Athlon 64 X2: 939 (4600+) or AM2 (3800+)?

[ANTant]

Hello,

I have a dilemma on my next computer upgrade since my Athlon 64 3200+
(754) is getting slow, especially for the newest (e.g., Oblivion,
Company of Heroes, etc.) and upcoming games (e.g., Crysis, C&C3, etc.).
I do non-gaming too like watch HDTV shows, DVDs, videos, listen to
music, Web surfing, Office 2000, some graphic work (nothing fancy), etc.
For no-gaming purposes, my old Athlon XP/64(754) was fine. It is the
game that isn't. I only play games up to 1152x864 resolution due to my
old 17" CRT monitor (can't get a bigger one due to my small room and
desk, but I don't mind -- more FPS!). I do love maximum graphic details
and anistropic. FSAA would be my other chocie but I don't mind if I
don't use it.

After a month of research and listening to people's comments, I have
narrowed down to AMD side again. Intel Core 2 Duo doesn't provide IDE
connections for my old drives, and getting an IDE controller card would
exceed my PCI slots (four in total). I am also budget limited (can't
spend over $750 including taxes and stuff). I want to avoid my computer
upgrade for at least two years. I might upgrade the video card after a
year like in the past.

I do NOT overclock my system since I have problems keeping my
non-overclocked box stable when my room gets hot (up to 90 degrees(F))
during the heat wave/summer. Also, overlocking is not what I do. I am
not a hardware person/expert.

My current computer specifications is at:
http://alpha.zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/about/computers.txt ... See the
primary/gaming machine. That is the one that will be upgraded. CPU,
motherboard, video card, HDD (15 GB is too small and C: drive/partition
only has about 800 MB free) and maybe RAM will be replaced. All other
parts like my TV tuner cards, SB Audigy 2 ZS, etc. will remain.

People tell me that I should get AM2 instead of 939. AM2 costs more
because I have to spend about $200 for new RAM (DDR2) and can't use my
old RAM that Athlon 64 3200+ (754) used. My friend and other sources
(e.g., http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2738&p=1 ,
http://www23.tomshardware.com/cpu.html , and
http://www.techreport.com/reviews/2006q2/socket-am2/index.x?pg=5 ) told
me that it is not worth getting AM2 because of the benchmarks are worse
or have tiny improvements (up to 5%).

I made a table of what I plan to get on both sides at:
http://alpha.zimage.com/~ant/temp/buy.html ... Noticed I had to
sacrifice my video card speed if I get an AM2 due to cost ($200 for
RAM).

So, what should I go AM2 or go with 939? Thank you in advance.
--
"Thanks for giving me the courage to eat all those ants." --unknown
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( )

 

[Conor]

So, what should I go AM2 or go with 939? Thank you in advance.

It's simple.

If you want to upgrade your graphics card as well, go socket AM2. If
you don't, buy a Asrock 939 Dual SATA2 which has both PCIe and AGP,
will take your DDR RAM and a Socket 939 CPU.

Just a warning though - already the only place it's possible to find
Athlon64 X2 4800+ in Socket 939 is Ebay - retailers are out of them.

 

[ANTant]

It's simple.

If you want to upgrade your graphics card as well, go socket AM2. If
you don't, buy a Asrock 939 Dual SATA2 which has both PCIe and AGP,
will take your DDR RAM and a Socket 939 CPU.

So, why can't I use the new PCIE video card on the 939? Is there a
problem? I don't want to reuse my old AGP 6800. It's too slow. I am
moving it into my Linux box that will use my old Athlon 64 3200+ setup
(different case).

Just a warning though - already the only place it's possible to find
Athlon64 X2 4800+ in Socket 939 is Ebay - retailers are out of them.

Yeah, that I noticed, but I found a 4600+ 939.
--
"Thanks for giving me the courage to eat all those ants." --unknown
/\___/\
/ /\ /\ \ Phillip (Ant) @ http://antfarm.ma.cx (Personal Web Site)
| |o o| | Ant's Quality Foraged Links (AQFL): http://aqfl.net
\ _ / Please remove ANT if replying by e-mail.
( )

 

[Conor]

So, why can't I use the new PCIE video card on the 939? Is there a
problem? I don't want to reuse my old AGP 6800. It's too slow. I am
moving it into my Linux box that will use my old Athlon 64 3200+ setup
(different case).

You can but with you mentioning the DDR, I thought budget was an issue.

Yeah, that I noticed, but I found a 4600+ 939.

They're shite. Half the L2 cache.

 

[kony]

Hello,

I have a dilemma on my next computer upgrade since my Athlon 64 3200+
(754) is getting slow, especially for the newest (e.g., Oblivion,
Company of Heroes, etc.) and upcoming games (e.g., Crysis, C&C3, etc.).
I do non-gaming too like watch HDTV shows, DVDs, videos, listen to
music, Web surfing, Office 2000, some graphic work (nothing fancy), etc.
For no-gaming purposes, my old Athlon XP/64(754) was fine. It is the
game that isn't. I only play games up to 1152x864 resolution due to my
old 17" CRT monitor (can't get a bigger one due to my small room and
desk, but I don't mind -- more FPS!). I do love maximum graphic details
and anistropic. FSAA would be my other chocie but I don't mind if I
don't use it.

A small desk is an even better reason to go LCD, if
maximizing framerate is a large concern then stick with a
19" rather than larger monitor... else you'd have to use
non-native resolution.

After a month of research and listening to people's comments, I have
narrowed down to AMD side again. Intel Core 2 Duo doesn't provide IDE
connections for my old drives, and getting an IDE controller card would
exceed my PCI slots (four in total).

If you need 4 PCI slots your choices will be much more
limited on a platform that supports PCI Express. Even
without the IDE card, most boards either don't have 4 or the
4th is right next to the video card, resulting in poor
cooling for it.

