Need new CPU. Any suggestions?

[skrisztian]

Hey, I have a Acer Aspire SA80 (very old i know) which i have upgraded several times to keep up with all the modern games. Here is what i have in it currently:

Motherboard: Acer E661GXM(came with comp)

PSU: OCZ 500W StealthXStream

GPU: Sapphire Radeon HD3850 AGP w/ 512mb GDDR3 memory

Ram: Mushkin DDR 400 PC3200 2GB (2x1) (they were bought at different times but their exactly the same)

CPU: Intel Celeron D 336 2.80ghz (Socket LGA775)

HD: Seagate Barracuda 80gb 7200rpm IDE

Western Digital Caviar 250gb 7200rpm SATA

OS: Windows Vista Ultimate SP1

I now realize my cpu is really bad for gaming and I am hoping to upgrade it so that I can run modern games like Call Of Duty World At War, Far Cry 2, and hopefully other games that will be released in the future so I am asking you guys what you think would be best. I am willing to spend around 200 - 250 dollars on this, possibly more if its really worth it. My goal is to be able to play all the newest games for atleast one or two years. Other comments about my comp also welcome.

 

[Twist86]

Well if your willing to spend that kind of cash I would say get a E8400
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115037

Can overclock it to 3.6ghz+ with some after market cooling as well.

or you can pick up a Q6600/Q6700 quad-core if your board supports it.



Personal thought would be a Q6600 and OC to 3.0ghz or 3.2ghz since I bet more games will have quad support in 09.

 

[skrisztian]

Thanks for the quick reply, I was also thinking about the E8400. My friend has a Q6600 and it seems like the best quad core for the money. Problem is that im not that good with OCing, well i cant find the place in my BIOS that gives me the option of OCing or else i would (phoenix awardBIOS). How does that work? Can you upgrade to a different bios thats a little more friendly towards overclocking or am I stuck with mine because of my mobo? I'm kinda leaning towards the E8400 just because it costs less. It would be great if i could overclock it too.

 

[Dazzeerr]

The E8400 isn't compatible with your motherboard. Maybe you should save a bit more money and get a motherboard too? Or just get a Q6600

EDIT: Your motherboard can't support Quad Cores either. The max FSB it can support is 533MHz, which is typical to Pentium 4's. It doesn't support Core 2 Duo's or Core 2 Quad's. It also doesn't support the 'standard' amount of RAM you want to run Vista flawlessly.