Thermaltake comp, upgrade help...

[Thermaltke]

First of all i'd like to say hii as this is my first post, or second.. i slept since then.. right...

i need your help, to start with take a look at my signature, im getting money together now and i'm thinking of buying half life 2, NFS;U 2, Battlefield 2, (when they come out) and maybe doom 3, (yes challenge) and my graphics card is only good enough to play last years games on minimum spec. i want to play loads of new games on max, plus combined with my 1mbps internet connection i want to play some online gaming. so what do you suggest as far as and hardware upgrades are concerned? i have a thermaltake silent butterly PSU that could munch up and top spec card. and i heard that doom 3 is a right smack in the teeth for most GPU's, so combined with my specs, what do you reccomend, and where can i get it cheap, as money is limmeted.

LOOKS; at the moment i have green UV cables and blue cables from the PSU, there are some stupid power cable lurking around for fans etc, which are mostly 92mm, (where can i upgrade theese?) the board is a AMD lan party so is also UV reactive, and i have 2 weak UV cathodes to swith on at night, and when in the light too bright for the UV i have two weak red cathodes. it looks, erm, satishfactory but i need something to make it unique, and tidy. (avatar is my puter )

If you can help that would be great thank god for this site, and i will be helping others soon with my experience...

request any more information needed, thankyou

haz

 

[Reefsmoka]

Hey dude, Welcome to the forums of PC Reveiw.

Now i looked at your post and i can tell you want something that'll eat anything for breakfast, which isnt easily done on the cheap, so it all comes down to how much coin you want to hand over for the latest and greatest gear.

I'll start with my favourite subject, graphics cards (gotta love em). At the moment the daddies of the graphics card world are the 6800 Ultra and the X800XT PE. Now these will both cost you around £350 a piece! Its too hard to tell you which is the better of the 2 because they both handle different games in different ways. A 6800Ultra will nock the block off an X800XT PE on Doom 3, but the X800XT PE should do the same to the 6800 Ultra on Half Life 2. But they will both run boths games quite happily without breaking a sweat.

If you dont want to be spending £350+ on just a graphics card (i dont blame you one bit!) there is only 1 card of choice, and that is the mighty Ati Radeon 9800 Pro. This is the best bang for your buck you'll ever find, it will handle Doom 3 and Half Life 2 quite well when accompanied with a decent processor and a good amount of ram/memory.

Next the Processor, as for value for money AMD and Intel arnt that far apart, even though what you might read. People say Intel are rip offs, but the prices are dropping all the time. But an AMD processor is a little bit cheaper, so i would opt for one of those. A 2800XP or a 3000XP will be perfect.

Memory isnt that cheap, but you will need at least 512 of it to have any fun on games nowadays, i strongly recommend a gig of it, which will set you back about £100. Decent quality ram is always a must, so opt for a well known make like Crucial Corsair Geil OCZ Samsung etc etc.

I'm not the man to be telling you about motherboard though, so i'll leave that to the others.

But to round it up:

A gig of ram = Around £100
AMD 3000XP processor = Around £120 with the fan
At Radeon 9800pro Graphics card = £125 delivered .

Sorry for all the babbling, its just im in that sorta mood .

 

[GONNA-GET-U]

i'am i right in saying ur current spec is in the sig box ?

if so-, i would recommend that u keep ur money for another 6 month and only upgrade ur graphic card (Ati Radeon 9800 Pro ) would do u just fine or something similar, and add another 512 mb of memory

 

[Reefsmoka]

The Radeon 9800pro will make all the difference .

 

[Thermaltke]

first of all thankyou ofor your responses.

secondly reefsmoka, i already have an Athlon 3200xp, so not to worry about that £130.

at he minuite i have 2 sticks of ram, purchased seperately, so different makes. both 256mb, taking up 2 out of 3 of my super duper lan party motherboard (robbed me of £80), so whats my next step? i have £40 soon the get another £40, then £50, i have just uprgraded ram, so 9800 pro first?

As i am a very ambitios lad, at christmas i will probably start a new project, this time learning from my mistakes i made with this puter. i though dual HT AMD processors couldn't be beaten, especially when i already own a 3200, another would much any computers stats. there an X800 would fit cosily, but then i have to put up with my graphics card now untill christmas. along with watercooling.. RAID, a very large psu, lol, and plenty of bays for some flashy temp monitors, liquid gagues, and just generally flashy things that would scare off other lan party-ers . i dont know hopefully three months of this website will knock me into shape for my next challenge. 1 more thing, i always have to have something different, my house has loads of tv, i had a plasma, the village is overrun by dial up, i got 1mbps, the villagers also all own beige boxes mine nice. jst an example to show you all what im like.

reefsmoka, i really dont mind the babbling the more the better, dont i do it?

 

[Reefsmoka]

Definatly get the Radoen 9800Pro next, you'll notice an incredible difference from your pitaful "NVIDIA GeForce2 MX 100/200" (sorry for any offence, but it had to be said ).

The Radeon 9800pro is the best thing for gamers (value wise). Its not really breaking the bank at a meer £125 delivered. The performance is excellent, I can play Far Cry, Doom 3, Painkiller ect etc without any problems with a resolution of 1024x768 and a good selction of the lovlies turned on without a problem. The games really do look breath taking.

You owe it to yourself to be playing the top of the line games at a great quality, and if not for yourself, then for your eyes!!!!!!

 

[Thermaltke]

yes thankyou, what do you think about my latest project, will a 9800 be at home, in such a supercomputer? what about an XT?

yes, my GPU now is poor, very poor, i did not buy it so you cant blame me

where did you get your 3D mark from may i ask?

 

[Reefsmoka]

If i were you i wouldnt waste my money on a 9800XT, its only got a 5% increase in performance from the 9800pro, which doesnt justify it costing double a 9800pro.

If you want to go gung ho and spend a hefty amount on a graphics card go for the X800 Pro ot the X800XT PE.

I got 3DMark03 from a PC Format cover DVD, but it can be downloaded for free from the Futurmark website.

It will be a locked version, but thats all you need to run the test.

 

[Thermaltke]

thankyou, se you around mate, i'll be after a 9800 pro now