Computer death = forced upgrade

[holliday]

Ok, I am new to these forums but have used them many times for help in a variety of PC needs. Currently though I am at a really hard place in terms of what to do with my computer. Two days ago she died, she is an Athlon XP 2400+ with 1 gig of PC 2700 ram, a GeForce FX 5900 running on an MSI KT4V motherboard. This computer has served me better than I could ever imagined and ran a good 2 years without any hiccups.

The death though seems serious. It will not POST, no beeps at start up. Fans and lights kick on, I can hear the hard drives spinning and etc. I've swapped the PSU, not the problem. I have disconnected everything but the Processor and mobo and still no beeps or POST. This leads me to believe either the motherboard is dead or the processor. Not terrible news entirely, I Was planning on upgrading sometime during the summer to a 64 rig, just not so soon. Now I am nose deep in all sorts of tech trying to piece together something to get me on my feet ASAP.

Issue #1 - I want to go 64 and be futurproof, this means socket 939 with PCI-X, however I cannot afford a new video card at the moment and my current is AGP.
Issue #2 - My RAM is only PC2700 since the 2400+ couldn't make use of PC3200 anyway

Potential Solutions

Solution #1 - get a cheap socket 939 mobo with AGP to hold me over until i can switch to PCI-X, buy the mobo with the Video Card. I would like to try and not break my bank all at once here so I am wondering if I go this route (the more viable at the moment) will my PC2700 work with the socket 939 mobo? If it does work is it going to be abismal performance? Would even 512 of the right speed ram run better than my 1 gig of PC2700?

Currently I was think of these components:
Chaintech Mobo
San Diego 3700+

Solution #2 - A local shop has a Socket 754 mobo with both AGP and PCI-X slots on it (sounds too good to be true). I have searched the net to see if this even exists in Socket 754 and found nothing but the lady swears it true, a brand i've never heard of as well. Is Socket 754 dead and gone? The 3700+ Clawhammer seems to be the limit. Is there a socket 939 with both PCI-X and AGP slots? This would no doubt be the best case scenario and solve all my issues.

What do you guys think is the best route to go? Is there another solution I am not able to see available? Thank you for your help I am sorry if I have gone about anything wrong here or posted in the wrong section since I am still new to the forums.

Also is there anything that may bite me in the ass? Something I am not thinking of then when it comes time to assemble I shall be screwed? My case just barely fits the current motherboard, are the new socket 939's bigger?

Again, sorry for asking so much

 

[ProviaFan]

AMD is going to be changing to a new socket (M2) and DDR2 memory sometime next year, so don't worry too much about PCI-E (that's PCI-Express, not to be confused with the server and high-end workstation PCI-X interconnect). In your situation, I would probably get a socket 754 board and processor, keep your RAM (unless you do really minimal stuff - internet and email only - 1GB of PC2700 will be much better than 512MB of PC3200) and video card, and save the rest for a bigger upgrade in a year or so.

 

[holliday]

I do plan on upgrading my card once the new line of ATI and nVidia's come out though. They seem to all be PCI-E 16x or so.

Is there any performance difference between a 3700+ socket 754 and a 3700+ socket 939? I read an article on tom's hardware that suggested socket 939 having an edge of some sort.

 

[Jiggz]

If you are not ready to upgrade yet you can still make use of your existing system by either replacing the mobo with a very cheap one or replacing the CPU. This should be around $50.00 for a mobo or a cpu. You need to isolate or even go as far as borrowing some parts from friends (CPU or rams or AGP card) to find out which part of the system is faulty. Developments in the computer hardware world is in a very fast mode right now. Now is not the time to upgrade since both AMD/Intel and mobo makers are still on a cross road on the 64 bit dual core platforms.

 

[0roo0roo]

nothing is future proof. just go with bang for buck. only thing future proofing buys you is a very slow obsolete computer you can throw money at adding on sh*t for no reason.

 

[theMan]

welcome to AT!

right now, there really isnt much of an advantage to PCIe. if you arent worried about upgrading with the new platform, M2, that will come out early 2006 (i would just skip over this platform completely and wait for DDR3 in 2007), then just get a nice AGP mobo, and upgrade everything except your video card. i think ATI and nVIDIA are planning on releasing AGP models of their new cards, becuase so many people still have AGP. If they dont, which would be strange, just get a current generation card, which really kicks a$$.

Here are my suggestions, but im not sure about your buget:

MSI K8n Neo2 Platinum
AMD Athlon 64 3700+ San Diego
2x512mb Corsair Value Select PC3200 DDR400 (depending on your budget, the PC2700 RAM will work fine on your board, and wont effect performance very much)
upgrade video when you have the money

good luck.

 

[holliday]

Thanks a lot guys. Good advice. I guess I get blinded by new tech and I think nothing is greater than PCI-E which I assume isn't true. How solid is the difference between PCI-E and AGP anyway? And are motherboard with extra features worth the cash? I already have an Audigy 2 so onboard sound is not important, nor onboard video. Basically I am pretty sure the San Diego 3700+ is my CPU and I am wondering if I should spend more than $67.00 on a motherboard, is the chaintech one I linked a poor board? I can't find any board with a rating higher than 4/5.

Also I just realized I have some work I need to do with my PC and getting it running is a priority now. Is there any way to narrow down the device that is failing more than CPU and PC? I stripped my computer down to the PSU, CPU and Motherboard and still no beep. Then I took out my CPU and just hooked the PSU to the motherboard and still nothing (fans connected to motherboard did turn on though) I am not sure if a motherboard is supposed to beep if it is just powered up alone or not (doesn't POST include CPU and RAM as well?)

 

[Rike]

Originally posted by: holliday
How solid is the difference between PCI-E and AGP anyway? And are motherboard with extra features worth the cash?

Right now, there are no performance differences between AGP and PCIe.

Why pay for features you will not use?

 

[KamiXkaze]

future proofing can be a one trick pony that is what maybe the end all that be all becomes crap in the end.

and just what every one has said so far there are know performance advantage between or the other right now (who know things could change but will have to wait and see)

KxK

 

[keeleysam]

Get the MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum