I have an aging system that really suits me well and I would like,
if possible, to extend its useful life for as much as it makes
sense (financial and computing):

Asus A7V400-MX (Socket A) - Sempron 2200+
single stick 512 Mb 333 GHz DDR RAM
2x120 Gb ATA133 disks

I am considering an upgrade for about $100. It can be done
now or a year later, depending on prices.

According to Asus, the board supports these CPUs at the
high range:

Athlon XP 2800+(333 MHZ FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
Athlon XP 2800+(333FSB)(Model 8)(Thoroughbred)
Athlon XP 2900+
Athlon XP 3000+(333 MHZ FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
Athlon XP 3000+(400 MHz FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
Athlon XP 3200+(400 MHz FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
Sempron 2800+ (Model 10)
Sempron 2800+ (Model 8)
Sempron 3000+

Questions:
1. What kind of speed increase in performance (say, DivX
encoding) can I expect by upgrading from to Sempron 2200+
to the speediest CPU in the above list?

2. Today, a used Sempron 3000+ can be had for ~ $70 delivered,
used Athlon XP 2800+ for ~$100 and used Athlon XP 3200+
for ~ $130. Would an upgrade to any of these make sense or
would I pay about the same for a new mobo/CPU/RAM
combination that is much faster?

3. How do CPUs in the above list compare?

Thanks,

DK

> Athlon XP 2800+(333 MHZ FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
> Athlon XP 2800+(333FSB)(Model 8)(Thoroughbred)
> Athlon XP 2900+
> Athlon XP 3000+(333 MHZ FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
> Athlon XP 3000+(400 MHz FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
> Athlon XP 3200+(400 MHz FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)

The above cpu's get very hot, i had a Athlon XP 3200+ FSB 400
need i say it, it burned out in the summer, so i got a Sempron 2800+
socket A

My mum and father in law went back to Jamaica to live he had a
Athlon 3000+ FSB 333 a week of running it cpu burned out.

> Sempron 2800+ (Model 10)
> Sempron 2800+ (Model 8)
> Sempron 3000+

> DK

DK wrote:
> I have an aging system that really suits me well and I would like,
> if possible, to extend its useful life for as much as it makes
> sense (financial and computing):
>
> Asus A7V400-MX (Socket A) - Sempron 2200+
> single stick 512 Mb 333 GHz DDR RAM
> 2x120 Gb ATA133 disks
>
> I am considering an upgrade for about $100. It can be done
> now or a year later, depending on prices.
>
> According to Asus, the board supports these CPUs at the
> high range:

I'm afraid a more basic question you forgot to ask is whether any of the
CPUs are going to available for purchase anymore. And the answer will
most likely be no. All of those CPUs are Socket A CPUs, and that family
was discontinued nearly 4 years ago. If you want to upgrade, it'll be
considerably more than $100, as you'll need a new processor, a new
motherboard, and new memory (DDR2 is the standard now). You'll also
likely need new hard disks, as most modern hard disks are SATA now, so
your old ATA hard drives will not work in the system, unless you
purchase an add-in ATA plug-in board.

Yousuf Khan

--
There is no failure, only delayed success

"DK" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:aw5Lh.99$(E-Mail Removed)...
>I have an aging system that really suits me well and I would like,
> if possible, to extend its useful life for as much as it makes
> sense (financial and computing):
>
> Asus A7V400-MX (Socket A) - Sempron 2200+
> single stick 512 Mb 333 GHz DDR RAM
> 2x120 Gb ATA133 disks
>
> I am considering an upgrade for about $100. It can be done
> now or a year later, depending on prices.
>
> According to Asus, the board supports these CPUs at the
> high range:
>
> Athlon XP 2800+(333 MHZ FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
> Athlon XP 2800+(333FSB)(Model 8)(Thoroughbred)
> Athlon XP 2900+
> Athlon XP 3000+(333 MHZ FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
> Athlon XP 3000+(400 MHz FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
> Athlon XP 3200+(400 MHz FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
> Sempron 2800+ (Model 10)
> Sempron 2800+ (Model 8)
> Sempron 3000+
>
> Questions:
> 1. What kind of speed increase in performance (say, DivX
> encoding) can I expect by upgrading from to Sempron 2200+
> to the speediest CPU in the above list?
>
> 2. Today, a used Sempron 3000+ can be had for ~ $70 delivered,
> used Athlon XP 2800+ for ~$100 and used Athlon XP 3200+
> for ~ $130. Would an upgrade to any of these make sense or
> would I pay about the same for a new mobo/CPU/RAM
> combination that is much faster?
>
> 3. How do CPUs in the above list compare?
>
> Thanks,
>
> DK

I dont do much encoding but on my old XP2400 a 2 hour film would take around
4 hours to encode to xvid and I did one the other day on my A64 4000 and it
took just under 1hr 30min using the same encoding program and settings.
So logically you would see a performance increase but just how much is
difficult to say - you may shave half an hour off encoding time.

