Upgrades Advice Please!

Don't fancy an i5 tbh, i was looking at i7 930 but thought i'd save some dough to spend on a better GPU. It's either 1366 or AM3

What's your budget?

A 1366 build is gonna generally cost significantly more than AM3. That 5870 VaporX is supposed to be a cracking card though, so instead you could save the money and put it towards better CPU/RAM/Mobo. What res do you game at?

Btw, you could save a bit by getting a 5870 from OCUK as they're currently selling them at under £300.

1680x1050 Budget @ £800 - £900. AM3 coming in about £880 atm, i7 about £1020 Could go 965 i guess.

Even though I know this is a waste of time but why 1055/1090/i7 over the amd 965?

Is it you read Custom PC and you select the top end parts because they say so?

Seeming you are still on skt 939 any of the above will be a vast improvement performance wise in gaming and applications. So I seriously doubt if you went the 965 route you would notice any kind of performance deficit from the other processors.

Don't splooge 300 quid on a gfx card for 1680x1050. A 5850/470 will suffice.

Don't get the coolit/corsair watercooling solutions. I don't consider them to be high end air cooling and certainly not even close to low end water. AT best they have the performance of budget air coolers and should be viewed as such. They are ideal for small factor pc's and people who value low noise operation rather than outright cooling ability. Sure they are fine for cpu's operating at stock speeds or older cpu's.

here is my midrange gaming system, fast memory, 1TB sataiii hdd....

I've not been able to upgrade my machine for about 5-6 years ago, so i do want the best sort of gear that will do me as long again, or an upgradeable base which will be relatively future proof for the same sort of time ( i know that's a white elephant in the PC world) And Custom PC, PC Format are my Bibles. LoL

i know what you mean BullyBeef, but for me personally the era of spending a lot of money on a system with the idea of keeping that system for 3 -5 years is gone.

I have been building systems since the 386 days. I have owned AMD fx chips, nvidia 6800ultra, and ati 850xt platinum and 3dfx cards in single and dual card configs. I had systems that where running 4 gig of memory when 2 gig was a lot for most people, heck even my 486 system had 64/128meg of RAM, in simms. I have spend stupid amounts of money on PCS and back then it was worth doing so, in most cases.

But that was back in the day, when there was far more competition and build quality was excellent for a reasonable price. Things also did not change as quickly as they do now.

The way i look at a system build now is purely on performance vs value for money. And i am always looking to upgrade in 18 months, 24 months at the latest. My dx10 vga card lasted less than 2 years, cpus and motherboards are changing so fast and the new tech in the technology makes the upgrade worth while, but not at the high end/bleeding edge.

I think of it like this. £800 / 18 is lets say £45 a month. Now the system i speced above will do more than fine in terms of performance vs value for 18 months. I then start putting away £50 a month to buy my next system. The high end/bleeding edge stuff is all just over priced marketing now days.

Last months edition of Custom PC had an article on building an upgradeable budget gaming PC for about £400...

Shame I didn't see this thread earlier, I've just stuck my rig on eBay.

Originally Posted by BullyBeef

I've not been able to upgrade my machine for about 5-6 years ago, so i do want the best sort of gear that will do me as long again, or an upgradeable base which will be relatively future proof for the same sort of time ( i know that's a white elephant in the PC world) And Custom PC, PC Format are my Bibles. LoL

Custom PC and PC Format i've been reading for years. Custom PC know what they are talking about, their tests are quite thorough and their group tests are packed with a wide range of products. PC Format i had to stop getting about a year ago and i just browse it in the supermarket just to make sure it's still **** their tests are very narrow looking and most of their group tests only have 4-6 products. it's blatantly obvious most of the writers don't really know about PC's, the only article in it worth looking at is the "ask luis" which often made me soil myself.

If you want a long range PC solution you really need to invest in an i7 1366 920/930 as much as i love AMD i can't see them being anywhere near competitive until that £1 billion intel paid them, trickles down, which i'd guess will be 18-24 months time.

Thanks for all the input peeps. I`ll keep you posted...