Upgrade or start from scratch? Help me out, um, bitches!

[Legoshoes]

I'm back in employment and looking to get myself a better rig for the future. My clunker works well enough but having to open her up so I can blow a fan on the inside (which, for all intents and purposes, probably does between 'fuck' and 'all') to play Mass Effect 2 at 800x600 resolution isn't my idea of fun. So I'm wondering if, given I want to upgrade the processor & motherboard, at least, whether it'll be easier to start from scratch & salvage certain things from my computer or just add a few things to my current setup. (apologies in advance for the dell-ness. i was young and foolish when i got it)

Here's what i have at the moment. I can probably save, realistically, about £500 over the next few months, otherwise i'll have to switch my pot-noodle rations for something slightly less edible. like paper.

[Dr. kitteny berk]

I'd probably look at a full build....

but a new cpu and gpu will help a great deal.

[Dog Pants]

Just from seeing the word Dell I'd say upgrade is unlikely to be a great option. Not that I dislike Dells, but they seem to use custom cases which make upgrading near impossible. Looking at that though if you built from scratch you could save some cash on stuff you have already; your monitor looks nice, your OS doesn't need upgrading, and 4Gb of RAM should be plenty (and be upgraded later when you have more cash). I think your CPU is about the same as mine - they're not really that important any more - but not upgrading it might nerf you later on by limiting your upgrade options. Hopefully a bigger nerd than me can tell you about that. A new motherboard will be on the cards if it's any kind of substantial upgrade, so you'll want a new case and PSU to make it happy, and the graphics card is well behind the times. Lastly you'll want a bigger HDD. You can get massive ones dirt cheap now (I think my 2TB was about £60), so there's no reason not to. Can you get that for £500? Maybe not cutting edge stuff, but I'm sure you could get an improvement. I've not done a major upgrade in a few years though so I'm not sure what to replace it with. I usually take a look in PCG for their current gaming rig, they usually price something up for about £800 which will play whatever you throw at it, but with your existing bits you might be able to cut that down to £500.

[Legoshoes]

Coolio. Thanks. I'll pick up the latest PCG next time i'm around some shops and see what i can utilise. I think a new case, motherboard, PSU and graphics card will see me right for a while, and make it easier to upgrade other stuff when i have the money.

[Thompy]

Looking to the future PC games are starting to bother with the increased power rather than sticking to 360/PS3 standards. With that in mind, if you want to appreciate upcoming games like BF3 in some kind of decent way you're looking at replacing motherboard, CPU, GPU. You're RAM is DDR2 so that won't be supported (I think) so you'll have to replace that too. What's your PSU wattage? New dies draw less power than they used to, but you'll need to check that, and if it's old enough it might not have appropriate ATX connectors.

I think you're looking at a new build really. £500 is a bit of a stretch. £600-700 will get you something above average. I paid £800 2-3 years ago for my i7 system and other than the 4850 GPU it is well above spec for anything releasing in the foreseeable future.

EDIT: Bit-Tech Buyer's Guide is a decent go-to. And oh yeah, concentrate on your choice of motherboard first, that's what determines upgradability (can't go wrong with an Asus P67). That's why I got a 4850, knowing that I'd be able to stick something else in some considerable time later.

[Legoshoes]

The PSU is 300W i think. Taking a look at it, it says "AcBel PC6035" so i'm assuming that's the name. i must've bought this thing in 2008-ish... Just after VAT went down to 15%
Edit: according to google it has:
1 x 24-pin ATX Connector
1 x 4-pin P4 Connector
1 x Floppy Connector
4 x SATA Connector

[Thompy]

300W is too low really. 500W would be enough.

The 4-pin thing is for the CPU, modern boards have an 8-pin connection. 4-pin will work, but you'll be feeding your CPU less power so high end stuff and overclocking wouldn't be a recommendation, but I don't think you're thinking about that anyway.

Also I'm guessing you missed off 4-pin molex connectors (on top of the floppy and sata connectors).

