New system: Athlon 64 3000+, nForce4 X1600PRO

[Boris]

Hi all,

I am building a PC from scratch and I'd like to know if you see any
component that is weaker or much better than the rest.

I am spending around $600(no monitor) for a reasonably fast PC that I
will use for daily stuff (web, video etc) and some occasional gaming
and research (including visual stuff, but not TOO much demanding).

CPU: AMD ATHLON 64 3000+ W/512KB SOCKET 939
Motherboard: ASUS A8N5X nVIDIA nFORCE4 (AMD SOCKET 939)
RAM: 1GB (2x512MB) DDR400 (for dual channel use)
Graphics: ATI RADEON X1600PRO 512MB PCI-E DD2 W/TV & DVI #RADEON
X1600PRO5612
HD: SEAGATE 250GB ST3250824AS SATA 8MB 7200RPM

My questions:
* Is it worth to upgrade AMD 3000+ to 3200+ for this system? I heard
that 3200+ has better overclocking capabilities too.
* Is it worth to upgrade the motherboard to ASUS A8N-E with nFORCE4
Ultra chipset instead of nFORCE4 for a system using Athlon 64?
* As I figure, since Athlon 64 has memory contoller etc on the chip
itself, I can use my RAM for dual channel operation without any problem
with this motherboard, right?
* Is it worth to use X1600PRO with 512MB or should I go down to 256MB?
* Would you recommend other video card than ATI X1600 not exceeding
$130 online?
* Does it make much difference to use a HD with 16MB instead of 8MB?
* Do you see any item that you don't like or you would definitely
change for another one?

Thanks in advance, I'll appreciate even if you can answer one question
in the whole bunch.

Boris

 

[Paul]

Hi all,

I am building a PC from scratch and I'd like to know if you see any
component that is weaker or much better than the rest.

I am spending around $600(no monitor) for a reasonably fast PC that I
will use for daily stuff (web, video etc) and some occasional gaming
and research (including visual stuff, but not TOO much demanding).

CPU: AMD ATHLON 64 3000+ W/512KB SOCKET 939
Motherboard: ASUS A8N5X nVIDIA nFORCE4 (AMD SOCKET 939)
RAM: 1GB (2x512MB) DDR400 (for dual channel use)
Graphics: ATI RADEON X1600PRO 512MB PCI-E DD2 W/TV & DVI #RADEON
X1600PRO5612
HD: SEAGATE 250GB ST3250824AS SATA 8MB 7200RPM

My questions:
* Is it worth to upgrade AMD 3000+ to 3200+ for this system? I heard
that 3200+ has better overclocking capabilities too.
* Is it worth to upgrade the motherboard to ASUS A8N-E with nFORCE4
Ultra chipset instead of nFORCE4 for a system using Athlon 64?
* As I figure, since Athlon 64 has memory contoller etc on the chip
itself, I can use my RAM for dual channel operation without any problem
with this motherboard, right?
* Is it worth to use X1600PRO with 512MB or should I go down to 256MB?
* Would you recommend other video card than ATI X1600 not exceeding
$130 online?
* Does it make much difference to use a HD with 16MB instead of 8MB?
* Do you see any item that you don't like or you would definitely
change for another one?

Thanks in advance, I'll appreciate even if you can answer one question
in the whole bunch.

Boris

Nforce4 versus Nforce4 Ultra are compared here. Maybe SATA 3GB/sec
is the difference ? And ActiveArmor networking, which doesn't work
properly, is not a feature one way or another.

http://www.nvidia.com/page/nforce4_family.html

A8N5X
http://usa.asus.com/100/images/products/596/596_l.jpg

A8N-E
http://usa.asus.com/100/images/products/455/455_l.jpg

Now, when reading these comments, remember that the motherboard
construction is almost identical, save for the changed Nvidia
chip. People aren't too happy with the firewall, as you can see
in the A8N-E comments.

A8N5X comments
http://www.newegg.com/Product/CustRatingReview.asp?Item=N82E16813131569

A8N-E comments
http://www.newegg.com/Product/CustRatingReview.asp?Item=N82E16813131530

This is the Asus-hosted forum. Select "Since - All Days" to see
all posted problems. Remember that the users have all levels
of experience, and you have to be careful to distinguish true
problems from user problems.

http://vip.asus.com/forum/bbs.aspx?SLanguage=en-us&model=a8n5x
http://vip.asus.com/forum/bbs.aspx?SLanguage=en-us&model=a8n-e

I would say on the video card, that there would be no difference
between 512MB and 256MB. Purely a marketing ploy. I did try
looking for some benchmarks on the X1600Pro, and I cannot seem
to find any. One thread I was reading, was suggesting an
X800GTO, but without benchmarks to compare them all, I'm not
going to repeat anything I just read. This article has a good
premise (bang for the buck), but doesn't include the X1600Pro
in the analysis. If you can find a benchmark for the X1600Pro,
perhaps you can fit it into the charts.

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=28135

On the processor choice, I think people select them based on
the multiplier. The idea is to start with a processor, such that
the multiplier opens up the range of operation you have in
mind, or think you can reach.

You can get overclocking results here, or use the Newegg user
comments for the various processor models you have in mind.
The Newegg user comments may be better than this database,
as at least the comments there, apply to one specific product,
whereas in the database here everything is mixed together.
Too bad, as before this database was revamped, it used to be
a pretty good source of info (I used to do scatter plots of
the overclocking results using their data).

http://cpudatabase.com/index.cfm?Action=search

Paul