A bunch of various questions..

[nuklear]

Well it seems like a bit too much for me to be worrying about. I'd have to find someone willing to buy it that is trustworthy and will pay a decent price, I'd have to ship it, no matter who ended up paying for it, I'd probably need to buy some sort of container or something for it, etc. In the end, I'm just not sure it'll be worth my time to do it.

Even if I were to get through selling it and everything, at the most, I'd be able to afford like.. a 6600GT if I stretched my budget enough. That's really not much of an upgrade..

 

[nuklear]

I just dug this up out of my older thread about all this stuff..

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=30307&Sku=ULT31312

600W PSU, +12V@28A.. seems to be plenty for what I need. There are a few issues I have, though. Is "Ultra" a good or at least decent company for a PSU? I'm sure tigerdirect is a trustworthy site so I'm not going to bother asking about that.. but what about things like shipping and customer service? Any good/bad experiences with it? I've pretty much just used newegg for everything, so I don't know much about any other places. Another issue I have is that it costs basically $80 at first. Sure, there's a $40 mail-in rebate.. but who knows how long it would be until I actually see that money again? So I guess my final question would just be a simple "yay or nay".


Another one I stumbled across again is this one..
http://www2.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817103928#DetailSpecs

I'm not sure if I understand the whole concept of having the 2 +12V rails though.. If it's +12V1@17A and +12V2@17A, does that mean that I basically have 34A for the +12V? Or am I misunderstanding?

That one is about $70.. once again, it's more than I was hoping to spend, but if it's a good choice I'm sure I can squeeze it into my budget.

Anywho, let me know what you think about either of those. I'm really leaning away from that first one, mostly because of the rebate. Rebates are nice and all, but I don't want to have to wait awhile to get my money back.

 

[BrutalDrew]

The first PSU you linked to is crap. Never trust a 600w PSU at that price. The second one you linked to is good, but the oen I showed you is cheaper. Since you are on a budget get the PSU I suggested.

 

[1cem4n]

Aspire maakes terrible PSU's. if you want a good PSu for a good price I would recommend what I linked to above. It is also black.

They're not THAT bad and still usable if you don't strain it.

-1cem4n

 

[BrutalDrew]

Why even risk it though? You should never settle for a crappy PSU.

 

[Yuriman]

Fixed.

I mean't power supply. I'm very tired.

Ohh, and I think it WOULd be worth your time to sell your card. Shipping will likely be under $8, so thats adding another $100 or more to your budget.

 

[nuklear]

Sure, it adds about $100 to my budget.. which I then have to spend even more to get a new video card. A 6600GT is $160+, and even that isn't all that much of an upgrade. I could also go with something like a regular 6600, but that's a bit over $100 and wouldn't really be worth it, afaik. I'd love to be able to upgrade my card and everything, but I just don't see that as a viable option at this point.. unless I'm missing something.

 

[nuklear]

Well, I've looked around at places like Anandtech and such, and it looks good and everything, but I just don't think now is the best time for me to worry about a video card. If I continue with an AGP card, if/when I upgrade my video card, I will need to buy a new mobo for the PCI-E. That's not a huge deal to me, because I'll have to have a decent chunk of money to upgrade the video card in the first place. At that point, I would probably sell my current card, depending on how much it's still worth when I get around to upgrading. The cost of having to get another new mobo is fine with me, especially since I may never really be able to upgrade my video card.

So anyway, like I said, I'm sticking with AGP for now. I'm going to be going with the same mobo (EPoX EP-9NDA3J), and depending on the cost of whichever PSU I go with, either the 3000+ or 3200+. Hopefully the latter, if I can afford it. As of now, I'm planning to get the XClio 450BL ATX 450W Power Supply(http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817189003). I will just be getting these 3 items for now. I will worry about heatsink first, if I need a new one, and then IF I can take care of all of this stuff and end up getting enough money, I will worry about a video card upgrade. Until then, I'm not even going to think about doing it.

If I choose the 3200+, I will be spending about $341 including shipping. If I go with the 3000+, it will only cost about $297. Unless anyone has any different suggestion for the PSU or has an opinion about whether the extra $44 for the 3200+ would really be worth it or anything like that, I will hopefully be making my final decision and ordering it all today.

Once again, thank you to everyone that helped me out by answering my questions, suggesting hardware, and making sure I don't make any big mistakes in what I choose.