Upgrade Time Help Please

[Phil Gr]

I know this is a common theme but i need help please, things have moved on soo much i have lost track of what is good and what is not.

Current PC Spec

Motherboard - DFI LAN Party NFII Ultra B
Processor - AMD Athlon 2500 Mobile (overclocked)
Memory - 1 Gig Ram (Corsair i think)
Video - AIW 9800
HD 1 - 2 x 37 Gig WD Raptors In Raid 0 SATA
HD 2 - 2 x 160 gig Samsung Spinpoint Raid 0 SATA
DVDRW - Lite-On - LDW-811S
DVD - Samsung DVD SD616

Usage
I used to play a lot of FPS games but time now limits this activity so gaming is not such an priority
What i would like is a very Fast Photoshop Machine

Budget
Tough one, funds are tight so say £300

Thanks in advance

 

[ukdave]

Difficult one, personnally i'd wait until you had a slightly higher budget, 400-500, 500 being preferable.

Then you could get a 939 mobo, 939 chip, new GPU and keep your RAM and everything else.

You're in a difficult situation because with AMD and Intel's current generation platforms all now on DDR2 and PCIe you could upgrade everything. You could even go for a lower end Conroe setup if you could get some DDR2 RAM.

If it was me i'd ditch the lot, but you'd have to wait until you had some more £££. You may also need a new PSU which would increase the cost a bit.

If your budget is not flexible then maybe a 939 package which includes a mobo with AGP so you can upgrade your GPU later.

 

[lee87]

You could upgrade to a decent skt 939 system but the cpu wouldn't be very upgradable. If you can go £20 over the budget then change the 3800+ for a X2 3800+.

GX-044-CO Connect3D ATI Radeon X1800 XT 256MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail (GX-044-CO) 1
£136.95 £136.95
CP-116-AM AMD Athlon 64 3800+ Venice 90nm (Socket 939) - Retail (ADA3800BPBOX) (CP-116-AM) 1
£66.95 £66.95
MB-002-AK Asrock 939Dual-SATA2 (Socket 939 & Upgradable to AM2) AGP & PCI-Express Motherboard (MB-002-AK) 1
£34.50 £34.50
Subtotal £238.40
VAT £41.72
Total £280.12

 

[Tetras]

Edit: I was typing when above was posted but i'll leave mine as is, kinda works with it

Shopping Cart (Prices in British Pounds)
Asrock ConroeXFire-eSATA2 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
£51.95
Intel Core 2 DUO E6300 "LGA775 Conroe" 1.86GHz (1066FSB) - Retail
£129.95
Corsair 1GB DDR2 Value Select PC5300 Dual Channel Kit (2x512MB)
£59.95
Subtotal £241.85
Shipping (City Link Parcel Next Day (Delivered Mon-Fri)) £8.25
VAT £43.77
Total £293.87

Could upgrade to 2GB of Ram later. You can't just use any old power supply for that though, something like a Seasonic S12 430 would cover it but is another £40 odd on top, then you'd need a graphics card and it'd end up closer to £400.

X2 3800+ 939 or Am2 are £120 now, could get a cheapish mobo like Asrock DualSATA and use current ram and graphics card (if 939 board) and another matched pair for 2GB total. New PSU if you need one. Would be £270 or so (including a PSU). Then you could go for AM2 daughter board and new graphics card later.

Asrock are going to do an AGP 8x board and an AGP 8x / PCI-E 16x (running at 4x) for Conroe neither of which will be that expensive (limited upgrade options though). For your uses I'd try get 2GB of Ram and a dual core CPU, might even be more worthwhile just getting 2GB for current system until you can afford something bigger.