Make sure yuor power supply new or old has the right conenctions for the newer mother boards and drives. That is a 6 pin mobo plug and SATA power connectors x2 at least. I was caught out not realising things have moved on from the good old molex plug and I had to buy a couple of adapters. My PSU was brand new too.

Edited 21 September, 201213 yr by Aspman

Good point. The Real problem is the ATX plug, adapters for the rest are rather affordable

Make sure yuor power supply new or old has the right conenctions for the newer mother boards and drives. That is a 6 pin mobo plug and SATA power connectors x2 at least. I was caught out not realising things have moved on from the good old molex plug and I had to buy a couple of adapters. My PSU was brand new too.

Ahh good shout there, best have a nosey in my case tonight/tomorrow as I do plan on buying stuff soon.

Thanks for all your help guys.

Just had a look just now and guess what, the PSU is on the older style connections, Guess I will be needing some of these then?

http://www.ebuyer.com/158874-xenta-lp4-molex-male-to-serial-ata-sata-power-adapter-connects-sata-sp-rb-414

Anything else aswell to convert it or is that all?

if the psu is old, check that its 24 pin to motherboard and not just 20 and also depending on the motherboard you may need another 4 or 8 pin connecter

also gfx cards often require additional power in either 4/6/8 pin configurations

if your not going to heavily overclock etc then you could buy a decent psu for 30-40 £, less if you want to take a chance on an ebuyer cheapie which i have in the kids pc and it runs an 275 gtx just fine

a psu is often overlooked but theres nothing worse than getting it all put together only to find the psu isnt any good and they cost a small fortune in postage so bundle it all together at ebuyer and it'll be free

Right just stripped the old computer down, took some pic's of the connector's that are part of the PSU so just needing to double check I'm ordering the correct part's so there is no mess up's and it can be put together right away once my part's turn up.

Sticker on side of PSU

The different connection's, please advise if you think I need to get convertor's for any of these

These would require these am I correct? http://www.ebuyer.co...-sata-sp-rb-414

This would require one of these am I correct? http://www.ebuyer.co...cable-atx2024mf

This was the powersupply for the floppy disc doubt I will be needing this then lol?

Many thanks once again for everyone who has offered help and advice.

Oh and one thing I've just thought of and call me silly if this is the case, but the heat sink/fan for the CPU, does the new one come with one of them or do I have to re-use my old one?

Oh and one thing I've just thought of and call me silly if this is the case, but the heat sink/fan for the CPU, does the new one come with one of them or do I have to re-use my old one?

New one comes with its own heat sink and fan.

400 watter should be fine for your setup. If you can stretch your budget buying a new PSU is a very good idea - no need to buy all those connectors and one has to remember that the most common point of failure in PCs these days is PSU. Your one is rather old so...

I think it will run your system but forget overclocking and it may give up a ghost soon anyways. Your 12v line is good for 288Watts so should run your GFX card ok.

Will this be fine for the job or would you suggest something better?

http://www.ebuyer.com/253900-coolermaster-elite-power-500w-psu-rs500-psapj3-it

If like me you want the best of both worlds 'APPLE' & 'MICROSOFT' then buy for example an 'APPLE' Intel iMac.

I have such an 'APPLE' desktop which has a partition within the hard-drive for 'WINDOWS XP' although it could be 'VISTA' / 'WINDOWS 7'

The cost of upgrading is minimal 'iMac Mountain Lion' £13.99 from my 'Snow Leopard' £24.00 upgrade, and with 'WINDOWS XP' upgrade to 'Windows 7' or 'Windows 8' around the £100 mark.

Buying a dedicated computer ie: 'WINDOWS 7' that cannot be upgraded will have a limited life before being upgraded as normal by yet another system.

I am NOT an 'APPLE' preacher but do enjoy the best of two worlds, in my humble opinion.

You don't have to buy new, these refurbished machines still has years of life in them, mine is now 5 years old, from new.

If you buy a 'Retail' or 'boxed' processors they'll come with a heat sink, if you buy an OEM processor it wont.

It doesn't look like you have the 6 pin connector you'll need for a gfx card. You can probably get an adapter but if you're having to buy loads of adapters you might be as well investing in a new 500w psu with everything already there. You won't need to overclock unless you're tinkering for the sake of tinkering.

A lot of the processors are voltage locked anyway to stop you doing it plus it's just not worth the bother. My mobo (which might be the same as yours) had an auto tune / overclock thing built in, it claimed to have tweaked things up. Can't say I noticed.

Get a laser mouse too if you don't have one.

Will this be fine for the job or would you suggest something better?

http://www.ebuyer.com/253900-coolermaster-elite-power-500w-psu-rs500-psapj3-it

That will do the job nicely .

Thanks very much, gonna get things ordered now, kinda excited not had a decent computer for a few years haha

If like me you want the best of both worlds 'APPLE' & 'MICROSOFT' then buy for example an 'APPLE' Intel iMac.

