Intel Guy moving to AMD nedd opinions

[kaw]

I need more CPU power, I process tons of RAW images and want to speed up the process. I curently run a P4 3.2GHz (Northwood) with 2GB RAM, GeForce 6800GT, a couple SATA HD, 1 IDE HD (System) and most of my applications are multithreaded, multitalking is important. I do play quite a few games also, I am running WinXP Pro.

I am looking at:
ASUS A8N32-SLI Deluxe
AMD Athlon 64 X2 4400+ or AMD Opteron 175
CORSAIR XMS 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR SDRAM DDR 433 (PC 3500)
eVGA 256-P2-N518 Geforce 7800GT

I am leaning towards the Opteron because I plan to OC the CPU/Memory a little (couple hundred MHz) and from what I read the Opterons OC better. Will I need a different CPU heatsink and if so which one? Preferably the heatsink would cool well but not be too noisy.

Do yall think I will see much improvement in processing speed in multithreaded apps that use 100% of the CPU while rendering?

 

[Markfw]

Go with the Operon 170. 165's are good but OOS except where I found then at $50 more. Other than that choices look OK, except why SLI for what you do ?

 

[kaw]

Thanks for the input:

I chose SLI because I do like to play games and that way I can add another card in the future if I want.

Why the 170 over the 175/4400, just a matter of price/performance?

What about the CPU heat sink, stock or after market? Like I siad I want at least 200MHz but 30-400 would be nice but I dont want to have to start tweaking voltages etc much of any.

 

[ribbon13]

I'd actually choose the Opteron 175 if its within your budget. The A8N32-SLI is the king of high multiplier overclocking. I'm buying one for that reason. I have absolutely no intentions of putting anything more powerful than a Sapphire GTO2 in it. (Of course I do plan on using the second slot for a MegaRAID SAS 8408E )

If you want to squeeze every last ounce of performance out of your system, Get OCZ DDR500 EB 1GB sticks, and run them at DDR550 3-2-3-7-1T

 

[Hacp]

maybe you should also move to a server harddrive???

 

[kaw]

So I take it you don't think an aftermaket heat sink is needed for the amount of OCing I want to do ribbon13?

Anyone have any idea how much faster this rig might be than the current one?

 

[kaw]

So no recommendation as to wether I would need a third part heatsink and if so which one would be good? If it were Intel I know I would be adding a heat sink but it seems that the new AMDs are running cooler than the Intel now.

 

[ribbon13]

The HSF with the Retail Opteron 175 is decent and perfect for about a ~400MHz overclock keeping decent temps, but if you want an aftermarket one, look at the sticky of the Cooling forum.

 

[Heckler 5th]

the retail heatsink should be fine as long as you run default vcore. you said you were gonna OC some so if you think you may be increasing the cpu's voltage, definitely look into the xp-90 @ svc.com or the xp-120 which takes a powerful yet quiet 120mm fan.

 

[ribbon13]

No need to increase the voltage for the kind of overclock he wants (small). That, and that's (raising vcore) when a person with any morale fiber in thier being considers thier warranty void.

 

[kaw]

Excellent, thanks for the info and sorry I did not check the sticky myself. I guess being new to AMD and these forums I am still in information overload at the moment.

LOL now I am thinking maybe I will go with a non SLI board (if there is a good one in comparison to the SLI boards) because when I think about it the next time I want to upgrade it will probably be for CPU speed not graphics as my 6800GT is serving me pretty well right now. Then I can divert that many to something else.

 

[ribbon13]

There are many decent non-SLI boards, but there is no non-SLI equivalent of the A8N32-SLI. I wouldn't waver from it if you really need that much CPU horsepower. Stick with your current plan, and sell your old stuff to help save for a VapoChill Lightspeed. They were $800 when they first came out over two years ago. They are still $800 now, so its not like computer parts that lose thier value. With one of those, your overclock can potentially be insane. Example. That would be like your current rig overclocked to 4.6GHz times two.