upgrading advice please

westiea

hi all

My son would like his Advent T9307 upgraded for gaming for his birthday. The problem he has (hence upgrade request) is when he tries to play Bioshock 2 the gfx card is not up to it.
He has asked for 3GB ram and a 512 graphics card. I have up to £120 (ish) to spend. Which graphics and memory cards would you recommend?

Current specs (as out of the box, plus windows upgrade) are -

Intel Core 2 Duo E6300 Processor
(1.83MHz, 1GHz FSB)
Windows 7
1GB DDR RAM
320GB Hard Disk Drive
Multi-format Dual Layer DVD RW Drive
256MB ATi Radeon X1600SE Graphics
8-in-1 Media Card Reader
6 USB Connections


I saw this... 'Another consideration is the power unit output. If you are looking at a more powerful graphics card the PSU will usually need upgrading.'

So wondered if this another upgrade needed - how easy is it to install if required for upgrade and which one would you advise?

Any help greatly appreciated

JasX

Found this website:

http://www.uktsupport.co.uk/advent/pc/t9307.htm

On the face of it you have a PCIe slot so 'should' work with any suitable PICe graphics card that doesn;t need a separate power feed..... HOWEVER unfortunately what you have there is a PC world own brand ultra low build quality machine (as alot of PC world stuff tends to be -don't buy from there) and a little googling of that motherboard / chipset brings up things like this:

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/299889-33-radeon-4650-p4m890

I used to have two Biostar boards with this chipset, both died after two years use. Some cards will work but only if they Do Not have Turbocache or Hypermemory and do not draw more power than the slot can provide. The power stages for the pci-e slot are weak and doubtful that it even meets pci-e power spec but I have gotten cards that use power from a 6pin or more to work without issue aside from the crappy FSB performance.

Wow what crap parts, this is why people should avoid buying crap and go quality. The chipset is worthless and you have no choice but to upgrade your board as it is not worth the headaches. As for the psu what a Lol its junk and it reminds me of my A-power that really sucked before I ditched it before it could fail on me.

So it seems because PC world cut so many costs/corners with their motherboards there is a good chance it will NOT support standard PCIe cards that don't need an external connector.

Leaves two options

1-You'd need to be looking at getting a beefier card that you can supply power directly to that takes an extra 6pin connector (might need a new PSU if your current one does not have a 6-pin power connector available -probably not if PC World can't even deliver a proper motherboard).

2-you will in future be able to re-use a new power supply and graphics card in a future machine, however RAM will very likely need to be thrown away with the motherboard as it won;t be compatible

3-being an ultra low quality motherboard you could upgrade along the above route but as per other posts expect it to fail eventually (not much over 2 years was quoted elsewhere) and should plan what you'll be doing then.

4-The problem with getting 'cheap' PSUs is they tend to blow up, and when they do blow up damage the rest of your PC effectively killing it rather than leaving you just needing just a new PSU.

Ultimately you need to decide if its worth the risk upgrading based on how long the thing will last. If you are planning on upgrading a machine rather than throwing it away and replacing don;t by the cheapest quality PC world ones (which are probably not the cheapest in any case)


....tho personally the expression throwing good money after bad springs to mind.

gonzo127

well the psu will be the biggest limiting factor with this upgrade (taking into account your budget) however since you have already got a dedicated GPU (graphics card) this will help as it means you should have some spare capacity from your psu when you take the old gpu out

now it would help us if you could give us information on the psu, this will just require you to open up the side of your computer and look at the sticker on the psu - also let us know what 'spare' connectors you have coming from your psu, including any extras connected to the gpu

as to your budget and all the upgrades

RAM - i think you only have 2 slots on your motherboard for ram so ideally you will be better having 2 or 4gb of ram using both slots, i also think you need ddr2 ram anyways you will be looking at £30 for 2gb and £60 for 4gb

graphic cards - something like this might be good http://www.ebuyer.com/product/190132 although we need to check on the power supply

GeoffX

The motherboard appears to be one of these:
http://www.msi.com/product/mb/P4M900M2-L.html#/?div=Detail

It only supports up to 2GBs of DDR2 memory, which should cost about £30. Make sure you get 2x1GB and not a single 2GB.

westiea

Hi again and thanks so much for all replies -

Gonzo will get son to open up tower tonight and give me that info.