We don't know how long you plan to use this system but in
the future (moreso every day) there will be more PCI Express
cards you might consider to replace your current PCI cards,
and ultimately will result in more performance as the 32bit
33MHz PCI bus is limiting, even moreso with the Gigabit
ethernet controller your current board seems to have.

Now a passing comment about your video card- it's a 6800 but
which one? With only 128MB of memory it might be a
lower-end crippled version of 6800, making it the larger
bottleneck to gaming in your present system. Since gaming
is the requirement for the upgrade you might put as much of
the budget as possible into the video card, unless you
wanted to upgrade that later and instead put the budget
towards longest viable life (More on that below).

I am also budget limited (can't
spend over $750 including taxes and stuff). I want to avoid my computer
upgrade for at least two years. I might upgrade the video card after a
year like in the past.

Waiting to upgrade to a DX10 based card is one option if
you'd run Vista, but if you get a lower to mid grade card
now you may find it no better at gaming than your current
system... we can't know if you'd then game on your present
system instead of the new build or not.

I do NOT overclock my system since I have problems keeping my
non-overclocked box stable when my room gets hot (up to 90 degrees(F))
during the heat wave/summer. Also, overlocking is not what I do. I am
not a hardware person/expert.

Ok, but in a hot environment it's primarily an issue of
tolerating more fan noise and/or a case that accomdates more
or larger fans, and of course better heatsinks. I always
build systems to withstand 90F or more even when it isn't
the expected ambient temp, then throttle back fans to lower
RPM = quieter, or it leaves more margin for adding filters
to case intake areas.

My current computer specifications is at:
http://alpha.zimage.com/~ant/antfarm/about/computers.txt ... See the
primary/gaming machine. That is the one that will be upgraded. CPU,
motherboard, video card, HDD (15 GB is too small and C: drive/partition
only has about 800 MB free) and maybe RAM will be replaced. All other
parts like my TV tuner cards, SB Audigy 2 ZS, etc. will remain.

People tell me that I should get AM2 instead of 939. AM2 costs more
because I have to spend about $200 for new RAM (DDR2) and can't use my
old RAM that Athlon 64 3200+ (754) used. My friend and other sources
(e.g., http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2738&p=1 ,
http://www23.tomshardware.com/cpu.html , and
http://www.techreport.com/reviews/2006q2/socket-am2/index.x?pg=5 ) told
me that it is not worth getting AM2 because of the benchmarks are worse
or have tiny improvements (up to 5%).

It is true that performance differences at a given budget
are the least of the concerns (if you were buying memory
too). Since you have memory the question is how long you
want to keep using it, as AM2 is "supposed" to allow upgrade
to AM3 CPUs in the future - though you have to trust that
your board manufacturer will support that, the only
guarantee it'll work comes the day you plug in an AM3 CPU
and it works... but it is expected to.

Buying more memory is easily more expensive than a 2nd new
board in the future, but at some point you'll need the DDR2
memory anyway. It might be an issue of how many secondary
use systems you want to keep around and how much memory you
want in them, to the extent that if you bought DDR2 memory
now you'd have the DDR(1) available to use in a secondary
system (or sell).

I made a table of what I plan to get on both sides at:
http://alpha.zimage.com/~ant/temp/buy.html ... Noticed I had to
sacrifice my video card speed if I get an AM2 due to cost ($200 for
RAM).

So, what should I go AM2 or go with 939? Thank you in advance.

Since you claim your present CPU is enough for present tasks
besides gaming, and most games aren't optimized for dual
cores yet but the purpose of the upgrade is better gaming,
you might consider a single core CPU at lower cost and put
some of the savings into a PCI Express replacement for one
or more of your PCI cards... this will be a useful thing in
the longer term as it's unlikely you will find a good board
again that has full features and 4 PCI slots. If the
platform is AM2, there will (in theory) be ample
opportunities later to upgrade the CPU if the need arises.
For skt 939, it's doubtful there will be a cost effective
CPU upgrade later from the 4600+.

Essentially, were are even less able to decide than you are,
for your uses, as you are the only one who can predict your
future plans.

 

[ANTant]

So, what should I go AM2 or go with 939? Thank you in advance.

You can but with you mentioning the DDR, I thought budget was an issue.

Uh, I am going to reuse my old 2 GB of DDR (not 2). If I go AM2, then I
have to buy 2 GB of DDR2 which costs about 200 bucks. See the problem? I
had to sacrifice the video card speed to lower my buying cost.

They're shite. Half the L2 cache.

I read that games don't seem to be affected much by this larger cache.
Is that true or false?
--
[Laser pulsing] "Bah. It's as easy as crushing an ant! You know, the..." [grunting] "Wh-wh-whoa! Hey, take my wallet and leave me alone!" --Mr. Burns from The Simpsons (Fraudcast News; FABF16/FABF18 episode)
/\___/\
/ /\ /\ \ Phillip (Ant) @ http://antfarm.ma.cx (Personal Web Site)
| |o o| | Ant's Quality Foraged Links (AQFL): http://aqfl.net
\ _ / Please remove ANT if replying by e-mail.
( )

 

[ANTant]

Just a warning though - already the only place it's possible to find

They're shite. Half the L2 cache.

I looked at the price for a 4800+ (retail -- want the extra warranty)
and its cost is too high.
--
[Laser pulsing] "Bah. It's as easy as crushing an ant! You know, the..." [grunting] "Wh-wh-whoa! Hey, take my wallet and leave me alone!" --Mr. Burns from The Simpsons (Fraudcast News; FABF16/FABF18 episode)
/\___/\
/ /\ /\ \ Phillip (Ant) @ http://antfarm.ma.cx (Personal Web Site)
| |o o| | Ant's Quality Foraged Links (AQFL): http://aqfl.net
\ _ / Please remove ANT if replying by e-mail.
( )

 

[ANTant]

A small desk is an even better reason to go LCD, if
maximizing framerate is a large concern then stick with a
19" rather than larger monitor... else you'd have to use
non-native resolution.

