Upgrade or new PC

PorkBlonde

Our current PC is around 6 years old and I'm thinking of either upgrading or buying a new PC.

The main reason for this is because it's getting to a point where we don't meet the minimum requirements for a lot of recent games. This is the primary 'demanding' use we place on the PC.

Another consideration is that I'm fairly sure I've blown the PSU on my current PC as I accidentally caught the voltage change switch while the power was on and I saw a flash in the PSU and the power will not come on at all. Is this likely to have damaged any of the components e.g. hard drive, cpu or motherboard?

I think we need a newer graphics card and PSU as a minimum. I guess the question is how obsolete is the CPU becoming? If we need to upgrade this as well I'm thinking it would just be easier to get a new PC.

Obviously, I can't get full access to my hardware details but I think the current PC has
CPU - AMD Athlon 2.4ghz
Graphics Card - ATI Radeon 9600XT 256DDR
Hard Drive - Maxtor 250GB SATA
RAM - 2GB DDR
Motherboard - K8VSE Deluxe

Any thoughts would be welcome!

penrhyn

Treat yourself to a shiny new PC.

https://www.dmxdimension.co.uk will give you an idea of what bang you can get for your buck, even if you don't get a Dell.

free4440273

after 6 yrs there is a longevity issue -- new machine /Christmas pressie

gonzo127

another vote for new pc, if gaming is the reason for the computer its worth spending on the system.

now everything depends on your budget my normal reference system is this http://www.dinopc.com/shop/pc/configurePrd.asp?idproduct=935 which is a good starting point for price and performance, although i have no idea what the customer service is like as i have never got anything from them

PorkBlonde

Thanks for the replies.

If I was to get a new PC the budget would be in the region of £400-£500. Any recommendations for graphics cards or CPUs? I'm quite happy to turn settings down on games, as long as it's playable enough!

I probably wouldn't want to get Windows 7 as I've got XP that could be installed. I also wouldn't necessarily want to get a new hard disk as this was bought fairly recently. It seems that on the sites where you can get custom PCs built that not having one isn't an option.

Darksun

PorkBlonde wrote: »

I probably wouldn't want to get Windows 7 as I've got XP that could be installed. I also wouldn't necessarily want to get a new hard disk as this was bought fairly recently. It seems that on the sites where you can get custom PCs built that not having one isn't an option.

You might have to reconsider the decision not to upgrade your OS if gaming is your aim. Newer games are likely to not support XP, and notably DX10 and 11 doesn't (officially) work with XP, so if you have any game which relies on a newer version of DirectX (which will become more and more likely) then it won't run.

GeoffX

For a graphics card I'd recommend either an ATI HD5770 or better, or an nVidia GTX 460 or better. The prices of ATIs cards were stable for a long time, but nVidia has finally caught up and bargains are to be had. The cards I've suggested will suit a monitor at 1440x900; if yours is significantly larger you'll need a more expensive card.

Don't be tempted to save a few pounds with a cheap PSU; a quality model from the likes of Corsair or Antec might cost you 10% or more of your budget, but the stability they provide, along with energy efficiency and lack of noise, are more than worth the extra money.

JamesK10

Hi PorkBlonde

PSU spark-outs are random. Sometimes single parts will be damaged, other times you'll fry the whole lot, other times the PC will carry on as if nothing happens until a random day where it refuses to boot up - a "slow fault" if you will - and you'd need a working replacement PSU to connect up and test the rest (unless of course, that's the PC that you're posting from right now!). If it's a retail PC instead of one that was built for you then that would be too much hassle to try to find. I vote a new machine.

You've had one AMD PC and it's served you extremely well, so it depends if you're open to another computer with AMD running in it. Intel can get faster but you pay the premium for yet another new socket and yet another new chipset every time they have a new range out, with the range getting discontinued, generally cleared out by the end of January.

Speaking of the power supply, I would say that it's more important than the graphics card now because it would last you years and years compared to graphics cards getting a new range or a new tweak, every three months, and there's a brand new card out there right now, the Radeon 6850 and 6870 but there's a brand brand new card tested in the latest Custom PC, not sure whether it's made by nVidia their only rivals - for graphics cards it never ends. A power supply though, you could literally spend £100 of your £500 on one model released five years ago (the Corsair HX650 - that's NOT my recommendation by the way) and it would literally last you that new build and two further upgrades. So think long term.

