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Cheap Build

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superFlint

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xentr_thread_starter
Hi,

I was looking to do a cheap upgrade for Dad for Christmas. He is running a close to 10 year old Dell Inspiron 580 i3 550 @ 3.2GHz. Not 100% sure on RAM or HD but it is awful slow. He only uses it to edit a few pics from his camera, surf internet and listen to a bit of music. On board audio/video will be fine.

Here is what I was looking at on newegg.ca:

- ASUS H110M-E/M.2 LGA 1151 Intel H110 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.1 Micro ATX Motherboards - Intel
- Intel Pentium G4400 Skylake Dual-Core 3.3 GHz LGA 1151 54W BX80662G4400 Desktop Processor Intel HD Graphics 510
- G.SKILL Aegis 8GB 288-Pin DDR4 SDRAM DDR4 2133 (PC4 17000) Intel Z170 Platform / Intel X99 Platform
- Crucial MX300 2.5" 275GB SATA III 3D NAND Internal Solid State Drive (SSD)
- CORSAIR CX-M Series CX450 450W 80 PLUS BRONZE Haswell Ready ATX12V & EPS12V Semi-modular Power Supply

Is his old i3 550 better than the G4400? It is 3.2Ghz but old. I cannot see it, but 3.2Ghz vs 3.3Ghz.

I am wondering if all components are going to play well together? Is the Pentium enough or should I spend the extra $70-80 for the Intel Core i3-7100 Kaby Lake Dual-Core 3.9 GHz? I was told on another site to get 2 sticks of RAM instead of one, I can get one stick for $80 or two for $120. Or is it that big of a performance difference in the dual channel vs single stick?

Thanks for the help!!!
 
For what your dad is doing his present configuration is enough. Just upgrade the RAM and throw in a SSD and that PC will fly. No need for an overhaul. I am running an i3 and doing video capturing and editing and is just fine.
 
I agree with MARSTG. Make sure he has 8gb ram, and get an ssd. That with a fresh install of windows and he will be happy for years. Is he on Windows 10?7?8? If he is on 7 or 8, just download win10 to USB and do a fresh install..a win7/8 key will validadate 10 as well.
 
xentr_thread_starter
Really that ole CPU still good? Well Ill be damned. Now to figure out what kind of RAM was in that thing, might never find any that old or it might cost a fortune. :)

Yeah that thing is running win7, I just upgraded my gaming rig to win10 and it seems to use more power now while gaming. Had to disable all downloads on win10 as it was using all my bandwidth for 3 days and could not figure out what was downloading and uploading. Now I got all auto updates turned off and a couple other services turned off to get the downloading to stop. Thought about reverting to win8.1 again.

Thanks.
 
Last edited:
xentr_thread_starter
Ok.

I got this SSD picked out https://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?item=N82E16820156150 It is listed as a compatiable upgrade for Dell.

The RAM is another story. The PC has 4 sticks for 4GB right now, all slots full. So what is my best course of action? Buy 2 X 4GB, 4 X 2GB, or leave 2GB in and add 2 X 4GB? Is this a good choice? https://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820226288&cm_re=ddr3l-1600-_-20-226-288-_-Product Or can I just buy one 8GB stick and plop that in there? Are 4 sticks more efficient than one stick?

Any suggestions on the RAM would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks!
 
xentr_thread_starter
Any suggestions on what to buy? I am afraid it is not going to work, I cannot find any RAM off the compatibility list.
 
superFlint said:
Ok.

I got this SSD picked out https://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?item=N82E16820156150 It is listed as a compatiable upgrade for Dell.

The RAM is another story. The PC has 4 sticks for 4GB right now, all slots full. So what is my best course of action? Buy 2 X 4GB, 4 X 2GB, or leave 2GB in and add 2 X 4GB? Is this a good choice? https://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820226288&cm_re=ddr3l-1600-_-20-226-288-_-Product Or can I just buy one 8GB stick and plop that in there? Are 4 sticks more efficient than one stick?

Any suggestions on the RAM would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks!
Click to expand...

2x4gb. If you can leave 2 of the 1gb sticks in with the new stuff without issue, then do it. If it causes any issues then just use the new2x4gb.

SSD is a good choice, so long as he doesn’t need more storage than that...otherwise go for the 525gb.

Doing a whole new build will be faster, but not worth the cost for those uses.

I would swap to Windows 10 to help “future proof” more, but your call.
 
xentr_thread_starter
Yeah I am going to stick win10 on there. I only got a 1.5mb(175KB/s) download, crappy line to download win10 on so sister got a fiber line and she is coming for Christmas, I got her buying a 8GB stick to download win10 on for me. I got win10 on a 4GB stick from a year or so ago, but it takes another 2-3 days to finish the upgrade to win10. The new win10 download requires a 8GB stick instead of 4GB so hopefully most upgrades will be on the 8GB.

Most of his storage is on portable drives, he got a couple to keep a couple copies of his pictures, just in case something dies so the 275Gb should be good.

Im still wondering what the brand of RAM should be? Will it matter?

Thanks.
 
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