The reason why I avoided CRTs is because I was true colors for graphic
works, videos, gaming, testing (have to change resolutions -- can't
always use the native resolution) etc. I might have to get a LCD
anyways since CRTs are becoming rare. I am going to hold onto this
three years old 17" CRT a bit longer until it dies or breaks (so far,
only blurry ). I doubt I can fit a 19" monitor. This 17" barely fits
in terms of horizontal/width!

If you need 4 PCI slots your choices will be much more
limited on a platform that supports PCI Express. Even
without the IDE card, most boards either don't have 4 or the
4th is right next to the video card, resulting in poor
cooling for it.

Aww crap, are you saying PCI Express is replacing regular PCI slots
fast? I remember when PCIE came fast and took over AGP. I think that
went too fast. Does that mean I have to replace my SB Audigy 2 ZS and my
two TV tuners? When is that supposed to happen in the future?

We don't know how long you plan to use this system but in
the future (moreso every day) there will be more PCI Express
cards you might consider to replace your current PCI cards,

I usually keep my machine's parts for two years, then swap the hardware
to my older boxes or retire them (keep parts that I can still use like a
NIC for PCI) OR sell/donate to someone who can use them. So, basically,
total lifespan can be up to five years. The older systems are just
backup workstations that do not gaming.

and ultimately will result in more performance as the 32bit
33MHz PCI bus is limiting, even moreso with the Gigabit
ethernet controller your current board seems to have.

And my current ASUS K8V SE Deluxe motherboard has that onboard Marvell
Yukon 88E8001/8003/8010 PCI Gigabit Ethernet Controller. Too bad I can't
use it fully because I still use a 100Mb hub and router. I will upgrade
them when they break. They work, so I don't bother. I don't even
transfer files on LAN that much.

Now a passing comment about your video card- it's a 6800 but
which one? With only 128MB of memory it might be a
lower-end crippled version of 6800, making it the larger
bottleneck to gaming in your present system. Since gaming

Uh, there's more than one? I have XFX NVIDIA GeForce 6800 (128 MB; AGP).
I bought it over a year ago and it was about 200 bucks. It does well for
Half-Life 2, FEAR, Battlefield 2, etc. It does crap for Oblivion,
Company of Hereoes, etc. This is with all graphic details and without
FSAA and with anistropic at 1152x864 and 1024x768 resolutions.

is the requirement for the upgrade you might put as much of
the budget as possible into the video card, unless you
wanted to upgrade that later and instead put the budget
towards longest viable life (More on that below).

Are you saying buy a low end video card like a 7900 GS with AM2 setup,
then get a faster video card aft5er a year or so?

Waiting to upgrade to a DX10 based card is one option if
you'd run Vista, but if you get a lower to mid grade card
now you may find it no better at gaming than your current
system... we can't know if you'd then game on your present
system instead of the new build or not.

I am not planning to run Vista any time soon. I use it at work daily for
testings, and I am not impressed. I probably won't upgrade to it for a
few years. DRM/WGA/Activation bugs me. I still use Office 2000 to avoid
the DRM crap. I might just use OpenOffice if Office 2000 is useless. I
know DX10 is only in Vista. How long will that take? It took XP
requirement for a few years to happen so I might wait that long as well
before I jump to Vista.

So right now, XP Pro. SP2 (32-bit) for a few years.

Ok, but in a hot environment it's primarily an issue of
tolerating more fan noise and/or a case that accomdates more
or larger fans, and of course better heatsinks. I always
build systems to withstand 90F or more even when it isn't
the expected ambient temp, then throttle back fans to lower
RPM = quieter, or it leaves more margin for adding filters
to case intake areas.

Yeah. Right now, it's winter so it's OK. I hope this Antec case does
well. It seem to did well when my room was in the 80s(F). We'll see what
happens in the summer.

It is true that performance differences at a given budget
are the least of the concerns (if you were buying memory
too). Since you have memory the question is how long you
want to keep using it, as AM2 is "supposed" to allow upgrade

Two years at least, then I will pass the parts to my Linux box (they
don't need to be fast -- even my Athlon XP was decent as a workstation).
Basically, I wouldn't need to upgrade if I didn't game.

to AM3 CPUs in the future - though you have to trust that
your board manufacturer will support that, the only
guarantee it'll work comes the day you plug in an AM3 CPU
and it works... but it is expected to.

I have seen this happened with CPUs before. By the time I upgrade, it is
not worth it after two years. I might as buy a new motherboard and CPU
that are faster than just replacing the CPU. I was actually surprised
that 939 lets me reuse my old DDR memory. I thought I was going to get
new RAM. Since I can reuse it, why not? Save 200 bucks right there for
something else (faster NVIDIA PCIe video card!). Also, I don't want an
ATI card because of poor Linux support. That was the big decision. I had
a 9800 Pro AIW card, and it was awful in Linux. Big $300 spending
mistake.

Buying more memory is easily more expensive than a 2nd new
board in the future, but at some point you'll need the DDR2
memory anyway. It might be an issue of how many secondary
use systems you want to keep around and how much memory you
want in them, to the extent that if you bought DDR2 memory
now you'd have the DDR(1) available to use in a secondary
system (or sell).

For gaming/primary/Windows machine, 2 GB is enough under XP unless
games/prgorams demand more within two years. I remember Battlefield 2
choked with 1 GB of RAM. 2 GB fixed that. For Linux box, 1 GB is enough
but it will be happy with 2 GB.

