Upgrading computer Hardware, these item good ?

JPC

- Motherboard Asus bus 1333
- Processor Intel Core 2 duo 2.33 ghz bus 1333
- 2* (1 go ddr 2)

I know in my country i can have that for 550 euros (my initial budget was 600)
Is there anything i could change here (on item list) , which would give me a minimum more speed for about 50 euros more ?

I just know ddr3 too expensive for me in france

B. Elliott

I may have noticed this post a bit sooner if it was in the computer section, but anyway. Do you have a particular Asus motherboard in mind or just any of their 1333 bus boards? You are looking in the right direction though with wanting to stick with DDR2. The performance vs. cost with DDR3 is still a little outrageous to consider it for anything close to a budget build. It the moment, more ram would be more beneficial than less faster ram.

Alex48674

Well what are you using your computer for and what OS are you running? Are you saying you can get just that for 550 euros? That seems quite expensive, here you could probably get that for $250!

JPC

Sorry for late response
i have already bought it, works well
- a P5K DDR2, double core compatible, 2 graphic card slots, motherboard
- 2.33 Ghz Dual core 2 Processor
- Corsair 800Mhz ram set

And i know its so expensive in France. Because of all those taxes everywhere.

B. Elliott

If you have a decent heatsink, that board and processor combo has some awesome overclocking potential. Even if you have just the standard Intel heatsink, you can still up it quite a bit.

Did the board come with any software for monitoring cpu and board temps? It being an Asus board i'm assuming it did. Out of curiosity, as Alex inquired, what are your plans for it?

JPC

it did

my plans : Play video games with the highest graphic quality

B. Elliott

The motherboard does play a part, but most of that is going to rely on your choice of graphics card(s). What graphics did you go with?

JPC

1950 XT Pro

B. Elliott

Does the motherboard support SLI or Crossfire? What kind of monitor do you have and what resolutions do you plan on playing the games at? The only problem i'm seeing is that the video card is little older (slower) than the potential that the motherboard holds. If you upgraded the video card and overclocked the processor just a slight amount, your game performance will increase by a considerable amount. Graphics cards seem to benefit a great amount once you reach the 3.0GHz mark with the processors. If I was to make a recommendation, I would say upgrade your graphics and overclock a bit.

http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/g...=724&chart=275

JPC

motherboard supports Crossfire i think
resolution : 1280 * 1024

but right now, works well
i have already spent a lot this year, i'll wait december for new purshasing

B. Elliott

Here's a good example showing what happens when you start to turn up the resolution, anti-aliasing and antiscopic filtering. The slower cars really start to show their Achilles heel.

http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/d...5%2C1563%2C%2C

JPC

remember that in france, for having the equivalent price :
convert 1 dollar = 1 euro (instead of 1.5 dollar = 1 euro), and add between 50 and 100 euros
everything is very expensive in france

But thanks for your information : )

B. Elliott

You're welcome. At least you rest assured that the prices will have dropped considerably by December.