View Single Post - Long awaited upgrade (System built 8/1)

caligo · Rated R

Finally getting around to upgrading my 8/9 year old computer. It is a 2GHz P4, so any upgrade will surely show. A friend gave me a sniper case and a CMPSU-400CX power supply as a starting point. Below is what I am considering buying towards the end of next month. Are these parts okay, or could I get more bang for my buck? Not a fan boy, so have no problem with buying amd/ati. Would like to get back into some gaming (monitor limits res to 1280x1024) and use the extra horsepower for folding. Budget limit is $600

GIGABYTE GA-P55A-UD3 $140
Core i3-530 $115
Kingston 4GB KVR1333D3K2/4GR $105
WD Caviar Black WD6401AALS 640GB $75
~$20 DVD drive
XFX GeForce 9800 GT $87

These put me at $542, which leave some room to buy windows 7.
(*prices from newegg)
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----------- Updated 8/2 ------------

New System specs:

Core i3-530 w/ Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus
MSI P55-GD65
Kingston HyperX 8GB (4x2GB) 1600
Lite-On/MSI Dvd Burners
WD Caviar Black 640GB
BFG GTS 250 1GB

Still have to do a bit of cable management on the system, but over all really enjoying the speed. For those curious, I came way under my budget. After rebates, cash-back, and a little buying and reselling of parts, the total came to $350 and some change (no OS yet - running a trial of windows 7). Even with buying windows 7, the total will be under $400, which will allow for some future upgrades.. or maybe a nice monitor. I also wanted to say thank you for the advice.