time for an upgrade!

My current gaming computer is:

ATI Radeon 9800PRO
2x512MB PC3200 DDR Ram
AMD Athlon64 3200+ ClawHammer S754
MSI K8N Neo Platinum
WD Raptor 36GBx2 Raid 0
Creative X-Fi XtremeMusic
Thermaltake’s Tsunami case

This rig is about 2~3 years old and I think I’m going to upgrade. Before, I’ve been avoiding upgrades because of my harddisk setup. RAID 0. In simple terms, it’s 2 harddisks working together as 1. The risk is also doubled. If 1 harddisk fails, data on both harddisks are as good as gone.

But I’m lucky as my harddisks have been running fine and non-stop(well, at least 90% uptime) ever since I bought them.

The biggest hassle is backing up files and restoring them on the new rig. But with less FFXI addiction now, I have more free time.

Things I’m going to upgrade:

A bigger, more spacious computer case
Dual Core CPU
Compatible motherboard with support for RAID 0
Dual graphic cards. SLI setup.
2x1024MB Ram. Because ram is cheap now.

But first, research must be done!

Update:

Here’s what I’ve chosen:

Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 & Gigabyte GA-965P-DS4 = SGD$847
Kingston ValueRam PC2-5300 DDR2-667 2GB (2X1GB) = SGD$250
Leadtek 8800GTS 640MB = SGD$695
Lian-Li PC7A+ = SGD$129

Total: SGD$1921 – Which is within my budget.

Decided not to go for SLI.

If I sell my old parts, I think I can get back $300~400.