Looking for best quality

[AlphaTI]

Price is no problem

I am after some high quality hardware for my ram, mobo, psu

Can anyone help please?

[Psymon]

any chance you could elaborate a bit more on your situation?

[AlphaTI]

Not much to tell, IM looking to upgrade my system and not sure which to buy but I dont want budget below par rubbish I made that mistake once, never again.

Im getting artic silver 5 and a proper gaming case on tuesday in an attempt to increase the cooling on my cpu as my air flow isnt good and it needs sorting but I cant add more chassis faans to my board or my psu as its a modular ocz psu.

[Psymon]

If your main concern is cooling then you could just look into getting some fancy heatsink.


If you want more case fans, then you can get a fan controller to plug them into.

[AlphaTI]

Where exactly is that fan controller going to go in the case?

I still need some help deciding on parts, Im pretty much set on corsair ram, if i can plug more fans into modular then i dont need to change the psu but I still need a new mobo and cpu, and have no idea what I will need intel/amd, mobo best for gaming compatability etc.

Just been looking online and found these two items, wondering if anyone had any oponions on them...

Xigmatek 120mm LED Cooling Fan Black Fin (for chassis)
Xigmatek Achilles HDT-S1284C Socket 775 754 939 940 AM2+ 120mm Fan - CPU Cooler (includes copper piping)

[Psymon]

The fan controller, depending on the size, will go in a DVD slot or floppy drive slot at the front of your case.

Before I suggest new hardware, could you share a few more things?

Whats the hardware of your current PC?
CPU?
GPU?
RAM?

Also, what games do you play now, and what games are you looking to play in the future?

[AlphaTI]

CPU: Athlon 64 x2 2.8 ghz
Ram: 2x1gb ddr2 brand unknown I didnt buy them.
GPU: Current - 8500GT Usual - GTX 260 Cannot run usual due to overheating.

Games:

Basic ones that require little to no graphics power due to overheating.

Mass effect, Mass Effect 2, Lineage 2, Neverwinter Nights 2, Dragon Age - all game I want to play but cant because

a: 8500gt card cant cope with them
b: cant use GTX due to overheating

note: both cards make my cpu overheat and shut down when playing games listed above.

The most demanding game I can run atm is dawn of war soulstorm but even then I cant run it at full due to heat produced...not enough cooling in my system, however I am not surprised only a fool would buy dual core and a top range gfx card and not upgrade the cooling, and thats what I did, now im paying the price.

Its obvious the stock heatsink, thermal gel, fans are not good enough to cool the heat down quick enough.

[liljim]

With the gtx in, what takes place exactly? screen locks up, glitchy graphics, machine powers down?

If u just want a new machine thats one thing but that card in your current one would be enough to run what u mentioned if we can get it running right.

another important question is whats your current psu?

[Psymon]

Interesting...

I too have an AMD X2. Mines overclocked from 2.2GHz to 2.64GHz, stock heat sink and fan.
I've also got 2GB of RAM
and I'm using the GTX 260.

I've got a fan at the front and side drawing air in and one on the back blowing out.
I don't get overheating...

According to speed fan, my CPU peaks just shy of 60°C and my GPU at 70°C.
Not good temps, but neither of which are high enough to cause any errors or crashing.

For comparison with what liljim's asking. I have a Seagate 500W. 4 years old now.

[AlphaTI]

I only have one chassis fan maybe thats why.

@jim

My psu is a 600w ocz stealth modular system, no glitches no errors just shuts down after cpu hitting 70+

Im hoping more chassisfans, better case for airflow and artic silver compound gel will fix it.

[liljim]

yea that should help alot but the video card should be unrelated unless its not venting the heat out the rear of the case. Like Psymon is describing, pull cool air in from the front with a fan pulling heat out the rear is ideal for any system. Hopefully that fixes you and you dont wind up building a whole new rig. Im also still using a X2 3 gig cpu with a 8800gt and havent found anything i cant run at max yet.

[liljim]

Psymon i just noticed u said Seagate and for some reason i had no idea they even made a PSU lol

[AlphaTI]

Im going to have to buy a non modular psu about 600w to run the gtx, its gonna be very hard for me to get a modular fan controller, so thats psu, case, gel and fans...could cost me at least £100

Saying that I have always used stock compound gel and has always wore out eventually, this isnt the first time I have had to relay it and the overheating has stopped, the gtx was running shift at max graphics fine, then suddenly one day 5 minutes into play...bam shut down, done it once then couple of days later it happened on every game I played within 5 minutes......so hopefully.

[Psymon]

WHUPS, seasonic PSU. haha, my bad.

[liljim]