[FatherJack]

Your motherboard, RAM and CPU really all need to be upgraded at the same time, the RAM to DDR3 and the motherboard/CPU to a matching socket type, likely 1155. Any money spent upgrading just one will be wasted money in the long term, but a ~3G quad core socket 775 processor (c. £100) in your existing motherboard would probably give you a year or two's grace, as a full upgrade of all three would probably put you over budget.

The major upgrade needs to be the GPU (£150+), and sadly they mostly have pretty hefty power requirements. Typically shop-bought PCs have the smallest, cheapest PSU they can get away with. Depending on the graphics card you'll need a decent make rated at least 450W, but 650-800W to be on the safe side - budget at least £100 for that. The GPUs usually need extra power connectors, often called PCI-E connectors, and come in two sizes, though adapters are most commonly provided.

Before doing anything, check you can get into the BIOS of the Dell motherboard - I've encountered some that are locked out, meaning they were effectively scrap. Your Dell copy of Windows will also refuse to install on what it thinks is a "new" machine, but you can get around it with a downloaded CD of your Windows version plus a phone call to MS where you punch some validation numbers in to verfiy the key printed on the sticker on the Dell's case.

[Legoshoes]

I upgraded from Fista, so i've got the Win7 disks lying around somewhere.
Looking around, it seems i could get a Radeon HD 4850 for a decent price. How good would that be?

Also, it looks like the motherboard can only handle dual-core processors, thanks for that, dell.

I think this may be a case of wishing upon a star or being a really good boy for santa this year.

[Dog Pants]

DDR2 isn't supported any more? Crikey.

[Legoshoes]

This is quick and dirty amazoning, but does this look good as a basis?
http://i.imgur.com/m2a09.png

[deject]

DDR2 isn't supported any more? Crikey.

The industry has been on DDR3 for a couple years now.

[Thompy]

This is quick and dirty amazoning, but does this look good as a basis?
http://i.imgur.com/m2a09.png

If that's what you want to spend then that's a pretty good spec. I couldn't comment on those specific makes/models though. RAM is so cheap I'd certainly consider 8GB (6GB is pointless with sandybridge as it's dual channel only and 3GB modules don't exist).

I'd say no to a 4850. It's what I have and although still capable (Crysis on high settings) it won't last much longer (I won't be playing BF3 with it). It's also DX10.1 only, and while some would say DX11 isn't necessarily essential (especially considering the performance hit) I don't see the point in limiting yourself now. If you don't want to go up into the 68xx range then a 5850 is very good value at the moment. It'll out do a 6850,is £50 cheaper, and using the slightly older architecture isn't a big deal. I believe Nvidias at that price point aren't up to scratch.

[Legoshoes]

I think this'll have to be a gradual build, getting maybe one or two components every time i get paid and, if i'm at uni, seeing if i can save enough money incrementally to get a new bit of gear every now and then.

[fabyak]

Honestly, rather than buy bits and bobs, put the money you would have spent away (e-savings or something) and then buy it all in one hit because by the time you get the bits for a full system you would have been able to get better components for your money

[Dr. kitteny berk]

What Fab said.

[deject]

Honestly, rather than buy bits and bobs, put the money you would have spent away (e-savings or something) and then buy it all in one hit because by the time you get the bits for a full system you would have been able to get better components for your money

QFT

Save up for a whole complete kit.

[Legoshoes]

Right you are, wise ones. Savings account!

[Legoshoes]

what are peoples opinions on semi-pre-built,barebones kits like this?
for the price i'm not expecting much but it looks competent. thoughts?

[Stoat]

what are peoples opinions on semi-pre-built,barebones kits like this?
for the price i'm not expecting much but it looks competent. thoughts?

Bundles seem a better idea than Barebones. There's nothing to gain from getting the Case, PSU and Mainboard as a set, while buying Mainboard, CPU and Memory together as least guarantees that they're compatible.