PC Upgrade Advice

The23rdman

The23rdman

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Dean
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I've decided to bite the bullet and get a pc that'll actually allow me to work at a decent rate.

I'm looking at this one of the bay, but I'm open to building one if anyone thinks I can do better for the money.
 
Well, I currently use an old p4 and my mobo wont allow any further upgrades. It's so slow it's untrue.

I run CS5 and LR3
 
To get the most out of a system with that uses CS, more Ram and bigger CPU is something to look out for. I run a Q6600 (Quad Core @ 3.4GHZ with 4GB) and when processing 200MB RAW files it brings my PC to a holt.

I have itunes, Canon Viewer work, utorrent, and Opera running in the back. It still stuggles. Maybe another 4GB will work.
 
Okay, tell me what I need and how to get it cheapest - don't mind a build. money is rather tight hence my looking at this tower.
 
I'd have to add that I never listen to music on my pc or download whilst working.
 
About half that, Ali, which is why I'd probably consider a parts build instead. I don't need an OS, mouse and keyboard - just bare bones and pretty quick.

edit: Neil, about a couple of hundred.
 
I don't think its "worth" the upgrade then tbh, be better to save your money and get the suggested deal above (or similar)
 
£78 AMD Athlon II X4 Quad Core 635 2.90GHz processor specs really well on benchmarks for the price @ http://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu_look...hlon+II+X4+635
£85 Gigabyte GA-870A-UD3 AMD 870
£65 Samsung SpinPoint F3 500GB SATA-II 16MB
£19 Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro Rev 2
£42 Samsung SH-B083L/BSBP 8x BluRay ROM
£130 Powercolor ATI Radeon HD 5770 1024MB GDDR5
£83 OCZ Reaper Low-Latency 4GB (2x2GB) DDR3 12800C6 (1600MHz) Dual-Channel (OCZ3RPR1600C6LV4GK)

From Overclockers.co.uk

You can give or take a few minus things.
 
Plenty to think about, thank you.


(Think I'll do as Ali suggests and hold fire for now)
 
Building and buying pre-built, the prices are about the same, unless you want something special... (eg. SSD and no hard drives, or a monster gfx card, or a specific motherboard, etc etc)
 
Yeah, it does look that way these days. I must be getting old. ;)
 
Buying prebuilt and building your own are gtetting closer price-wise, however, a lot of the porebuilt stuff cuts corners with hardware (I've a Asus P5N-Sli from a packard bell prebuilt that is so stripped down it's unreal). IMHO, you will always get better kit by building yourself, especially if you're on a budget.


If I may suggest a build:

Barebones case, £90: http://www.ebuyer.com/product/191652
2gb kingstom mem, £30.99: http://www.ebuyer.com/product/148853
Intel E5300 CPU, £49.55: http://www.ebuyer.com/product/155434
Seagate 320gb 7200rpm SATA HDD, £31.99: http://www.ebuyer.com/product/142569

the onboard graphics will do until you can afford to upgrade, and it'll be about a gazillion times faster than your current.
 
Thanks, Mike, I'll look into that one, mate. :)
 
Interesting stuff, Mike, thanks...I like the look of the next one up with the quad core.
 
Essentially there's pleanty you can get for <£200, and if you're happy making a few sacrifices and 'I'll buy that later' choices, there's no reason you can't build yourself a damm fine machine for pittance.

For the record, I've built myself a PC based around that processor I linked to you for £140 - admittedly I had a lot of kit donated though and I've got many friends with bits of PC for sale, so I was able to scrape together a good deal.
 
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