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Upgrading htpc question

post #1 of 9
5/23/12 at 9:13am
Thread Starter 
Right now I am using a E6850 3.0 dual core with 2 gigs of ddr2 800 ram and I have a evga 430gt video card on it's way. Would I notice any difference moving up to a 1155 build with a 2500K cpu and 4 gigs of DDR3 as far as blu rays, 3d movies/hd content only (no gaming on this or anything, just for media). Is this overkill?

I notice that using XBMC, I have a slight delay navigating through the menus and files and a little stuttering on larger files but I am using the onboard graphics right now so maybe the new 430gt card will fix that?
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post #2 of 9
5/23/12 at 9:37am
Probably overkill. i3 with onboard graphics is enough. It probably makes more sense to install the videocard when you get it and see if everything runs smoothly before spending money to solve a problem that hasn't happened yet.

That said, it is a decent time to get the i5-2500k, the microcenter by me had them for 170, but I only use that one cause my htpc is my do-everything pc now that my laptop died.
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post #3 of 9
5/23/12 at 9:39am
Thread Starter 
Someone was selling a 2500K and 4 gigs of ram for $160 and after a rebate and promo code, you can get a 1155 mobo for $15 so I thought maybe I should jump on it but I will wait for the card and see how it does. Thanks.
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post #4 of 9
5/23/12 at 9:42am
The 2500K is certainly overkill even if you are going to rebuild.

But your current setup should work fine. See how it is with the new GPU. And other than the GPU, probably no one thing would produce as noticable a performance boost as installing a SSD. You'd think you got a new computer.
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post #5 of 9
5/23/12 at 9:51am
Thread Starter 
Would a ssd still show improvement if just the OS and XBMC was installed on it but my media files were on a 2tb green hard drive?
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post #6 of 9
5/23/12 at 9:55am
Its funny, I have the same CPU with 4GB ram.
The best upgrade you can make is install a fast SSD. Any SSD will be fast for that matter.
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post #7 of 9
5/23/12 at 10:01am
Quote:
Originally Posted by agent8 View Post

Would a ssd still show improvement if just the OS and XBMC was installed on it but my media files were on a 2tb green hard drive?

Yes. Indeed, that's how it's usually done.
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post #8 of 9
5/23/12 at 10:06am
Thread Starter 
Thanks. I have always been leery with having an over sized flash drive for a main hard drive but it seems that they are working most of the kinks out. I will look into that for sure. Thank you!
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post #9 of 9
5/23/12 at 10:14am
Quote:
Originally Posted by agent8 View Post

Thanks. I have always been leery with having an over sized flash drive for a main hard drive but it seems that they are working most of the kinks out. I will look into that for sure. Thank you!

BTW, since your motherboard certainly isn't SATA III, you might consider the Mushkin Enhanced Callisto Deluxe 120 GB that Amazon sells for $95.99. I put one of those in an even older Pentium D machine that I use as a secondary htpc and it works great (with a $30 Radeon 5450 and that SSD, that old retired office Dell Optiplex Small Form Factor now has a lot of life left in it).
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