Will repost with the info tonight - thanks again all.

JasX

Fundamentally if there is a chance of graphic card / PSU incompatibility (due to dodgy motherboard power distribution above) best piece of advice would be whatever PSU / graphic card you go for unless you're gatting an amazing ebay deal would be buy from somewhere reputable eg ebuyer

Buy ONLINE so you get DSR reg protection, then be very careful to unpack it keeping all packaging intact and in mint condition, try installing everything asap (take anti static precautions).

If it does prove incompatible package it back up so it doesn;t look opened and return it within 7 days saying you're returning it "because you can" under DSR regs for a full refund including postage. -or say you read something since ordering that it was incompatible, NOT that you've opened and used the product.

westiea

Hi Gonzo - sorry for delay with info.

The PSU is 35 watt and there are 4 spare connectors (2 large and 2 small)

thanks again

JasX

westiea wrote: »

Hi Gonzo - sorry for delay with info.

The PSU is 35 watt and there are 4 spare connectors (2 large and 2 small)

thanks again

I'm afraid 35w is almost certainly inaccurate as that wouldn't even be enough for the CPU chip (350 perhaps) and large/small is not at all helpful in describing PSU connectors as there are about 8 different types

westiea

Cheers Jasx -

Doh i am stupid (sorry stressed parent!) its 350w - i have taken some PICS as i am not 100% certain on the connections, and just to clarify info.

I am sure they are 4 pin molex (x2) and 4 pin fdd. x2)

I am afraid a new pc is not even on offer as funds will not run to it for a good while, so I am hoping we can do some upgrades - does not look good tho judging from what has been said. :sad:

gonzo127

damn it just lost loads of info i posted up gggrrrrr

ok basic sum up
you have got 2 molex and 2 fdd spare, however with only a 350w PSU i personally wouldnt want to put much more load on it so i wouldnt want to consider using those extra connectors,

a PCI-E connection should be give 75w of power the power draw of the 5670 i have linked to above is ~61w so should not require a extra power connector, and even with a less than perfect PCE-E slot having ~15w less power draw than the connector should be able to give, SHOULD give it enough head room to keep the system stable

RAM you currently have 2 x 512mb sticks however a upgrade to 2 x 1gb sticks (givning you 2gb RAM) shouldnt be a problem as they shouldnt draw any more power in theory, although if they do it will be minimal

Bioshock 2 requires from wiki minimum requirements
AMD Athlon 64 Processor 3800+ 2.4Ghz or better, Intel Pentium 4 530 3.0Ghz Processor or better - you have better than this
2 GB RAM - you can get this 2 x 1gb sticks for about £30
GPU NVIDIA 7800GT 256MB graphics card or better, ATI Radeon X1900 256MB graphics card or better - the 5670 posted earlier beats this

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/gaming-graphics-card-radeon-hd-6870-geforce-gtx-570,review-32094-7.html#Scene_1 - shows the rough level of graphics card when compared to each other (look at discrete) the 5670 is 6 levels higher than the x1900 GT
http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/graphics/2010/01/14/ati-radeon-hd-5670-review/1 is just a basic review of the 5670

so for the RAM and the 5670 (please check the dimensions of the card and your case to make sure it will fit in - common sense in all reality however most people dont think about it untill its too late) you would be looking at roughly £100 (£30 for the ram and £70 for the graphics card) however please please please take into account the information about about making sure you are very very careful when unpacking and unwrapping it as if it isnt suitable you can usualy send it back for a refund

quick edit if you want to save some money you could go for the ATI 5550 or the 5570 which should be less than £60 - although they are only just better than the x1900 (only a few levels) - although a power draw of under 45w does give it the advantage of putting even less strain on your psu and PCI-E connector - this being said i personally think the 5670 would be a better choice (so long as it is stable)

westiea

Gonzo your an absolute doll.

Will take all your advice (and measure up!) and also Jasxs' and order online and unpack carefully.

Cant thank you techie peeps enough.