Dick Axtell
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| posted on 18/4/15 at 03:48 PM |
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Motherboard Bundle - Questions
I'm hoping for some interesting feedback on this topic.
Right, my PC has become so sluggish, to the point of approaching full bloody stop, on some occasions. It worked perfectly, when loaded with XP, but
ever since having to xfer on to Win7, the overall performance has diminished. So I've been looking around at what the marketplace can offer, and
discovered pre-selected motherboard bundles. These seem a distinct possibility for upgrading my existing machine.
Searching here has produced this thread - http://www.locostbuilders.co.uk/viewthread.php?tid=180146.
However, most of the marketplace search results haven't mentioned graphics cards, (either that, or I've misread the sales blurb!). As you
may deduce, I'm not a PC expert, merely an "end user"!! So can I use my existing, and fairly old card, or does one buy a new item?
Not looking for anything like a supergamer machine, just for the usual web forum browsing and posting, photo storage, scanning stuff, emails, and the
ability to upload files to a website.
The graphics interest is purely for the ability to use whichever CAD package I eventually acquire, and to use these on a website.
So which motherboard supplier would you recommend?
Work-in-Progress: Changed to Zetec + T9. Still trying!!
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leon51274
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| posted on 18/4/15 at 04:44 PM |
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I know a bit but not a lot but what I would say is ssd hard drive all the way, I've know got 2 pc's running ssd and they make it so much
quicker, that and obviously as much memory as poss although I think the max you can run on xp is 4ram as it won't recognize anymore than 4.
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gremlin1234
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| posted on 18/4/15 at 05:01 PM |
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most motherboards these days come with reasonable graphics 'on board',
these can also be supplemented by graphics cards, but for your use probably unnecessary. (but can be added in the future if cad programs do require
faster graphics)
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Dick Axtell
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| posted on 18/4/15 at 05:20 PM |
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Thanks for your replies. I'll have to investigate "ssd hard drives", as this sounds fairly new to me.
Gremlin1234 - So that explains the absence of any bundle specifying a separate graphics board. And it makes more sense of some the bundle descriptions
I've found recently.
Work-in-Progress: Changed to Zetec + T9. Still trying!!
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David Jenkins
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| posted on 18/4/15 at 06:01 PM |
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If you like to run video games, or do a lot of graphic design, then a good graphics card is a must. However, if you are a 'normal user'
who just browses t'internet, does email and writes documents (maybe some minor graphical stuff) then the built-in graphics on a modern
motherboard is just fine. Having a really good graphics card comes at a cost: you usually have to beef up the power supply to cope, and possibly
extra fans to get rid of the heat.
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MikeR
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| posted on 18/4/15 at 09:58 PM |
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don't forget, if you're upgrading the motherboard, make sure the power supply / case can accomodate it.
I tend to find (although I haven't done this for years) that you end up buying a new case, power supply, motherboard, cpu, memory and ....
depending if you've already got SATA hard disks, hard disks.
Or buy a second hand relatively decent spec machine.
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britishtrident
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| posted on 19/4/15 at 07:40 AM |
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Solid state drives get to be expensive as the size goes up. If you look on eBay conventional SATA that have been pulled from new systems for less than
£20, In have been buying them and using them as clone drives for backups.
You can get a bare bones Netbox style from Maplin for about £89.
However new PC prices are at an all time low take a look in PC world you will find complete Windows 8 PC boxes without screens from about £190
[I] “ What use our work, Bennet, if we cannot care for those we love? .”
― From BBC TV/Amazon's Ripper Street.
[/I]
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bigfoot4616
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| posted on 19/4/15 at 08:22 AM |
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ssd's are not that expensive, £80 will get you a decent 250GB which is all you need for OS etc. you can then get a 1TB hdd for less than £50 for
storage.
actually if your not into gaming a 120 GB ssd would be big enough
[Edited on 19/4/15 by bigfoot4616]
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MikeRJ
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| posted on 19/4/15 at 11:07 AM |
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quote:
Originally posted by Dick Axtell
I'm hoping for some interesting feedback on this topic.
Right, my PC has become so sluggish, to the point of approaching full bloody stop, on some occasions. It worked perfectly, when loaded with XP, but
ever since having to xfer on to Win7, the overall performance has diminished.
Whilst an improvement in many areas, Windows 7 does runs slower than XP on the same hardware, and boot times are much longer.
I've found Windows 8.1 is noticeably faster and more responsive than my system was running Win7. With an SSD, my desktop PC will boot Windows
8.1 to the desktop and be ready to use in about 5 seconds. That's partly down to the hybrid boot system in Windows 8, but even with that
disabled it's well under 10 seconds.