Also the choice of CPU - There won't be many new AMD Athlons because their big range change is 3-6 months away, they've just tweaked the existing range and so your motherboard would keep the existing socket AM3 that AMD have used for two years or so. Intel's range change is right now though they haven't had a rebrand from the codename Sandy Bridge, but it means the Core i3, i5 and i7s as they are at the minute, Intel will want to clear them from the retail channel by the end of January unless they break with tradition of 12 years.



So sorry to waffle a bit, my choices are:

1) PSU: Antec Earthwatts EA 650 (the one I've got)

or as prices fluctuate Antec's Truepower New TP-650 which would be modular and result in less cabling to be managed in the casing. These models are built by Seasonic and the X650 under their own name is also excellent.

Also note the pattern of sticking with 650W, you will be told modern PCs are so efficient they don't need more than 500W. That's nonsense, depending on the resolution you play games at and the power requirements of everything in your machine, I'm sticking to 650W minimum after seeing Crysis and CoD4 crash out my PC until i beefed up the cooling and the PSU. So stick to 650W as there won't be a dramatic price drop to go down to 600.

If the budget forced you down below 600W, then Be Quiet's Pure Power 530W would be the minimum to settle for, that's around £60.

2) Graphics cards: Don't buy anything with less than 1GB of RAM on it, both for gaming and for possible Ebay re-sell. The HD5770 as recommended is a great balance of performance and power efficiency but now the 6870 is its brand new replacement. I'll post back about the graphics card when I pick up the newest Custom PC tomorrow but I really would make it the last thing you consider about your machine as it will be the first thing to go out of date.

3) CPU? You've been happy with AMD in the past. The two top of the range choices are the 6-Core AMD Phenom II x6 1100T Black Edition, or the 4-Core Phenom II x4 970. On the motherboard the 870A chipset is the one to look for as the "A" means it'll have two USB3 ports on it and at least two SATA III for faster hard disks in future, thanks to the SB850 southbridge chip - but that is the chipset before last that's been given a bump. As ever that will make it cheaper by up to £40 compared to the newest chipsest to be released, whose boards are still around £100.

You also got good service out of an Asus motherboard, so if you were sticking with them look for the Asus M4A88T-V EVO/USB3 880G, general going rate £80.
OR with Intel, you could try to pick up a Core i5-760 on a LGA1156 motherboard, but those are now the previous generation that's on a clearout, depending on the launch date for the next lot.

You haven't asked about it, but Samsung are also clearing out their 1-terabyte hard disks for around £40 wherever you buy them so I'd say don't miss out on that bargain. Here's where I bought it from. Even though I normally stick by Western Digital, that was too good a deal to pass up.

Giant_Space_Lizard

tbh i think they cpu will bottleneck a descent card, if you look at cost of a descent psu and nice gpu a new build i think would be a good idea, especially seeing as you got such a good run with your current system.

JasX

For gaming / leaning towards good value higher end components this place has been showing quite good value recently:

https://www.dinopc.com

Tho if you read reviews are not the fastest at building/hitting delivery dates but at least you get good value with the hardware when it does eventually arrive...

rodenal

As above time for a new pc I think, but i'd go down the new components route. I personally wouldn't spend more than £50 on a psu, you'll find something plenty good enough within budget just do a bit of reading up and go for a proven one.

Similarly I'd steer clear of the X6 cpu's for now, they're commanding prices that are too high considering the every day benefit you'll actually get. Stick to a mid to high end phenom 2 X4 (something like a 955) or even go for something like a x2 555 and aim to unlock the cores (you may or may not be able to, these are apparently good for it though). For gaming you want to be getting as high a clock speed as you can (for the moment anyway). You'll pick up a very good cpu for £100

Ram go for 3 or 4 gig, considering the price it's available at there's no reason not to really. spend about £60 on it

Graphics card again I'd suggest the best or high end last generation cards, you'll save alot of cash and will get 90% of the benefits for about 50% of the cost. Aim to spend £80-100

Motherboards I'm not particularly clued up on at the moment but again just pick carefully, it's easy to spend £100+ on a board that will give you no real everyday benefits over a £60 one.

As far as the OS i'd agree it's well worthwhile picking up windows 7, it's a revelation if you've ever used vista.

You should easily get a capable machine for well in your budget - don't expect absolute top performance and you wont be disappointed. For gaming your monitor / desired resolution has a big impact on what you want/need gpu wise.