How would you upgrade an old agp set-up? $400-500 limit

[BigJim]

My current system is an Athlon 3500+, 1 gb corsair extreme ram ddr400, asus a8v deluxe mb and a 6800gt graphic card. Also my current psu is an antec smart power 500 watt. I made a post earlier about a new system I was going to build but some things changed financially (daughter needs to get braces) and I have about $400-500 max to spend atm.

I was thinking about just get a 1950 pro agp card for $200.00 or so and being done with it, however a friend of mine suggested that I buy the ASRock mb and a core 2 processor. The mb only cost $62.00 and the processor $125-225 (depending on which one). Not sure which core 2 to get as in the 4400, 6600 or in between so any suggestions on that would be appreciated also. Here is a link to the board.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16813157107


From all the reviews I have read it seems to do exactly as advertised without any problems. It will support both agp and pci as well as ddr400 and ddr2 667. I heard it might possibly support ddr2 800 but not sure on that one.


Anyways my question is this.

1.) Should I just upgrade to a 1950 pro agp card and call it good.

2.) Buy the board and processor and use my old ddr 400 and 6800gt untill I can afford more upgrades?

Any other suggestions would be great but please remember I have $400-500 max to spend. I know if I buy the board and a processor it would leave me with some cash left to maybe purchase a graphic card also but I am not sure what to choose in the $200-250 price range.


As for uses, I play online games (EQ & WoW) and plan to do some photo editing soon. I know I could save another $200-300 and get a fairly new set-up but to be honest something would come along and take my play money away and if I can get away with an upgrade that will last another year maybe two then thats fine with me.

Thanks again

 

[apt403]

I just wouldnt buy right now. Save your money.

For one, P35-based mobos are getting cheaper by the day. There's already a board available for $100. P35, amoung other things, supports the new C2D's that have a 1333mhz FSB.

DDR2 ram is also going down in price, you can get a 2gb kit for under $100.

There's an Intel price drop coming up, July 22nd actually. You'll be able to get a Q6600, the quad core brother of the E6600, for $266. Intel is also going to release the new 1333mhz FSB chips that day. One of them, the E6750, is only going to cost $183! The E6700 costs over $300 ATM.


Also, The HD2600 series, ATI's midrange line of dx10 gfx cards, is going to be released soon. There's really no viable option ATM for you budget. The 8800gts 320mb is selling for around $270 at the cheapest, and the other dx10 cards that you could afford (8600gts & 8600gt) are overpriced and underpowered. When the 2600 cards start shipping, you'll have some new options, or at the very least it'll cause Nvidia to drop the price of the 8800gts.

So, continue saving your money. You'll be able to get much better parts for less money if you wait a month or two.

 

[g-paw]

You could put together an AMD X2 3600 dual core with a 7600GT video card and 2GB of RAM for less than $500 if you can use your current case and drives. Probably could even go with the X2 3200 and would be very upgradeble. Sounds like you have kids that are of an age that discretionary income will be tough for a few years. Eventually you could get a new case and drives and give the old machine to the kids

 

[BigJim]

How much do you think I would gain performance wise with the ASRock mb and 6600 cpu along with the 6800gt, 1 gig of corsair ddr400? To upgrade to that would be about $260.00. It would be a big boost cpu wise but the rest would obviously be the same. I know I'll only have 1 gig of ddr400 and a 6800gt card would kinda suck but I plan on going to atleast an 8800gts or whatever is the best mid-range card in about 3 months. Also when ready it's not a big lose when I have to replace the mb since it's only about $60.00.

I also thought of buying maybe a 4400x2 939 chip for about $130.00 along with a 1950 pro card so total would be about $330-350.

What about just adding an agp video card for now for about $180-250? i was looking at this one:


http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=10005264

From the reviews I have read it seems to be the best as far as no problems. The Gecube x1950xt card seems to have some serious cooler problems although it's a better card than the 1950 pro above.