Undecided if I should upgrade or buy new

Well the CPU specs 1st,

Q6600 @ 3.4Ghz with Zalman 9700

Gigabyte EP35-DS3P (775 mobo)

8800GTS 512 (G92) @ 700/2100

Gigabyte 2GB DDR2ram (can upgrade to 4gb but its only 667)

320GB WD and 146GB VRaptor

Antec 650watt trupower or toughpower, forgot

umm I think thats it.

If I do build new, it will be a I5 or I7 8xx, 9xx is a bit too much

Either 5850 or 470

haven't decided on mobo or rest of it, it will set me back about 1500 AUD

again those are AUS prices.

Stick with your CPU and mobo, since a 3.4ghz Q6600 is still very formidable and will stay that way for some time to come. That CPU was a hell of an investment. I would say get the extra 2GB of RAM and the 5850, and then you're set for the next couple of years.

Stick with your CPU and mobo, since a 3.4ghz Q6600 is still very formidable and will stay that way for some time to come. That CPU was a hell of an investment. I would say get the extra 2GB of RAM and the 5850, and then you're set for the next couple of years.

hartsickdiscipl

yeah what he said you will yield 2 years tops..

Stick with your CPU and mobo, since a 3.4ghz Q6600 is still very formidable and will stay that way for some time to come. That CPU was a hell of an investment. I would say get the extra 2GB of RAM and the 5850, and then you're set for the next couple of years.

hartsickdiscipl

Only problem I have is, a 5850 won't even fit in my case, and could I still keep my 8800GTS in someway, thats why I was leaning to Nvidia, and considering to use it just for physx, it would be a waste just not to use it. Im just wondering if a 5850 and a 8800GTS will be fine with650watts

Oh and a 470 will fit, 5850 is a bit too big.

[QUOTE="hartsickdiscipl"]

Stick with your CPU and mobo, since a 3.4ghz Q6600 is still very formidable and will stay that way for some time to come. That CPU was a hell of an investment. I would say get the extra 2GB of RAM and the 5850, and then you're set for the next couple of years.

Amith12

Only problem I have is, a 5850 won't even fit in my case, and could I still keep my 8800GTS in someway, thats why I was leaning to Nvidia, and considering to use it just for physx, it would be a waste just not to use it. Im just wondering if a 5850 and a 8800GTS will be fine with650watts

Oh and a 470 will fit, 5850 is a bit too big.

there the same size actually.. in fact (varying on model) the hd 5850 is actualy SHORTER in size :P

also it would consume over half your psu under idle.. better make sure you have no power hogs under your hood :P

The two cards are identical in length. They are both 9.5 inches in length.

There are hacked drivers that let you run PhysX on a Nvidia GPU while using a primary ATI GPU and drivers. If you do pick up an HD 5850, I suggest looking at ones with non-stock cooling like this Gigabyte one.

As for the RAM I would suggest, like the others, to upgrade to 4GB.

As for the rest of your PC, your pretty much good. You already have a quad core. If you wanted to get a bigger HDD you could, 1TB and 2TB HDDs can achieve far better speeds than your 320GB HDD and even your 146GB VRaptor.

there the same size actually.. in fact (varying on model) the hd 5850 is actualy SHORTER in size :P

also it would consume over half your psu under idle.. better make sure you have no power hogs under your hood :PionusX

http://www.guru3d.com/article/radeon-hd-5850-review-crossfire/9

Our test system is a power hungry Core i7 965 / X58 based and overclocked to 3.75 GHz. Next to that we have energy savingfunctions disabled for this motherboard and processor (to ensure consistent benchmark results).

Our ASUS motherboard also allows adding power phases for stability, which we enabled as well. I'd say on average we are using roughly 50 to 100 Watts more than a standard PC due to these settings and then add the CPU overclock, water-cooling, additional cold cathode lights etc.

Keep that in mind. Our normal system power consumption is much higher than your average system.

System in IDLE = 168 Watts
System with GPU in FULL Stress = 348 Watts

The monitoring device is reporting a maximum system wattage peak at roughly 350Watts, andfor a PC with this high-end card,this is simply low and certainly remains within acceptable levels.

