Time for me to upgrade my PC?

[chesirecat1701]

ahhh well like said it is a matter of personal preference but you can't deny the Rampage II Extreme when it comes to bada** boards, anyways yeh i7 it, being as you have a case/HDD/dvd and all the good stuff you'd be in a good shape, could probably snag a i7 920/a Moderate x58 mobo and a nice set of DDR3 for around $700 but that PSU would be in question and OC'ing would be too much on it.

Unless you playing hard core resolutions (19*12 and up) with all the eye candy I'd suggest a 4870 512 MB and a E8400 and you'd run perfectly fine for FlightSimX and the other stuff. It'd run you about $340 w/shipping and you could squeeze in a nice Vista upgrade and a good set of PC6400 4Gb ram for another $110

edit:although I don't know if that ancient chipset on your board supports the new E series and if not hopefully it has a BIOS out that does

 

[King$nake]

ancient chipset? Man - how times change, haha. I remember when the P5B deluxe was hot stuff.

Anyways - you mentioned the Vista upgrade. Is it now safe to upgrade to Vista for gaming?

 

[Whirlwind]

So...are you guys saying this.
New mobo...new cpu....new ram= better Gaming Performance over
OLD setup with ...4gb ram....new video card?

 

[AP4LIFETN]

its really not worth it unless you were to build a new system from the ground up.. your gaming experience won't increase that much if you kept the same graphics card, likewise, that PSU would hold you back from going dual graphics.

I'd say get a E8XXX series and a newer graphics card.

 

[Whirlwind]

its really not worth it unless you were to build a new system from the ground up.. your gaming experience won't increase that much if you kept the same graphics card, likewise, that PSU would hold you back from going dual graphics.

I'd say get a E8XXX series and a newer graphics card.

That is kind of what I was getting at...I am in no way an expert in building pc's, but from my experience with games....and I have played alot of them I have come to find out that more ram is a better upgrade than faster ram....I mean 4gb pc 800 better than 2gb of faster ram.....your cpu is fine for games....the Video Card is the single most important component for gaming performance....this is only based on gaming performance however....If you need your pc to do benchmarking and the likes....then I am sure the faster ram and more powerful cpu and the likes makes more of a difference.
The cpu is still important for gaming, but you have a dual core overclocked to 3.0 Ghz....that is a good gaming cpu.

I have a core 2 duo at 2.4 Ghz...when i overclock it, I do see a very small increase in my gaming performance....but not very much....my increase in ram and my new video card however....made a nice upgrade in performance

Again...this is only my opinion and I only have my personal experiences to go by...anyway you decide to go you are gonna have a much better pc than you have now...but for PURE GAMING PLEASURE....you are gonna want to upgrade that video card over the cpu in my opinion.

Enjoy your pc, which ever way you decide to upgrade.

 

[Tenenbaum]

My opinion?
Save the money for a whole new build later on.
It will be cheaper then.

Especially if you can run the game as it is. (Without to much lag)

If your looking for a quick, but small fix, buy a new video card. And save the rest of the money for a later, much newer, much better build.

 

[Stryker_77]

If u just want to play flight simulatorX maxed out then get a decent gpu...(hd4850 or hd4870) n 4gigs of ram. Core i7 would be an overkill for flghtsimulatorx. Save ur money for later upgrades. If u can max out ur game for 300 bucks then why do u want to spend a fortune? Plus ur new gpu could be used in future upgrades!

 

[King$nake]

My opinion?
Save the money for a whole new build later on.
It will be cheaper then.

Especially if you can run the game as it is. (Without to much lag)

If your looking for a quick, but small fix, buy a new video card. And save the rest of the money for a later, much newer, much better build.

Between you Whirlwind's post, I am thinking now of just getting a nice GPU an possible a CPU. Will my current Power Supply be fine with a new GPU and CPU? (Im thinking quad core)?

Also, what is the best GPU card out there now? I remember when I first build my PC, the 8800GTS I purchased was one of the best. What would be the equivalent card today?

 

[Hefemeister]

gtx 280 or 260 if you want to save some cash.

 

[saltynay]

Gtx 260 is about to be revamped I say wait a month if your happy with current performance why change? I have sli 8800gts got the first one back in 2006 me thunks when they were the second best card on the market got the second one recently did give a significant performance boost however this year I am looking to upgrade to a 260 55nm core 216 and using one of the old 8800gts in a media pc and the other as a dedicated physx card.