Upgrade to AMD X2 or X3?

[anubis44]

I haven't been able to find any support on my current mobo (EPOX EP-8KRAIPRO). Having not been up to speed lately on manufacturers, I'm not even sure if EPOX is still in business. This mobo has 2 SATA connections, but I don't know if they will work with the new SATA HDDs today, or have performance issues. Have not heard back from EPOX support center on this.

Budget is somewhere in the $500-$600 range.

I was looking to get a separate video card, but I don't really want to go as far as high-end quad-core. Something in the dual-core/tri-core would suit me fine. I guess that would be in the Athlon X2 or Phenom X3 categories.

EPOX is indeed out of business as of a couple of years ago. You can give a new SATA drive a try, it should work.

If you do go for a new board/CPU/ram combo, I'd highly recommend the primary machine hardware in my sig. The AMD Phenom II X2 550BE CPU is quite inexpensive (about $110US, I believe), runs at a default clock rate of 3.1GHz, and if you get a motherboard like mine with dual bios, you can unlock the other 2 cores on the CPU and get a quad core for half the price. Some will tell you there are no guarantees about the quality of the other cores, and that's true, but my X2 550BE has been running all tests flawlessly on all 4 cores since I bought it. Even if you find one or both of the other cores is bad, you still have an excellent, quick dual core CPU. In addition, you can use super cheap DDR2-800 ram without much performance difference over DDR3 with this CPU, or you can spring for a DDR3 motherboard. In any case, if you do plan to try to unlock the other 2 cores, make SURE that motherboard has been proven to be able to do so. Not all mobos can unlock the Phenom IIs extra cores. If you really want a cheap quad core, however, and you want to be certain all 4 cores are good, you can always just buy the Athlon II X4.

What I've told you is the very cheapest possible upgrade value for the $$ you can get right now. Good luck!