I have such an 'APPLE' desktop which has a partition within the hard-drive for 'WINDOWS XP' although it could be 'VISTA' / 'WINDOWS 7'

The cost of upgrading is minimal 'iMac Mountain Lion' £13.99 from my 'Snow Leopard' £24.00 upgrade, and with 'WINDOWS XP' upgrade to 'Windows 7' around the £100 mark.

Buying a dedicated computer ie: 'WINDOWS 7' that cannot be upgraded will have a limited life before being upgraded as normal by yet another system.

I am NOT an 'APPLE' preacher but do enjoy the best of two worlds, in my humble opinion.

You don't have to buy new, these refurbished machines still has years of life in them, mine is now 5 years old, from new.

Errr, you lost me, where does Apple come into this thread, he only wants to spend a few hundred, which rules out Apple from the word go seeing as the cheapest Mac is a grand

Thanks very much, gonna get things ordered now, kinda excited not had a decent computer for a few years haha

Post up a final rundown before you do

good idea on the psu, splitting a 20 pin mobo power to 24 isnt a good idea at all, ive seen some of these adapters burned out

good idea on the psu, splitting a 20 pin mobo power to 24 isnt a good idea at all, ive seen some of these adapters burned out

That would be the last thing I would want, and as was mentioned the PSU is kinda old aswell so may aswell start fresh with everything.

Post up a final rundown before you do

Here goes then :-

Motherboard: http://www.ebuyer.co...oard-p8h61-r3-0

Memory: http://www.ebuyer.co...3d1337dt1tx0ceu

Processor: http://www.ebuyer.co...d-bx80623i32120

Case fan: http://www.ebuyer.co...ector-pfs12bk4p

Graphics Card: http://www.ebuyer.co...x65001341-1072f

HDD http://www.ebuyer.co...ive-st2000dm001

DVD drive (didn't really require the Blu-Ray but I can upgrade at a later date): http://www.ebuyer.co...m-sh-222bb-bebe

4 x SATA cables: http://www.ebuyer.co...6cm-est-sata3-0

SSD (Went with the 64GB to save some money slightly): http://www.ebuyer.co...ssd-ct064v4ssd2

PSU: http://www.ebuyer.com/253900-coolermaster-elite-power-500w-psu-rs500-psapj3-it

Grand Total of:- £450.91

Inc next day Delivery it's £462,15

EDIT: How silly of me forgot to add the PSU haha

Edited 23 September, 201213 yr by Southy

if you want that ssd then get this version of it

http://www.ebuyer.co...-ct064v4ssd2baa

youll need a caddy and they usually cost more than the difference here and youll only now need 2 sata cables

also they do that cpu with 8 gb of ram for only £26 more, every penny helps

also that motherboard is only sata II/3GB/s you might be better getting sata III/6GB/s and usb3 built in, just a suggestion but like everything itll cost a little more

http://www.ebuyer.com/351615-gigabyte-b75m-d3v-socket-1155-vga-dvi-8-channel-audio-matx-motherboard-ga-b75m-d3v

might fit the bill but do a little research first

Edited 23 September, 201213 yr by the mad monk

Really liking this thread at the moment as I am looking at changing/upgrading my current machine and am looking at building one, possibly canibalising my current machine for certain appropriate parts. Some great advice on hardware but I have a couple of questions about the OS.

1. With my current ready made machine I have Windows 7 installed, with a licence key, but no disc. Can I download the software and use this key again as the old machine will no longer exist?

2. If I have to get new copy is it best to wait for Windows 8? I see that most suppliers of ready mad machines are offering an upgrade from 7 to 8 for about £15. I know litte about 8 other than it is quite a radical change.

1. If it's an OEM license then legally no. The license is fixed to the case literally and legally. In reality you can get round it quite easily even if you have to phone up MS to activate it. "Dear Mr MS I had to replace my Mobo, HD and NIC because of a lightning strike".

If it's a full liense then you are free to move it as long as it stays on only one machine at a time (unless it's a funny one like my Office license which is for two home PCs, MS licensing is more complex than ancient Greek).

2. Might as well get 8 if you're waiting. You might hate it though so check the license is backwards compatible with 7.

http://www.novatech.co.uk/products/components/powersupplies/cm-rs500-asabl3-uk.html#utm_source=tradedoubler&utm_medium=affiliate&utm_campaign=1018132_HotUKDeals

PSU deal

http://www.ebuyer.com/393890-asus-x54c-laptop-x54c-sx078v

Have you thought about this? In your price range... Slightly lower spec than what you got for a stationary one above but... you can take it anywhere and can do some data logging for your car as well . Low review scores by people who should really be buying a full setup and maintenance service as well as they have no clue really... Mind you, for that money you can upgrade to SSD and get the existing HDD out, buy a case for it and have as your protable HDD! and be still within the budget. One think you can't do is to much desktop's graphics card performance. Please remeber that there is plenty of aftermarket laptop high capacity batteries available now.

Sory to throw a spanner in the works so late in the day but I think you might be interested in this as well

I've already ordered everything and will be delivered tomorrow :p I've already got a decent laptop so that's not an issue, and got full access to a proper Snap-On garage diagnostic's machine.

Have fun.

Sounds like you are sorted then Enjoy!