Question on upgrading vs building

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Hey_Blinkin

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May 16, 2013
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Although i've been playing PC games for about ten years, i know very little about the guts of the PCs themselves. (All my PCs have been ordered from Dell)

Getting older and more money conscience I have decided to look at upgrading or building from scratch. Here is my current $1100 4.5 year old build:

XPS Studio 435MT
I7-920 2.67
HD 4850
8gb @1066

Although the PC is rather old, the thing that slightly confuses me is it's ability to play games like Skyrim and Far Cry 3 on max dx9 settings at 1900x1080. That's where the thought of trying to upgrade the 360w psu and gpu come in instead of starting from scratch. But then i think i spend that $250-300 on starting a new build that would last me hopefully another 4.5 years. Which is why i've come here to the experts.

Sorry for the newbish question and i would greatly appreciate any input.
 
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Kisianik

Kisianik

Splendid
Jan 24, 2013
3,462
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Upgrading Dells is my speciality, can not help much about building new PC, so.
Let me give you maximum CPU upgrade validated by Dell - Intel® Core i7 965 (Bloomfield).

About SSD - The XPS 435 MT is not designed to work with the Intel Responsiveness Technologies that make the system faster. This technology needs an mSATA module apart from the SSD and the SSD would only act as a caching drive. When used on your system, the SSD would act just as an ordinary hard drive. The only benefit would be the longevity of the SSD over conventional hard drives. The difference in speed in this case would hardly be noticeable.

RAM - you can have up to 24 GB of 1066 (not more, BIOS downcloking) see here for proof http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/desktop/f/3514/p/19368276/19835904.aspx#19835904

Power supply.

Most generic standard ATX power supply units, can be installed, with either a 24-pin or 20+4-pin main motherboard power and a EPS/ATX12V 8-pin connector, with or without the on/off switch.

You should be able to buy a compatible power supply from either a local or online computer store.

Note: You require a power supply with four SATA power connectors.

The default power supply is a ATX 360w unit.

It's reasonable to upgrade the power supply when installing a new video card, that requires more wattage than the default 360w.

When choosing PSU look at this list as a guide http://www.eggxpert.com/forums/thread/323050.aspx

Case. You can change case here is proof http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/desktop/f/3514/p/19372152/19850782.aspx#19850782

And here is Front I/O pin layout

attachment.php


It was a long post and I am tired, so if I miss something just let me know.

Here is the proof about larger PSU and huge GPU

5700.xps-435mt.jpg
 
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Kisianik

Kisianik

Splendid
Jan 24, 2013
3,462
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I am definitely tired - I was looking at faster RAM and could not see 1333

Below is what we (Dell engineering) qualified to run -

XPS435MT
F680F DIMM,1GB,1067MHz PC3-8500,128X64
Y996D DIMM,2GB,1067MHz PC3-8500,256X64
TW149 DIMM,1GB,1333MHz PC3-10600,128X64
P223C DIMM,2GB,1333MHz PC3-10600,128X64

Problem is with RAM manufacturer, I would strongly recommend to go with Dell RAM or at least with Crucial, those will work, the others might not (at 1333 speed). Avoid fancy timing, go with standard.
 
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k1114

k1114

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May 2, 2010
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The ssd part is wrong. Intel responsiveness technologies is unnecessary. It covers 3 technologies, rapid start which is for fast waking from hibernate, smart connect which is for updating software while sleeping, and smart response which is ssd caching (which btw does not need msata and works on sata too). The only real useful one is ssd caching but an ssd alone will always be the better solution so you are better without it. The benefit in an ssd is access times which is why an ssd is always always always faster than a hdd even on sata 1.
 
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Kisianik

Kisianik

Splendid
Jan 24, 2013
3,462
3
22,515


I know I have troubles with science here, but the idea is much simpler. XPS 435MT doesn't have AHCI mode in BIOS, it only has SATA or Raid modes.

I am trying to find out RAM in more details. At this point there is inconsistency with Crucial RAM advise tool - it offers memory only for XPS 435 model, but there are 2 of them 435MT a smaller version, and 435T a larger version, I suspect that Crucial provides suggestion for 435T. Will continue looking for confirmations of faster memory.

As for PSU, I would recommend to go with Corsair due to the size. I put in BOLD the crucial element - length.
Corsair 5.9"(W) x 3.4"(H) x 5.5"(L)
Rosewill 5.91" x 3.39" x 6.30" (WxHxD)
Rosewill is longer almost by 1 inch, and Corsair is already long (compare to original)
In the picture I provided there is Antec EA650 3.4" x 5.9" x 6", you can see my point. I know both advised models are modular, but still it is very crowded there, so smaller is better.
 
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Kisianik

Kisianik

Splendid
Jan 24, 2013
3,462
3
22,515
I found 2 workarounds for installation of SSD, however, clean reinstall of Windows maybe required (not upgrade).
Basically and simply - AHCI mode is hided in RAID mode, which need to be enabled during installation of new OS http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/desktop/f/3514/p/19452283/20120078.aspx#20120078

And the other thread similar but different
http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/desktop/f/3514/p/19440604/20068949.aspx

Regarding RAM. So far it might be difficult and there is a possibility that it might be downclocked, here is confirmation for 1333 speed http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/desktop/f/3514/p/19393674/19919311.aspx#19919311 unfortunately there is no part number provided.
 
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k1114

k1114

Titan
May 2, 2010
14,240
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Ahci is a subset of raid. My dell does the same thing, although a core 2 duo. Sata is not a mode, the different modes are ide, ahci and raid. The thread is a bit misleading as well. Trim is not the only garbage collection available. Although without ahci an ssd may not work properly, there are other software that can do garbage collection so performance does not degrade.
 
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