Upgrading - i7 or 775

[Omnomnick]

I'm thinking about getting some good upgrades for my computer after I get my results in about 5 days. I've been wondering whether to get a brand new i7 Motherboard, CPU and RAM for around £480 or whether to simply get a new 775 Motherboard and CPU (keeping my old RAM) and saving some money because I'm unsure how much I will be allowed to spend.

Can you guys give me some advice on which is the best option, the pro's and con's of each option or give me your own option you think would work well.

At the moment I have:
Intel Pentium D CPU 2.8Ghz (2 CPUs)
2046MB DDR2 RAM
Windows XP Professional OS (5.1 Build 2600)
Phoenix MS-7187 Motherboard
nVidia GeForce 9600GT 1024MB GPU

Thanks

 

[AtomicSpark]

Never pay for early adoption. Stick with the 775s (unless you want to go AMD).

 

[Dinnesch]

Never pay for early adoption. Stick with the 775s (unless you want to go AMD).

I wouldn't call it 'early', they're much faster and not much more expensive(compared to C2Q) :|

If you're gonna get anything above a GTX260 get a i7 920 with a decent cooler(you can easily overclock them to 3.6 with 70 degrees C max)

 

[Krynn72]

They are a good deal more expensive when you take into account the combined cost of the processor and the motherboard. Last time I checked (couple weeks ago) the motherboards were still pretty damn expensive.

 

[DreamThrall]

i7 is are marketed as pro or performance equipment. If that's not what you're aiming for, I'd say stick with 775. Well, I'd say stick with 775 anyways because it's cheaper.

 

[Krynn72]

You could wait until the holiday season too. I'm sure the prices will drop a bit.

 

[Kadayi]

I'd be inclined to hold out, and just start putting some money aside every month and buy a system later in the year. Right now there's not a great deal coming out gaming wise at present (everything seems to be heading to next year) and in all honesty I'd say the sensible thing to do would be to look at buying an i7 system rather than investing in 775, as aside from your graphics card anything you buy that's 775 (CPU, RAM) won't translate to an i7 system later on down the road.

 

[Warbie]

If it's for gaming i'd also consider amd. The i7 doesn't appear to offer much of a benefit for games (a few fps when compared to the best amd chip), but does cost a whole lot more. With the difference in price you could afford a considerably better gpu which would give you better performance. Of course, if you're loaded you can get i7 (isn't i9 on the way?) and an uber gpu.

 

[VirusType2]

I plan to wait to upgrade my computer until after Windows 7 takes off.

HP and Lenovo are promising they will ship XP Mode pre-installed on PCs loaded with Windows 7. AMD has agreed to enable hardware virtualization on all its CPUs by the launch of Windows 7 excluding the Sempron processor.

Windows7 'XP Mode' requires a CPU that supports virtualization.

However,

Microsoft is trying to deflect the perception that XP applications in general are incompatible with Windows 7."I'd like to take a moment to clarify what Windows XP Mode is designed for, and highlight the point that in many cases Windows XP Mode will not be necessary," said Scott Woodgate, director of desktop virtualization and Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack (MDOP) at Microsoft, on the Windows Team blog. Woodgate said many applications that run on XP should run natively on Windows 7.

In an interview, Woodgate called XP Mode the "last mile" of compatibility. He said if users can get their XP applications to run natively on Windows 7 they can take advantage of the performance, management and security improvements in the new operating system.

 

[Dinnesch]

If it's for gaming i'd also consider amd. The i7 doesn't appear to offer much of a benefit for games (a few fps when compared to the best amd chip), but does cost a whole lot more. With the difference in price you could afford a considerably better gpu which would give you better performance. Of course, if you're loaded you can get i7 (isn't i9 on the way?) and an uber gpu.

As you go higher with the GPU the difference gets much higher. With a GTX 260 the difference would be small, but if you put in something like a GTX 275/285/295 it gets much bigger.