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tech questions on upgrading system - Ldy, the lemony, ligerish ducttaparian's Magic Treehouse of Lost Thoughts
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03:21 pm March 14th, 2007
ldy
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tech questions on upgrading system
I'm noodling getting a new motherboard and cpu.

Now, here's my quandry... I have two component parts, and I need to decide if they're worth keeping...

Winfast A250 Ti-4600
This was a great card when I bought it-- it's STILL a great card. Is it good enough to warrant the purchase of a board with AGP instead of PCIexpress?

Creative Audigy 2ZS Platinum
While this piece of hardware is an evil little monster and absolutely does NOT play nice with others, it does have front inputs, and gives stillar performance once tamed. I'm hoping a new mobo might make it happier.

I'd also like to keep my Enermax Noisetaker II 480W PS if at all possible.

I'm considering moving from Athlon to Pentium because of heat issues in the room, but I understand that Athlons run a lot cooler than they once did. I'm also considering dual-core.

Any words of wisdom from the peanut gallery?
13 tall tales or Tell me a story
Comments
Thread started by The Ultimate Penultamor
alcestis From: alcestis Date: March 14th, 2007 07:23 pm (UTC) (permalink)
mac
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ldy From: ldy Date: March 15th, 2007 02:20 pm (UTC) (permalink)
I'm the PC guy, with a video camera strapped to his head.
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Thread started by Mr Lem
happymrlocust From: happymrlocust Date: March 14th, 2007 07:38 pm (UTC) (permalink)
The problem with getting a motherboard AGP instead of PCIExpress is that when you eventually need to upgrade the card, and you might as things are starting to require the features of new cards, you will have to buy yet another motherboard. Games like Battlefield 2 and Supreme Commander will not start with the Ti series of cards (or at least, they won't with my Ti4400). I don't suppose there are any boards that come with AGP *and* PCIExpress that'll let you get a bit more life out of the Ti4600?

Can't help you with the soundcard sadly, as I myself haven't upgraded from the SoundBlaster Live! 5.1. Actually, I think I might have a Guillemot Hercules Fortissimo in there at the moment.
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ldy From: ldy Date: March 15th, 2007 02:21 pm (UTC) (permalink)
I don't think there's much out there (if anything) that has both... but your point about PCIe is well taken. That's definitely the route to take. Thank you!
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Thread started by AndySoft
andysoft From: andysoft Date: March 14th, 2007 08:09 pm (UTC) (permalink)
Erm, I would not call a GeForce4 card great anymore :) OF course it all depends on what you need it for, but anything 3D that thing is ancient. Time to move onto something better, AGP is dead, you can get however a decent card nowadays for cheap and it's cheaper than the same card in AGP...if it's even available.

Soundblaster stuff as long as you can get drivers working last till the end of time.

That PSU should be fine, unless you plan on getting some crazy card that has multiple GPUs on it and sucks wattage like a $2 ho.
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ldy From: ldy Date: March 15th, 2007 02:22 pm (UTC) (permalink)
I don't want a power hog, but you're right about AGP. It's not quite dead, but dead enough to move on to PCIe! Thanks! :)
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Thread started by Cj
ztrooper From: ztrooper Date: March 14th, 2007 08:11 pm (UTC) (permalink)
Flat out... the card is no longer usable with some games and entertainment programs. Totally not worth handicapping your future upgradabilty by forcing you to get an AGP board now. Not to mention that AGP boards now will cripple your choices of CPU's to get.

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ldy From: ldy Date: March 15th, 2007 02:23 pm (UTC) (permalink)
Yup, time to jump off the AGP bandwagon, for sure! Thanks :)
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Thread started by  
From: zztzed Date: March 14th, 2007 08:14 pm (UTC) (permalink)
Seconding everyone who says "don't stick with AGP", for pretty much the same reasons.

Also: modern motherboards with onboard sound should have headers for front audio jacks, so if your case has front audio jacks, there's no reason to stick with the Audigy if it's giving you trouble. Even if it doesn't you can probably find some front-audio-jack widget to stick in an empty drive bay. Of course, if you need MIDI, you may want to stick with the Audigy.
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ldy From: ldy Date: March 15th, 2007 02:25 pm (UTC) (permalink)
The audigy is a beyotch, but that's probably due to A. my ancient mobo and B. Win2k. Remarkably few other cards come with front audio jack widgets. If I can stick with this one, I will-- I think it will have far fewer problems with XP and a new mobo.

And AGP is out the window :) thanks!

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Thread started by green_34
green_34 From: green_34 Date: March 15th, 2007 06:58 am (UTC) (permalink)
My 2 cents is:

I think it's worth keeping the Audigy, you're right, once you can tame the beast, it's a solid, good sounding option for what you are likely to use it for.

although I don't know much about the PS, it sounds like it's worth keeping.

Ditch the vid card, get a new one.

And finally, go the dual core, although I don't use it on the main box (just the lappy), I'm thinking I should.


HTH (hope this helps)
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ldy From: ldy Date: March 15th, 2007 02:26 pm (UTC) (permalink)
We've pretty much come to the same conclusions, I think :) Thank you so much!
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Comment by It is hard / to be good
echo_off From: echo_off Date: March 15th, 2007 03:17 pm (UTC) (permalink)
With quad-cores coming out later this year, are you sure you want to buy a dual-core now?

Oh and I have the same soundcard. It's not a great team-player sometimes under XP either.
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