[clairelovestlc]

hi everybody "Hi Dr Nick" ( sorry little simpsons humor)

you may have read my ongoing thread "computer freezing" and if your interested heres the link http://www.d-a-l.com/help/showthread.php?t=13070

Eveshams coming to pick my pc up monday and have a poke, so see if they can find out the problem, unfortunaly only my new part is covered so if it isnt the graphics card were all stumped, and theyll send it back to me in 5-7 working days, which 2 b honist is a big pain in the bum!

now enuff waffeling, im now debating when i finally get a semi working system back, wether to upgrade it or wether to buy a new one ( throwing the old oneout the 3rd story window of my house, and laugh as it smashes into smitherenes or sell it)

ive never upgraded a pc, although i did a level ict which involved having a poke inside a non working one that had died witha screwdriver and taking bits out. ive also had a look inside mine ( mainly to try and work out what the hells wrong with it)
its current specs are as follows

Evesham pc, 3 years old
Operating System: Windows XP Home Edition (5.1, Build 2600) Service Pack 2
BIOS: Award Medallion BIOS v6.0
Processor: AMD Athlon(TM) XP1800+, MMX, 3DNow, ~1.5GHz
Memory: 512MB RAM
DirectX Version: DirectX 9.0c (4.09.0000.0904)
and its got a 100gig hardrive which sincei only reformatted the thing recently is about 80% free

Display Devices
---------------
Card name: RADEON 9600 SERIES
Manufacturer: ATI Technologies Inc.
Chip type: ATI RADEON 9600 Series AGP (0x4150)
DAC type: Internal DAC(400MHz)
Display Memory: 128.0 MB
Current Mode: 1280 x 1024 (32 bit) (60Hz)
Monitor: SyncMaster 170T/770D TFT, SyncMaster Magic M17D-AN(Digital)

i do play some games on the pc ( dont laugh but im a huge sims2 fan and am interested in buying doom 3 if i can get a pc to handle it) and would like a more powerful system that can cope with 3d graphics n all that jaz at the same time i download ALOT of music, and i play about editing videos from my camcorder and editing photos from digital camera, i also use the pc for watching dvds n the usual junk.
id quite like 1gig of ram, and a nice fast good quality ati graphics card.

is this a feasible option? would it be ( relativly) easy to do?
or am i better off to give up buy a new pc, with a 64 bit processor and knowing tghat the pc will last me for a good few years?
if i buy new im looking at someing along the lines of an evesham axis 64 str, with all the added optional extras ( minus the screen as i already have a nice enuff one)
or an evesham evolution lightning, once again with all the options or finally
a dell dimension 8400 once again with all the top options
( im also open to suggestions)

and im on about a £1000 maximum budget ( im a student and i leave for university in a few months, with car insurace of over a thousand pounds due in 8 weeks..so even £1000 is gonna b a push)

thankyou so much

clairey

[jephree]

As far as upgrading: what is the current Evesham model?

Run this scan & post back the info under these headers:

http://www.belarc.com/free_download.html

System Model

Main Circuit Board

Memory Modules

Local Drive Volumes

We can then see what upgrades your current system will support.

Upgrading is easy & educational

As to your dream machine:

Evolution Lightning (Pentium 4 3gig) £728.99 inc VAT (£620.42)

Axis 64 MKR (AMD Athlon 64 3200+) £869.01 inc VAT (£739.58)

Welcome to Evesham Technology

or

Dimension 8400
XP Home, 2nd Bay DVDRW, Sound Card, Dell 425 Speakers & 2 year Service

$1,389
$1,039
After 25% OFF Instantly

Dell

[clairelovestlc]

system model : eveshamvale

Main Circuit Board : Board: ASUSTeK Computer INC. A7V266-E REV 1.xx
Bus Clock: 133 megahertz
BIOS: Award Software, Inc. ASUS A7V266-E ACPI BIOS Rev 1004c 11/13/2001
Memory Modules :512 Megabytes Installed Memory

Slot 'DIMM 1' has 256 MB
Slot 'DIMM 2' has 256 MB
Slot 'DIMM 3' is Empty

Local Drive Volumes:
c: (on drive 0) 100.02 GB 73.60 GB free

and once again, thankyou for your help

and as to my dream machine, well not quite dream, as that would cost me absolutly thousands... this is more of a whats actually afordable machine.
my dads coming home either 2nite or 2morrow so ill talk it over with him i seem to have him nearly coninced about a new machine, aslong as i pay for it. and as for the upgrade he said hes fine aslong as i dont electricute myself.
n ive pretty much desided that if i buy new ill go with one of those 2

Evolution Lightning (Pentium 4 3gig) £728.99 inc VAT (£620.42)

Axis 64 MKR (AMD Athlon 64 3200+) £869.01 inc VAT (£739.58)
but with the higest processor option, ram option and graphics card option on either.. bringing both upto about £1100 ish

[jephree]

Conversation has been copied here from another Thread.....

Other thread merged.

[clairelovestlc]

Processor
1.55 gigahertz AMD Athlon XP
128 kilobyte primary memory cache
256 kilobyte secondary memory cache

my dads said if i want to buy a new one its ok, i just have to wait untill i have the money after easter. and i can sell the one i have ( hopfully getting about £180?? ( what a price reduction this thing cost over 2 grand when i bought it!)

thanx for the help, your a star!!

[jephree]

About all you can upgrade is your RAM & that alone would not be much of a change.

The Axis 64 MKR looks sweet

The only thing I don't like is that it has XP Home.

I would want Pro & preferably I would want it without an Operating System and then buy your own version of XP Pro. That way you always have the ability to repair & reinstall without having the limits of the OEM recovery methods.

Anyway just my few cents

[clairelovestlc]

I intended on upgrading to xp pro anyway, i have it on my laptop, and deff prefer it.
Do you have an opinion on windows xp media centre edition? do you think its worth getting? or stick with xp pro?

thanx

clairey

[clairelovestlc]

scrap that, i dont think i want meda centre. xp professional it is..

on the line of graphics card is the 256mb ati radion x800 pro pci- express graphics any good? or is the nvidia ddr 256mb 6800 ultra pci express graphics better?

[AphJN]

Both suck up 2 slots...But the ATI gets higher marks.

[clairelovestlc]

whats the downside to them using up2 slots? will i need one of them for somthing else??

sorry im not all that clever lol obviously the downside is that, theres one slot less if i want to upgrade... but will i actually need it in all likely hood
?