Gotta love getting your tax return. New toys

[RobertJasper]

I got my tax return and bought some new stuff. I'm so happy right now. Here's what I got...

First, an Asus Transformer TF101 16GB tablet running ICS. I freakin love this thing. I got a great deal on it through CL, only $240, and I sold my old Eee 900 netbook for $100 to offset the cost.

Next I got a refurbished Asus K53TA 15.6" laptop. It's got an AMD A6-3400 APU, 8GB DDR3 1333 (I upgraded it from 4GB), and the APU's integrated HD 6520G plus a dedicated HD 6650M 1GB GPU. Crossfired together AMD calls them an HD 6720G2. Except for the refurbished sticker on the bottom you'd never know it's not brand-new. I got it from newegg for $420 plus $28 for the second stick of RAM, and I sold my old Asus X83VB-X2 with C2D T6400, 4GB and 9300M GS to a friend for $300.

Next, I ordered some parts to upgrade my desktop. I'm waiting for these to be delivered. I got:

Asus M5A97 AM3+ motherboard
AMD FX-8120 CPU (yeah I know Intel's better I wanted this though )
16GB AMD Performance Edition DDR3 1600
Asus HD 6870 1GB

This is going from an Asus P5N-D motherboard with Core 2 Quad Q8400, 8GB DDR2 800 and a pair of Asus 9800GT's in SLI. I paid $580 for all of it, and I'm hoping to sell the old stuff for $300.

Finally, I ordered an Asus VE258Q 25" 1080P LCD monitor for $260. This is upgrading from an Asus 22" 1680x1050 LCD that I'm hoping to sell for $100.

Can you tell I like Asus? lol. And yes I know someone is going to tell me I should have gotten an i5. I just wanted to go with AMD this time. I think I did pretty good for the money with selling the old stuff. If I can get what I'm hoping for for the old parts and LCD then the total out of pocket cost of everything will only be $728.

I do want to get both the laptop and desktop each an SSD and a second 6870 for crossfire in the future, but I needed to stop before my wife killed me lol. So what do you think?

[mondena]

I got my tax return and bought some new stuff. I'm so happy right now. Here's what I got...

First, an Asus Transformer TF101 16GB tablet running ICS. I freakin love this thing. I got a great deal on it through CL, only $240, and I sold my old Eee 900 netbook for $100 to offset the cost.

Next I got a refurbished Asus K53TA 15.6" laptop. It's got an AMD A6-3400 APU, 8GB DDR3 1333 (I upgraded it from 4GB), and the APU's integrated HD 6520G plus a dedicated HD 6650M 1GB GPU. Crossfired together AMD calls them an HD 6720G2. Except for the refurbished sticker on the bottom you'd never know it's not brand-new. I got it from newegg for $420 plus $28 for the second stick of RAM, and I sold my old Asus X83VB-X2 with C2D T6400, 4GB and 9300M GS to a friend for $300.

Next, I ordered some parts to upgrade my desktop. I'm waiting for these to be delivered. I got:

Asus M5A97 AM3+ motherboard
AMD FX-8120 CPU (yeah I know Intel's better I wanted this though )
16GB AMD Performance Edition DDR3 1600
Asus HD 6870 1GB

This is going from an Asus P5N-D motherboard with Core 2 Quad Q8400, 8GB DDR2 800 and a pair of Asus 9800GT's in SLI. I paid $580 for all of it, and I'm hoping to sell the old stuff for $300.

Finally, I ordered an Asus VE258Q 25" 1080P LCD monitor for $260. This is upgrading from an Asus 22" 1680x1050 LCD that I'm hoping to sell for $100.

Can you tell I like Asus? lol. And yes I know someone is going to tell me I should have gotten an i5. I just wanted to go with AMD this time. I think I did pretty good for the money with selling the old stuff. If I can get what I'm hoping for for the old parts and LCD then the total out of pocket cost of everything will only be $728.

I do want to get both the laptop and desktop each an SSD and a second 6870 for crossfire in the future, but I needed to stop before my wife killed me lol. So what do you think?

WOW! thats a tonne of upgrades, done very well (except for not getting an intel CPU) for maximizing performance/dollar, especially considering your offsetting costs of selling stuff. Good work!

[RobertJasper]

Thanks mondena.

I thought about going Intel, but I wanted an unlocked CPU and the i5 2500k and equivalent Asus motherboard would have been $70 more than this setup. I also do a lot of work with VM's and thought 8 cores might help. Also to be honest, I have really bad OCD and wanted both my laptop and desktop to be AMD. It drives me nuts to have one AMD and one Intel lol. I'm sure this setup will be plenty powerful for my uses though. I wont get the upgrade parts until Wednesday, and the monitor until Thrusday, but I already have the laptop and tablet and I'm loving them. [thumbup]

[Ruzhyo]

Ctrl+F Asus. LOL.

Grats on the upgrades.

[RobertJasper]

Ctrl+F Asus. LOL.

Grats on the upgrades.

I like things to match lol.

Thanks. It seems like the wait for them to be delivered is taking forever.

[Gordo]

Nice - I'm a bit like that, OCD, as I prefer to have all the components from the same supplier/brand - but I don't get hung up on it

Tax returns are great - until you realise the Gov'ment has been using that money, interest free, when it was really yours all the time

[alaskan_thunder]

RobertJasper + Florence95 = Same person???

Florence95

Re: Gotta love getting your tax return. New toys
I should have gotten an i5. I just wanted to go with AMD this time. I think I did pretty good for the money with selling the old stuff. If I can get what I'm hoping for for the old parts

RobertJasper

Re: Gotta love getting your tax return. New toys
I like things to match lol.

Thanks. It seems like the wait for them to be delivered is taking forever.

[RobertJasper]

RobertJasper + Florence95 = Same person???

Nope. I'm guessing he was trying to quote me but messed up.

[watto_uk]

[yes] Nice.

I've just blown last months bonus on:

Asus P8Z68-V LX Intel Z68 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard
Intel Core i7-2600k 3.40GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor
Kingston HyperX Genesis Grey 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit
EK Supreme LTX CPU Waterblock - Nickel Acetal
EK-FC680 GTX Full Cover Waterblock
Palit GeForce GTX 680

Didn't quite cover it with my bonus, but get paid again on Thursday. Expecting a similar sized bonus for that month too. (had 3 REALLY good months).

Going to put it all together tomorrow. Upgrading from Q9450, so it's been a while.

[alaskan_thunder]

[yes] Nice.

I've just blown last months bonus on:

Asus P8Z68-V LX Intel Z68 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard
Intel Core i7-2600k 3.40GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor
Kingston HyperX Genesis Grey 8GB (2x4GB) DDR3 PC3-12800C9 1600MHz Dual Channel Kit
EK Supreme LTX CPU Waterblock - Nickel Acetal
EK-FC680 GTX Full Cover Waterblock
Palit GeForce GTX 680

Didn't quite cover it with my bonus, but get paid again on Thursday. Expecting a similar sized bonus for that month too. (had 3 REALLY good months).

Going to put it all together tomorrow. Upgrading from Q9450, so it's been a while.

Prepare to be sexually assaulted! [wave][thumbup]