Advice needed

[Xerties]

I'm brand new here and would firstly like to say hello to everyone here.

I'm sure you all see a bunch of threads like this, but I need some advice in upgrade choices.

My current computer is as follows:
Asus A7N8X Deluxe
Athlon XP 2800+
Radeon 9600 Pro 256meg
1.5 gigs PC3500 Ram

That's all that really relates to my question. Now, I'm in need of an upgrade, but, as is always the case, there are a bunch of new technologies looming on the horizon so I'm torn between going for just a new video card, i.e. the NVidia 6600GT AGP, and maybe a XP 3200+. My other thought was to go all out and get a Asus a8n sli board with an Athlon64 3500 and the 6600GT PCIe. My dilemma is I'm not sure when the next generation of GPUs will be out, and dual core procs for that matter. Also, if I wait for a while on the mobo I can give SLI more time to mature.

So, that's my problem. Any thoughts or advice is appreciated. Thanks for reading!

 

[TheGreatGrapeApe]

First getting a recent socket939 solution should give you a good chance to add a Toledo dual core later.

SLI in it's MoBo form won't mature much more, the only thing that would add to that would be ATI and Alienware's solutions, but I wouldn't wait for those if you need performance upgrades now. An SLI board is a good choice if you think you can benifit from it. Getting a single GF6600GT and then upgrading it is a safe bet for maximum options, but if you have a little more funds I'd suggest a plain GF6800 (especially a 256mb one) over the GF6600GT.

If you're looking for long term (which would be the dual core concern) then go PCIe. If you're going for a term of less than 1year, then AGP will be fine IMO. The thing is we are bound to see AGP cards stay for a while, but if the GF6600GT is any example future PCIe bridged to AGP cards will likely be more expensive than their PCIe brethren.


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