i am new so i will say a big halo to everyone. My thoughts concern upgradeing. I like fligt sims and gaming, but my presant rig is a dual core 3800+ and a 7900gt card and 1 gig of pc3200 ram and it is starting to feel the strain, I have never built my own rig, but after much reading [ Books, Mags, Forums, etc] i think i could manage it . I am looking at a E6850 cpu, 2 gig of ram, and 8800 640 mb of vido card wich i hope will do the trick. oh and also a Asus p5kc mb and xp home edition. My pc is also the family pc so it needs to be up and running after the rebuild. Lets say i keep the same hard drive, 300 gig sata, i am not sure what to expect when i power up for the first time, some help here would be greatly apreaciated,will the mb reconise everthing and that will be the end of it, or will i end up with a dead duck. I have read that is easier to start again with a new hard drive and a fresh install of windows, again feedback here will be much apreciated, and i could keep my old drive as backup. Going into the unnone is a bit scary so i hope you can ease the burden. Well i think thats it for now, hope to hear soon. ps, I am stuck with socket 939, so its the reason for upgrading.
You will have to install Windows again no matter what you try. You are changing from an AMD to Intel proc, which means you have a completely different chipset. Just make sure you have the SATA files for your mobo when you install and hit the F6 to load those drivers, ect. If you run into any problems at all you can post here and any of us will be more than happy to help you out. I would recommend not overclocking since you are inexperienced, but this would be a great way to bring you into the world of rigg making.