Upgrade Options from a Sandy Bridge Prebuilt Sff

AlienC on 16/10/2021 - 13:44

So I bought one of these years ago I think was 2017

REFURB HP Elite 8200 Quad Core i7 2600 8GB RAM 500GB HDD Win 10 Pro Desktop $208.05 @ BNEACTTRADER eBay

https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/354830

Put in a 1050 Ti Low Profile

Added 32gb ddr3 ram (total 32gb ddr3 ram)

Added 2 x ssds (500gb Samsung 850 EVO + 2TB Micron 1100)

Added 1 x mechanical hdd (8TB Seagate External Portable shucked)

Added 1 x DVD combo drive (which I have never used ok maybe only once)

Added 1 x usb wifi n dongle

It came with 240 watts psu

It's a great machine and I can even game at 1440p 40-60 fps on bfv low settings

Recently it has been getting an issue where it doesn't post or boot but the pc turns on and the fan spin at full speed and it just does that forever until I turn it off

The monitor does not engage nor does the keyboard rgb lights which is a good indicator that the pc has turned on ok

I have got some suggestions to try reset the cmos settings and reseat the ram which I will try today and hope it works but the purpose of this thread is to ask what would be the best SFF or cheap prebuilt to buy that will do better than the i7 2600

I'm ready to spend $200-400 again to get another barebones SFF of prebuilt with a larger psu and better CPU then maybe resell this one for parts

So that is my request and question

It is time to upgrade this great Sandy bridge soldier and put him to rest but only if there is anything better out there otherwise ill just buy a similar machine and cannibalise my current components into the "new" machine

I am still very happy with the performance I can get from the 1050 Ti Low Profile and 32gb ddr3 ram I can still play many games at 1080p medium settings solid 60fps

So any machine that has lower performance than a i7 2600 I have to dismiss

Are their any good deals I can put my current parts in

Computing Computer Desktop Computer HP

Comments

  • Gnostikos on 16/10/2021 - 13:49
    +1

    Sandy Bridge never dies.

    I still have a spare rig from 2011 running an OC'ed i7 2600K and it can still game amazingly well in 2021.

    The longevity, value or inter-generational leap in performance of that CPU architecture will ever be repeated again. That was truly the golden era for PCs.

    • freefall101 on 16/10/2021 - 14:46
      +1

      IMO Zen 3 will probably be looked back on in a similar light.

      Sandy Bridge was so good because Intel screwed up the prior release and didn't make an enthusiast chip for Westmere. If you wanted a 4 core, 8 thread chip you had to go back a generation, all Westmere offered was 2 core, 4 thread chips or 6 core chips on a server socket, it was ridiculous. Their pricing was also all over the shop with Nehalem, they were charging double the price for chips that were 200-300mhz faster despite being exactly the same besides that.

      Then suddenly Sandy Bridge came along with 4 core, 8 thread chips at an amazing price, great overclocking and there were well priced boards to go with it. It wasn't a hugely faster chip than what came before it (it did have a lot higher clockspeeds though) but it was available to the masses.

    • Diji1 on 16/10/2021 - 15:07

      it can still game amazingly well

      I'm not sure what your definition of amazing is but I consider six cores to be a minimum now.

      • Gnostikos on 16/10/2021 - 16:42

        PC games are still some of the least multi-threaded software programs out there and are overwhelmingly GPU-dependent and single core performance/base clock speed is usually much more important than core count. You can still game on a high-end quad core CPU from a few years ago and not be CPU-bottlenecked enough to noticeably impact framerates.

        A 10-year old gaming rig with an i7 2600K @ 4.6Ghz, 16GB of RAM, an RX 580 4GB and a SATA SSD running recent, triple-A titles like Doom Eternal and Hitman 2 at 1920x1080 and achieving a solid average of 50-60FPS even with High settings is amazing.

        I can guarantee whatever 6-core CPU you buy now is definitely not going to be relevant for triple-A gaming in 10 years time.

        • AlienC on 16/10/2021 - 16:48

          Yeah if i tried that in 2010 with a 2000 equivalent it would not perform the same or give the same results at all.

          That is what makes this cpu such a standout in computing history.

          Sandy Bridge will forever go down in the history books as an enormous leap in cpu perfomance for years to come.

    • AlienC on 16/10/2021 - 16:45

      It is definitely something that will stand out in the history books.

  • FireRunner on 16/10/2021 - 14:20

    Is there a way to troubleshoot the problem?
    Usually there's either beeping or a flashing LED light which would indicate a code that will help diagnose the problem

    • AlienC on 16/10/2021 - 16:49

      If you have any ideas im all open but i myself have no answers.

      Im just gonna reseat the ram and maybe disconnect and reconnect some power cables and see if that does anything otherwise looks like i need to find a new sff or home for my computer parts.

      • FireRunner on 16/10/2021 - 17:16

        Found the HP Elite 8200 technical reference guide here
        Apendix A (page 93) shows the blinking light error codes. Count the number of times the light blinks and it will indicate the problem.
        Example: 5 blinks = RAM issue

        • AlienC on 16/10/2021 - 17:39
          +1

          Cheers thanks awesome

  • freefall101 on 16/10/2021 - 15:01
    +1

    You could keep an eye out for something similar, similar PC but 4 years newer goes for a similar price to what you paid 4 years ago - https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/203571570875?hash=item2f65cfa8bb…

    That apparently fits a GPU, you could put your drives and RAM across (I think the RAM would go) and you're good to go. There's also Dell SFF that would be basically the same. Ultimately, once the market gets flooded with ex-lease versions of a desktop they get super cheap, thus buying one a couple of years newer costs twice as much (but isn't twice as fast).

    At a guess, after 10 years the PSU is starting to go in your existing machine. It could be RAM as well, you could try running memtest on it (it sounds like it boots sometimes but not every time?) but my guess would be PSU.

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