Upgrade Stuffs?

Okay, so I've been out of the loop for a few months, and my brother could use a CPU and video card upgrade, this is what is as so far, so any suggestions? He won't be upgrading until early august, so please consider anything that might be comming out before then.

Asus A7N8X+
1600+ t-bred a on alpha 8045
Gainward Geforce3ti500
1024mb of Corsair PC2700 XMS
2 60gig IBM Suckstar 60GXP's

He's looking for the bleedest edge video card, so what will be the best in a few months?

Also, I was thinking of going for a 1700+ tbred b for 43 bucks from newegg, but is there any better bang for the buck?

Lastly, he could use some new harddrives, because those 60GXP's are gonna die any time now. Should he go twin 37gb Raptor's in RAID 0, or is there something better?

Thanks!

Hmm, well, at 10,000 RPM's and an 8MB cache, those hdd's should be nearly unbeatable save by SCSI. (And that gap is closing rapidly.)

Can't really speak on the CPU issues at the moment. At the present, ATI's top card is generally accepted as "the best", although the GF-FX's have performed well, too. (Depending on how you view 3dmark 2003, of course.) I wouldn't expect too many new happenings in video between now and Augst, but then again, dropping a line in video might be worth the while.

-- Paul

I'd say the 9800 Pro is going to be the best card out there, trading spots with the GF-Fx (5800 Ultra? I'm not sure on the name) on certain apps and games. Either card and you really can't go wrong.

Be prepared for very loud cooling solutions on some of those FX's. Actually, I also ran across a bug (not personally, but read of) where the cooling would shut down (or go into a slower, quiet mode) when the screensaver comes on, and so if it's a 3D screensaver, the GPU would get quite hot. I'm not sure if that's still an issue or not, but it would be something to keep in mind.

-- Paul

Bartons are starting to get cheap now, but 1700tbreds are cheaper. And both hit about 2.1-2.4ghz.
I'm not sure on the video card.

If that thing is air cooled, water cooling might make a quiet and cooler upgrade.

Pc3200 might be a possible upgrade, too. (or pc3500 or pc3700)

It also might be wise to replace those hard drives before they die. Possibly with a SATA raid solution... maybe WD Raptors if speed matters, Maxtors if storage and speed matters, or Seagates if storange and silence matters.
Note that the maxtors do not outperform the WD, but they are better than all the other SATA drives so far.

Otherwise, everything looks top of the line.

Or, if you have the money and don't have an adverse reaction to intel, a springdale/canterwood board and a 200fsb P4 could probably improve it.

Okay, definitly going for two Raptors, and maybe a new video card, as from the sound of things, there won't be much new video card tech from here until august.

I'm thinking about going for a Barton for the CPU. What is the best value/overclocker right now?

2500+.