Upgrade to a dual core, socket 775

[ghostbahamut]

What I have:
Acer Aspire SA80
e661fgm mobo
Socket vga775
Celeron D in it

I was wondering if I could swap that for an intel dual core also having socket 775.

If the answer is no, I'd appreciate the explaination, would it be because of specs being too low on the mobo? Which specs? I finally found specs for the mobo on the ecs site, only says stuff about "up to" whatever GhZ.

I wouldn't wanna have to buy a new mobo to use a dual core..

Any help would be amazing : )

 

[CMH]

You wouldn't be able to run the latest Core2Duos.

The motherboard doesn't have enough power phases to deal with them.

For true confirmation, why not call Acer and see what's the most powerful CPU you can pop in there?

 

[dividebyzero]

Doesn't look like it judging by the Acer spec sheet. Looks as though the motherboard is limited to a 533FSB (QDR), which would preclude all Pentium D except the 805 (2.66GHz) since the other 25 Pentium D CPU's are 800FSB (QDR). So you are limited to a P4 as an upgrade....which isn't much of an upgrade to tell the truth.
I sincerely doubt you would gain anything even if you were able to upgrade to a Pentium D as the system looks severely bandwidth limited in terms of memory (2Gb DDR-400 max.)
My suggestion would be to either keep the system but don't throw much (if any) cash or resources at it- any gains you make wont be commensurate with the time and effort involved, or...
(Cheap upgrade) start looking around for a Core 2 Duo/quad + P35/P43/P45/X38/X48 in the second-hand market -or possibly an AMD equivalent. or...
(more expensive) a new Core i3/i5 +H55/H57/P55 (or AMD Athlon II based system) for warranteed components.
Both these options will become more affordable once Intel's new P67 chipset (and possibly AMD's new Llano CPU/new socket motherboards) are introduced later in the year.

 

[Archean]

Is this your system?

However, apparently the processor is of LGA775 socket, but your motherboard 'may' not support newer processors or may require BIOS to be updated.

Your current processor was released in Q4/04, hence at best you may be restricted to whatever was available at that time; at best you may be able to slot in a Pentium D processor as DBZ as already pointed out.

I concur with DBZ's suggestion that you will be better off by getting a completely new system, both as i) performance and ii) ROI. Regards

 

[ghostbahamut]

Thank you CMH for your reply, I've tried Acer before hand, they won't answer cause my warranty is up. (Call and pay, yay).

DBZ, lol love that show... thank you as your response seals my thoughts on the issue, I was thinking it was too good to be possible.

I will indeed wait a good while Archean, and no, my comp is a Vaio, and way more powerful than this system, I'll finish the profile lol.

Cheers.

 

[CMH]

Unfortuantely your motherboard is one that was released pre-Core2Duo. From my knowledge, they precluded the ability to add any Core2Duo CPUs, but there was always that possibility that your board was manufactured close enough to the release date that they can use the OLDER Core2Duos (thinking of E6xxx series here).

Then again, like DBZ mentioned, which was echoed by Archean, you're much much better off just getting a new mobo, CPU and RAM. Everything else is compatible.

I've recently seen many older Core2Duo PCs out there for cheap (I recently passed down my own Core2Duo E6420), so it might not cost as much as you think.