HELP .....3 year old BEAST of a PC

[deaduar3]

Well i got this pc in like 2003, back then the 9700 pro was the king of the hill costing an arm and a leg.My xurrent system specs are:

Intel p4 2.66
512 DDR
Some gigaybte mobo
Radeon 9200 pro 256mb

back 2-3 years ago i could run everything with this pc. These days im lucky to run games on low.And a few weeks ago i just got a 17" LCD monitor with a native resolution of 1280x1028. Major killer for gaming since my gfx card was struggling with 1027x768 and now it has to put up with this crazy resolution.

So its that time of the year again and i want to do some sort of an upgrade to improve my gaming ability. I also want to get some good speakers and a soundcard. I would like to keep the budget at around $700-1000 max.

What i had in mind is getting a 7800GS AGP card and a $100 audigy soundcard and $400 5.1 speakers.

What do You guys think i should do. THis upgrade will have to last me till the end of 2007. Will the 7800gs be too powerfull for my pc? should i just get a cheaper AGP? should i getmore RAM?... or...???

Please help me!!!

Oh and all Prices are in New Zealand dollars since thats where i live. And to get price list of the hardware here please visit www.pricespy.co.nz

What would you do in this situation.??

I want to get together with some friends in july and have a small LAN so bear this in mind as well!

THanks

 

[Yoad]

If you ask me... you went cheap even in 2003 lol...

BTW.. don't get an extra soundcard just get an onboard one, but dont get an onboard video card..

im in a rush ATM so i can't fetch you a whole build.... look aroudn theres plenty of builds for 900-1000$ +/-

You'll need a whole new thing, though.. you'r CPU Is old, you'r video card is old [if it were 9800 Pro it might have been able to holdup in medium settings even today..] and you'r mobo won't fit anything that is used today either.....[I Assume socket 478]

 

[deaduar3]

Yup i think ur right......so can anyone suggest something more detailed..?

edit:
well after soem consideration i think in the July holidays i have i want to get a new pc for around $1700 this must include a 5.1 speaker set and the PC. I have a monitor already.

Please look on pricespy.co.nz for price list.

 

[john3]

how bout u wait 1 or 2 months, a whole slew of new parts are coming out, specifically the Conroe and G80.

 

[NosBoost300]

If you ask me... you went cheap even in 2003 lol...

BTW.. don't get an extra soundcard just get an onboard one, but dont get an onboard video card..

im in a rush ATM so i can't fetch you a whole build.... look aroudn theres plenty of builds for 900-1000$ +/-

You'll need a whole new thing, though.. you'r CPU Is old, you'r video card is old [if it were 9800 Pro it might have been able to holdup in medium settings even today..] and you'r mobo won't fit anything that is used today either.....[I Assume socket 478]

and no, if he's going to put out the money for an expensive sound system, i would highly recommend an audigy z2's or whatever it is, or an x-fi music one, that'll stray around 100 dollars, and for speakers, you don't need to spend 400 dollars, just grab the z5500 from logitech, 1000 watt peak, insane loudness and surround sound. And i think you could even go for a 6800gs agp if you want, and it really depends on ur mobo if its4x or 8x agp, if its a 4x.. your screwed, if not, your good to go. But if you do need a new cpu, i would really suggest you just start a new build, you could keep your hard drive, cd drives, possibly ram, and if your power supply is any good you could keep that too.

 

[MrCoffee]

Depends on how much you feel like waiting, if you can wait 2-3 months then you will definately want to be looking at the next gen of intel chips i.e. Conroe and also as has been said new dx10 gfx cards will be out soon.

If I were you I would wait till then and perhaps in the meantime just get and extra 512 ram and a better gfx card.

If you can't wait or you don't have the budget to upgrade now and build a new system in a few months then you probably want to be looking at and AM2 based system, as AMD have released this new socket today I believe.

 

[deaduar3]

By all means i can wait 2-3 months, But are you sure the new generaton cards will be out then?. And in the mean time ill guess ill get something like a 6600gt.

should be enough to play doom3, and most wanted right?

 

[NosBoost300]

ya a 6600 get should get by on medium for doom, and most wanted probably high without the AA and AF

 

[tehdigit]

the cards arent comming out in 2-3 months
try early 2007

conroe is comming to us in a few months
im not sure about anything else.

 

[NosBoost300]

ya, i don't see the g80's coming out any time soon either.. but you never know, they said june before, i havent been reading if they pushed that back or not.. but i wouldnt doubt it, it would surprise me if it actually came out june... it sucks cuz the 7900's are still only what 3 months old at most?