Advice Requested for Gaming Upgrade

W

WaterWatcher

My current computer is based on an MSI MS-6712 motherboard with an Athlon
XP2000 CPU, two sticks Kingston 256MB PC2100, GeForce 4200ti 64MB video
card, Seagate 80MB hard drive and Antec 350w PSU. I'd like to start
upgrading it for games such as Quake IV, but I'm on a limited budget. My
current plan is to replace the mobo and CPU while reusing the other
components for the time being. Later I will upgrade the video to a PCI
express card and double the RAM with 512MB x 2 PC3200. The mobo I'm
considering is the ASRock 939Dual-SATA2 Socket 939 Uli M1695 paired with the
Athlon 64 3200+ Venice. Does this sound like a reasonable way to go about
it? Any different components I should consider?

Thanks for any assistance,
Ray
 
J

johns

If you take that route, you could well find yourself not able to
test the new "parts" until they are older than the vendor warrantee
support date ... generally only a few weeks. Good way to lose a
lot of money. That is a good mobo. I recommend starting backwards.
Get a new Antec case first. Then a new hard drive, and put that in
your old PC ... 160 gig SATA. I like Hitachi. New DVD/CDRW ...
and so on. Last get the mobo bundle .. and immediately test it
with the old video card .. if possible. And then get the video card.
That way you get to test and protect your investment.

johns
 
J

John Doe

WaterWatcher said:
My current computer is based on an MSI MS-6712 motherboard with an
Athlon XP2000 CPU, two sticks Kingston 256MB PC2100, GeForce
4200ti 64MB video card, Seagate 80MB hard drive and Antec 350w
PSU. I'd like to start upgrading it for games such as Quake IV,
but I'm on a limited budget. My current plan is to replace the
mobo and CPU while reusing the other components for the time
being. Later I will upgrade the video to a PCI express card and
double the RAM with 512MB x 2 PC3200. The mobo I'm considering is
the ASRock 939Dual-SATA2 Socket 939 Uli M1695 paired with the
Athlon 64 3200+ Venice. Does this sound like a reasonable way to
go about it? Any different components I should consider?

I have the Antec 350w PSU also. I would check to see whether it has
the enhanced 12 volt supply (increased amp rating).

You should have Windows XP, it's important for gaming.

Otherwise, yes, I like the fact your choice includes AGP and DDR
support. That way, you get to see whether or not the mainboard and
CPU by themselves make much difference.
 
W

WaterWatcher

johns said:
If you take that route, you could well find yourself not able to
test the new "parts" until they are older than the vendor warrantee
support date ... generally only a few weeks. Good way to lose a
lot of money. That is a good mobo. I recommend starting backwards.
Get a new Antec case first. Then a new hard drive, and put that in
your old PC ... 160 gig SATA. I like Hitachi. New DVD/CDRW ...
and so on. Last get the mobo bundle .. and immediately test it
with the old video card .. if possible. And then get the video card.
That way you get to test and protect your investment.

johns
Thanks for your response. I was under the impression all of my old parts
would work with this motherboard & CPU, so I would be able to test it, save
for the interfaces such as SATA, PCIe etc. Then as my budget allows,
upgrade the video, memory, hard disk and other drives, in that order, and
probably the PSU too. Is this not a viable upgrade path? Also, my present
mobo does not have a SATA interface, so I presume I would have to add one,
but I have not looked into this. My reasoning is that instead of just
popping an upgraded AGP video card in my present box for better gaming,
instead get the advanced mobo/CPU features now, and replace the other
outdated components later. This way I will have a faster computer in
general, somewhat better gaming and I don't blow the budget.

Thanks again,
Ray
 
W

WaterWatcher

John Doe said:
I have the Antec 350w PSU also. I would check to see whether it has
the enhanced 12 volt supply (increased amp rating).

You should have Windows XP, it's important for gaming.

