XPS 400 HELP

calling out for a little help here. i made the bad choice of buying a dell XPS 400 a couple years ago. I now build my

own. need to know if there are any other newer or better boards dell or other that will fit in my case. in another

post here it was said that a xps 420 would fit in a 400 case but by the looks of things the IEEE 1394a Port, 4x usb

Ports, and eSATA Port would either not fit or would not have an opening. i dont mind cutting into the case and or

basically making holes for things. need to know if the two boards have the same dimensions or like i said any better

board that would fit. any info on the dell xps 400 cpu cooler fitting on the 420 board would be helpful as well. just

trying to save a little green and if that 420 board would work then for less than $300 ill have a quad core and a

better board...thanks for your time.




VodKa420.........BF2 FOR EVER

thanks for the reply. the reason i would like to keep the case and all is to save a little green. i figured if i got

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6819115131 and

http://cgi.ebay.com/Dell--XPS-420- [...] 68005r1533

that way i could use the same heatsink and Fan(since dell uses their own type on these boards) 4 gigs of ram

newer power supply and gfx card i have. basically i just need a cpu upgrade but the xps 400 wont accept any other

processor than a pen D. beyond all that i really would like to know if the board would fit just because ive been

looking into it for a couple of days now. thanks again


VodKa420

one last shot at this....does anyone think i can use a Intel Pentium D 3.73 GHz

Extreme Edition 965 in my xps 400 and if so would it be worth it? found a couple

around $100

just noticed that my chipset is i945p and according to this.....http://www.intel.com/Products/Desktop/Chipsets/945P/945P-overview.htm

it supports Intel® Core™2 Duo so do you think i could use this.....http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115059 and would it be a better option than the rest?

PC Wizard 2009 states that my max FSB is 1066 MHz so if im not mistaken all the numbers line up(fingers crossed)

also my current Manufacturing Tech is 65 nm on my Pentium D 930 Presler 3.0GHz. the Manufacturing Tech on that Core 2 Duo is 45 nm does that crush my dreams?

for real thanks for taking the time i would love to top this machine off and be done with it until i build my future machine

$125 for a DELL board?!?!? Forget it. Why do you think you need a Quad? Get a E2180/E5200 and OC that. I doubt you need a Quad.

Do this:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813128380
P43-UD3L $80

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6819116072
E5200 $63

That's only $143.

Add in a CM Scout, and that brings us to a total of $233. You can go cheaper on the case to save more money. I'd say don't go with the Pentium D. With your budget, you can easily get a MUCH better stuff. E5200 can OC to 3.6Ghz and higher easy.

@Shadow
Dell XPS400-XPS420s all had locked down mobos, so you can't OC. Which is a damn shame, since my 410's E4300 should be able to run at a much higher clockrate without even increasing its voltage or heat dissipation. I'd have to pin mod the freaking chip in order to get it to run at a more acceptable clockspeed. Pretty lame having a CPU bottleneck only because you can't change the FSB.

sorry if i annoyed any of you with this. was just going by the specs for the chipset.

ill probably end up putting my gaming card and extra ram in my secondary and

using that for gaming since it has a c2d e6750 overclocked to 3.0 and uses the

same ram. the dell just cant hold all my hard drives. guess i can just build a new

secondary using my p D