The two cards are identical in length. They are both 9.5 inches in length.

There are hacked drivers that let you run PhysX on a Nvidia GPU while using a primary ATI GPU and drivers. If you do pick up an HD 5850, I suggest looking at ones with non-stock cooling like this Gigabyte one.

As for the RAM I would suggest, like the others, to upgrade to 4GB.

As for the rest of your PC, your pretty much good. You already have a quad core. If you wanted to get a bigger HDD you could, 1TB and 2TB HDDs can achieve far better speeds than your 320GB HDD and even your 146GB VRaptor.

kilerchese

Thnx for ur help guys,

Thats a newegg website, we dont have newegg in aus. I'm just contemplating if its worth going from a q6600 to say and i5/i7 (the quads) and building a whole PC, as the graphics card and possibly a case set me back about $600. Would I see a price/performance increase in going from those, then keeping them. Also I forgot to add, I do game at 1920*1200

The only good upgrading to ATLEAST an i7 860 is that they are good for stuff like 3D model, media converting, HD encoding. Other than that your pretty good on the gaming front.

You don't need a new case for the HD 5850, it will fit just fine. The GTX 470 and HD 5850 are the SAME LENGTH. So, if you say again that they won't fit I will have to slap you through the internet.

[QUOTE="kilerchese"]

The two cards are identical in length. They are both 9.5 inches in length.

There are hacked drivers that let you run PhysX on a Nvidia GPU while using a primary ATI GPU and drivers. If you do pick up an HD 5850, I suggest looking at ones with non-stock cooling like this Gigabyte one.

As for the RAM I would suggest, like the others, to upgrade to 4GB.

As for the rest of your PC, your pretty much good. You already have a quad core. If you wanted to get a bigger HDD you could, 1TB and 2TB HDDs can achieve far better speeds than your 320GB HDD and even your 146GB VRaptor.

Amith12

Thnx for ur help guys,

Thats a newegg website, we dont have newegg in aus. I'm just contemplating if its worth going from a q6600 to say and i5/i7 (the quads) and building a whole PC, as the graphics card and possibly a case set me back about $600. Would I see a price/performance increase in going from those, then keeping them. Also I forgot to add, I do game at 1920*1200

you would but it wont be anything truly "spectacular" this is mainly because no games really need a quad core atm and those that do BARELY need one.. even the dissmally made metro 2033 barely needs one :p

and as we stated the gtx 470 and 5850 are the same size :P.. in the extreme event this is the new problem.. hd 5830 n be happy :p smaller and about 10% less preformance.. not a bad deal.

you would but it wont be anything truly "spectacular" this is mainly because no games really need a quad core atm and those that do BARELY need one.. even the dissmally made metro 2033 barely needs one :p

and as we stated the gtx 470 and 5850 are the same size :P.. in the extreme event this is the new problem.. hd 5830 n be happy :p smaller and about 10% less preformance.. not a bad deal.

ionusX

We kinda don't have the 5830 here yet, we get evrything slow and overpriced :(

And this won't just be for games, I do some basic video editing, and would benefit from a quad as I will be doing rendering soon.

[QUOTE="ionusX"]

you would but it wont be anything truly "spectacular" this is mainly because no games really need a quad core atm and those that do BARELY need one.. even the dissmally made metro 2033 barely needs one :p

and as we stated the gtx 470 and 5850 are the same size :P.. in the extreme event this is the new problem.. hd 5830 n be happy :p smaller and about 10% less preformance.. not a bad deal.

Amith12

We kinda don't have the 5830 here yet, we get evrything slow and overpriced :(

And this won't just be for games, I do some basic video editing, and would benefit from a quad as I will be doing rendering soon.

if rendering is the issue then yeah core i5 / phenom II x4 (same preformance diff price :P) might as well keep your gpu then.

You don't need to spend the extra money to get yourself a new quad core. Your fine as it is. I only justified my expense of $600+$400 for two i7 920 and two X58 motherboards because I do HD encoding, 3D modeling and like to run multi-servers for games that I play.

Having two i7 machines lets we do one project on one machine while the other is rendering or encoding data.