Semprons have very little L2 cache (even as little as 128kb) and the
Thoroughbreds had 256kb and the Bartons had 512kb and the extra cache was
the main reason for the performance boost.

If you have $100 to spend then a better CPU would give your system a decent
boost but I would personally save up and do the mobo/cpu/ram upgrade.

(as for the other 2 posts - anyone who fries a CPU only has themself to
blame NOT the CPU for being ignorant of proper system cooling and operating
temperatures. also any current mobo has both SATA and IDE ports because
there are still plenty of IDE drives around.

In article <45fd0088$(E-Mail Removed)>, Yousuf Khan <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>DK wrote:
>> I have an aging system that really suits me well and I would like,
>> if possible, to extend its useful life for as much as it makes
>> sense (financial and computing):
>>
>> Asus A7V400-MX (Socket A) - Sempron 2200+
>> single stick 512 Mb 333 GHz DDR RAM
>> 2x120 Gb ATA133 disks
>>
>> I am considering an upgrade for about $100. It can be done
>> now or a year later, depending on prices.
>>
>> According to Asus, the board supports these CPUs at the
>> high range:
>
>I'm afraid a more basic question you forgot to ask is whether any of the
>CPUs are going to available for purchase anymore. And the answer will
>most likely be no. All of those CPUs are Socket A CPUs, and that family
>was discontinued nearly 4 years ago. If you want to upgrade, it'll be
>considerably more than $100, as you'll need a new processor, a new
>motherboard, and new memory (DDR2 is the standard now).

Well, there are plenty of used Socket A processors around. Actually, it is
quite suprising how expensive *used* Athlon XP 3200+ is on eBay:
$120-160 (which I know does not make sense because today one can
buy faster and cooler processor for less).

>likely need new hard disks, as most modern hard disks are SATA now, so
>your old ATA hard drives will not work in the system, unless you
>purchase an add-in ATA plug-in board.

That's exactly why I'd rather upgrade and postpone a hassle of moving
everything to the new system.

DK

On Sun, 18 Mar 2007 07:04:38 GMT,
(E-Mail Removed) (DK) wrote:

>I have an aging system that really suits me well and I would like,
>if possible, to extend its useful life for as much as it makes
>sense (financial and computing):

Extend it's useful life doing what exactly? The most
demanding uses would be the most important factor.



>
>Asus A7V400-MX (Socket A) - Sempron 2200+
>single stick 512 Mb 333 GHz DDR RAM

Your memory can't properly support the fastest CPUs, you
would have to underclock the memory bus and just putting it
into asynchronous mode will be a performance loss before
considering it's then slower than the FSB for the CPU.


>2x120 Gb ATA133 disks
>
>I am considering an upgrade for about $100. It can be done
>now or a year later, depending on prices.

It would be a bad value to upgrade that CPU now, even worse
in another year. You might get a 30% performance increase
but your system has limitations from the KT400 chipset
including slower memory and PCI bus, and it has not so much
memory at 512MB. I think it best to wait and add more money
towards replacing the motherboard, 1GB or more DDR2 memory,
and CPU. PCI Express video card too if you can't settle for
integrated video.

If encoding Divx takes too long then I suggest queing up the
jobs and letting them run overnight. Athlon XP generation
wasn't well suited for Divx encoding in the first place, the
newer CPU architectures are better at it, particularly with
the newer versions of the Divx codec.

"DK" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:aw5Lh.99$(E-Mail Removed)...
>I have an aging system that really suits me well and I would like,
> if possible, to extend its useful life for as much as it makes
> sense (financial and computing):
>
> Asus A7V400-MX (Socket A) - Sempron 2200+
> single stick 512 Mb 333 GHz DDR RAM
> 2x120 Gb ATA133 disks
>
> I am considering an upgrade for about $100. It can be done
> now or a year later, depending on prices.
>
> According to Asus, the board supports these CPUs at the
> high range:
>
> Athlon XP 2800+(333 MHZ FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
> Athlon XP 2800+(333FSB)(Model 8)(Thoroughbred)
> Athlon XP 2900+
> Athlon XP 3000+(333 MHZ FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
> Athlon XP 3000+(400 MHz FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
> Athlon XP 3200+(400 MHz FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
> Sempron 2800+ (Model 10)
> Sempron 2800+ (Model 8)
> Sempron 3000+
>
> Questions:
> 1. What kind of speed increase in performance (say, DivX
> encoding) can I expect by upgrading from to Sempron 2200+
> to the speediest CPU in the above list?

