AMD Athlon 64 3200+ upgrade to Athlon 64 X2 3800+

mustard010

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Sep 13, 2003
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Hi. I currently have a single core Athlon 64 3200+ from 2004. My motherboard only accepts Socket 939 and the only available upgrade path is the Athlon 64 X2 3800 (or higher). The X2 3800 is a dual core rated at 2.0 GHz while the Athlon 64 3200+ is a single core rated at 2.0 GHz.

For $50...is the upgrade path above justifiable?

I'm upgrading my processor because currently it can't handle 1920 * 1280 video on Hulu (I think it's a processor bottleneck). This is the only reason why I want to upgrade is to play videos flawlessly online.

Thanks
 

Markfw

Moderator Emeritus, Elite Member
May 16, 2002
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I would say don't put another dime into that dead socket. Whats your upgrade budget ? Too bad you missed the $60 motherboard/cpu Fry's combo. It ends today, but my store ran out days ago.
 

ZipSpeed

Golden Member
Aug 13, 2007
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$50 is tad steep for the X2. $25 and it would be a no-brainer. Have you tried overclocking the CPU to squeeze a bit more muscle out of it?
 

Syran

Golden Member
Dec 4, 2000
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What type of video card do you have? If an atom on a ion platform can handle hulu, a single core A64 should as well. You might be better off spending some cash there instead.

Unfortunately 939s are fairly expensive processors these days compared to what a similar Am2/2+ processor would go for. Biggest problem right now for upgrading is memory has skyrocketed (well, DDR2 has) lately.
 

Lead Butthead

Senior member
Oct 5, 2009
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Unfortunately 939s are fairly expensive processors these days compared to what a similar Am2/2+ processor would go for. Biggest problem right now for upgrading is memory has skyrocketed (well, DDR2 has) lately.
DDR1 RAM of late costs nearly twice that of DDR2. So frankly if you have a budget of say about $200/$150, you are better off moving onto AM2/2+/3.
 

Syran

Golden Member
Dec 4, 2000
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DDR1 RAM of late costs nearly twice that of DDR2. So frankly if you have a budget of say about $200/$150, you are better off moving onto AM2/2+/3.

Right now, he's saying $50, and he has the memory already... 4gb of ddr2 or 3 right now is at least $80 for the most part.
 

mustard010

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Sep 13, 2003
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The thing is... all I want to do is run Hulu on fullscreen (1920 * 1280). Here's what I'm using:

AMD Athlon 64 3200+
2 GB DDR1 RAM
Nvidia Geforce 8600 GT (1 GB) (this is really a cheap $30 card).



Would upgrading my video card enable me to run hulu on 1920 * 1280? I thought the CPU was the bottleneck....
 

cubeless

Diamond Member
Sep 17, 2001
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hmmm... i just tested... 2.5ghz x2 3800 and a 8600gts takes over 50% of the cpu to watch colbert on hulu in high res... never tested that before... yup, unless you get a more efficient player, you need more cpu... ran in both chrome and ie...

and i just loaded up the flash 10.1 plugin and active x, and it uses even more cpu and stutters in both ie and chrome... hmmm... looks like you need the latest nvidia driver... will test again in a couple...
 
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mustard010

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Sep 13, 2003
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Try using the beta version of Flash 10.1. It offloads a fair amount of processing to the video card. Unfortunately, it's still fairly new and you might need to wait a little while before it becomes completely stable and they release the final version.

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3678


WOW. THANKS FOR THAT ADVICE.

I downloaded the 10.1 beta prelrelease from adobe flash and I can wathc Hulu on fullscreen 1920 * 1280 on my $30 8600 GT :)

thanks... I guess I don't need to upgrade anymore!