$250 upgrade=WOW.

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Popinski

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First of all, I want to say "THANK YOU" for all of you on BITOG for helping me on parts choice and pricing. Originally, I wanted a whole new computer but felt like it would have been a waste of money. For those of you that don't know, I had a:

-AMD Athlon XP 2000+
-4GB of ram at 333 MHz
-Nvidia GeForce 7900 GT
-Old Chaintech motherboard using max specs

UPGRADED:

-ASRock motherboard that can handle 8 GB 1600 MHz ram and the lastest Phenom processor. For what it can handle, the price is incredible!!! This is definitely the Hyundai of motherboards. I have been using demanding computer apps and the motherboard has been very stable.

-AMD Athlon II X3 Tri-core 2.9 GHz, the easiest processor to overclock. (Thank goodness you guys recommended me some webpages because I found out that this processor was faster than the more expensive Phenom processors)

Patriot 2 GB of Ram at 1333 Mhz (Someone told me not to buy the 2 GB at 1600 MHz until Ram prices go down).

Biostar 4650 HD (again it got mixed reviews. Big power for a good price and is stable with graphic apps)

All other parts are from the old computer from 2003, even the 300 Watt Power supply!!!!! In conclusion:

Blu-Ray=WOW
Games=WOW WOW WOW
Music apps performance=WOW
Internet performance=WOW
Overall speed=SUPER WOW
 
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I would still upgrade the power supply. Counting the fact capacity reduces with aging you are _right_ at the limit.
I would get something like this here SeaSonic unit. Not overkill but yet retains upgrade capacity. 80+ Bronze so it converts less electricity directly into heat. 5 year warranty. Win Win.
 
Originally Posted By: Colt45ws
I would still upgrade the power supply. Counting the fact capacity reduces with aging you are _right_ at the limit.
I would get something like this here SeaSonic unit. Not overkill but yet retains upgrade capacity. 80+ Bronze so it converts less electricity directly into heat. 5 year warranty. Win Win.


What happens if I go over the limit? My original plan was to upgrade my PSU when the AMD Phenom X4, Radeon HD and Ram prices are much cheaper.

According to a webpage calculator, My PSU is running at 270 Watts Max for the age. The maximum that all of my equipment needs is 240 watts. The HD 4650 needs a miniumum of 400 watts but majority of HD4650 users have less than 300 Watt PSU's!!
 
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When you go voer the limit you fry the psu, or it fries your parts, or it just drops out and shuts off randomly causing data corruption, or it can swing voltages at the limit and cause problems with the overclock.

Just get a good solid 450 or 500 from a good brand and you'll be fine. Besides, the big guys usually have a nice big 120mm fan in them to help cooling too...
 
Originally Posted By: hate2work

"the Hyundai of motherboards"....I love that:)

Good job on the upgrade~


I say that to everything that is reliable, low-price, and full of features.
 
Sounds like a good upgrade for $250. I'm second guessing the upgrade I'm doing to mine now. I have a 2006 Compaq that had an athlon 3500+, 1GB ram, and integrated ATI graphics. A while back I put in a Radeon 9500 GT($40), and I'm also upgrading to 2GB Ram($20) and an athlon x2 3800+($40). Only $100, but I started with a faster computer and am ending up with a slower one. Sometimes older equipment is more expensive. DDR ram costs more then DDR2, especially in larger sizes. Athlon 4800+(the fastest 939 processors) still go for over $200 on Ebay, but you can get a better AM2 processor for cheaper.

Woot had a quad core athlon II with 8GB ram for under $500 and I was tempted.
 
Originally Posted By: T-Keith
Sounds like a good upgrade for $250. I'm second guessing the upgrade I'm doing to mine now. I have a 2006 Compaq that had an athlon 3500+, 1GB ram, and integrated ATI graphics. A while back I put in a Radeon 9500 GT($40), and I'm also upgrading to 2GB Ram($20) and an athlon x2 3800+($40). Only $100, but I started with a faster computer and am ending up with a slower one. Sometimes older equipment is more expensive. DDR ram costs more then DDR2, especially in larger sizes. Athlon 4800+(the fastest 939 processors) still go for over $200 on Ebay, but you can get a better AM2 processor for cheaper.

Woot had a quad core athlon II with 8GB ram for under $500 and I was tempted.


Your first upgrade was slower than the previous specs? How so? Nevertheless, better processor, Ram, graphics card,and mother board=dream come true. This is my first time experiencing Blu-Ray and High-Definition computer apps... it's so mesmerizing.
 
I would highly recommend upgrading or atleast replacing the psu. I hope not replacing it does not prove to be a bad mistake. Age deteriorates the psus most(capacitors).
The best of the components and peripherals are useless if the psu fails.

And I hope the 2GB is not one stick but split like 2x1GB, that will help leverage the benefit of a dual channel memory system.
 
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Originally Posted By: youdontwannaknow
I would highly recommend upgrading or atleast replacing the psu. I hope not replacing it does not prove to be a bad mistake. Age deteriorates the psus most(capacitors).
The best of the components and peripherals are useless if the psu fails.

And I hope the 2GB is not one stick but split like 2x1GB, that will help leverage the benefit of a dual channel memory system.


Ok,I'll think about the PSU. About the RAM, I originally wanted 2x2GB of Ram but because of my budget, the computer geeks told me that 1 stick of 2GB for now is good enough.
 
Yes capacitors deteriorate as they age; so you want some buffer.
Thats why I said over. I also built your system on a PS calculator and got 285W but + 30% for aging gives 335W.
At the least, what brand is the 300?
 
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It's a Sparkle 300 watt PSU. From the people I asked, it's a good brand. It's 7 years old and I clean the dust in the inside every 3 months. It never gave me any problems.
 
Yeah, nice job on the upgrades. I bought an ASRock motherboard years ago and it was a solid board. I'm also still pleased with the performance we are getting out of one of the first generation tri-cores.
 
ASRock is ASUS's inexpensive line of boards. They aren't bad.

And as long as your day to day activities aren't taxing that PSU, you'll be OK. You start doing something like SETI or F@H that runs the CPU wide-open, then you might start to see the affects of inadequate power.
 
Haha, very nice
I found my best upgrade ever as far as WOW was going to my dual Opteron back in the day. Now that dual core has been mainstream for so long, getting a new multi-core CPU after a few years of being on a dual, just doesn't give the WOW it first did.

I love my i7, but it only really shines in actual benchmarks, 3D gaming, and synthetic tests.

Using the machine does feel a little better than my last rig, but its not the upgrade like going from an XP2000 would be.

Congrats on a great budget upgrade!
 
Originally Posted By: Popinski
It's a Sparkle 300 watt PSU. From the people I asked, it's a good brand. It's 7 years old and I clean the dust in the inside every 3 months. It never gave me any problems.


"Sparkle" for a power supply name is about as confidence inspiring as "Crash" would be for brake parts.
grin2.gif


In addition to, and I think more likely than, complete computer failure because of a bad power supply, is general flakiness where you get intermittent problems like failure to boot because your power supply isn't quite making it.

I don't see any reason to panic, but it would be a good idea to upgrade your power supply as soon as you have the loose change to do it. Get a good quality one in addition to plenty of reserve power. Power supplies aren't a good place to cut corners.
 
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