Since you claim your present CPU is enough for present tasks
besides gaming, and most games aren't optimized for dual
cores yet but the purpose of the upgrade is better gaming,


you might consider a single core CPU at lower cost and put
some of the savings into a PCI Express replacement for one
or more of your PCI cards... this will be a useful thing in
the longer term as it's unlikely you will find a good board
again that has full features and 4 PCI slots. If the

The reason for dual core, is I like to multitask heavily (sometimes run
20 programs at once). Like recording/watching high definition (HD) TV
shows. Currently, my HDTV (software based) stuff takes over 60% of my
CPU and my computer feels sluggish. Playback is worse and takes like
99%. I am hoping the dual core will fix this. This should also help when
I run background programs when gaming.

platform is AM2, there will (in theory) be ample
opportunities later to upgrade the CPU if the need arises.
For skt 939, it's doubtful there will be a cost effective
CPU upgrade later from the 4600+.

Essentially, were are even less able to decide than you are,
for your uses, as you are the only one who can predict your
future plans.

Yeah, this is difficult. Grr.
--
[Laser pulsing] "Bah. It's as easy as crushing an ant! You know, the..." [grunting] "Wh-wh-whoa! Hey, take my wallet and leave me alone!" --Mr. Burns from The Simpsons (Fraudcast News; FABF16/FABF18 episode)
/\___/\
/ /\ /\ \ Phillip (Ant) @ http://antfarm.ma.cx (Personal Web Site)
| |o o| | Ant's Quality Foraged Links (AQFL): http://aqfl.net
\ _ / Please remove ANT if replying by e-mail.
( )

 

[Wes Newell]

Uh, I am going to reuse my old 2 GB of DDR (not 2). If I go AM2, then I
have to buy 2 GB of DDR2 which costs about 200 bucks. See the problem? I
had to sacrifice the video card speed to lower my buying cost.

You need to check out prices of used DDR ram on ebay. they are going for
as much as new ram. Replacing your DDR with DDR2 won't cost you more than
$20 in the end. Not to mention you can get 2 1G dimms to run in dual
channel mode and in case you didn't notice, the AM2 board supports either
8 or 16G of ram IIRC. Personally, I thikn you'd be making a big mistake to
go 939 at this stag of the game. It's a deadend path.

I read that games don't seem to be affected much by this larger cache.
Is that true or false?

I think you are correct for most games.

 

[ANTant]

You need to check out prices of used DDR ram on ebay. they are going for
as much as new ram. Replacing your DDR with DDR2 won't cost you more than
$20 in the end. Not to mention you can get 2 1G dimms to run in dual
channel mode and in case you didn't notice, the AM2 board supports either
8 or 16G of ram IIRC. Personally, I thikn you'd be making a big mistake to
go 939 at this stag of the game. It's a deadend path.

I am actually going to keep the RAM for my Linux box if I have room. I
am not planning to sell it.

I think you are correct for most games.

When we say most games, is that for newer games? I don't care about old
games that run fine on my current Athlon 64 3200+ (754) like FEAR,
Battlefield 2, etc. Games I am looking at are like Company of Heroes,
Call of Duty 2, Oblivion (ouch), etc.
--
[Laser pulsing] "Bah. It's as easy as crushing an ant! You know, the..." [grunting] "Wh-wh-whoa! Hey, take my wallet and leave me alone!" --Mr. Burns from The Simpsons (Fraudcast News; FABF16/FABF18 episode)
/\___/\
/ /\ /\ \ Phillip (Ant) @ http://antfarm.ma.cx (Personal Web Site)
| |o o| | Ant's Quality Foraged Links (AQFL): http://aqfl.net
\ _ / Please remove ANT if replying by e-mail.
( )

 

[ANTant]

You need to check out prices of used DDR ram on ebay. they are going for
as much as new ram. Replacing your DDR with DDR2 won't cost you more than
$20 in the end. Not to mention you can get 2 1G dimms to run in dual
channel mode and in case you didn't notice, the AM2 board supports either
8 or 16G of ram IIRC. Personally, I thikn you'd be making a big mistake to
go 939 at this stag of the game. It's a deadend path.

I think you are correct for most games.

Are there any future games, within 2-3 years, that will depend on dual
cores? I can't think of one. I know all(?) current ones use single
core and developers are talking about supporting multiple cores.
--
[Laser pulsing] "Bah. It's as easy as crushing an ant! You know, the..." [grunting] "Wh-wh-whoa! Hey, take my wallet and leave me alone!" --Mr. Burns from The Simpsons (Fraudcast News; FABF16/FABF18 episode)
/\___/\
/ /\ /\ \ Phillip (Ant) @ http://antfarm.ma.cx (Personal Web Site)
| |o o| | Ant's Quality Foraged Links (AQFL): http://aqfl.net
\ _ / Please remove ANT if replying by e-mail.
( )

 

[kony]

When we say most games, is that for newer games? I don't care about old
games that run fine on my current Athlon 64 3200+ (754) like FEAR,
Battlefield 2, etc. Games I am looking at are like Company of Heroes,
Call of Duty 2, Oblivion (ouch), etc.

L2 cache or clockspeed, either and both have benefit or can
offset less of the other. Since skt 939 is a dead end
socket (not necessarily a bad thing as you already observed
the performance parity with AM2, but for planning
purposes...) it might make more sense to get the faster CPU,
now, while with AM2 anything cheap might tide you over then
after awhile the faster CPUs will have dropped in price
enough to make it little to no more expensive to buy a
second CPU... especially so if you then sell the first one
or have a (re)use for it.

Certainly gaming benchmarks will show faster CPUs have
benefits in gaming, on benchmarks, but it's up to you to
determine how high a framerate you need, if at a cost
premium.

 

[kony]

Aww crap, are you saying PCI Express is replacing regular PCI slots
fast? I remember when PCIE came fast and took over AGP. I think that
went too fast. Does that mean I have to replace my SB Audigy 2 ZS and my
two TV tuners? When is that supposed to happen in the future?

Yes, it's already slim pickin's to get more than 3 PCI
slots. I'm all for PCI Express, but also have quite a few
PCI cards I can't find suitable replacements for. To me
"suitable" doesn't just mean does a roughly equivalent task,
as over the years I'd accumulated tons of PCI cards and
picked among them exactly what worked best in the intended
role... something we don't have the luxury of yet with PCI
Express.

