Need Help Upgrading !

Discussion in 'CPU, Motherboards and Memory' started by ady1966, Mar 30, 2005.

  1. ady1966

    ady1966 Geek Trainee

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    Hello !

    You will see from my hardware list that I have a KT3 Ultra ARU (MS-6380E) ATX Mainboard and a AMD Athlon XP 2000 CPU (Socket 462). The chipset is a VIA KT333 (552BGA). There is also 'Promise 20276 On Board which supports ATA133 RAID 0 or 1.

    The question is , how best can I upgrade preferably using the same motherboard. Do I upgrade the CPU and Chipset and if so with what ???

    I have 1024mb PC2700 333 RAM.

    Any help would be appreciated

    Thanks


    Ady :good:
     
    ady1966, Mar 30, 2005
    #1
  2. Addis

    Addis The King

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    For gaming performance you can upgrade your graphics card to a Radeon 9x00 card and getting a better CPU would also help.
     
    Addis, Mar 30, 2005
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  3. Exfoliate

    Exfoliate Geek Trainee

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    For the cpu, the XP 2800 delivers a nice performance to price ratio. Your ram is excellent for your mobo so don't need anything there. So long as you have around 5 or so gigs free don't bother with upgrading your HD. For you video card, depending on how much you want to spend, the radeon 9800 pro is still a fine card, as is the 9600 pro/XT. If you want you can look for a GeForce 6600GT AGP version, it's not super cheap but it's a great card. I swear by Newegg so you might want to check out their selection if you haven't already.
     
    Exfoliate, Mar 31, 2005
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  4. ninja fetus

    ninja fetus I'm a thugged out gangsta

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    instead of getting a 9600XT, or anyhting below it, try finding a 9700Pro. Much better card
     
    ninja fetus, Mar 31, 2005
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  5. Big B

    Big B HWF Godfather

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    That all depends on the buget you have to work with and what you want to improve upon. I'd advise against more RAM, since you're really set there. Off-hand, I'm not sure what CPU cores the KT3 supports, but you might want to check what MSI supports including with BIOS updates. You're going to be limited to 266MHz FSB CPU's.

    For the video card, the 9700 and 9800 series cards are good, but for the price, you might look into a GeForce 6600GT, which provides better performance for about the same price. Just make sure you buy the AGP version and not the PCIe. The AGP versions of the 6600GT's are around $20 than comparable PCIe versions. I'm not 100% sure that this will work, and if not, the 9700/9800's should.

    Going along with that, you might need a new power supply. The Thermaltake PurePower units are relatively inexpensive and provide good power ($40-50 for a 400-480W range unit on-line).
     
    Big B, Mar 31, 2005
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  6. ady1966

    ady1966 Geek Trainee

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    Hi everyone,

    Thanks for the advice ! I have since found out that the board should host upto the 3200 Athlon XP CPU. This coupled with the memory I have should improve things slightly. If I get really carried away I might even treat myself to a new motherboard which can host one of those Athlon FX CPU's and cobble together some parts so that I can rehouse the existing board and cpu in a new box. The PSU I have in the machine at the moment is a 500w model and seems to cope well.

    Thanks again for your suggestions

    Regards

    Ady
     
    ady1966, Apr 1, 2005
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