Otherwise, yes, I like the fact your choice includes AGP and DDR
support. That way, you get to see whether or not the mainboard and
CPU by themselves make much difference.
Thanks for responding. I do have Windows XP. As far as my PSU goes, I'm
not sure how to check for enhanced 12v supply. It has 16a on the +12v rail.
Are the new Athlons 64s particularly sensitive to this?
Oh. Thanks for that too.
Ray
 
J

jaster

My current computer is based on an MSI MS-6712 motherboard with an
Athlon XP2000 CPU, two sticks Kingston 256MB PC2100, GeForce 4200ti 64MB
video card, Seagate 80MB hard drive and Antec 350w PSU. I'd like to
start upgrading it for games such as Quake IV, but I'm on a limited
budget. My current plan is to replace the mobo and CPU while reusing
the other components for the time being. Later I will upgrade the video
to a PCI express card and double the RAM with 512MB x 2 PC3200. The
mobo I'm considering is the ASRock 939Dual-SATA2 Socket 939 Uli M1695
paired with the Athlon 64 3200+ Venice. Does this sound like a
reasonable way to go about it? Any different components I should
consider?

Thanks for any assistance,
Ray


I did the upgrade from XP2000+ to XP64 3000 and video from Ti4200 128mb to
X800 256mb. The best route is to spend money on the video first then
cpu/mb. Although new graphics are coming out every 6 mo. if you go for
X800/X850 or 6600GT/6800 you'll be up to date on gaming graphics cards.
These cards can be found as AGP and are just as fast if not faster than
their PCI-E version. Motherboards are a matter of preference as generally
good low cost boards perform as well as good high priced boards. I've
been playing pretty good with 1 stick of 512 PC3200 which performs better
than when I had 512mb PC2700 and 512 PC3200.
 
J

John Doe

jaster said:
I did the upgrade from XP2000+ to XP64 3000 and video from Ti4200
128mb to X800 256mb. The best route is to spend money on the
video first then cpu/mb. Although new graphics are coming out
every 6 mo. if you go for X800/X850 or 6600GT/6800 you'll be up to
date on gaming graphics cards. These cards can be found as AGP
and are just as fast if not faster than their PCI-E version.
Motherboards are a matter of preference as generally good low cost
boards perform as well as good high priced boards. I've been
playing pretty good with 1 stick of 512 PC3200 which performs
better than when I had 512mb PC2700 and 512 PC3200.

Thanks for the information. Are you saying that the mainboard CPU
upgrade was boring? Seems to me that AGP video cards are more
expensive than their equivalent PCI-E version. I have been looking
at the 6600GT and have to look again when I think it's a good price
and realize I'm looking at the PCI-E version.

http://www.msi.com.tw/program/products/mainboard/mbd/pro_mbd_detail.php?UID=362
 
J

jaster

Thanks for the information. Are you saying that the mainboard CPU upgrade
was boring? Seems to me that AGP video cards are more expensive than their
equivalent PCI-E version. I have been looking at the 6600GT and have to
look again when I think it's a good price and realize I'm looking at the
PCI-E version.

http://www.msi.com.tw/program/products/mainboard/mbd/pro_mbd_detail.php?UID=362


Boring cpu/mb? Well sort of. Yes improvements in overall speed, really
noticeable burning videos, quieter and cooler. Worth the change but I was
playing most games on the XP 2000/Ti4200 rig. Only BF2 didn't play and
I'm not 100% sure that wasn't because of a bad install.

I live by Tomshardware advice, here's one about how much graphics is
needed. There's also a cpu performance comparator somewhere on the site.

http://graphics.tomshardware.com/graphic/20050302/index.html

I just heard about http://cairo.com which will scan and alert you to
the best sale prices for whatever in your USA area. I haven't paid
attention to price differences but I was lucky to catch a refurbished card
sale (agp or pci-e) at 40-50% off retail at the ATI site.

PCI-E versions are slightly faster than AGP versions but I don't think the
speed difference is noticeable to the eyes besides so many other things
impact actual performance.
 
J

John Doe

jaster said:
playing most games on the XP 2000/Ti4200 rig. Only BF2 didn't
play and I'm not 100% sure that wasn't because of a bad install.

They say that Battlefield 2 requires a minimum of 1GB RAM. Apparently
somewhere between 1 and 1.5GB of RAM.
 
J

jaster

They say that Battlefield 2 requires a minimum of 1GB RAM. Apparently
somewhere between 1 and 1.5GB of RAM.

No I had 1gb mem. I think my problem might have been the XP2000+at
1666mhz. BF2 looks for 2Ghz cpu.
 
W

WaterWatcher

jaster said:
No I had 1gb mem. I think my problem might have been the XP2000+at
1666mhz. BF2 looks for 2Ghz cpu.

Just wanted to say thanks for the helpfull suggestions. I'll post on my
upgrade results whichever way I go about it, whenever I get around to it.

Ray
 

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