And my current ASUS K8V SE Deluxe motherboard has that onboard Marvell
Yukon 88E8001/8003/8010 PCI Gigabit Ethernet Controller. Too bad I can't
use it fully because I still use a 100Mb hub and router. I will upgrade
them when they break. They work, so I don't bother. I don't even
transfer files on LAN that much.

Slow parts never break - that's a law I think. Anyway
buy.com has had some really interesting deals in the past
month or so, I've picked up 3 more Gigabit switches for
under $20 each after rebates. That's sort of amazing, it
wasn't but 4 years ago all Gigabit were $100 and up, larger
and more power hungry. Now they're almost like USB hubs,
the weight of the cables practically pulls them off a shelf.

Uh, there's more than one? I have XFX NVIDIA GeForce 6800 (128 MB; AGP).
I bought it over a year ago and it was about 200 bucks. It does well for
Half-Life 2, FEAR, Battlefield 2, etc. It does crap for Oblivion,
Company of Hereoes, etc. This is with all graphic details and without
FSAA and with anistropic at 1152x864 and 1024x768 resolutions.

Sure, there's 128 or 256bit bus, different memory speeds,
different GPU clock speeds, # of pipes & shaders. XT, LE,
NU, GS, GT, etc.

Are you saying buy a low end video card like a 7900 GS with AM2 setup,
then get a faster video card aft5er a year or so?

That's one choice - but I can't make that choice for you.
I would hardly call a 7900GS a low-end card, but given that
you're going to run 1152x864 resolution, you don't
necessarily need as high-end a card as many people will.

As I'd mentioned previously, I'd choose AM2 if you're
confident you have a need to reuse (or sell) your present
memory. I don't know if you'd reuse that video card to it's
full potential, if you had need for a 2nd gaming station.
If not, it seems a bit of a waste to buy an upper-midgrade
card then replace only a year later, but then again it's
expected you do want to be able to game now, as it was a
core purpose for the upgrade.

So maybe it's a choice between faster video card or being
able to upgrade the CPU again later (going with AM2).

I
know DX10 is only in Vista. How long will that take? It took XP
requirement for a few years to happen so I might wait that long as well
before I jump to Vista.

The issue that might effect you the most is if/when games
come out that you want to play, that benefit significantly
from DX10. I can't predict that.

Two years at least, then I will pass the parts to my Linux box (they
don't need to be fast -- even my Athlon XP was decent as a workstation).
Basically, I wouldn't need to upgrade if I didn't game.

When you put it that way, the best choice seems to be the
best video card, BUT anything you buy now will depreciate a
lot in the next 9 months or so with DX10 cards on the way...
but we have to wait and see what it'll cost for the DX10
equivalent of a 7950. I could guess around $175 after it's
equivalent replacement has been out for a quarter year, but
I could be wrong...

I have seen this happened with CPUs before. By the time I upgrade, it is
not worth it after two years. I might as buy a new motherboard and CPU
that are faster than just replacing the CPU.

Maybe, but sometimes it works out well. I've upgraded old
BX boards with Tualatin Celerons for cheap - sometimes it
blew out the capacitors because they were marginal in the
first place, but other times I'd already recapped a board
and it then runs the Tualatin great... several relatives of
mine are running such an upgrade and I'm glad not to get
their systems in... because they *like* free repairs.

Early socket A was a similar situation, I had a GB of PC133
memory just lying around and put a Athlon XP
something-or-other into an old Asus A7V-VM. Now I just have
to figure out what to do with it, it's not much good for
many tasks as it has that marginal Via 686 southbridge on
it.

The reason for dual core, is I like to multitask heavily (sometimes run
20 programs at once). Like recording/watching high definition (HD) TV
shows. Currently, my HDTV (software based) stuff takes over 60% of my
CPU and my computer feels sluggish. Playback is worse and takes like
99%. I am hoping the dual core will fix this. This should also help when
I run background programs when gaming.

Your new video card should drastically reduce playback CPU
load. You might look into replacing one (or both) of your
capture cards with a PCI Express type if you find something
you like, perhaps with hardware MPEG encoding to further
reduce CPU load.

Yeah, this is difficult. Grr.

Then get the skt 939, then you'll have the last/fastest
platform possible to reuse your DDR(1) memory... reuse it
for the longest amount of time possible I mean, before
any/all systems that use it seem too slow for their
purposes.

Then again, you could just sell the memory as Wes mentioned,
it's not as though you can compare seling it to reusing it
in another system since IF you bought skt 939, you'd not be
able to reuse it in the other system either.

I think I'd go with skt AM2 in your situation, with the
turning point being that you're only running 1152x768
resolution for gaming so you can squeak by with less video
card.... but then again, I would've expected a 6800 to do
reasonable at 1152x768 already, unless yours is one of the
lesser 6800 models.

 

[ANTant]

I read that games don't seem to be affected much by this larger cache.

L2 cache or clockspeed, either and both have benefit or can
offset less of the other. Since skt 939 is a dead end

Mainly for newer and upcoming games, is it worth spending extras for
that?

socket (not necessarily a bad thing as you already observed
the performance parity with AM2, but for planning
purposes...) it might make more sense to get the faster CPU,
now, while with AM2 anything cheap might tide you over then
after awhile the faster CPUs will have dropped in price
enough to make it little to no more expensive to buy a
second CPU... especially so if you then sell the first one
or have a (re)use for it.

I actually don't buy a faster CPU on the same motherboard. I never did
since I started custom PCs in 1993 (486 DX2/66). I always upgrade the
motherboard, CPU, and RAM (first time for 939 to reuse old one).

If my CPU, RAM, and/or motherboard got fried or something, then I would
probably just buy a new set or similiar specifications. When my ASUS
AV7333 motherboard got fried, I had to get a refurbished MSI
motherboard. I was able to reuse my old RAM, video card, and CPU that
weren't harmed.

