Can I just upgrade to a new motherboard/CPU – opinions?

In My Humble Opinion
1

I have a HP Vectra VL420 mid-tower system I’ve had for at least 10 years. It has been my business computer, but lately I’ve been doing everything on my laptop because the HP has become so painfully slow.
I have crappy luck with laptops, so I’m getting a bit nervous.
I’m thinking I could breathe new life into the old box by pulling the old motherboard and replacing it with this motherboard, and this CPU. I got the idea from here.

The thing is, I haven’t built a computer for at least 15 years, and I know a lot has changed, so I thought I’d run this by you guys for comments/opinions. As I said, this would be my business computer. It would mostly be running Quickbooks and hosting spreadsheets & various documents. I don’t play any games more complicated than Angry Birds at this time, but you never know what I’ll be doing in the future.

So anyway, The old motherboard is approximately 9.5” x 9.5”, as best I measure without taking it out, which makes it a micro-ATX, I believe, same as the new one. Also the new board has a single PATA connection, so I could keep using my old IDE hard drives for now. That’s good because I have a stack of them. I’d lose the CD drive, the 3.5” diskette, and the Zip drive. (yes, I still have a Zip drive). I haven’t used the diskette or the Zip drive in years, so no biggie. I have a portable DVD drive/burner I can plug into a USB port that I put together when I got my netbook, so that’s covered.
The existing HP power supply is rated for 250w, so I think I’m good there.
The CPU comes with a heat sink and fan, and, I think, some thermal paste. I read the reviews on the CPU to see what people thought of the supplied heat sink. Some folks said it was just fine, and some said it was a POS, but I’d trust you guys’ opinions before I’d take the word of some tweekers. I don’t plan to overclock the chip. I might try to unlock the 4th core someday, if I ever conceive of a reason to do so, but I’m not planning on it at this time. Does anyone have any experience with AMD supplied heat sinks? Thoughts?

Have I overlooked anything? Any gotchas? What can I expect to happen when I turn this frankenbox on for the first time?

Sidebar:
Someday I will probably get a small form factor box to move my components into that could actually sit on a desktop to eliminate one of my pet peeves; crawling around on the floor to plug/unplug USB gadgets, but that’s some time in the future. Right now I’d just like to resurrect my old business computer for not very much money. (~$200.00+)

Thanks very much for any help you can give me.

2

I too have not built a new PC in years but I think you might need a new PSU.

Also, you will probably need to reinstall the OS if you are using Windows - and may have issues reactivating. I have not swapped out a motherboard but driver issues will probably keep you from booting off the old drive and Windows will see things as a second install on a new PC.

3

You need a new Power Supply and new memory (DDR3) at the minimum (in addition to what you have specified). Fortunately for you today is the day to be doing it:

You probably want a new case as well:

From what I have seen in the past, those are some great deals that aren’t very common, and I follow Fatwallet & Slickdeals religiously.

4

You can. A few years ago I put together a half decent computer for under $200 fitting a new motherboard into a old beige case, a hand me down from a computer my son put together in the late 90’s. I am capable of drilling a few holes and fabricating brackets, but didn’t have to. Note, this was my first computer build. I am not a young geek either.