PC upgrade time

[Bloodwych]

I really don't do anything with the big PC other than web, torrents, and will be trying to sort out our (pretty large) media collection.

In your situation JT I'm not sure you need the power of an i5 or i7, but if money is no object then it makes sense to go Intel as they have the highest IPC (instructions done per clock). Not sure they are the best value however.

Otherwise, what is out there that's a bit tasty, but good value?

Another option is a Phenom II x4 black - I've seen the 3.2Ghz 955 versions going brand new for as little as £90, and the 1055T x6 going for £130. Ebay second user may even be cheaper. With the right motherboard, you can even overclock these to 4Ghz. AMD motherboards are cheaper too, plus with the dirt cheap price of DDR3 at the moment it's a great time to upgrade.

A machine like that would be easily fast enough for your needs and good value. Phenom II's feel VERY snappy in windows - just make sure you go at least Quad core as that's the future.

[Teho]

Yeah, I've been using the Phenom II X4 for a couple of years and have no complaints. The original Phenom X4 got a bad reputation for being a shoddy make which was basically two dual-cores jury-rigged together so people have been wary about the Phenom II. But this one is actually very good, a decent quad-core which is nothing like the original. Only thing is that the heatsink+fan is fairly noisy and isn't very effective at all, definitely get something else to cool the thing.

[Harrison]

Most stock heatsink+fans are noisy and not very efficient.

The one I always recommend everyone, the Arctic Freezer 7 Pro rev. 2 is compatible with both AMD and Intel and comes with all the required fittings for both makes, and at only £15 is is a great buy. Teho you should get one for your existing system. You would see a drop in temps and noise.

[J T]

I'm torn here, I thought I'd give myself a budget of around 300-400 bucks and try and get the most out of that - however when I go and look at things I think 'well, just 50 more...oh, that's got a bigger number and it's just another 30...oh, that one sounds neater for another 20...'

The thing is, I've got the money to spend, but don't really want to 'waste' it on things that I don't really need, and at the moment the old PC (It must be well over 5 years) is still OK, just a little slow.

[Harrison]

Here is a suggestion for you, and exactly what I did. I needed to update the PC I use for downloading, burning CD/DVD, streaming music and video around the network, managing files etc... And this was my solution:

An i3 540 CPU, Asus middle of the range motherboard, 4GB DDR3 ram, Arctic Freezer 7 Pro cooler, 600W Coolermaster PSU. All that cost under £200 and is amazingly fast for the money.

The i3 CPU is more powerful than its price tag might suggest, and they are actually dual core CPUs with hyperthreading, so the OS sees then as 4 cores, and my 540 runs at 3.06GHz stock speed so is nice and fast out of the box. It also has speedstep which reduces the CPU clock speed to around 1GHz when idling which reducing power consumption and keeps the CPU cool. Mine idles around 24 - 28 Deg C, and even under load never goes over 40 Deg C. The i3 also has built in Intel graphics, so with a compatible motherboard you don't even need a separate graphics card if you are not gaming, and the Asus board I'm using even has dual VGA and DVI outputs so I can run a dual display setup from it. Such a setup is still a lot faster than your current AMD X2 system and would be exactly what you need. And its still good for a spot of gaming if you wanted by added a dedicated PCI-E graphics card if you wished. Obviously an i3 won't deliver the power current game releases need to run on high settings, but its great otherwise and I think ideal for your needs.

[J T]

I need to do a fresh install of windows as my current vista is creaking, despite only being around 14 months old. And I've got a copy of Win7 that I want to put on it (it has been running very well on the little Revo under the telly).

While I fanny about trying to make up my mind, I might just sling an SSD in to my big PC and put a fresh install on there.... but will a SATA3 drive be able to talk to my old SATA1 ports on the A8N-E mobo? (Yes, I know that if it works I won't be getting the full speed, but it would help for the moment and maybe stretch things out so I can get an even better CPU in say six months).

[Harrison]

Yes, sata is backward compatible so sata 3 will work with sata 1 ports. However you can get fairly cheap PCI or PCI-E x 1 sata 3 cards, so you could stick one of those in for the full benefit of the new drive in your old system. It is 600MB/s vs 150MB/s after all, although in the real world the best ssd's only manage about 300MB/s.

The only other thing is your motherboard. When I had the A8N-SLI Premium motherboard I found it very picky about hdds it would work with. It didn't work properly with sata drives by Maxtor for example, so it might be worth doing some compatibility checks in google first, or going the sata 3 card route.