Certainly gaming benchmarks will show faster CPUs have
benefits in gaming, on benchmarks, but it's up to you to
determine how high a framerate you need, if at a cost
premium.

Yeah.
--
[Laser pulsing] "Bah. It's as easy as crushing an ant! You know, the..." [grunting] "Wh-wh-whoa! Hey, take my wallet and leave me alone!" --Mr. Burns from The Simpsons (Fraudcast News; FABF16/FABF18 episode)
/\___/\
/ /\ /\ \ Phillip (Ant) @ http://antfarm.ma.cx (Personal Web Site)
| |o o| | Ant's Quality Foraged Links (AQFL): http://aqfl.net
\ _ / Please remove ANT if replying by e-mail.
( )

 

[ANTant]

On Sun, 17 Dec 2006 14:25:34 -0600, (e-mail address removed) wrote:

Yes, it's already slim pickin's to get more than 3 PCI
slots. I'm all for PCI Express, but also have quite a few
PCI cards I can't find suitable replacements for. To me
"suitable" doesn't just mean does a roughly equivalent task,
as over the years I'd accumulated tons of PCI cards and
picked among them exactly what worked best in the intended
role... something we don't have the luxury of yet with PCI
Express.

Yep. That it why PCIE is too soon if we don't have any PCI replacements.
What am I supposed to do with my TV tuners? I don't see any replacement
for the HDTV one that works in both Linux and Windows.

Slow parts never break - that's a law I think. Anyway

So true! My SB16 ISA card lasted a decade until ISA slots were no more.
I had to get rid of it.

buy.com has had some really interesting deals in the past
month or so, I've picked up 3 more Gigabit switches for
under $20 each after rebates. That's sort of amazing, it
wasn't but 4 years ago all Gigabit were $100 and up, larger
and more power hungry. Now they're almost like USB hubs,
the weight of the cables practically pulls them off a shelf.

Heh, nice. Again, not replacing my network setup until they break/die.

Sure, there's 128 or 256bit bus, different memory speeds,
different GPU clock speeds, # of pipes & shaders. XT, LE,
NU, GS, GT, etc.

Look at http://pastebin.ca/282844 for EVEREST's output on my NVIDIA GF
6800 card. According to HWiNFO32 v1.71, it says: 256-bit, Processor
clock 324 Mhz, memory clock 753.3 Mhz, # of Pixel Pipelines 12, # of
Vertex Shaders 5. So, I guess it is not cripped. Whew. And yet it's
slow for newest games (e.g., Company of Heroes and Oblivion) with
most/full graphic details even at 1152x864!

That's one choice - but I can't make that choice for you.
I would hardly call a 7900GS a low-end card, but given that
you're going to run 1152x864 resolution, you don't
necessarily need as high-end a card as many people will.

Oh, I thought 79xx series was considered low-end. I hope it lasts a
couple of years before I get a 8800 or something. Also, I am not
planning to do SLI either. I'm not that crazy!

As I'd mentioned previously, I'd choose AM2 if you're
confident you have a need to reuse (or sell) your present
memory. I don't know if you'd reuse that video card to it's

It doesn't look like I can add more RAM to my Linux box with the 2 GB
because the old motherboard only has three memory slots. So I can only
use 1 GB + 2 512 MBs to make it two GB total. Bah. I wouldn't mind
having 3 GB total if I had RAM slot room!

There's no way I can reuse my GeForce 6800 card. It's AGP! The
motherboard wants PCIe. Beside 6800 is too slow from what I have seen.

full potential, if you had need for a 2nd gaming station.

Nope. Just a Linux workstation. Maybe I can run a game server on LAN,
but unlikely not.

If not, it seems a bit of a waste to buy an upper-midgrade
card then replace only a year later, but then again it's
expected you do want to be able to game now, as it was a
core purpose for the upgrade.

Yes, game soon so I can catch up what I missed like Oblivion (haven't
gotten far -- still in the caverns -- don't want to know how slow
outdoor is).

So maybe it's a choice between faster video card or being
able to upgrade the CPU again later (going with AM2).

I am not planning to upgrade CPU on the same motherboard. I never did in
the past unless CPU blows up or something, but that never has happened
in the past and I don't overclock. Most likely, I will upgrade the CPU
with the motherboard, RAM, and maybe video card (depending if it is slow
or not) after the Athlon 64 X2 setup. That will probably be in late
2008/early 2009 unless my computer dies completely or something that
can't be recovered completely. Then, those old latest parts go to my
Linux box for another two years. Total lifespan: 4-5 years.

The issue that might effect you the most is if/when games
come out that you want to play, that benefit significantly
from DX10. I can't predict that.

Two games that I want: Crysis (DX10 friendly) and C&C3. Supposedly, both
come out next year. Crysis with DX10 will require Vista which I am not
planning to get for a few years. I just hope Crysis still look pretty
without DX10 stuff.

When you put it that way, the best choice seems to be the
best video card, BUT anything you buy now will depreciate a
lot in the next 9 months or so with DX10 cards on the way...

Didn't they always in the past? I think the longest gaming card I had
was my ATI Radeon 9800 Pro AIW. I think I used it for two years before
NVIDIA GeForce 6800 (bought it cheap and knew it was only last a year).

but we have to wait and see what it'll cost for the DX10
equivalent of a 7950. I could guess around $175 after it's
equivalent replacement has been out for a quarter year, but
I could be wrong...

Yeah, hard to decide. I just hope I make the right decisions on my
upgrade.

Maybe, but sometimes it works out well. I've upgraded old
BX boards with Tualatin Celerons for cheap - sometimes it
blew out the capacitors because they were marginal in the
first place, but other times I'd already recapped a board
and it then runs the Tualatin great... several relatives of
mine are running such an upgrade and I'm glad not to get
their systems in... because they *like* free repairs.

