My AMD XP2800 cpu based system is struggling to deliver 10-50 fps in lfs and its all too juddery when other cars are around. I could improve the graphics card but I dont think it will help much because of the maxed out cpu. I have been looking at getting a new system and came across the following deal at Overclockers UK for £420.
It seems like a good buy to me but I would appreciate any feedback on whether it is a reasonable spec system for Lfs, GPL etc.
I do not want to spend more than this right now.

CPU AMD Athlon II X2 Dual Core 245 2.90GHz
Cooler AMD Black Edition Approved CPU Cooler
Card ATI Radeon HD 4850 512MB GDDR3
Hard Drive Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache
Memory Kingston HyperX 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 6400C4 800MHzD
Dual Channel
Motherboard Gigabyte GA-M61PME-S2P nForce 430 PCI-Express DDR2
Motherboard
Optical Drive LG GH22NS30 22x DVD±RW SATA Dual Layer ReWriter
Power Supply Corsair CX 400W ATX Power Supply
Sound Card High Definition 7.1 OnBoard Sound Car

Systems looks very good for lfs. Only the power-supply is a bit weak. Would be better to get a good 500 watt psu for more power-reserve.

Thanks for that Bluebird
Yes I thought it was a small psu but I have an Enermax 535w psu in my old system that I could use if any problems.

if you're going for a duel core, go for the AMD Phenom X2 Dual Core 550 3.10GHz
it's a socket AM3 but it also runs on an AM2+ board. you get so much more cache with the Phenom.
also go for a hdd with 32mb of cache rather than 16mb. more cache = good. and the difference in price is pennies.

400w of PSU is a bit weak i assume. 4850 and 4870 (i got 4870) are similar cards. Im on 550w and its just about enough. But still, i would reccomend a bit more than 400w.

Quote from Bluebird B B :

Systems looks very good for lfs. Only the power-supply is a bit weak. Would be better to get a good 500 watt psu for more power-reserve.

I disagree. A X2 245 is very power efficient. Also the 4850 has one 6 pin connection so I can't imagine that being a super power hungry video card. That PSU is fine for that system.

I think that motherboard is ancient. It has an nForce 4 and a 6100? You could get that more than 3 years ago! I would personally go with an AM3 board, and DDR3 ram. It will be easier to upgrade in the future if you ever need to. I see no reason to go with old hardware.

As far as LFS is concerned you won't have any problems. LFS isn't a demanding game by today's standards.

My New Specs will look like this .

AMD Phenom II x2 550 Black Edition AM3
Gigabyte GA-MA770T-UD3P AM3
ATI Radeon HD 5770
4GB DDR3 1066/1333
2x WesternDigital 160GB 7,2 MB/s
550/650 Watt

The Phenom II X2 550 IS ABLE TO UNLOCK TO QUAD CORE WITH THIS MAINBOARDS : http://edgemeal.110mb.com/AMD_Unlocked/Stats.htm


Gigabyte GA-MA770T-UD3P AM3 -> Sucess to X4 with Bios F2/F2C/F3

Just a little warning on the ability to "unlock" to a quad core: The reason they lock it is because those other cores failed some of AMD's QA tests (meaning they are manufacturing defects), so don't be surprised if they cause Windows or games to crash. They aren't locked out just so AMD can sell you dual-core processors, they are locked out because if you use them then you might run into problems. It varies from CPU to CPU though, some of them may work well, and some of them may not work at all. Just a heads up. It would be cool to try unlocking them and see what happens though.

Not quite - AMD (Intel do the same) start of with a batch of xx quad core CPU's, and they want yy Quad's and then zz Tri's - they will bin them from "best" to "worst", and then order them accordingly. Some may be unstable - some will be fine.

i.e. Intel only make a few CPU's, rank them and then slap models / clocks on them based on what they want to sell, not based on what they have in front of them (because the cheapest ones are the most popular...).

Quote from hazaky :

400w of PSU is a bit weak i assume. 4850 and 4870 (i got 4870) are similar cards. Im on 550w and its just about enough. But still, i would reccomend a bit more than 400w.

I'm on 520W with 2x a 4850 and a quadcore, with 4GB of fast ram, So what you say is nonsense I think.

Nothing much about the PSU's wattage rating, but the amperage rating. You should get a good PSU with moderate amperage on the 12V rails, etc. My friend ran his quad Phenom and GTX260 and loads of RAM on a 450W PSU. No problem there. He upgraded to a TX750 though.

There is absolutely no need to buy another PSU for HD4770, your Corsair CX400 is rated 30A on +12v which is far more than your system requires. It is also made by Seasonic which is one of the best manufacturers in today's consumer PSU market and you can google up multiple reviews with very impressive results. All I'm saying is that if you "upgrade" to bargain bin 500-600W PSU, you might actually end up with worse unit than what you have right now.

Edit: Oh wait, last specs posted are in no way related to OP....

I have got a Coolmaster 500 watt psu, it's fine on my system with 5 hdd's/AMD x3 720 @ 3.3/ ATI x2 4770/OCZ 8GIG 1066/X-FI soundcard/BluRay Drive. It's not struggleing to power it at all but it all depends on the quality of the psu tbh.

Some are crap but some are really good, i got mine for £60ish but if you got a psu rated at 500watt and cost half the price, if you go ahead and but the cheap you will risk blowing most off your pc components.

400W is enough for that system. Also Corsair is probably the best PSU manufacturer at the moment.

Quote from Loose Cannon :

My AMD XP2800 cpu based system is struggling to deliver 10-50 fps in lfs and its all too juddery when other cars are around. I could improve the graphics card but I dont think it will help much because of the maxed out cpu. I have been looking at getting a new system and came across the following deal at Overclockers UK for £420.
It seems like a good buy to me but I would appreciate any feedback on whether it is a reasonable spec system for Lfs, GPL etc.
I do not want to spend more than this right now.

CPU AMD Athlon II X2 Dual Core 245 2.90GHz
Cooler AMD Black Edition Approved CPU Cooler
Card ATI Radeon HD 4850 512MB GDDR3
Hard Drive Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache
Memory Kingston HyperX 4GB (2x2GB) DDR2 6400C4 800MHzD
Dual Channel
Motherboard Gigabyte GA-M61PME-S2P nForce 430 PCI-Express DDR2
Motherboard
Optical Drive LG GH22NS30 22x DVD±RW SATA Dual Layer ReWriter
Power Supply Corsair CX 400W ATX Power Supply
Sound Card High Definition 7.1 OnBoard Sound Car

Sounds like a software related problem. That spec should be able to deliver 50FPS no problem at all.

I have an old PC with 1.2Ghz single core, 512Mb RAM and low end GC and it manages 30 FPS.