Help with bulding a new system!

Hello guys,

I've been thinking about getting a more modern system for a long time now. I have a couple of things to keep in mind, though:


1. XP64 daily usage compatible! That's crucial. In just a couple of words - Win7 and all of the above have significant core changes in their audio/midi management system and since I'm doing a lot of audio recording/processing stuff, I just can't afford a couple of things not to be working properly or not at all. Note: I'd really like to avoid the 'XP is super old - no, it's not' discussion.

2. Processor performance is important, but memory performance is even more important. Both memory speed AND latency should be of a very high level.


So, as far as I know, a combination of a z77 chipset and a i3770K cpu work great with XP.
The question is - is there a combination that's still XP compatible and even better regarding the performance?
I've read all over the net that z87 is still XP compatible but all the discussions are somewhat inconclusive and I really need to be sure.

First of all, what's your budget? Since you are doing a lot of audio recording/processing, I assume you interract mostly with,sort of, professional audio editing programs. So even whether you're working on XP or Win7, there's likely no real difference. Since you're interested in multitasking, I would suggest going AMD and maybe save a few bucks for a good external audio card.

Hi Itachiii, thanks for the reply!

Most of the software I use can work fine with Win7, yes. There are a couple of applications for controlling other equipment, though, which DOES NOT WORK with win7 and I really really need those working as well.

Budget is like around 500 euro or about 650$. I intend to reuse all of the components in my signature for this new system, so basically I only need a new motherboard and a new cpu.
Maybe I'll change the memory later on as well.
I don't even need a new sound card since the recording interface I have (basically, an external sound card) does everything I need it to do

Frankly, I have no clear answer to WHY, but AMD is not good for audio processing, so I'm aiming at Intel.

ok then, things can get a bit tricky when trying to get new components work on old OS. Haswell has issues for sure, hell I don't even think Ivy Bridge works 100% fine on Windows XP. Maybe if you can find an i5 2500k or an i7 2600k may be able to do the job. Wait till more experienced users reply to this thread.

Just wanted to post a quick update:
Got the 4790K + Asus Z87-Pro
Everything works like a charm with XP x64