Early socket A was a similar situation, I had a GB of PC133
memory just lying around and put a Athlon XP
something-or-other into an old Asus A7V-VM. Now I just have
to figure out what to do with it, it's not much good for
many tasks as it has that marginal Via 686 southbridge on
it.

Heh. no more VIA chipset for me. Too much hassles and headaches on my
last three motherboards using VIA. I hope this NForce is good.

Your new video card should drastically reduce playback CPU
load. You might look into replacing one (or both) of your
capture cards with a PCI Express type if you find something
you like, perhaps with hardware MPEG encoding to further
reduce CPU load.

Is there one HDTV tuner card that works in both Linux and Windows? I
researched it and couldn't find one. I use this one:
http://www.bbti.us/products_air2pc_atsc_pci.htm ... Got it for a decent
price (60 bucks) last year. It's 40 bucks now. I avoided ATI's HDTV
tuner cards because they're WIndows only.

Then get the skt 939, then you'll have the last/fastest
platform possible to reuse your DDR(1) memory... reuse it
for the longest amount of time possible I mean, before
any/all systems that use it seem too slow for their
purposes.

Yeah, I plan to hold onto the parts and CPU for 2-3 years or so for the
gaming box. Then, move them to my Linux box for another 2-3 years. The
only thing might change is the video card for faster speed in games.
Just a note. I am not a hardcore PC gamer. I only play like a few hours
a week due to lack of free time. Most of the times, my PC is for
workstation, recording/watching DTV, etc.

Then again, you could just sell the memory as Wes mentioned,
it's not as though you can compare seling it to reusing it
in another system since IF you bought skt 939, you'd not be
able to reuse it in the other system either.

Yeah, we'll see... Still need more feedbacks.

I think I'd go with skt AM2 in your situation, with the
turning point being that you're only running 1152x768
resolution for gaming so you can squeak by with less video
card.... but then again, I would've expected a 6800 to do
reasonable at 1152x768 already, unless yours is one of the
lesser 6800 models.

Well, it doesn't do well with newer games and future games that's for
sure like I noted earlier. Remember, I don't use the graphic defaults. I
max everything I can like anistropic, details, etc. The only thing I
don't enable is FSAA if speed is a problem.
--
[Laser pulsing] "Bah. It's as easy as crushing an ant! You know, the..." [grunting] "Wh-wh-whoa! Hey, take my wallet and leave me alone!" --Mr. Burns from The Simpsons (Fraudcast News; FABF16/FABF18 episode)
/\___/\
/ /\ /\ \ Phillip (Ant) @ http://antfarm.ma.cx (Personal Web Site)
| |o o| | Ant's Quality Foraged Links (AQFL): http://aqfl.net
\ _ / Please remove ANT if replying by e-mail.
( )

 

[kony]

Mainly for newer and upcoming games, is it worth spending extras for
that?

There's no way we can predict future games, but for present
games you'll have to seek benchmarks of those which vary CPU
rather than video card. Generally speaking, many reviews
post average framerates while the more important factor is
minimum rate, so you might want an average over 60FPS, or to
derat a little since you're running lower resolution,
perhaps 50FPS at 1280x1024 as a guideline.

I actually don't buy a faster CPU on the same motherboard. I never did
since I started custom PCs in 1993 (486 DX2/66). I always upgrade the
motherboard, CPU, and RAM (first time for 939 to reuse old one).

Up to you... but by the middle of the AM3 CPU era, you
should be able to get a substantially faster CPU for
moderate price. The other thing this does for you is
eliminates any issue of migrating the OS installation to
another board, which is more difficult but possible with XP,
but should you eventually go Vista... could be a PITA or
*technically* breech of EULA if you don't have the full
retail ver$ion.

 

[kony]

Are there any future games, within 2-3 years, that will depend on dual
cores? I can't think of one. I know all(?) current ones use single
core and developers are talking about supporting multiple cores.

It is doubtful any developer would choose to limit their
customer base by making the game *require* dual cores, as
any two threads could still run on a single core. If money
is no option, a very fast high-end dual core processor can
be bought, but presently on a budget it's nearly a wash,
faster single core processors win in gaming. If you were
into overclocking it might be another matter, a lower end
Core 2 Duo overclocks like crazy giving the best of both
worlds.

 

[ANTant]

There's no way we can predict future games, but for present
games you'll have to seek benchmarks of those which vary CPU
rather than video card. Generally speaking, many reviews
post average framerates while the more important factor is
minimum rate, so you might want an average over 60FPS, or to
derat a little since you're running lower resolution,
perhaps 50FPS at 1280x1024 as a guideline.

Heh, 30+ FPS is fine for me. I just hate those FPS that go down to 10! I
know in FEAR. I see low as 11 FPS with my current setup. Average is like
30.

Up to you... but by the middle of the AM3 CPU era, you
should be able to get a substantially faster CPU for
moderate price. The other thing this does for you is

I doubt that will happen unless my CPU gets hosed and I can't afford a
new motherboard, RAM, etc.

eliminates any issue of migrating the OS installation to
another board, which is more difficult but possible with XP,
but should you eventually go Vista... could be a PITA or
*technically* breech of EULA if you don't have the full
retail ver$ion.

True. I never had problems with existing XP installation and swapping
motherboards, chipsets, CPUs (AMD and Intel), etc. Worse case scenario
is use the repair install method.

