Hello AnandTech and the Video forums.

[wraven]

I have been lurking here as a guest for almost two years. Its time to pony up and say hello with a registered account =p.

Also, a question for the mass.

I have a fairly dated rig.

Abit NS7-S MB
1 gig Corsair XMS x512
AMD 2600+
EVGA 256meg 6800 Ultra (yes a real ultra, not an OC'ed GT)
74 gig WD Raptor drives X2


The question is..if I upgrade to a AMD 3000+ Barton core, will I get more performance out of my rig? Will it be wortht he money? I feel i'm bottle necking the video card?

 

[wraven]

To also add, I have a Dell 2001FP and thus run my resoloution and games at 1600x1200

 

[RollWave]

You would gain some performance, but I feel like that Video card is much much better than the Barton Procs.

 

[dug777]

overclock that 2600+ first mate (if it's a tbred-b they are usually pretty ok o'cers), does your mobo have an agp/pci lock? If so and you can get 200x11 or 200x11.5 out of it that would be nicely faster than the barton 3000+ afaik...

BUt at this stage in the game throwing money at socket A CPUs is a mugs game, save it for your next build i suggest

 

[wraven]

Thanks for the respones. I play MMORPGS, (mainly Eq2) and am wanting to run FRAPS to record. it just seems like my frames drop pretty rapidly when I start recording.

So from what I understand, toss'n a 100 bucks into a barton 3000+ wouldn't yeild enough performance to justify the upgrade?

 

[forumposter32]

It all depends if you know how to overclock or not.
I've seen the Athlon 3700+ (socket 754) on Ewiz and Compuvest for $158 US and $169 US. That's a great deal for performance. If you only had to change mobo and CPU, that would be a lot cheaper. I don't know what the best mobo is with AGP but some people like the Abit KV8 Pro.

http://www23.tomshardware.com

 

[wraven]

Been around computers since the Comador 64 days, so OCing is not something alien to me, but not something I practice on my rigs. I did attempt to push my rig when I first built it, but found it to be a little unstable so I stayed with factory clock speeds.

I have considered changing out my Proc/MB, but DDR 2700 with that proc would be a..injustice.

 

[route66]

If someone says "upgrade your video card" I just might puke.

 

[wraven]

-laughs-

Funny Route66, hopefully I don't get a response like that =p

 

[rcabor]

Originally posted by: route66
If someone says "upgrade your video card" I just might puke.

How about. "Its your power supply man, yeah its too underpowered, you need at least a 600w with that rig!"

 

[Kogan]

For best price/performance, I'd upgrade to one of the nforce3/AGP motherboards and cpus (either 754 or 939).

And of course if you want the ultimate upgradability, get one of those boards that has AGP and PCI-E: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813157081
Then go and get a cheap $100/used 939 processor, or a new one for around $130.

It will cost you around $150-$200, but will be well worth it, and you won't have to worry about upgrading the motherboard for a very long time

 

[Concillian]

Originally posted by: wraven
So from what I understand, toss'n a 100 bucks into a barton 3000+ wouldn't yeild enough performance to justify the upgrade?

That would be my opinion.

 

[spazo]

My advice is to overclock and then keep on benchmarking the processor to make sure its stable(maybe get a better cooler). Thats the best way to go and save up for an upgrade later on.