I've been out of hardware researching for a while so I thought I'd ask here where I got the info for my current system
Right now I currently have a Pentium 4 3.0E on an Asus P4C800E Deluxe with 1GB of memory and an ATI x800 PRO modded to an XT. I also have 4 250GB SATA drives in 2 RAID 0 arrays. My vid card is partly fried I think (too much OC) and can't change resolutions properly without crashing (its not drivers, formats have done nothing). But that is not the problem. My question is, given my current system, will a new system really give that much more performance over upgrading my current setup?
Case 1: Upgrade to 2GB of memory and to an AGP Radeon 3850. Cost: $220ish
Case 2: Build a new system with Quad Core, 2GB of memory, PCI Express vid card (not quite top of the line, not looking to SLI/crossfire either), prolly 2x 500 or 640 or 750GB SATA2 in RAID 0. Cost: ??? $1000ish or something around that
Will the extra performance gained from the new system really warrant the increased cost? I will be looking to choose sometime this summer and will be on a budget. I'm not looking to play Crysis at full resolution with all the bells and whistles, but I want to be able to keep up with current games better. I've been having to play games on my laptop because of my vid card problems, but that gets to be a hassle (it can play Crysis though, on Low). I want to have my gaming machine back!
So basically, would P4 -> Core 2 Quad and AGP -> PCI-Express (not to mention DDR -> DDR2 and SATA -> SATA2) be worth the $1000ish versus the $220ish. Thanks!
Right now I currently have a Pentium 4 3.0E on an Asus P4C800E Deluxe with 1GB of memory and an ATI x800 PRO modded to an XT. I also have 4 250GB SATA drives in 2 RAID 0 arrays. My vid card is partly fried I think (too much OC) and can't change resolutions properly without crashing (its not drivers, formats have done nothing). But that is not the problem. My question is, given my current system, will a new system really give that much more performance over upgrading my current setup?
Case 1: Upgrade to 2GB of memory and to an AGP Radeon 3850. Cost: $220ish
Case 2: Build a new system with Quad Core, 2GB of memory, PCI Express vid card (not quite top of the line, not looking to SLI/crossfire either), prolly 2x 500 or 640 or 750GB SATA2 in RAID 0. Cost: ??? $1000ish or something around that
Will the extra performance gained from the new system really warrant the increased cost? I will be looking to choose sometime this summer and will be on a budget. I'm not looking to play Crysis at full resolution with all the bells and whistles, but I want to be able to keep up with current games better. I've been having to play games on my laptop because of my vid card problems, but that gets to be a hassle (it can play Crysis though, on Low). I want to have my gaming machine back!
So basically, would P4 -> Core 2 Quad and AGP -> PCI-Express (not to mention DDR -> DDR2 and SATA -> SATA2) be worth the $1000ish versus the $220ish. Thanks!