New Mobo&CPU, or New GPU?

W

Wheelbarrow

First time out of the vault
Hello NMA, I'm Wheelbarrow. I've been a creeper here for a while and I've finally registered.

First post, first question:

My Rig:
P4 3.00 Ghz
2 gb RAM(note:mobo does NOT support more than 2gb)
GeForce 7800GTX 256mb

Fallout 3 runs nicely at medium high settings 1680x1050.

I'd like to upgrade this holiday season to play some newer games. After some research, it seems that despite the heavier CPU reliance that new games have, a GPU upgrade will provide the biggest immediate benefit. I'm thinking about grabbing one of the 220$ GTX 260s at newegg.

My mobo was one of the dual compatible ddr/ddr2 models so it only supports 2gb maximum memory.

So, should I grab the 260, or go for a cheaper gpu in addition to a newer mb and cpu with 4 gb of ram?
 
Is the 260 even compatible with your mobo?

I mean at this rate I would upgrade to a new MoBo that has PCIe 2.0 and take advantage of a new CPU and memory - then when you DO get a 260, your MoBo can 1) handle it or (at least) 2) take advantage of it fully.
 
Seconded.

Furthermore, RAM is dirt-cheap these days.

About the 260, keep in mind that you'll need two things for it to run optimally; a mobo that will support it and an adequately powerful Power Supply Unit.

Because you don't want to overload the PSU. Bad things happen when you overload your PSU. If I hadn't rolled a successful LK check, I'd have a fried mess instead of a computer.
 
Thanks for the input. I'm pretty sure my mb supports the new card because PCIe 2.0 cards are supposedly backwards compatible with old PCIe 1.0 slots.

But it looks like I'll be getting a new mb and the GTX 260, so problem solved there. I'll have to check and make sure about that PSU.
 
Yeah most PCIe 2.0 cards will work in a 1.0 slot - the only drawback is bandwidth is lower

Honestly, I do that right now. I do want to upgrade my mobo to one that supports PCIe 2.0 eventually.
 
Seconding the Pentium IV reply. I wasn't aware of how slow my Pentium IV 3.2 2MB was until I upgraded to a Core 2 Q6600. Netburst is really the worst architecture I have seen.
 
Yeah, I think if you have a P4, then the MOBO and CPU upgrade route is a good one. I'll put it this way:

P4 3GHz era -----> E6600 era -----> E8400 era -----> i7 920 era

You don't need to go socket 1366, or even 45Nm 775 if you don't feel like it (the Q6600 is cheap and great), but the P4 really is going to be a bottleneck in new games.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top