As suspected, T Gregg is a talented guy who is facile in dealing with computer hardware as well as all of the software required to put together a (decent) trading computer ... ... so his post needs to be read with that in mind. *** For most guys figuring out what you want and purchaisng a computer with the right specs is enough of a challenge, especially when you factor in all of the software you have to be familiar with to trade well. Last and certainly not least is the fact that not all hardware is comptabile with other hardware, and you'd better make darn sure everything you're running is mutually compatible when putting together a multi-monitor trading rig. Good trading
Thanks for everybody's suggestions. I was able to remove the board in about 10 mins and it doesn't look too daunting. Is it worthwhile to upgrade the CPU as well now that I have it apart? It's a pentium 4 3.2G.
I'm assuming you're running Windows. Going from a uniprocessor to multi-core requires upgrading the HAL and that, plus the mobo swap will probably require you to re-validate Windows due to all the hardware that's changed. If it's an OEM Windows you might run into a dead-end.
If you upgrade the CPU along with a newer motherboard, you'll most likely need to upgrade the ram as well. The new motherboard may only run DDR2 or DDR3 ram - assuming the old setup was using DDR or even older ram. By the time you've done that, you basically have built a new computer. - As mentioned in the previous reply, activating windows XP may be problematic. But depending on the license it was sold with, you may be able to solve the activation problem by simply calling Microsoft and explaining the problem.