Help upgrading

[dragoku]

OK so my friend help me to build a custom computer a while back and now i'm looking to upgrade my mother board and graphics card. I curently have an ASUS P5VD2-VM SE motherboard with an intel pentium 4 processor. My question is can i make an easy switch to the ASUS rampage extreme motherboard? And by easy switch i mean keep my current ram and processor.

My second question is what is a good card for me to get that has a high performance for a not-so-high price? I'm looking around the price range of the NVIDIA GeFORCE 9800 GTX.

finally if i can switch easily to the new motherboard does the card work with it.

sorry for all the newbie questions i just don't know what to look at on the specs to answer these questions.

 

[daisymtc]

Basicly you can install a 9800GTX without changing the motherboard. A PCI-E x16 2.0 card will work at PCI-E x 16 1.1 slot.
If you have $150, you either looking at ATI HD4850 or NVIDIA 9800 GTX+, but you need to make sure your PSU is strong enough to run those card.

 

[dragoku]

well i have a 750 watt PSU so i think that should be enough

and if i can just keep my motherboard should i be looking at a new processor or does what i have work well enough for current games and such?

 

[daisymtc]

A quality 450W PSU can power up 4850/ 9800GTX+

I suggest you get the new video card first and try if you are happy with its performance before upgrade CPU.

It is because intel have new CPU with new socket.
If you upgrade CPU with socket LGA775, E7300 @ $130 is the best CPU you can get for your Mobo.
On the other hand if you want to upgrade to the Corei7 now, you would talking about a new Mobo ($250?), new CPU ($270?) and new RAM (4 GB DDR3 $150), which is quite expensive. I would suggest upgrade to Corei7 in the middle of next year when the price come down.