Hi dumpystig,
My current setup is a combined curse and blessing..lol. The "curse" has to do with its age and lack of speed since I built it over 6 yrs ago...1 gig DDR1, ATA 66, single core Sempron on a Gigabyte K8U board with 8x vga and a single sata 1 7200 rpm..which works for surfing and email and little else. I have another box with the same board but twice the ram and a higher speed Athlon 64 single core and a larger graphics card that will run some 3D games (Quake, Riddick Butcher Bay, etc...older versions) but it will not run my DAW (Presonus Studio One Pro) without bogging down after creating 3 tracks with Delay, Reverb, Compression, etc...that's my "thing"...composing, mixing and mastering music tracks, so on the second box I require major changes! The audio workstation's number of tracks that can be recorded and number of processing devices that can be assigned and run on each individual track is limited ONLY by the processing power of the computer on which it is installed. Audio apps like mine and video apps like yours have similar processing needs.
The "blessing" part has to do with the fact that even DDR2 would seem like a HUGE improvement..haha..so, I am really going to feel the speed increase for very little money. I have a parts list for a $250 upgrade ballpark for the first Sempron system.
The music studio upgrade is closer to $1200 for the "ultimate" and could probably be done for $750 or less. I don't require great graphics for the cheap one, so I'd do the onboard Nvidia graphics solution for the no-gaming, internet, email and small office apps. Here are my two tentative lists...$250 is the target but may be just a shade more...
In the existing Apevia case:
1 49.99 motherboard
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128469
2. 39.99 500 watt p/s
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817494002
3. 87.99 Phenom II dual core
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103846
4. 34.99 Cheap 8gig DDR3
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820313123
5. 68.99 Cheap SSD (*see note below)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227738
Total= $281.95 before tax and shipping, so probably a tad over $300 all-inclusive.
I already have Win7 64 bit but may just put UBUNTU 11.04 on this one. Also, I have a wireless (802.11n) card that will work well on this particular board. It requires a manual install in Ubuntu but have the command lines already saved and ready to input again.
The cheap motherboard is Sata II but has a PCIe slot that can accommodate a SATA III controller card for another $30, and can handle a decent video card should I ever see the need for more than the onboard graphics. This board judging by the reviews can play limited HD1080, but again even that much quality isn't necessary for anything much other than the occasional YouTube Tech conferences that I attend online and I usually do that on my newer laptop which handles HD nicely. This is where diagnosing the personal need and usage of the build comes into play.
*Cheap SSD...the story on these particular ssds has been horrific. I am buying this one for this non-critical system because I have done enough research and OCZ has fixed the majority of the problems. Current buyers who are still having problems seem, for the most part, not to do their homework on the firmware installation and available fixes. OCZ has great customer service and most likely prior to install I will have a conversation with them to confirm the correct order to update the firmware and settings changes in BIOS for my specific system. I already have an SATA II 550gig 7200rpm Seagate in this box which I will use as storage and I use a Seagate Go Flex USB 500gig external drive now for backups. I am ready to get my feet wet with ssd and since this is non mission critical and the cost of the drive is so low this minute I have no problem forking over the money even if it fails.
The better setup for the Digital Audio Workstation will be built around Christmas and many things could change pricewise in the next few months.
I will decide which AMD 990 chipset by then. There are several fine boards out there and it is just a matter of choosing the right one for me. The display for my DAW is just a little graphics intensive so I probably don't need an SLI or Crossfire setup..a good single card will do .. probably in the less than $150 range..which supports DX11..I'm going back and forth between the 8 core, 6 core, 4 core choice right now. I'm not so blown away by the current Zambezi test results.
This is where the "blessing" comes in again...I will be so amazed at the speed gain of anything above a single core that I will not spend much time worrying about buying the 8core if a 4 core will do for MY purposes. Again, shopping for myself and my needs. I'm an old fart and don't care if my neighbor has more or less computer than I do as long as mine just gets the job done for my specific needs.
I'll go ahead and get the 16gig ram, probably do the Synapse Cache with 4 smaller (500gig?) hdds in Raid 1+0. I have a firewire 400 audio interface so I'm looking for a board that has onboard ieee1394 and decent audio output. It will require a large power supply and I'm puttting it in a mid tower case with quiet fans, Corsair or Lian-Li with probably 850 watts. The condensor mics in my music room are extremely sensitive and my old case fans, power supply fans and even the CPU fan just scream over the sensitive mics when trying to get a vocal or acoustic guitar track. Right now all that is subject to change depending on sales and new product releases between now and Christmas. I'm somewhere between $750 and $1200 depending on my final choices. Anything I save will go towards outboard audio gear anyway (microphone preamps, etc) so the motivation is there to buy what I need vs what I want.
I'll get back with you with a progress report. I should be buying the first system components within a week.
I have traditionally steered away from Intel purely due the prices. I should also mention that in the recent benchmarks against the 8core Bulldozer/Zambezi at AnandTech...I have turned an eye towards the Z68 chipset running the 2500K processor. Keeping an open mind on it for now as well. When it comes to the week before I buy, I will narrow down the field.
Happy Trails!