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[Pachinko]

A year after I bought my computer I started thinking about upgrading it. I bought a newer video card and ever since then have debated about upgrading the rest.

My Current specs-

Processor- 1.5 GHZ 256 mb L2 cache Pentium 4
Motherboard- 400 MHZ FSB SDram D845 intel
on board audio(disabled), 4X USB ports 1 AGP4x, 6 PCMIA
Ram- 2 X 256 kingston 133MHZ SD ram
Audio Card- 5.1 platinum sound blaster
Video card- ATI Radeon 9500 128 DDR
Drives- 56 X cd , DVD burner- 16 X +/- dvd burn/read , 4 X RW, 48X CD read/burn

So it's not awful by any means but other then the dvd burner I want something more.

Recently I've been confused by that number of options with motherboards- should I get one with a PCIE capable board and buy a brand new video card for it or save a few bucks and get an older AGP board and keep my video card ...

All I know for sure is I want a motherboard that has atleast 6 USB ports, atleast 800 mhz FSB , and 533 mhz DDR memory(768 megs) and a processor that takes advantage of that stuff but nothing brand new, I don't want to be paying 350 dollars just for a CPU.

If I do go with a PCIE board, whats a good video card to get ?

 

[teh_pwn]

Kind of hard to do what you want with a PCI-E board.

The AMD PCI-E boards just came out (or will very soon). The intel boards are out, but the new intel processors aren't so hot.

Here's some ideas:

An Intel AGP System:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=13-127-152&depa=1
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=19-116-163&depa=1
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=20-146-950&depa=1

An AMD AGP System:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=13-130-468&depa=1
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=19-103-500&depa=1
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=20-146-950&depa=1

An Intel PCI-E System:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=19-116-183&depa=1
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=13-127-180&depa=1
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=20-146-950&depa=1


Low End Video cards:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=14-150-078&depa=1
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=14-102-414&depa=1




High End Video cards:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=14-143-021&depa=1

 

[Dkong]

It'd probably be in your best interest to wait for nForce 4 motherboards. You don't sound like you'll need to be rushing this anyway.
If you buy an nForce 4 motherboard you should grab a GeForce 6600 GT for about 200 bucks and the motherboards should be available in time before christmas.
Considering you want 6 USB-ports you'll need to choose a more deluxe motherboard, so you'll end up with the nForce 4 Ultra chipset. Those boards should cost you about 100 to 150 bucks.
Also I recommend buying a motherboard that supports socket 939 since this is the socket AMD will be using for their desktop systems for at least the following year.
About the memory: on Athlon 64 systems the memory controller is integrated in the processor, so whether you can use DDR or DDR2 memory depends on the processor itself. AMD is planning on releasing DDR2 supporting processors soon.

 

[Pachinko]

Thanks for the help guys. The debate for me really is wether I upgrade in december or wait until february.... but I wanted the advice of someone who knew a bit more about computer parts to help me out.