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splitrivet
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| posted on 19/4/15 at 02:30 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by Dick Axtell
I'm hoping for some interesting feedback on this topic.
Right, my PC has become so sluggish, to the point of approaching full bloody stop, on some occasions.
Have you tried editing the start menu in msconfig.
Might be all it needs.
Cheers,
Bob
I used to be a Werewolf but I'm alright nowwoooooooooooooo
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Dick Axtell
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| posted on 19/4/15 at 09:17 PM |
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Well, there's a variety of opinions in these replies, but nonetheless, I thank you all for them. Much food for thought before I take the plunge.
Work-in-Progress: Changed to Zetec + T9. Still trying!!
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David Jenkins
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| posted on 20/4/15 at 08:11 AM |
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Dick,
There are a few other options:
Increase your memory - this depends on how old your machine is, and whether it's worth doing. If you only have the minimum amount recommended
then this may be worth doing.
Re-install Win 7 - if it's been on there a while then maybe it has got cluttered up.
De-fragment the disk - how long is it since you last did it?
Run Ccleaner or similar - there may be stuff on your machine that's clogging it up.
Then there's my personal choice - install Linux Mint and you should end up with a machine that fairly whizzes along! It's far less
demanding of resources and therefore much quicker.
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Chris_Xtreme
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| posted on 20/4/15 at 08:57 AM |
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Along the lines of above - what is the spec of the current computer? depending, you may find that just upgrading it's storage to SSD that it
will be plenty good enough again.
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mcerd1
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| posted on 20/4/15 at 12:07 PM |
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I've always avoided the bundled motherboards, mainly because I'm after something a bit higher spec will last me a bit longer and the
bundles tend to be at the budget end of the market with lower specs...
(I know building them to last is a loosing game, but my current one is 5 years old and still going strong...)
I'd say pick your CPU first then find a MB to run it on:
a mid spec i5 CPU will be around the £150 to £200 mark (obviously i3's are cheaper, but less powerful. Also avoid the Celeron and Pentium
branded stuff - its cheap for a reason)
but a basic MB to run it could be as cheap as £45 from a good brand (personally I like ASUS ones)
Also you can usually download the manual before you buy to check its spec / compatibility with the rest of your build before you spend any money
its also worth getting some half decent reliable memory (RAM) - 8Gb is about £50 from a half decent brand.
and as above a power supply that's up to the job - if your current one won't do then that's another £30 - 50
the onboard graphics you get will depend on your CPU (the different i3/i5/i7 chips have various graphics abilities) - but if that's not enough
£40 - 50 will get you a card capable of running most CAD packages
as for the hard drive - the sky is the limit really, just comes down to what you want to spend
I went for a 1TB old fashioned SATA one ~5 years ago on my 1st Gen i7 PC (when SSD's were small and expensive) and now its the one thing holding
back the speed of my machine....
[Edited on 20/4/2015 by mcerd1]
[Edited on 20/4/2015 by mcerd1]
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Paul Turner
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| posted on 28/4/15 at 03:50 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by MikeRJ
Whilst an improvement in many areas, Windows 7 does runs slower than XP on the same hardware, and boot times are much longer.
Here is my experience. We have a Dell Vostro Laptop, cost a fortune when we bought it about 8 years ago, 17" monitor, decent graphic card, 2gb
memory (it was good at the time), 250 gb HD (again it was good at the time) and came preinstalled with XP Professional. Over the years it slowed down
considerably and when the Mrs bought a new cheapo Dell laptop about 2 years ago (2 gb mem, 250 gb HD Win 7 Home) it was obvious things were not
right.
Both laptops were running the same software, same e-mail clients and even the same antivirus so we could not blame any of those.
So about 18 months ago I took the decision to upgrade it to Win 7 Professional. I obtained a valid product key and a clean copy of Win 7 with none of
the bloat ware you normally get. Install went fine, the only extra I had to download was the graphics card drivers (the default ones worked fine but
the performance index reported things could be improved). Loaded up the software and copied the files back. I expected it would need upgrading to 4 gb
ram but decided to try it first for a while.
How does it run. It boots up in about 1/2 the time of XP and has been perfectly stable. I do video/photo editing and I also run CAD, they are probably
the programmes that use most resources and I can tell you its absolutely fine. The fact there is no bloatware running is the main benefit of doing the
install using a clean Win 7 disc and this minimises the processes and memory usage. At idle it uses less than 25% of the 2 gb on board.
Just my experience.
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