Old motherboard new devices constant lack of knowledge

[SoIdidItAgain]

Hey,
Im trying to breath new life into an old and now unreliable machine by replacing the motherboard, chip, memory and graphics card for modern future proof ones, but i want to know if the old devices (which i am happy with for the time being) will be compatible with the new motherboard and whether the new board will have enough sockets for the four devices; DVD drive, CD drive, Floppy and hard drive. The original motherboard is a Gigabyte ga-72xe, and the devices are unbranded (at least from the outside) and look like pretty standard and generic. The hard disk is something like 32gb i think, anyhow the new board ive got in mind is either an ASUS A8n, msi k8n, or Gigabyte ga-k8nxp or one of the many Ga-k8 subtypes as the starting point for a hefty new system. Really im concerned that while trying to put together a cost effective but forward looking upgrade (going for pci-e) for an old machine, an overlooked practicality will mean delays and extra unexpected expense. Will i still be able to use the old devices? will it all still fit in the existing case? does the modern motherboard need something more than my standard cheapo power supply? can i just plug the old hard disk in and everything will fire up as usual? Any answers guys would be much appreciated!
Cheers

 

[vegasgmc]

You're fine. CDROMS and hard drives made in the past 8 years are standardized. I havent bought a new computer since "99. I just keep upgrading. Just make sure the new motherboard has at least 2 IDE connectors and a few PCI slots. You might want to get a newer hard drive. They are alot faster now and you can get one for as little as $50.

 

[Bobcat1132]

oh yeah you should be way good to go. you may have to tell your motherboard which order to boot up your drives before you can install windows but they are going to be compatible

 

[SoIdidItAgain]

hey thanks! that was quite quick...

Thanks guys, great to hear that, nice advise. Come to think of it, the harddisk is a little long in the tooth and good new ones are pretty cheap.
I'll keep coming back to this hugely helpful message board.
Appreciate the help, :bounce:

 

[Bobcat1132]

no prob and glad to be of help

 

[RealBlackStuff]

If you go that way, you WILL need a more powerful powersupply.
Your new one should be of the ATX12v type, with the extra 4-pin CPU-cable, PCI-E cable(s) and SATA cable(s). Reckon around 400W minimum.
The AMD64 alone will take care of about 80-90W.
Read up on PSUs in posts in our 'Other Hardware' forum: https://www.techspot.com/vb/menu14.html

You will also have to install everything from scratch!

 

[Justin]

400W Generic perhaps. Any quality 300-350W (Think Antec SmartPower series) will do superbly on just about any a64 system even with a high end video card and several drives. Don't skimp on the PSU though.

 

[SoIdidItAgain]

PSU advice taken, very interesting. Hey though, why does everything have to be re-installed? What are the issues going on with the existing setup?? I saw that the latest asus socket 939 pci-e boards won't work with win 98 or me, that doesn't effect me though cos i have XP, but are there any other issues with using older software within XP while running such modern boards??
Appreciate it,

 

[Bobcat1132]

it seems as if that would make sense to just plug in your hdd and let it rip but very rarely does that even remotely happen and if it does you run the risk of long term affects happening and your machine crashing. im not sure what it is in the motherboard that wont allow you to use an already formatted hdd maybe the bios or something i really dont know but i do know it wont work 99.9% of the time that is why you will have to reinstall everything again

 

[Merc14]

Yep, you are going to need to do a OS reinstall no matter what. Changing MoBos pretty much requires a new build. Do you have a licensed version of XP? MS is going to start denying access to upgrades if it isn't and be advised that if the XP you have came with a PC you bought (like a Dell or HP) then XP really isn't on there. You can get a new freshly minted copyof XP w/ SP2 integrated for $80 though (OEM version).

Plan on $80 for a good PSU and you can get a fast new 160GB hard drive for under $100. 512mb of RAM is a minimum nowadays and look at AMD for the CPU as they are 64 bit ready and are generally cheaper than Intel. Get one with the 939 pins and a matching 939 socket MoBo with onboaard sound and LAN and PCIexpress slot. You'll need a Video Card too. You can get a 6600GT for $150. All of the aforementioned will clock in at about $900 but the difference in performance will be eye watering.

You may have some software that won't run on XP but I doubt it. XP is a very forgiving OS and is light years better than 98. One problem you may have is your files will be saved in FAT32 and XP likes the NTFS Hard Drive filing system. Just something to be aware of wehn you start.

 

[Didou]

Swapping your board without so much as a reinstall (243kB of images