Finally! A PC Upgrade!
Despite some misgivings about spending money now, when my Dell Dimension 4700 rebooted on me for the umpteenth time, I told myself that I have had enough. The time had come for a much needed upgrade, that I had put aside for the longest time, despite the encouragements of my buddy Wilfrid, who had upgraded his home PC back in May 2008.
So when one of Warden’s friend’s Dell Dimension 4700 (I’m not putting across a point, it is a real coincidence) “died”, apparently due to a terminal hard disk failure, I decided to pass her my pretty new hard disk, plus 1 GB of RAM, since I was helping her to resuscitate the machine. In doing that, I decided to replace the Xpert Vision nVidia 7300GT graphics card, the motherboard and CPU, the hard disk, the memory (RAM), the power unit as well as the casing.
Thus, during the last weekend, Warden and I went on a multi-purpose “excursion” to relieve a couple of itches:
- The laptop that Warden has been using needs fixing.
- I was to get the hardware for my upgrade.
- Warden wanted to do some shopping.
- I might drop in on Alan Photo to get a circular polariser filter.
My Warden has been putting up with a laptop screen that started having a single vertical line, and grew to multiple lines, that could not be read properly. As we walked around Sim Lim Square, the first shop that we found quoted us $250 with 9-months warranty (after Warden’s persistent bargaining), for a glossy screen. The second shop quoted $220 with 1-month warranty for a non-glossy screen. The third shop turned out to be under the same management as the first shop, but after some bargaining, gave us $230 for a glossy screen with 9-months warranty. To put things in perspective, Dell wanted to charge us about $550 for a year of extended warranty.
Next, after collecting all the promotional materials from various shops, we sat down for a cup of coffee, and an ice kachang for Warden. I looked for the hardware that I sought, and did the maths, which did not look too pretty at around $1,400. The shops seem to be priced around the same, so I just chose one that looked decent and checked with a friendly sales guy. I told him what I wanted, and he quickly pieced together the components after I told him I had a budget of $1,000. Warden actually asked him, “$800 can or not?” and the guy actually said it could be done. But we all know where that’s headed. I did not want something that I will throw away in less than a month. This must have been one of those quick and dirty shopping experience – just hit and run. Here’s a quick run through of what I got for $1,095 (incl. the damn GST):
- Intel Q6600 Core 2 Quad (2.4 GHz)
- MSI P43 NEO3-F – LGA775 motherboard
- Team Elite 800 – 4GB Kit (RAM)
- Western Digital 500GB/16MB SATA2 (Hard disk)
- Palit GF9800GT 512MB PCI-E (Graphics Card)
- Andyson 500W Power Plus (Power Supply Unit)
- GZ-X1 ATX Casing
- Microsoft Vista Home Premium 64-bit (OEM Operating System)
Yes, after much hesitation, I have finally upgraded to Vista.
Since we were waiting for the laptop to be repaired and the desktop to be pieced together, we went over to OG to look around. Then went for some food at the nearby market/hawker centre, plus some more shopping around the area. After which, it was time to pick up the goods and head for home. Since I had spent all my budget on the PC, I decided to give Alan Photo a pass. Sigh… another time, another month perhaps… but I’m a happy man 😛
You assembled your own PC!? You handy man. I know who to look for when I need help now. kakaka…..
You and I need to meet one day. Good lobang. 🙂
Many congratulations! I remember I always get very, very happily excited after I upgrade my PC. Gosh, everything runs so much faster right?! Quad Core! Wise choice! 64-bit OS! Pray do tell me the gaming experience.
ECL, I used to assemble my own PC, but these days I ask the shop people to do it for me. Since they provide excellent service and do not charge extra, might as well. Plus, you do not have the hassle of having to dispose of all the boxes 😀
Wilfrid, yes I am very very excited by this new piece of equipment. When I downloaded photos from the Nikon D90, it was super fast. In fact, everything’s super fast… err except when I tried to defrag the hard disk. The 64-bit version of Vista is supposed to be better. And yes, my gaming experience (or the very brief encounters I have tested so far) has improved by ten-folds!
To be honest, for a non-gamer, AMD is a much cheaper alternative. But who cares about office applications at home right? 😛
I had experienced to such problem. Re-install is annoy, especially if must backing-up many important data.
Hi Tikno, I have actually done quite a bit of Operating System installations, including Linux. Windows is annoying, and so is backing up data, but I tend to be more paranoid these days and backup on multiple hard disk storage for the important files.
64-bit Vista! You rock man!
And you kept it at 4GB of RAM? Go for 8 GB!
You need at least 700 to 1000W these days generally. I don’t know. I don’t want to be a wet blanket but 500W isn’t a good idea actually.
Lol CSC, I think 4GB is enough for my current needs. I work with a budget – 8GB RAM and 700-1000W PSU will blow that by a substantial margin. I do not really need that kind of power unless I decide to use 2 graphics cards on SLI mode. Anyway, I think a lot of us waste a lot of unnecessary power these days. It’s time to think of the future generations and save Mother Earth 🙂
I mean, the reason why one gets a 64-bit Vista is so that one can expand the envelope, go over the 4GB limitation of regular Vista! WOO!
CSC, I see what you mean. I remember XP could not fully utilize RAM beyond 3GB. Then again, Vista is much more resource-hungry.
I think video and image editing software can utilise that extra RAM! Heheh. Tempted yet?
CSC, yes tempted but probably not now. I need to save some money for 2 lens, couple of filters, a pen lens cleaner, a microfibre cloth and a tripod 😛
Hey there Darkspore. Came across your site. Just want to ask you, where did you get the system from? It’s really cheap. Interested to know as i’m looking to upgrade to.
Hi Craze! Thanks for dropping by. I got the system from Bell Systems Electronics at Sim Lim Square, Singapore. Price is ok I guess 🙂