How much faster would it be...?

[Marty502]

I've been on a tight budget for my computer for a while. Raising funds for other stuff.

I'm OK with my PC performance currently, but the Black Edition Kumas look tempting since they're so cheap. Plus DDR2 prices are really low now and I could get a good mobo for cheap.

The thing is, would it be that much better than my old 3800 X2? For games I usually crank it up to 2.6 Ghz, while the BE Kumas usually reach 3.2 Ghz on air I think. That's a ~30% increase in clockspeed, without considering the better DDR2 RAM and the extra chunk of L2/L3 cache on the BE. Would it be just a moderate improvement or actually dramatic? I'd like to see at least a 40/50% improvement. Or I should just forget about it and save up for a PII X3/X4?

Also, even with a decent amount of RAM and everything, I still feel this computer isn't responsive enough. Browsing lots of pages, or while using WMP11, or in Adobe Premiere. My hard drive is defragged and it's fast, my XP installation is very light and well optimized. It feels a bit lethargic and sluggish. With Vista it wasn't much better. Would a BE Kuma be any better in this aspect?

Thanks!

 

[Schmide]

That doesn't sound right. Are you sure your drives are hooked up right? For the activities you're talking about, your system should do fine.

Go to your device manager and see if any of your drives are in PIO mode and make sure DMA is enabled.

 

[Sylvanas]

Don't bother with the 7850s- theyre simply the older Phenom 1's 65nm and are more trouble than they're worth. The P2s are a different story however, I'd say save up and get an X3 + 790gx/x/fx mobo with some cheap ram and you're set.

 

[cusideabelincoln]

LOL, how are they trouble? Do they bite when you insert them into the socket?

To answer the OP: It would be a significant improvement, but at this point I think you are better off saving up some more money and getting a processor with more than two cores. For another $60 a Phenon II X3 710 would be a good chip for you to upgrade to. To get an idea of how the new Athlon X2s perform, here is a chart comparing a 4600+ (2.4 GHz) to the stock 7850 (2.8 GHz): http://www.anandtech.com/bench...3.44.45.46.47.48.49.50

But you shouldn't be experiencing sluggishness in XP with your system. I'd say it's some software problem that's reducing your performance and making the hard drive active.

 

[Marty502]

Actually, it's just that I tried some E5200 rigs at my Uni loaded with Windows 2000 and man, those felt electric!

It's not really sluggish, it's not just as ballistic as those were. My HD is working at Sata 1.5 (Fastest my mobo can do, no difference with Sata 3 I've heard) so that's not a problem.

For instance, Windows Media Player 11. I've got around 10k music files or so. If I open up the artist library and scroll down the list, it quickly becomes a choppy mess. Now WMP11 isn't exactly a light software, but that's still a mayor dissapointment.

Thanks for your input! So I should wait, you say? I'll do that I think.

 

[cusideabelincoln]

Well something is up, and I'd put the blame on the hard drive. I see you have the Caviar Blue drive, which is supposed rotate between 5400RPM and 7200RPM depending on whether you need speed or conserve energy.

But Windows 2000... man that thing is light. I have a Windows 2000 machine with an Athlon XP processor and even it feels nice and zippy

 

[Schmide]

Even if your main HD is running in sata 150 mode, if you have a DVD drive or other HD running in PIO mode it will cause your system to delay transfers. I went to my buddies house because he was complying about slow performance. He had a low density ide cable on a old cdrw drive idling in his system. (had another DVDRW in the system) Popped that thing out, re-enabled DMA, fast again.

 

[Denithor]

Originally posted by: cusideabelincoln
Well something is up, and I'd put the blame on the hard drive. I see you have the Caviar Blue drive, which is supposed rotate between 5400RPM and 7200RPM depending on whether you need speed or conserve energy.

Wrong - the Caviar Green drives are the ones that run 5400rpm idle and ramp to 7200rpm under load. Caviar Blue drives run a steady 7200rpm.

I'll second the suggestion above - make sure your drive has not dropped into PIO mode. Go to Device Manager, into the IDE Controllers and make sure everything is in DMA mode.

You might also turn off Cool'n Quiet if enabled - sometimes those chips don't ramp back up correctly (or quickly enough - so it feels sluggish).

One last thing - you're considering a new processor - but that's going to entail a new motherboard & memory as well at the least. If you're going to go that far, make sure you get something worthwhile - the Kuma is not. Go for one of the new 45nm X2 chips instead of the hot old generation Kuma.

 

[Lorne]

Theres not much of an improvement you can do with the setup you have at the moment, Being soc 939 and what you already have CPU is the only up you can improve on.

To make any other upgrade will cost you for a motherboard, Ram and GFX as I belive yours is AGP at the moment.

Just look to optimise a little more and save for a all around new set up.

 

[Marty502]

Yeah... I'm not much of a gamer so I think I'll eventually splurge on the CPU and RAM and get me a nice quad instead.

Now that I give it a thought, budget aside, is there any reason left nowadays to build a new dual core rig?
At least for enthusiasts like us folks at Anandtech.