Hi, I was wondering if anybody could help me out with some advice on a planned upgrade ? My current system CORE 2 Q6600 @ 3.4ghz DFI DK P35 T2RS 4x1gb CRUCIAL TRACER 1066mhz OCZ GAMEXSTREAM 700w BFG 9800GTX 19" SAMSUNG TFT WINDOWS 7 RC1 3DMARK 06 - 14777 3DMARK VANTAGE - P7618/GPU 6057/CPU 33563 Planned upgrade CORE i7 920 D0 DFI DK X58-T3EH6 3x2gb CORSAIR DOMINATOR PC3-12800 CAS8 XFX GTX 275 XXX 24" BENQ TFT My first question is, I would attempt some overclocking on the 920, would the OCZ 700w be suitable for the new system? and secondly being as my q6600 is already at 3.4ghz (can go higher but temps are a bit much) would buying the 920 be really worthwhile now or better to wait? Any help would be hugely appreciated, thank you in advance
At first glance I wouldn't say you're upgrading your current machine so much as replacing it. You need to replace most of your parts. Why not sell your current system and use the proceeds on the new build? You might want to wait even though it will probably be Christmas before the next gen CPUs are worth purchasing (Price). As for the PSU... it should be fine. Personally I wish I had your current build... I've been chugging along with my Asus G1 notebook for over two years now. What are you hoping to improve with an upgrade? It looks like your only weak points are the GPU and RAM. Get yourself a GTX275 and 8GB of 1066 RAM for now and you should be golden.
It's up to you, really. You've chosen some decent parts there, but only you can decide if it would be money well spent. Personally, I wouldn't say it would be worth it, but that's based on my individual requirements so you need to make that evaluation myself. Although I know the i7 is fast, I only ever upgrade when my current system can't do the things I want it to as quick as I want it to do them (like keep up the FPS in the latest games). If it can cope with everything you throw at it, then it might be better to hold off and save the money until it really would be worth it to you. If you do decide to go with the upgrade, 700W should be absolutely fine. Also, you might want to consider a partial upgrade rather than an almost complete rebuild. The first thing I would upgrade is that 19" monitor to a 24" one. Depending on the games you play, the 9800GTX might not be able to handle 1920*1200 so you'd probably want to upgrade the GPU to the GTX 275 at the same time. Other than that, your current system looks fine for the time being, perhaps just wait until those i7 prices come down a little more or something a bit quicker comes along that would make it worth stumping up that much cash for.
I guess just nice playable frame rates and some more desktop real estate really, Im not so bothered about having every detail setting on maximum just with the jump up to 1920x1200 I figured the 9800 would need replacing. My first thought was a 260 maxcore but after seeing the 275's for around the same money, it seemed like the better buy. The ram has always been an issue, this is my 3rd set of tracer modules (2 sets were rma'd for mem errors) so thats an easy decision to make. I really dont have faith in them anymore, Im just waiting for this set to crap out on me now
Yeah, I think thats a good idea. Being as the current system is oc'd already, Im not sure it would be a big enough step in processing power to warrant changing everything bar the psu.
keep what you have for now and wait until the next set of graphics cards comes out. after that the current ones will get waaaaaaay cheaper. then id say upgrade to a 275 and get another 19inch monitor so you can get a 2 monitor span. which looks pretty cool on a desktop imo especially when you are showing it off
You could get the screen and a new graphics card. As the others have said, the cpu, ram, mobo etc are still pretty decent, and i7 is in its infancy so its still expensive. Screens don't go out of fashion so quickly, so that'll be a better investment. Also, something like a Titan Fenrir or Thermalright Ultra-120 eXtreme would keep the cpu cooler if that's a problem As for a graphics card, that depends on budget and the games you like to play.
