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I know there are lots of hardware gurus on here, so would you guys mind giving me some suggestions for hardware. I've been out of the loop for a long time .. in fact, it's 4 years a go that I did all the research to build my own PC, and since then I've ignored the hardware market, so I know very little now. Places like Toms Hardware are good at finding out about how hardware compares, but I don't really fancy spending a whole evening researching (I'm really busy at the moment).

Specifically, I want to upgrade the mobo,CPU,RAM and GPU. I currently have a gigabyte dual SLI mobo, with 2GB RAM on there, and a dual GPU 6600, and AMD4000+. I'm not sure of clock speeds, but I'm guessing if I get a brand new mobo, I'll want to get better RAM.

I think I'll throw an initial budget of £600 into the mix. Can you guys help me choose:
- Motherboard
- CPU
- Graphics card
- RAM

I'll also need a new PSU with this purchase, since my old one has started going mental, refusing to turn on, and various other strange behaviours.

Cheers for your suggestions.

I highly recommend buying a Radeon 9250. You can't beat that superiority in terms of power. Trust me.

Well, your cpu is a little weak for the other equipment you are getting, it could turn into a slight bottleneck. I recommend the 6000+ for dual core or 9950 black edition for quad core - it would really be worth the upgrade if you are getting a beast of a graphics card.

It's not necessary to go all the way to phenom II, though.

put a Hemi inside it, that should do the job

I tried that once. Only problem was that I had to pick up gas for my PC and it only got 6 cycles to the gallon.

I couldn't find that Radeon on Play when I had a look on there. Is the 250 the clock speed?

I found this package:

- Intel P45 Motherboard
- Intel Q6600 4 x 2.40Ghz
- 2x 2048Mb 800Mhz PC26400 240pin DDR2

For £320. What do you guys think? Good quad core? I know the RAM isn't DDR3. I dont think the mobo supports it either.

Then I could get:
Novatech GeForce 9800GTX+ SLI 512MB GDDR3 TV-Out/Dual DVI PCI-Express **** With Far Cry 2 FREE ****
£110

Or would 1GB be better for a GT card:
Novatech GeForce 9800GT SLI 1GB GDDR3 TV-Out/DVI PCI-Express - Retail with PhysX, CUDA & 3D? £100.

Any thoughts? That'd put me in the £450 range, which is much more comfortable.

Ok, well I guess I had to go and find out for myself. I opted for EBuyers, cos they seem to have the best overall prices. Quad core seems to be the overall best CPU. 260s seems to be the best I can get at this price range. Still not sure about DDR2 vs DDR3, but the price is significant, so I stuck with 2.

Here's what I intend to get:
£32 OCZ 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 800Mhz/PC2-6400 GOLD XTC Memory Kit CL5(5-5-5-18)
£156 Intel Core 2 Quad Q6700 2.66GHz Socket 775 1066MHz 8MB (2x4MB(4MB per core pair)) L2 Cache OEM Processor
£53 Gigabyte GA-73PVM-S2H GeForce 7100 Socket 775 onboard VGA 8 channel audio mATX Motherboard
£135 Inno3D GTX260 896MB DDR3 448bit Dual DVI HDTV Out PCI-E Graphics Card
£47 OCZ Stealth Xtream 500W PSU - 1x PCI-E 6/8pin, 2x SATA 12cm Fan
----
£422

Any comments?

I say get a slightly higher psu, like 600 or greater watts.

Running both that graphics card and that cpu on the 500w power supply won't leave much room for upgrades, if it works at all.

That's my opinion.

When buying a processor and RAM modules you have to take notice of the amount of L2 cache in the processor as well as how much RAM you are going to buy.
To further explain: a L2 cache of 512kb in size can handle caches of up to 128mb of RAM. Using my crappy mathematics skills I figured out that your Q6700 with 8mb in L2 Cache is able to handle 3GB of DDR2 ram without any bottleneck problems.
While 12mb L2 Cache; 4GB of RAM. (Correct me if my math is wrong, I suck at it).


As for your selection of RAM Modules, I know OCZ is a very good brand. So don't have much to say about that.
800mhz of DDR2 is what I am running, though I bought 1066mhz. It seems that my processor (Q6600) have trouble running the memory at that speed: the computer won't start windows, or it does, with a bluescreen after a few seconds.

As I mentioned I have a Q6600 processor. I have overclocked this to 3.0ghz without any trouble. It runs smoothly, but about 5degrees Celsius hotter than at stock clock.
The Q6700 should probably be able to run at 3.0ghz as well considering it belongs to the same series. So the only difference in buying a Q6700 over the Q6600 (Apart from being less expensive (but why?)) is the amount of stock clock speed.

Your motherboard, being a mATX, is probably too small to be working well along with the GTX260. What I mean is that the GTX260 uses two slots, so you'd end up with only one PCI slot.
The specs looks good though, being a 1333mhz FSB gives room for overclocking, if you're into that. I'm not, I just wanted to save some cash buying a quad processor that worked well overclocked to 3.0ghz instead of buying one stock clocked at 3ghz for maybe £80 more.

And finally I know absolutely nothing about the new GTX series from nVidia. My 8800GT does the job good enough. It also supports PCI-Express v2.0 which transfers data at 16MBPS instead of 8MBPS. So I bought a motherboard that took advantage of that (even though games these days aren't yet able to take full advantage of it). So if you're willing to add an additional £200 on the motherboard, and the GTX260 supports this feature, you may choose to do so.


But anyway, what do I know about computer hardware.. *awkward laugher* I don't really have any reference to back up what I've written so you'd just have to rely on someone else if you are unsure.

That's a really helpful post mate. Thanks. I'll definitely have a rethink about some of my choices. I wasn't aware that L2 cache had any relation to the amount of RAM. Interesting. Perhaps I'll look at a better motherboard too.

The stuff I want to move across is an Audigy Platnum, 2 DVD drives, and 2 HDs. I'm taking Zeke's advice and upgrading the PSU. But I dont think I'll add anything else any time soon, so I don't need a massively upgradable mobo.

Thanks for your comments. Very helpful.

If you are unsure of what PSU to buy, I can recommend the Antec NeoPower. The link will take you to the website of a 650W PSU (The one I bought).
I am very happy with this one:
* It is quiet(!)
* In the back it has lots of connections where you can connect more power cables if you need it. For example if you have 2 DVD Drives and 2 HDs you'd only need 4 molex power cables (I think you have 2 molex plugs on one cable, so that's two cables). And of course one 6 or 8 pin for the GTX (not sure how many pins it uses, but the PSU have cables for both setups). This means you won't have lots of unused cables laying around blocking the air cooling (if you use fans) and it will look tidier and cleaner.
* Uses 3x 12v at 19A each (57A total). For stability, and to handle that GPU.
* I also love the color on it! It's gray but a very strong non-glossy gray. Sweet!

I also replaced the fan on my 8800GT, bought one 120mm and two 92mm fans to keep it cool. Also I payed a little extra and got some super quiet fans. But now I can't tell if the computer is turned on or off (Well, obviously if the power indicator lamp on the cabinet is shining, the computer is on!) But I've made the mistake sometimes of turning the computer off when I wanted to turn it on, because it had gone into a screen saver mode (my screen saver is a black image Don't like that windows logo or whatever else there is), aww..

I'll also stand behind Antec PSUs 100%. I would also recommend SeaSonic. It's what I've currently used for the past year, they're near dead silent, and from what I've heard they're the one's who actually make Antec PSUs.