to be 2.7ghz before i bought it!!!

Now under the guarentee and such i got with it i am entitled to upgrades with fre fitting costs, so do you think it would be better for be to have them install an new chipset (something like 3ghz+) andmore ram, or to build a new pc with all the top stuff.

Cheers,

Also anybody have a general idea of the costs of both??

[Simon]

Depends what you mainly use it for, Jam.  What you have is a pretty good spec already.  I'm not 100% convinced that you would see all that much improvement, in general terms, by upgrading, but others may disagree.  My PC is about 18 months old now, and I have built others for other people, with  similar specs to what you have, (higher than my own) but I haven't really noticed a 'WOW!' factor with the new ones, compared to my own.

I suppose it's because I mainly use mine for Internet, which is only as fast as the connection, but a gamer would probably notice more of a boost in speed following an upgrade.

[Jaminxz]

well i use the t'internet a lot, but i do like to play games. everything was pretty smooth, until i played a farcry demo on my pc, it was minimum 2ghz but it was quite slow and jerkey and i suspect newer games will be the same if i ever buy any

[Simon]

Is the graphics card 8X, and is it a separate card or onboard?

[Dack]

Its the graphics card thats the bottleneck with the system -  Geforce MX isn't up to much (gameplay wise) these days. The XP2700 rating comes from it having the equivalent performance as a Pentium 4 2.7G so you haven't lost out.

Worth having a look in PCWorld (honestly!) as they've got a few bargains on the managers discount tables around the country - I managed to pick up 4 Geforce 4800's (same as 4600 but with 8x) for £40 each the other day (128M DDR, 8X AGP, DVI, and just a smidgen faster than a geforce MX but only direct X 8.1 cards)

A speed comparison link for you, and those are on a 3.2GP4 and XP2700 system:
http://www.tomshardware.com/graphic/20031229/

[Jaminxz]

right cheers.

If i do update i think i have to buy from them.

So if i do choose to go for the top graphics card, will i have to get a new motherboard?

[Sandra]

It depends on whether your current mobo will take it or not.
You will have to find the make and model of mobo and we can find out for you  

[Jaminxz]

Board: MICRO-STAR INTERNATIONAL CO., LTD MS-6777
Bus Clock: 166 megahertz
BIOS: Phoenix Technologies, LTD 6.00 PG 10/14/2003

[Sandra]

According to this :

http://tinyurl.com/2t2rt

You should be ok with an 8X agp card  

The links gone funny but it still works  

* Simon amended link.  

[DJ]

You can use the following link...

http://tinyurl.com/2t2rt

DJ  

[Simon]

[Jaminxz]

ok thanks again guys, just a few questions -

all the stuff about tv out, does that mean i don't need to get another pci card to play ps2/watch tv???

what does this mean - Note: nForce2 does NOT supports x4 memory device. 1GB can be made by other density of dram chip such as x 8, x16.
Due to the High Performance Memory design, motherboards or system configurations may or may not operate smoothly at the JEDEC (Joint Electron Device Engineering Council) standard settings (BIOS Default on the motherboard) such as DDR voltage, memory speeds and memory timing. Please confirm and adjust your memory setting in the BIOS accordingly for better system stability.

and if i do need a new pci tv card, do i have a free slot?

[Sandra]

TV out is part of the graphics card, usually via an S-Vid connection or a Composite one so that anything you are doing on your PC can be viewed on a TV screen.
To input TV or your PS2 to watch/play on your PC monitor then you need a TV PCI card.
I will leave your other questions to someone else at this time  

[Jaminxz]

ah right thanx.

anybody got ideas about the rest?