For Vista, that will definitely be a clean installation. I never do OS
upgrades. Too messy and stuff. Of course, that will not happen for a
few years.
--
[Laser pulsing] "Bah. It's as easy as crushing an ant! You know, the..." [grunting] "Wh-wh-whoa! Hey, take my wallet and leave me alone!" --Mr. Burns from The Simpsons (Fraudcast News; FABF16/FABF18 episode)
/\___/\
/ /\ /\ \ Phillip (Ant) @ http://antfarm.ma.cx (Personal Web Site)
| |o o| | Ant's Quality Foraged Links (AQFL): http://aqfl.net
\ _ / Please remove ANT if replying by e-mail.
( )

 

[kony]

Look at http://pastebin.ca/282844 for EVEREST's output on my NVIDIA GF
6800 card. According to HWiNFO32 v1.71, it says: 256-bit, Processor
clock 324 Mhz, memory clock 753.3 Mhz, # of Pixel Pipelines 12, # of
Vertex Shaders 5. So, I guess it is not cripped. Whew. And yet it's
slow for newest games (e.g., Company of Heroes and Oblivion) with
most/full graphic details even at 1152x864!

It looks like a plain 6800, which is a low-midrange variant
in the whole 6800 family, except that today and in the
future the 128MB memory is a limit on the detail levels you
might run... I'd expect medium or low settings in games will
work the best on that card. There's a comparison table
towards the middle of this page,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GeForce_6_Series

Oh, I thought 79xx series was considered low-end. I hope it lasts a
couple of years before I get a 8800 or something. Also, I am not
planning to do SLI either. I'm not that crazy!

.... well if you want a 8800, maybe that's the right option
now. In your 700 budget you could put 450 on a 8800GTS, 70
on a board, and the remainder on CPU... and memory,
depending on which socket you pick and the concession of
selling the DDR(1) if it's AM2. IMO, a gamer needs to spend
significantly more on the video card than the CPU,
especially if you go the skt AM2 route because you can get
by with a $100 CPU for awhile, but not a $100 video card,
and the CPU will have depreciated less if you sold it a year
from now. I mean less total dollars, I couldn't guess about
%.

It doesn't look like I can add more RAM to my Linux box with the 2 GB
because the old motherboard only has three memory slots. So I can only
use 1 GB + 2 512 MBs to make it two GB total. Bah. I wouldn't mind
having 3 GB total if I had RAM slot room!

There's no way I can reuse my GeForce 6800 card. It's AGP! The
motherboard wants PCIe. Beside 6800 is too slow from what I have seen.

I meant reuse video card for another system IF you had a
need for a lesser performing gaming system... since a 6800
is kind of a waste for a non-gaming system and would require
more power and cooling with no gain in non-gaming uses.
Another item that could be sold, the more you sell the
higher the budget for that 8800GTS.

Is there one HDTV tuner card that works in both Linux and Windows? I
researched it and couldn't find one. I use this one:
http://www.bbti.us/products_air2pc_atsc_pci.htm ... Got it for a decent
price (60 bucks) last year. It's 40 bucks now. I avoided ATI's HDTV
tuner cards because they're WIndows only.

I don't know of any, but haven't looked. A linux oriented
forum might be the best place to ask that.

Well, it doesn't do well with newer games and future games that's for
sure like I noted earlier. Remember, I don't use the graphic defaults. I
max everything I can like anistropic, details, etc. The only thing I
don't enable is FSAA if speed is a problem.

Then one of the major things you need is more video memory,
but I'm not claiming that alone would future-proof it.

 

[ANTant]

It looks like a plain 6800, which is a low-midrange variant
in the whole 6800 family, except that today and in the
future the 128MB memory is a limit on the detail levels you
might run... I'd expect medium or low settings in games will
work the best on that card. There's a comparison table
towards the middle of this page,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GeForce_6_Series

Ah. When I bought this card, I didn't want to spend over 200 bucks and
it was only for being used for gaming for a year. Sheesh, that went
fast. LOL. I will still use the card in Linux though. faster than the
GeForce FX 5200.

... well if you want a 8800, maybe that's the right option
now. In your 700 budget you could put 450 on a 8800GTS, 70

No way. Not now. Way overpriced for me. I will wait a year to buy it
when my 79xx becomes slow.

on a board, and the remainder on CPU... and memory,
depending on which socket you pick and the concession of
selling the DDR(1) if it's AM2. IMO, a gamer needs to spend
significantly more on the video card than the CPU,
especially if you go the skt AM2 route because you can get
by with a $100 CPU for awhile, but not a $100 video card,
and the CPU will have depreciated less if you sold it a year
from now. I mean less total dollars, I couldn't guess about
%.

I wonder if the 939 and AM2 have bottlenecks for the 79xx series? I know
FiringSquad did a bottleneck benchmarks for 8800 series.

I meant reuse video card for another system IF you had a
need for a lesser performing gaming system... since a 6800
is kind of a waste for a non-gaming system and would require
more power and cooling with no gain in non-gaming uses.

Well, there's some 3D programs like Google Earth, screen savers, the new
3D thing (forgot its name) in X, etc. I will keep the GeForce FX 5200 as
a backup if my 6800 blows up and can't be repaired via warranty.

Another item that could be sold, the more you sell the
higher the budget for that 8800GTS.

Nah, I am going to keep it. I'd be upset if I don't have another
AGP video card to use for the Linux box.

I don't know of any, but haven't looked. A linux oriented
forum might be the best place to ask that.

Yeah. So far, it is that card and another Linux-ONLY card. Sheesh. I
just hope PCIE doesn't take over PCI too fast like AGP one.

Then one of the major things you need is more video memory,
but I'm not claiming that alone would future-proof it.

I am hoping 7950 GT (512 MB) for 939 setup would be enough. I hope the
CPU isn't the bottleneckfor the video card.
--
[Laser pulsing] "Bah. It's as easy as crushing an ant! You know, the..." [grunting] "Wh-wh-whoa! Hey, take my wallet and leave me alone!" --Mr. Burns from The Simpsons (Fraudcast News; FABF16/FABF18 episode)
/\___/\
/ /\ /\ \ Phillip (Ant) @ http://antfarm.ma.cx (Personal Web Site)
| |o o| | Ant's Quality Foraged Links (AQFL): http://aqfl.net
\ _ / Please remove ANT if replying by e-mail.
( )