coupla small upgrades

[Elric]

ok, Im upgrading my computer at last, and just looking for a few handy pointers.

Planning on a bit of new memory

New GFX card

urm... thats it.

Anyone know any good UK sites that I can look at prices n stuff?

local shop is doin a Creative GFFX 5700 for £124
and some DDR 3200 512mb for about £50.

linky for local store too

www.pc4less.org

[Eddie]

I would try www.komplett.co.uk

Located somewhere abroad.. but has really nice prices :D

Especially for the UK.

I think I saw a Sapphire 9600XT 128Mb for around 100 pounds, which I might be investing in soon*.

Eddie

* when I get some damned money

[Psyco Groupie]

dont scrimp on ram, get branded.

gfx doesnt matter as much cos they are usually just rebadged

[Elric]

cool tip on the memory, I'll looky into it.

Whats this whole TwinMOS thing thats listed with memory, what significance would that have to me?

[Psyco Groupie]

TwinMOS is a brandname, rather confusing since 'dual channel' mem came in - dual chan is just using two sticks of ram at once to increase bandwidth

other good brands in no particular order :

Corsair, Kingston, Mushkin, TwinMOS, OCZ, Samsung, Geil

Some are btter than others in extreme overclocking situations etc, the only other real diff is price :P

Another thing to look at is latency

ram all has a speed (2100 2700 3200 3500 might ring some bells) - this denotes how much bandwidth the ram has

but it also has latency, the main controlling factor is cycle length (CAS) you get 3, 2.5, 2 usually - this denotes the 'access time"

there are super low latency ram which has faster other latencies which will be rated somethign like '2-2-2-6'

[L0KI]

Dabs.com (http://www.dabs.com) - Got my GeForce 4 Ti from here for £77

Ebuyer (http://www.ebuyer.co.uk) - Very cheap - Incredibly fast delivery, delivery is cheap as hell.

[Elric]

thanks Psycho.

I know about the whole rating thing, My board can up to DDR3200 so Im probvably gonna go for that. I guess I'll check out branded prices too.

suual latency for DDR3200 seems to ber a standard CAS of 2 or 2.5 if Im reading right.

[El_MUERkO]

www.komplett.co.uk

www.overclock.co.uk

www.overclockers.co.uk

I'd go with the Sapphire Atlantis Radeon 9800 Pro 128Mb Retail Boxed (http://www.overclock.co.uk/customer/product.php?productid=16709&cat=253&page=1) from www.overclock.co.uk for £135.42 ex.VAT -> £159.12 inc.VAT

[Psyco Groupie]

Originally posted by Elric
thanks Psycho.

I know about the whole rating thing, My board can up to DDR3200 so Im probvably gonna go for that. I guess I'll check out branded prices too.

suual latency for DDR3200 seems to ber a standard CAS of 2 or 2.5 if Im reading right.

yeah you dont usually find CAS 3 3200 :)

Get CAS 2 if you can afford it, and the super low latency stuff if you can afford again :)

[Elric]

Originally posted by Psyco Groupie
yeah you dont usually find CAS 3 3200 :)

Get CAS 2 if you can afford it, and the super low latency stuff if you can afford again :)

I think i can :D (depending how much i decide to splash on the graphics card)

looks like it may be mail ordery stuff for me then, But I'll have to do it tonight so I have it for Thursday.

[numb]

Crucial is a good and cheap brand of memory. It may be identical to corsair. I cant remember for sure. I've used that in all my boxes over the past few years and it's worked great (it is known as a good brand on various hardware review sites).

[Glok]

I'm using OCZ Premier DDR3200 ram at the moment, nice stuff that runs happily at whatever settings I throw at it. I'm ordering another stick tomorrow, since I finally have some money. :)

[Anderton]

www.novatech.co.uk
Do not buy a radeon Card, trust me they are very bad. Go for a geforce, i hate my new Radeon 9600 Pro i bought, it's utter crap .. i always get bluescreens when playing games .. one problem after another, there drivers are poor also.

If i was you i'd go for a GeForce card, this is my first radeon and it stinks .. my Geforce 4 ti4400 i used to have was outstanding .. no problems.

[Glok]

My Radeon performs flawlessly. You really really need to completely cleanse your system of nVidia drivers if you switch out. Google for 'detonator destroyer', that will get you a good prog to do this.

[Xizor]

Get a Geforce FX 5900XT/SE it's cheap and good. Otherwise go for Radeon 9700/9800 pro.

[Ferabukoo]

9800 pro.. 200 dollars

[Elric]

Thankyou for all the input folks.

I was seriously looking at the ATI 9800 Pro, with some fancy heatsink thingy on it (was called the ICETEK or something), but in the end they worked out way too expensive. that and the fact theres a damned resistor in the way on me motherboard that JUST edges out over the AGP slot housing that would fuck that up, which also unfortunately ruled out the very nice Gainward GF FX 5900 with fancy ass heatsink too :(

I kinda accidentally went a bit daft on HMV's website with the DVD section too so reduced the budget a bitty :lol:

Used Novatech in the end.

New PSU

Leadtek GF FX 5900 Ultra (http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/specpage.html?LEA-FX59XT)

Crucial DDR 2700 512 memory stick. (too match up with currently installed memory)

should have the stuff by tommorow :D

Wheeee for special delivery

[FirestarXL]

http://www.pcindex.co.uk can be useful.