Almost none. You might be able to speed up your CPU by about 25%, but
overall system performance will only increase by about 10%, which will not
be noticeable. People forget that the CPU is only one part of the system.
They think just plopping in a faster CPU will make a significant
improvement. CPU (alone) can usually not make a significant improvement,
though.



> 2. Today, a used Sempron 3000+ can be had for ~ $70 delivered,
> used Athlon XP 2800+ for ~$100 and used Athlon XP 3200+
> for ~ $130. Would an upgrade to any of these make sense or
> would I pay about the same for a new mobo/CPU/RAM
> combination that is much faster?
>

You can't make an improvement on your current system without replacing
mainboard, CPU, RAM and video card, plus a beefier power supply to support
all that. -Dave

In article <45fd5b65$0$97220$(E-Mail Removed)>, "Dave" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>
>"DK" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
>news:aw5Lh.99$(E-Mail Removed)...
>>I have an aging system that really suits me well and I would like,
>> if possible, to extend its useful life for as much as it makes
>> sense (financial and computing):
>>
>> Asus A7V400-MX (Socket A) - Sempron 2200+
>> single stick 512 Mb 333 GHz DDR RAM
>> 2x120 Gb ATA133 disks
>>
>> I am considering an upgrade for about $100. It can be done
>> now or a year later, depending on prices.
>>
>> According to Asus, the board supports these CPUs at the
>> high range:
>>
>> Athlon XP 2800+(333 MHZ FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
>> Athlon XP 2800+(333FSB)(Model 8)(Thoroughbred)
>> Athlon XP 2900+
>> Athlon XP 3000+(333 MHZ FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
>> Athlon XP 3000+(400 MHz FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
>> Athlon XP 3200+(400 MHz FSB)(Model 10)(Barton)
>> Sempron 2800+ (Model 10)
>> Sempron 2800+ (Model 8)
>> Sempron 3000+
>>
>> Questions:
>> 1. What kind of speed increase in performance (say, DivX
>> encoding) can I expect by upgrading from to Sempron 2200+
>> to the speediest CPU in the above list?
>
>Almost none. You might be able to speed up your CPU by about 25%, but
>overall system performance will only increase by about 10%, which will not
>be noticeable. People forget that the CPU is only one part of the system.
>They think just plopping in a faster CPU will make a significant
>improvement. CPU (alone) can usually not make a significant improvement,
>though.
>
>> 2. Today, a used Sempron 3000+ can be had for ~ $70 delivered,
>> used Athlon XP 2800+ for ~$100 and used Athlon XP 3200+
>> for ~ $130. Would an upgrade to any of these make sense or
>> would I pay about the same for a new mobo/CPU/RAM
>> combination that is much faster?
>>
>
>You can't make an improvement on your current system without replacing
>mainboard, CPU, RAM and video card, plus a beefier power supply to support
>all that. -Dave

All right, thanks all. Just about everyone confirms what I suspected,
the upgrade is not worth it. Actually, with the rate by which hardware
industry introduces incompatible everything, it seems that any computer
upgrade rarely if ever makes any sense.

DK

DK wrote:
> All right, thanks all. Just about everyone confirms what I suspected,
> the upgrade is not worth it. Actually, with the rate by which hardware
> industry introduces incompatible everything, it seems that any computer
> upgrade rarely if ever makes any sense.


That pretty much is the basic case. There's only about a 3 year window
in which upgrades make any sense, then it's massive replacement time.

Yousuf Khan

--
There is no failure, only delayed success

DK wrote:
>
.... snip ...
>
> All right, thanks all. Just about everyone confirms what I
> suspected, the upgrade is not worth it. Actually, with the rate
> by which hardware industry introduces incompatible everything, it
> seems that any computer upgrade rarely if ever makes any sense.

To my mind, the upgrades that make sense are (in order):

1. Switch to ECC memory, if missing
2. Add memory
3. Add hard disks

I have omitted the prime upgrade, install Linux.

--
Chuck F (cbfalconer at maineline dot net)
Available for consulting/temporary embedded and systems.
<http://cbfalconer.home.att.net>



--
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