drawbacks of a 939 solution?

[tornadog]

Everybody I know is jumping on the C2D and above bandwagon. I am still comfy with my opty 165 @ 2.8Ghz and 2GB ram. What difference would I see by spending close to 500 bucks on new cpu/mobo and ram that I am not seeing now. People say my cpu is a bottleneck from getting the best performance out of games. I am playing all the modern games except Crysis at 1680 x 1050, max settings turned on, which is my monitor's native resolution.

 

[Arkaign]

If you're happy with it, then there's nothing wrong. Wait until you're ready to upgrade, who cares what anyone else says.

 

[tornadog]

I am thinking of installing Vist x64 now that SP1 is out. WIll adding 2 gigs of ram to my 2gigs improve performance?

 

[LOUISSSSS]

your system should be fine to play all modern games except crysis at 16x10 depending on your video card. If it is working fine for you, theres no need to upgrade unless u really WANT to spend the money

 

[Arkaign]

Originally posted by: tornadog
I am thinking of installing Vist x64 now that SP1 is out. WIll adding 2 gigs of ram to my 2gigs improve performance?

Well, stick with the ram you have. DDR1 is $$$$$$$$$$. Keep in mind that an E2160+Board can be found for ~$130ish combo that will overclock extremely well. A mildly overclocked 2160 is notably faster than any X2. It helps that you can get 4GB of quality DDR2 for under $100.

 

[tornadog]

last question is vista 64 bit worth upgrading to then. I use my pc for gaming, streaming movies to my 360 using tversity, and browsing. only apps i use are clonecd, utorrent, newsbin pro and daemon tools. All of those work on Vista 64???

 

[sutahz]

I used Vista x64 and I didnt run into any programs that didnt run. x64 still runs 32bit applications just fine.

 

[Arkaign]

It will work, but it wouldn't help you. I'd wait until you jump for a new rig to buy Vista64.

 

[LOUISSSSS]

Originally posted by: tornadog
last question is vista 64 bit worth upgrading to then. I use my pc for gaming, streaming movies to my 360 using tversity, and browsing. only apps i use are clonecd, utorrent, newsbin pro and daemon tools. All of those work on Vista 64???

dont bother with vista 64, it uses extra ram with no system performance. u even take a small hit in gaming.

vista IS prettier, and 64bit DOES allow for 4gb+ of ram which is cheap but with ur DDR1 you're better off sticking to XP until u can get a new rig with 4gb of DDR2 so u can fully utilize it in vista 64bit

 

[Tempered81]

tornadog, your opty rig is great, not as fast as a penryn c2d, but still great. You said 500 bucks - you could get a great mobo + e8400/e3110 + 2gb 1066ram + aftermarket cooler for that amount or less. With regards to vista/xp - I've ran both and prefer xp sp2 because most games will run at greater FPS in xp. vista is nice and userfreindly, and has a lot of neat little extras and new implementations. But on the downside, it is quite slow and annoying. I'm thinking of running a dual boot xp sp3 / vista 32bit sp1. I do prefer xp pro over vista.

If you upgrade, I would get a good p35 mobo. ds3r, blood iron, dq6, p5k, ip35e (louissss's board is pretty nice) . I would get an e8400 or e3110 and 2gb of 1000mhz or 1066mhz ram with good micron d9gmh's, pair that with your 8800gts 320 and a good aftermarket cpu cooler too. for air coolers i would choose one of these:

thermalright ultra 120/ or extreme, zerotherm nirvana 120, xigmatek hdt1283, zalman cpns9700LED, or tuniq tower.

 

[daveybrat]

Your rig is very similar to mine, with same video card and amount of ram. Mine is AM2 based but otherwise very similar. I too can run anything on my rig with no problems except maybe crisis.

I see absolutely no reason for you to spend $500 on an upgrade when you can play your games smoothly at your monitor's native resolution already.

And it's certainly not worth spending that kind of money just to play crisis.

Save your money and wait till Quad-core processors are cheap and you can buy a video card for under $200 that will double your framerates.

 

[twistedlogic]

If your happy with your rig, then no need to spend the cash.

Not saying you wouldn't see a difference in gaming with a C2D, but you would probably be better off just waiting for ATI's or Nvidia's next flagship GPU. Then you could run Crysis @ 1680 * 1050 w/ AA @ w/ > 30 FPS, lol.

 

[SlowSpyder]

http://forums.anandtech.com/me...id=28&threadid=2148520

I'm happy with my s939 system too. If it still does what you need, then why upgrade? A lot of people on this site are techys, so lots of people here like the latest and greatest. My system plays everything I ask it to at 1680x1050 as well... not the latest and greatest, but it does ok for it's age. I can't complain, this system has served me well for about 2 years now.

 

[Twsmit]

I'm in the same boat as you. My personal solution is to upgrade to a 9800GT or something like that in a few months. If you have a high end DDR1 939 system like me, i think its best to wait for a completely new system to go 64bit and to upgrade to 4GB.

For me I'm waiting for 4-8GB of ram and cheap next gen quad cores to come out, until then im going to upgrade my 7800GT and sit tight with XP and socket 939.

 

[Marty502]

I'm happy enough with my rig. I'll just get an uber-GPU one of these days and I'll be set for a while! It should walk Crysis at reasonable resolutions and even more intensive games than that, with ease.

 

[icingdeath88]

I'm running an fx-55 with 2 gigs of ram, an x-fi, and an 8800gts (320). Same boat as you, except single core. You - and I - can wait to upgrade. Running bioshock at all high just fine on 1680 x 1050, so what's the point?

 

[Nathelion]

The only reason to upgrade would be if you want to play supreme commander, and even then you only need the upgrade if you want to play on really large maps, or if you're really into playing the campaign (the AI is a CPU hog).